bizgirl

Ahh, another night, another awards ceremony.

Tuesday was the Silver Scrolls at the Wellington Town Hall. This is the big songwriters' awards ceremony, organised by the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA), and which is specifically geared up to reward good song-writing in a number of fields, as opposed to commercial success, or the hottest looking video, or the biggest marketing team.

As such, it's quite prestigious and highly regarded, and all the music big-wigs tend to come out of the woodwork for a good old hooley of a time, which, for the first time in ages, took place in Wellington instead of Auckland.

Which was good news for me. Noizy had scored us some media tickets, so we bowled along at 6pm to get stuck into the infamous open bar that accompanies the event. I had my Voon frock on again, but noizy had decided to wear his ridiculous Scooby Doo and Shaggy brown corduroy jacket, which has a picture of the said cartoon anti-heroes on one pocket, and the Scooby Doo logo in big gold letters on the other. Needless to say I 'lost' him in the crowd as soon as we got in the door.

And what a crowd it was. Unlike the b.net awards, which are a bit more indie/alternative and bring out only a small smattering of stars, the Silver Scrolls gets a much more successful breed of music celebs out and about. Not that any of the readership from outside NZ will recognise any of these names, but within a short time I'd variously managed to spill my champagne on Dave Dobbyn, clocked Jordan Luck in the side with my elbow as I swung around to see if it was indeed Shayne Carter who'd strolled past me going the other way (it was), and knocked Scribe's baseball cap slightly askew as I pushed past him on the way to find another drink. He left it that way all night, much to my amusement.

I didn't really know anyone there other than noizy, so I did my usual wallflower thing, quietly drinking my champagne and noting the clothes the celebs were wearing. Most of the older lads had made a bit of a jacket and pants effort, but, as is the way with the rock'n'roll crowd, the less mature boys were all sneakers and jeans and t-shirts. It made the women, who were almost all dressed up in party frocks look even more beautiful (and there were a fair few lovely ladies there, I can tell you).

Eventually the guests started making their way into the downstairs auditorium, and those of us with press passes got shunted to the upper floor, where we were to watch the 'proper' guests eat their dinners, and take in the live performances that were planned. I met up with noizy, who was aghast to discover that the media weren't to be supplied with free booze for the duration of the ceremony, disappeared for 5 minutes, returning with a dozen beers from the off-license down the road, which he then proceeded to share out amongst the small posse of media people that were settling in around us.

Making vague pretences at maintaining the media charade I was there under, I dutifully got out my pencil from my purse, borrowed a bit of paper from noizy, and proceeded to make notes on the night's happenings. My notes ultimately ended up being nothing more than a list of the winners, and of the performers who played the songs that had been nominated for the big Silver Scroll award, and which I could have just seen online here, later on. I did make a cryptic note to myself about 'Arthur Baysting's story about Trevor Mallard', but I have no idea what the story was now.

Scribe, much to the surprise of everyone, including himself, won the top award (with p-money, who wasn't there), and in a quite gracious and endearing acceptance speech, said something along the lines of...

"Well, I really didn't expect to win this. Shit. I haven't got a speech or anything. Shit. Even to be nominated in the same category with such great songwriter's as Warryn from TrinityRoots, and, uh, those other guys..."

This got a great laugh from the rest of the media contingent.

"...well, shit, it's great. Cheers."

Everyone had, it seemed, expected Warryn Maxwell from TrinityRoots to win the award for his amazing song 'Home Land and Sea' off their equally excellent album of the same name that was released earlier in the year. Despite being a totally self-funded, self-produced and self-marketed (ie. not really marketed at all) effort, the album has managed to go gold and led to the band being able to do sell-out gigs at venues as large as the Town Hall we were currently sitting in. The song itself is one of the most heart-felt bits of music you're ever likely to hear, so it was the favourite (amongst people I talked to, anyway) to take the gong. Ah well, no denying Scribe, who has won everything else there is to win this year on the nz music circuit. As the NZ Herald so nicely pointed out: "The Herald understands there are no more awards Scribe can win this year."

After that, the official bit of the evening was over, and the media hacks were allowed back into the downstairs area to get post-match interviews with the winners and losers.

Or, in my case, to drink and eat as much of the complimentary wine and food that was literally piled onto each of the score or so tables that were arranged around the main auditorium. It appeared that many of the attendees were industry big-wigs who had to be up early for work the next day, and hadn't touched a drop of their free wine, so the remaining musos, hangers-on and media spent the next few hours getting completely and utterly trousered. Well, I did, anyway, and judging by the increasingly loud volume of conversation that was going on around the place, I suspect it was probably true for everyone else.

