Library Day in the Life: Day 5

Readers, this is my final post for the Library Day in the Life, Round 8 project. As you can imagine, Friday was a day with all sorts of different tasks to accomplish, and I have even included some more photos as it's Friday.

As usual, I turned on a few of the computers for the staff as I walked in and went and got settled in my office. The library director handed me a few new books I needed to invoice and mark as received in our ILS. I mentioned in the first couple of posts this week that I have been working with a new acquisitions workflow, and it seems to be going well, with a modicum of tweaking and adjustment. I also checked our funds in the ILS to make sure things were running there as they should, and indeed they were. Using this system gives us item by item tracking, which is really great. I also cataloged a couple of new acquisitions.

Some of our rare and framed items arrived at the museum today, and so I needed to move those items from the library into our secure collection storage area. I always love doing this, because I get to make sure all the items that are down there are where they are supposed to be, and doing well. Unfortunately, I cannot say much beyond that - but it's certainly one of the perks of my job!

Friday is the day I deal with our "Needs Attention" shelf - the items that come back to me after a problem arises with the item and the catalog. Usually, it's an issue of a record that just did not load properly, and sometimes the problem is a bit more complex. Today I had a multi-volume set that did not have barcodes and labels for each item in the set - just the first volume. So I took the time to barcode and label each volume, creating an item record for each volume. Here's the result:



It takes a while to do these sets, and so I just correct them as they come across my desk. I also corrected any issues with the other "Needs Attention" books, so that's clear again!

Our volunteers came in, and covered 19 hardcover books with mylar. They are extremely good at this, so I save all our dust jackets for them! I helped them get settled and checked in on them from time to time. Because they were both covering books, I sat at the reference desk for the quietest shift I have ever had here. I cataloged a book from our backlog that a curator requested and checked our funds again to make sure everything is posting as it should.

After our volunteers left, I moved the books they covered out and integrated them into our new books area I talked about earlier this week.

Friday is also the day that I check our reflection areas, which are seating areas with books and iPads. Here's a photo of my favorite one:



Basically, I straighten the books and check the iPads. It's also a great time to see the art in the building. For example, here is our recently installed Claes Oldenburg:



And, simply because it was raining outside, here's a photo of the rain coming off the roof of the restaurant:



And that's it folks. I hope you are having a great Friday!