Booktrucks, Loving your

Book trucks are a hot commodity in libraries. Protect them. Label them for your department so that they don't wander. Send out accusatory mass emails when they go missing. Decorate them. Rotate their tires every 7,000 miles. But please, please, please, please, please.... spare us all and don't dance with them.

No, Just say

List all your library's prohibitions on homemade signs and paste them around your library. No food. No drinks. No cell phones. No animals. No noise. No weapons. No sex. No farting. No murder. No eefing. How else will your patrons know all the things they are not allowed to do in your library?

Ask the readers: What is the most ridiculous prohibitive sign in your library?

Circulation, Beware of

Library circulation departments are where the real crazies work. Don't mess with these people. They will do something to your car. Or unravel your cardigan.

Ask the readers: Which is the craziest department in your library?

Coffee, Fixing the

A polite librarian will sneak into the library staff's coffee stash, empty the Folgers Half-Caff canister, and refill it with the good stuff. You can make your library a better place.

Librarian, Being a librarian's

If a colleague calls you "a librarian's librarian," it is perfectly acceptable to punch him or her in the mouth.

Projecting, Overhead

Librarians can kick it old school by using an overhead projector and transparencies in their library instruction sessions. Print the transparencies from PowerPoint slides to show that you are being ironic.

Breaks, Taking

Happy, healthy librarians smoke cigarettes. Smoking librarians get more breaks, take longer breaks, and get outside the library several times per day.