This is when I really should have been making notes of what was said, as some if it, I'm sure, would have been absolute blog gold. But with a glass of wine in one hand, and the other required for the constant frock re-aligning that my new dress requires, note-taking was problematic. I do recall one conversation I had with one of the guys out of goodshirt, that was pretty typical of all my chats that night...

"Hi, um, I'm Natalie. I love your Good album. I listen to it constantly. Well, not constantly, but, you know, quite often. Maybe about once a month?"
"Errr, cheers."
"Yeah. I used to borrow it from the library where I work, but then it got nicked, and we replaced it, and it got nicked again, so I got forced to go out and buy it."
"Wouldn't want to force anyone into buying our music."
"Oh, no, didn't mean it like that. Anyway, that bit in that song, where you go baby baby baby yeahhhh! You sing that don't you?"
"Um, yeah, I think both Rodney and I go a bit nuts at about that point usually."
"Ahh, I love it. Love that bit. Great song. What's it called?"
"Mousey."
"Yeah. Mousey. Great."

Ahhh, so drunk, embarrassing myself in front of rock stars. Thankfully, noizy, who has a remarkable ability to pace his drinking over a long evening so as to stay (technically) under the drink-driving limits, came and rescued me from further blush-inducing memories and gave me and a couple of other people a lift home. We stopped by someone's house on the way for some post-function wind-down, and I discovered one of the other people being shuttled by noizy was Dave Long, ex-Muttonbirds and who is now a bit of producer extraordinaire about town.

"Ohhh," I said, "I love your Envy of Angels album."

...etc.

I eventually got home about 2am, having sworn to myself earlier in the evening that I'd try and be in by midnight. I checked the phone - no messages from Josh, not that I was expecting any, and tumbled into bed, steeling myself for an 8am start in the morning.

Thank god the awards season is nearly over. Only one more geek event to go I think - the NetGuide's in a couple of weeks - and I'm now working under the assumption that I won't be getting a nomination, and thus will have no excuse to go. Not that that would normally stop me from trying (or getting noizy to organise it), but I think I've just about had my fill of the whole thing. Librarian's just aren't cut out for this sort of schmoozing action.

Besides, I've already worn my Voon frock out to two ceremonies, and someone's bound to notice my lack of wardrobe eventually.

After Thursday night's antics, I felt a bit like having a long recovery weekend to allow the various toxins poisoning my body to work their way out of my system. I had to call in sick on Friday, but Josh, having avoided my own excesses of champagne and sake, dutifully toddled off to the library after I rolled him out of bed at 8am. In the cold hard light of day, I was able to see quite clearly: mmm, nice bum. My ladder-based assumptions were proved correct.

Friday itself was a write-off. I got up after Josh left and did some chores in the morning, but then went and lay down on my bed to rest my eyes for a couple of minutes, and woke up to find the clock reading 4pm. I booted up the laptop to do a blog entry on the night before, but found myself massively distracted by the National Library Matapihi site, and, again, before I knew it, the phone was going and my friend Patty was inviting me around to her place for some Friday night drinkies.

Hair of the dog. The perfect hangover cure. I hung out with Patty and her boy for a bit, admiring some of their gardening they'd been working hard on all afternoon, and then turned down their invitation to join them at a cocktail party they were going to, partly because I was still feeling so sick, but mostly because my new frock that would have been perfect for such an event was currently scrunched up in a messy ball under my bed. I went home, cleaned said frock, watched some bad TV, neglected my blog again, and collapsed into a turbulent night's sleep.

Anyway, the real action happened on Saturday night, when, despite still feeling a bit crap, I headed to town after watching the NPC rugby final at noizy's. (Victory to 'Caaannn-aaa-breeee!' as the lads were prone to shouting out - if you're interested.) It may have been the site of large men in tight shorts smashing into each other a million miles an hour, but, from having felt like a there wasn't a kilojoule of energy stored anywhere in my body, I was suddenly bursting with vigour. Noizy and I arrived at the venue at about 10pm, and were taken aback at the queue that was snaking its way down the steps and out onto the road. As per his usual gig-going technique, noizy just strolled past the patiently waiting punters with me in his wake, waved at Blink who was manning the door, and had two pints of Macs Gold sorted for us before I'd even caught my breath. He's blagged us tickets for the Silver Scroll Music Awards on Tuesday as well. Classic.

