TFML Staff Exchange

There were 12 people for the program

A patron is looking for a red Kodak floppy disk left in a drive last week. If you find it, call Walter Pompei at 354-9157.

Hi everyone,

April 13 will soon be here, and our staff is preparing for the high volume of calls expected from patrons requesting tickets for the Erik Larson program. Please remind your staff (so they can inform patrons):

· Ticket reservations are required and must be made by calling the Downers Grove Public Library at (630) 960-1200.

· Patrons must have a library card from one of The Big Read libraries to register for the program.
· Those who register can pick up tickets at their home library from Sunday, April 24 through Saturday, April 30.

Tickets reserved for patrons, as well as those we've already reserved for staff, will be delivered to each library by Friday, April 22, so you will have them available for your staff and patrons to pick up April 24-30.

Once all the tickets (1000) are reserved, Downers Grove staff will continue to take calls and will keep a waiting list of up to 100 patron names (with phone numbers). On Monday, May 2 any tickets not picked up at our eight libraries will be offered to patrons on the wait list. Early on Monday morning, May 2, please email me with the total number of unclaimed tickets at your library so DGPL staff can begin calling the wait-list patrons. Since there will not be enough time to get the tickets to the wait-list patrons, please bring all your unclaimed tickets to the Larson program for wait-list patrons to pick up at the door.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Jolene

I asked Jolene how many tickets a caller could request. She said 4.

John McKendrick is the Library's new Young Adult Librarian! John will start next week, when he will be working Wednesday and Thursday evening. He will be responcible for selecting teen materials, running the teen board, planning and producing programs, and promoting teen services in the Library. Next week Aaron and I will be working with John to get him oriented to the job. Summer reading is coming soon.

There were 12 people here on Wednesday evening for the discussion of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. A few new faces.

We started the meeting discussing how Betty’s house was sold quickly, and now her husband Dave has sold many of the furnishings. They will have a bed up to the day they move in June.

Anne reported on the financial aspects of the Timber Trails development. The developer will be giving the Library $150,000 in three installments to mitigate the impact of increased population. Eventually the Library will be receiving $100,000 to $160,000 more each year in property taxes. The houses will be built from 2006 to 2012.

The John Kass program is Saturday evening. Chairs will be delivered on Friday and set up after closing at 5:00 p.m. on Saturday.

Anne noted the new round of grant offering from the Illinois State Library. Aaron said that he was discussing with Jenny Levine an idea for video gaming equipment to be held by the Metropolitan Library System and loaned to libraries for teen programming.

New library board members to be installed in May are William McLaughlin, Robert Sullivan, and Geraldine Bergfeld.

Rick and Aaron have completed interviews for teen librarian. Interviews for the magazine desk supervisor are next week, starting April 11.

Nancy and Aaron continue to work on the creation of the Remembering Western Springs Houses databases and web site. Rick is working on a brochure and unveiling program for the grant project.

The next big thing about the Big Read program is phone registration for the Erik Larson program. Downers Grove will be taking registrations by phone starting next Wednesday, April 13. See previous TFMLstaff blog posting by clicking here.

Computer #4 is freezing up and not printing. I shut it down and Aaron knows about it.

The Office programs on Computer #4 in the reference area are working, as is the printer (for me, at least). The Internet is not available using any of the browsers.

I would say that the problem is the network card, but I was aboe to print using the network printer. It might be a software problem instead. Still might be the network card. Who knows?

Rick

My program "What is Wireless" brought in zero people. I'm still thinking about what that means.

FDG on April 8 brought in 20 people.

Ref #4
This computer is strange. It wouldn't let me browse the web, so i logged in as Admin and it behaved fine. So before I go ripping it apart, let's see how this does for a while.

CR #2
It is getting loaded. Which isn't to say it has been abusing drugs and alcohol, but rather getting all of the pieces of software and plugins it needs to be one of the elite computers serving the patrons ofthe TFML.

DONE!, everything is pretty much up to snuff. still must load wordperfect tho...

