Another Book I Read

Everything Matters!
by: Currie, Ron, Jr.
2009/07 ISBN:0670020923  /  9780670020928
In infancy, Junior Thibodeaux is encoded with a prophesy: a comet will obliterate life on Earth in 36 years. Alone in this knowledge, he comes of age in rural Maine grappling with the question: Does anything I do matter?

–

It does, but not in ways he imagines.  Written from the perspective of Jr.’s loved ones and from the omniscient 2nd person point of view of a voice in his head (that tells him things he cannot possibly know), this is a lot of questions added in.  Is the world worth saving?  Is anyone worth saving, especially yourself?  Does the end matter as much as getting there?  Certain to start many conversations about family, growing up, free will and the many worlds interpretation of our universe.

Introducing Ready to read @ ALPL — The Children’s Department Blog!

Just in time for a super summer reading program and another round of storytimes, all starting in June, stay tuned to a new blog from our library family, Ready to read @ ALPL.

Useful and fun information for children and parents alike!

Visit the blog and see SuperLibrarian (pictured) battle the Riddler in the stacks!

Second Blogoversary Today

Friday, May 8th was our SECOND YEAR!

After two years of blogging here, our numbers stand at:

1. Number of page views:  20,394
2. Number of posts:  146
3. Number of comments:  83
4. Number of SPAM comments:  3,036

Top Five Search Terms:

• alligator 970
• elf 299
• banned 284
• zardoz 265
• banned books 212

I first blogged about a very odd movie that still attracts the curious.

I would like to welcome more and more ALPL staff as bloggers, joining Cindy and myself.  The more perspectives the better, everyone who works here has one (as do our patrons and commenters).

Don’t forget….

• You can follow our updates via RSS by clicking here when in your reader.
• You can find us on Facebook here.

We will miss Cheryl!

This is a sad week for us at Avon Lake Public Library.  Our friend and valued co-worker,  Cheryl Harmon, is leaving us for a busy retirement.

Cheryl has worked here for about a decade as a Materials Processor.  That means that, along with her work partner, Anne Herrilko,  she prepares books, magazines, DVDs, CDs, kits, every kind of library material for the shelves.  Cheryl and Anne prepare and attach the labels and stickers that allow the rest of us to shelve and locate the materials within the Library.  They also do the final quality check to make sure the catalog and the labels are in agreement.  They  receive and send out InterLibrary Loan items and manage all the items coming in and out of the Library.  This is a job requiring lots of attention to detail, organization and a commitment to quality.  Cheryl has all these attributes in abundance.  Besides that, she’s warm and caring, has a lovely sense of humor and an upbeat demeanor that has made her a joy to work with. Her office mates in Technical Services will especially miss her sweetness and thoughtfulness.

Cheryl is leaving us to enjoy more time with her family.  Along with spending time with her husband Tom and her children and in-laws, Cheryl is looking forward  to  having more time for her grandchildren:  Perri, Jordan, Jessica and Jason.  She’s planning to travel to see extended family and devote time to her many talents and hobbies:  quilting, singing, golfing, gardening and riding her wave runner on the lake.  Cheryl has shown us a number of beautiful quilts she’s designed and made.  The perfect marriage of creativity and dedication to doing it right! I wish I had pictures to share with you.  Cheryl is also a cat lover.  In fact, she adopted her last cat, Tigger, here at the Library.  Perhaps Tigger will remind her of us and encourage her to come visit!

Check This Out — Behind The Scenes

What do people do in Technical Services, anyway?

By the way, the “Sticker Lady”, Cheryl Harmon (pictured), is retiring this week after 10 years of service to our Library.  Thanks Cheryl!

A Fright at Your Library

Things are pretty scary around here today, especially around the Circ desk, but don’t let that keep you away.  It’s all in the spirit of the day!

Other days, these lovelies are known as Vicki George, Deb Reehorst and Cheryl Paginelli.

Learwood Eighth Graders Are the Best!

Once again this year, we had a great time with the eighth grade class from Learwood Middle School! Over three hundred of Avon Lake’s finest young people came through the Library on August 28 to learn about Library resources and services.  They are immediately putting to work much of what they learned on their Washington D.C. Monuments project.

We put them through ten stations to learn about using the catalog, electronic resources, the Reference department, etc.  They seemed to soak it up!  We sure learned a lot and had a blast with them.  We look forward to seeing more of these sharp young people in the Library.

Nancy, we will miss you!

 

I’m sorry to report our friend and colleague, Nancy Albrecht, is leaving us to enjoy her much-earned retirement.