I don't do live reviews very well, suffice to say both Cassette and the Phoenix Foundation were excellent. Like any local bands whose repertoire I don't know backwards, they occasionally venture into the realms of yawn-inducing, but, for the most of it, they both played fantastic gigs: Cassette did their slacker-Neil-Young-alt-country-rock thing and gradually wound things up to an all out rock-frenzy finale, only to have the power fail two minutes into their last song. Showing full dedication to the cause (or a Spinal Tap ability to be completely unaware of what was actually going on), the drummer kept time while the guitarist/singer threw his guitar to the ground and danced a jig around it. After about a minute of this, the power came back on, the amps kicked back into life, and the band finished things off with a stadium-worthy rock finish: barump, barump .... barrrooooMMMPPHHH!

The Phoenix Foundation are more difficult to describe, as their sound is more all over the place. A bit alt-country, some rock, some pop, whatever. Best trick is to just have a listen. But, yes, they were good too. More blog reviews of the night are here and here.

I managed to meet a couple of hitherto internet-only buddies as well, which was nice. Hi Jess! Hi Hugh! Nice to put names to faces finally.

Josh was there (Hi Josh!), but it was so crowded that I didn't get a chance to say hello until I was virtually walking out the door. He told me he was expecting some blog action on our previous exploits sometime soon, which I promised I'd deliver at some point, and we parted ways despite my late realisation that he was looking even finer than he had been the other night. Or maybe it was just the post-rugby hormones still flowing.

Yet again, I had totally lost track of time, and as I wandered out onto Cuba Street with the sounds of Phelps and Munro ringing in my ears, I was amazed to find out it was pushing 3am. Thank god for Labour Day, is all I've got to say. With my day off on Friday, and the public holiday on Monday, I was able to sleep for most of Sunday and Monday and get my energy levels back to somewhere approaching normal for the start of the working week.

Work. Amazing how four days off can make you forget what it's like...

After just about bringing serious injury to superstar librarian Josh earlier in the week, I was stuck for a descent excuse for refusing his invitation to a drink on Thursday night. Not that I minded too much. It was the perfect chance for me to try out my new Voon summer frock I'd bought in a New Zealand Fashion Week-inspired shopping frenzy earlier in the week.

I was running a bit early on the bus back into town from Newtown, so I jumped off at the Embassy end of Courtenay Place to walk the rest of the way to the rendez-vous at Cuba Street. Despite my misfortune at the Sky Tower Casino a couple of weeks back, and my subsequent resolution to never gamble again, I found myself in a pokie parlour, thinking it'd be a fun way to burn off half an hour.

I watched aghast as the pokie swallowed $20 of twenties without a single pay-out. I hadn't even begun to figure out the system of the game I was playing when I got a wee tap on the shoulder.

"Excuse me dear, you don't seem to be having any luck on that slot."

It was a wizened old guy, dressed in black, a whispy white beard sprouting from his chin.

"Err, no." I agreed.
"Do you mind if I put in my lucky coin now?" he asked, holding up a twenty cent coin. "I will split any winnings with you on this slot 50/50 if I win," he said.

How could I resist the lucky coin?

"Sure."

He put it in. Of course, he struck some crazy combo, asked me if he wouldn't mind me investing one of my own coins into the machine to take advantage of a multiplier, and I said yes, and he did manage to double the take, but asked if I'd invest in another nudge, at which point I found some sense and said no, I'd rather quit while I was ahead, as it was time for me to go. He cashed it in. We split it. I was ahead by five bucks. It was only after I left the pokie and was another 50 metres down the road that it really occurred to me that I'd been scammed in any way. Still ahead, but scammed.

When I wandered past some swanky do going on at the St James further down the road, and spotted champagne being passed around on big silver platters within, I was feeling a little like the world owed me something. So I drifted into the general throng going in through the main doors, carefully managed to avoid showing anyone any supposed invite or ID, plucked a couple of champagne flutes from the first tray that came within reach, and sidled off to a corner to figure out just what event I was gate-crashing.

"Ms Biz, nice frock," said a voice behind me.

I jumped. Why are people always sneaking up on me?

"Ah! Noizy, hi. What are you doing here?"
"We're in the awards. Did you guys get nominated?"
"No. No idea. I just walked in. What for?"
"Ahaha. Nice work. This."

Noizy pointed, and I finally spotted the big 'TUANZ (e)-vision Awards' banner on one of the Foyer's walls. Aha, another industry back-patting event.

Noizy had bought over a champagne for me, having somehow missed the fact I already had two, so we stood there with two drinks each and surveyed the badly dressed men and well dressed woman that made up the cream of NZ's interactive and media design sector. Noizy was one of them, actually. Good shirt. Bad jacket.

"Noizy, do you ever go to anything but awards ceremonies?"
"Recently? Ummm, no."

