Things I Learned Last Weekend

• Purple frosting is harder to make than you might think.

• You can't expect a bunch of kids to sit still for more than thirty seconds. Just leave the movie playing and accept the chaos.

• When putting sprinkles on five dozen cupcakes, put the cupcakes in the sink first. Sprinkles have amazing and mysterious aerodynamic properties that cause them to end up everywhere if not carefully contained. (See picture above for the results of sprinkles properly contained.)
  

• The color pink has a sneaking fascination for every girl everywhere.

• There is absolutely nothing that should not be in a librarian's job description. Give "pony rides" to shrieking little girls? Check. Simultaneously keep an eye on ten preteens with bottles of colored sand and ponder the question of what on earth makes Patrick Dempsey so popular? Check. Bake and frost five dozen cupcakes? Check.

• There is a princess for everyone. (We had a Mulan, a Belle, a Cinderella, a Sleeping Beauty, two Jasmines, a Tinkerbell (we'll leave aside the question of whether she is actually a princess), and three generic princesses in attendance on Saturday.)

• Everyone should have a tiara. (Mine is purple - thanks G!)

• If you're going to bake and frost five dozen cupcakes, you really ought to do it more than twelve hours before Passover begins. And not schedule a Princess Party between the baking and sunset.
  

The Librarian's Workout

D and I have decided to write an exercise book. We're going to call it the Librarian's Workout. Among other things, it will include:

• Hauling boxes of books from one end of a building to another.
• When that gets boring, hauling piles of books without the boxes. Preferable large and awkward piles.
  
• Moving shelf-loads of books from the bottom of an eight-foot shelf to the very top, and then moving the books from a top shelf to the very bottom.
  
• Running up and down aisles with an armload of books, looking for the spot they belong while trying not to be away from the desk for more than thirty seconds.
• Escorting demanding patrons from one section to another, and then another, and another...
• Nodding and smiling at the demanding patrons while escorting them (this move for advanced librarians only).
• Beating one's head against the wall. Hard.

I realize that this job isn't as physically demanding as, say, construction work. But anyone who thinks that librarians just sit around and read all day is sadly deluded. By the time we were done setting up for the book sale last Friday, every one of us had aching muscles and assorted bruises and bumps. Weeding can give me sore legs and shoulders for days. And I burn more calories nodding and smiling at idiots than I would if I went out and bought a treadmill.

Which is probably a good thing, since some days the only way we can get through it without screaming is by the judicious application of chocolate. Sometimes in alarmingly large quantities.

Things I have done recently that are not in my job description

• wash lettuce
• choose upholstery fabric that no one can object to
• move chairs and tables
• repair chairs and tables
• find a stuffed rat
• escort a Big Red Dog to story time
• tell a member of the prison work crew how to get a library card
• debate the merits of various heads for a scarecrow
• act like a jumping bean
• care for a (deeply perturbed) box turtle for seven days
• arrange for the removal of a petrified lizard (no, I was not going to do it myself)
• carry a dragon through three states in twenty-four hours
• bake more cakes than you can shake a stick at
• make friends with local clergy, unreconstructed rednecks, fourteen-year-olds, and convicted felons
• bully someone into cutting an access door to a crawl space, supporting a library policy, and finishing electrical work that should have been done twenty years ago
• learn about manga, wikis, yeast-free recipes, teen psychology, the Fourth Circuit Court, feral cats, storytelling techniques, county government, and how to spend $2500 on DVDs in forty-five minutes