  Nancy has worked at the Avon Lake Public Library for over 24 years, starting in the Children’s Department and then moving to Technical Services where she has served as the Acquisitions Specialist for children’s materials.  Nancy processes orders for books and other materials and then receives them and prepares them for the cataloger.  It involves a lot of detail work and a good deal of organization.  Nancy excels at it. She also works at the Circulation desk where you may have had the pleasure of being assisted by her and been treated to one of her warm smiles.

She’s also a wonder at team work, pitching in for other staff and doing whatever it takes to get the job done.  Even more importantly, Nancy is valued for her warmth, her kindness and her evident joy in life. Her co-workers are grateful for her frequent words of encouragement when one of us takes on some new task we’re not quite sure about.  And we will miss her laughter (and husband Skip’s gifts of cinnamon bagels whenever Nancy worked a Saturday!).

Nancy plans to spend time with her mother, enjoy her grandchildren Maya, Andrew, Katie, Jack and Henry, and travel with her beloved husband Skip.  Our loss is their gain.

Enjoy yourself to the fullest, Nancy, and come and see us all often!

 

Latest info on Rachel’s Mugs and the new library in Benin

Regular readers of this blog and visitors to the Avon Lake Library may recall Rachel’s Mugs. Rachel Miller is a peace corp worker from Painesville working in Guinagourou, Benin. Rachel is working with the community there to build a library and her mom, Susan, who’s a skilled potter, created and sold some gorgeous mugs to raise money for the project. Our patrons and staff purchased many of those mugs. Rachel is home on leave for her sister’s high school graduation and she and Susan stopped by to say hi and give us an update.

All the money has been raised, the foundation poured, and Rachel worked along side community members of all ages to make 8000 huge bricks! The roof, made of tin, will be raised shortly. The first books are on order and six teen intern librarians have been chosen to work under a village teacher’s supervision to staff what is truly a community library!

Rachel, Susan and the people of Guinagourou are grateful for the support of the people of Avon Lake who contributed half the money needed to make this library happen. And we’re grateful for our beautiful mugs (dishwasher and microwave safe even).

We’ll miss Marleen!

  Our beloved colleague, Children’s Assistant Librarian Marleen Rippeth, will be leaving us for warm and sunny South Carolina.  Marleen is leaving a big hole at Avon Lake Public Library.  She holds that highly unusual combination of superior organizational skills, whacky creativity, and an intrepid heart!  And most of all we love her because she’s a great team member.

 Marleen can make fun out of any opportunity, a trait our young patrons are going to miss.  She’s been one of the madcap geniuses behind our amazing children’s parties here at the Library, creating remarkable crafts and games for the children.  Marleen has posed as the Cat in the Hat, a read’n cowpoke, and a waffle chef.  Except that last one wasn’t a pose: Marleen taught the children to make waffles one day, bringing a book alive for them.

Marleen is also fearless.  Only Marleen would dare combine peanut butter, melted chocolate, and a score of preschoolers!  The result was messy, hilarious, and a riot of fun for the children (someone ought to write a children’s book about the Librarian Who Made Buckeyes)!  Then there was the summer reading video that featured a fire in the Library.  Guess who volunteered to be hosed down by the Avon Lake Fire Department?

Side-by-side with all the fun, is Marleen’s incredible organizational skills.  Even among librarians, Marleen is notorious for her tendency to alphabetize things the rest of us would never dream of!  And believe me, we’re grateful.

Marleen has been great to work with.  She’s one of those special people who shares freely of herself, working for the good of all and sharing the credit for all the wonderful things that have a way of happening around her.  We’re going to miss her a lot!

Here’s the poem Marleen wrote to lure author Judy Sierra and illustrator Marc Brown of Wild About Books to our Library in 2004.

Wild About Books

It started the summer of 2004,

When Wild About Books arrived at our door.

 

With the help of some beavers, a stork, and a gnu,

We watched in amazement as our Zoobrary grew.

 

It delighted our patrons, they came young and old,

The Avon Lake Zoobrary was a sight to behold.

 

Then one Thursday morning as the clock struck nine,

A class of first graders marched in, all in a line.

 

As they listened , we talked about taking good care

Of the books that they own and the books that we share.

 

They loved Judy’s story, Wild About Books,

And Marc’s illustrations inspired their new looks…

 

They turned into animals (Well maybe not quite.)

Then they searched to the left and they searched to the right.

 

They searched high and low, and in all of the nooks,

To find animals reading their own Zoobrary books.

 

Each child was given a blank book as well,

For we know that they have their own stories to tell.

 

Three cheers for the Zoobrary, Judy and Marc too,

We’re wild simply wild, about their marvelous zoo!