Jul 27, 2011

Adriana Sorts it Out

Adriana came to Cambridge to improve her English. Her English is actually very good, it just suffers from the famous final "e" which Italian speakers love to attach to an English-e word-e. A dog is a dogge, a book is a booke, and even my bike would become a bike-e. Somehow the bookseller sensed an opportunity to hide (nascondere) his own errors in Italian, and generally take advantage of a very pleasant presence.

It so happens that some books needed to be re-shelved, shelves needed to be re-sized, dusted, moments of organisational doubt were on the horizon. Books needed to be looked at, queried if they won't ever leave the premises and pay their rent. This kind of work is best done in two. One sits on the computer screen, the other stands at the shelf, and so we tried to improve the pronunciation of our Italian guest by making her shout out titles across the warehouse.

And in between, photos were taken.





Thanks, Adriana. Call again! Did your job restoring artworks work out?



Jul 23, 2011

Cambridge Librarians at Plurabelle


Cambridge Librarians meet at Plurabelle for their annual summer party. The Cambridge Library Group is an active association of Cambridge librarians with a membership of more than 80(?). It was not one of those perfect college lawns, there were no porters, and no dons to be seen, but the trains were passing in the background.


 
Darren brought two right hands to get those big tables out of the warehouse, the delightful summer rain, which never fails to attend this event, was promptly seen (well, just a bit).
 



Those big conference table (each seats 24) were wheeled out on the lawn, filled with food and drink, and the book professionals took a good look at how we would try to recycle their unwanted stock. Who would want to spoil the fun and talk about cataloguing rules or how to identify first names? 





Saxology brought five saxophonists (nice!), Ruth provided excellent Plurabelle fare (thanks!), Jillian did the local co-ordination, and at the end someone was seen disappearing on a unicycle.  Amor librorum nos unit!