Teen Computer
This one is perhaps about 75% ready for the teens to have their shot at it. I will let everyone know when it is an option to send people aged 12-18 to use that computer.

DONE! We just need to decide on the procedures for signing in and out. Otherwise, the computer is ready.

Reference Printer (Magazines too)
HP is no longer making the types of printers we've been buying. Buying two new printers doesn't make much sense to me, so we're going to buy one NICE laser printer for us to share. The ink will be much cheaper per print, it will be faster than an inkjet and will be of a higher quality. Potentially, we could share this will our patrons using the wireless as well. What do you think? Where this will go is up for us to decide. If we could get power to the Ready Reference area, we could keep it there out of our way....

DONE!!

Please let me know in the comments section how #4 is behaving.

Thanks!

We have S&P NetAdvantage throughout the entire building now. The URL is:

http://www.netadvantage.standardandpoors.com/

and I will update the desktops to have a link.

There is a great amount of content available, and I can show anyone how to get to the good ol' stock reports. Play around if you're so inclined, and ask any questions.

Remote use for patrons is coming soon.

On Friday, 4-15-05, Susan Fry, Kris Downs, Julie Lillquist, Susan Murawski & Susan Ruzivick will not be at the library. We will be attending the Illinois Library Association's "Reaching Forward" annual conference at the Donald E.Stevens Convention Center in Rosemont. We hope to come back with lots of new ideas!

A person calling for M. Simmons seemed very concerned that we would not have any tax forms left on Monday when M. Simmons can come pick them up. I assured him that we would but agreed to make a packet and set it in the tray at the reference desk. So there is now an envelope with the name M Simmons on it containing major tax forms at the Reference Desk in the tray.

Rick,

Betty is coming in from Arizona on Thursday afternoon and then will work the desk from 5-9 pm though she may be a little late.

The 2003 and 2004 issues of National Geographic Magazine are being sent to the bindery. Also the Nat. Geographic bound edition Jul-Dec 1997 is being sent along with them as an example. We may get them back in a couple of weeks.

I really enjoyed my first time at Reaching Forward. The keynote speaker Loretta LaRoche, who looks at everyday stress as a source of humor, was fantastic. Each of the three sessions I attended was interesting and valuable. I hope I can go again next year.

Julie Lillquist is our new magazine desk supervisor. She'll be training with Betty, whom she'll succeed in June. Congratulations, Julie.

Rick,
Would you like the new plays that have been purchased with grant money to be put on the patron e-mail notification list? I have not marked these as "NEW", either. Tell me if you'd like them marked other-wise.
I have finished processing about 1/3rd of the these....
Thanks

The Adult Services Department will meet at 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, April 27 to discuss summer reading and other matters. I will bring something from my oven.

Rick

The computer doesn't seem to be playing nicely with the new NIC. I've not been able to install the correct driver for it because it freezes before I can do anything.

So it is out of commission for now. I'll approach it first thing Tuesday at 8:30.

The Summer 2005 booklet from the Recreation Department hasn't made its way into our "Local Interest" file on the Reference shelf. If anyone has seen one, please bring it to the Reference Desk. Thanks!
Nancy

Rick,

I have registered for the following event at the MLS.

Event Name: Technology Summit - Gaming @ Your Library (Event
Date: Thursday, May 26, 2005

It is in the morning, so I'll be at the library 5-9. There are no scheduling conflicts.

I removed 33 books in the 300s this afternoon.

Phyllis K called to apologize for not picking up her articles yet, and said that she'd be in soon.

A number of students have been in for a report on ancient Rome. The circulating collection is a bit wiped out. While assisting these people, I've noticed that we only have a few (smallish) books on ancient Rome in the Reference collection. Picking a good source up might come in handy.

What do you think?

Kris,

I covered an electrical floor outlet in the reading room with a “Do not use” note and tape. The plug from the desk lamp has broken off in the outlet. The exposed copper looks menacing.

Rick

Just processed a new magazine for the Youth Services Department. "Gifted Child Today" is located in the Parent/Teacher collection in the YS area. Other new magazines include "Junior Baseball" and "Dig."