His work crowd were in a couple of categories whose names I instantly forgot upon hearing them, so 'Best-Technical-Achievement-in-the-Field-of-Geekery-and-Gadgetry' did they sound. A gong went, and people started upstairs to the auditorium where, presumably, the presentations were to be held. Noizy slipped me his ticket in case there were any problems with security, and headed back to his mob for a pre-awards group shot. Having guzzled the two champagne flutes I'd grabbed upon entry, purloined another one while gabbing with noizy, and having had no dinner, I was starting to feel a little light. I flitted upstairs to see if there was a free bite to eat or buffet to be taken advantage of, but, before I knew it, I was ushered into the middle of a row of people, one in many tightly-packed rows made up of collapsible corporate seating facing towards a small stage. Trapped.

I made it through to the half-time without too much drama. There was one excellent prize given out for the Student Work Award, that seemed, to me, to be the kind of sound-visualiser that comes pretty standard with winamp or media player. Whatever it was, it had apparently been picked up by Pioneer Car Stereo for installing into their products. As the MC had to point out, 'Ours is not to wonder why Pioneer are wanting to install an intensely distracting visual display unit into the dash of your car.'

They handed out more champagne at half-time, so I figured I might as well stick it out until the end. With a couple of backup drinks stashed discreetly under my chair, the second half was most notable for the moment one of the award-winners took a step too far towards the back of the stage, fell off, threw her arms backwards to steady herself, only to find the wall sized display screen they'd been using to project images of the nominee's work onto wasn't as secure as it looked, and ended up knocking the whole thing off its perch and onto the floor. Yet another Occupational Safety and Health incident to report! I seem to a bit of a catalyst for that sort of thing at the moment.

Anyway, noizy's bunch won an award near the end of the evening, and then, much to my surprise and professional delight, the National Library won the major Innovation Award right at the end of the ceremony, for their Matapihi site, which is, indeed, excellent. (Actually, being a bit of a geekgirl, I also checked out some of the other finalists later on as well - the Shift interactive NZ map they did for Tourism NZ is also very cool). I had to have a drink to toast the work of my fellow librarians, and did so, and another, so, by the time everyone had mingled back downstairs again, and were planning on what to do next, I was totally trolleyed.

And then I remembered Josh. Terrible. I weaved out of the St James, and half-ran half-staggered to the cafe down Cuba Street we'd agreed to meet at, about two hours earlier. Bless his heart. He was still there. Looking only moderately grumpy.

"A blaurgle, err...wards, uh...thing, sorry," I spluttered drunkenly at him.
"Ah, it's okay. A couple of friends were here anyway and just left, so no harm done."

I felt a headache coming on already.

"Ugh, don't know about that. I need food or I'm going to pass out."

I regaled him with my tale of gatecrashing the awards ceremony as we headed down the road for some sushi. He laughed at the appropriate places, and twice managed to stop me walking headlong into lampposts, so his stock was rising rapidly in my book. When he paid for my sushi (and sake) and offered to take me out dancing, I could have just about swooned, but we'd somehow managed to go about four hours chatting about stuff, and I was starting to crash, so suggested we just call it a night and perhaps catch up again at the Low Hum gig on Saturday night. He offered to share a taxi back towards my place (he lives in Berhampore, a bit further on from my place), so, with all the dodgy taxi action that's been taking place in Wellington recently, I accepted and we jumped in a cab and headed home.

"You up for a cup of tea?" suggested Josh, as we pulled up to my flat.
"Umm, yes, why not?" I acquiesced.

A cup of tea. That's all, I told myself.

We went inside. I actually made him a cup of tea. By the time I got back to the lounge, he'd already booted up my laptop and was reading my blog.

"Errr, um, you might recognise some of that," I said.
"Ahaha. Yes. I'm a regular reader."
"What?"
"Been reading for ages. I'm pleased to see I've finally warranted an entry or two."
"Err, yes. Um, hell."
"Don't worry, I'm not telling anyone. God forbid that Mrs Oolong should find out."
"Don't even joke about that."
"Haha. I won't. It's a good read. You say a lot of the things I wish I could say."
"Thanks."
"Anyway, I should, um, probably get going. Thanks for the cuppa."

Brain implosion time.

"Oh, look, if it's too much of a hassle, you can just crash here tonight. On the, err, couch?"

We both looked at the couch, covered in magazines and probably about two feet too short for a comfortable's night sleep. Josh noded through to my bed, visible through my bedroom door.

"Top and tail?"

Him, so forward! Me, so drunk!

"Oh, all right. No funny business though."
"On my honour."

And, tell you what, he wasn't too bad behaved himself quite well.

Oohh, the intrigue.

One of the great things I enjoy about my blogging is the stats. I'm a stats junky. I fiddle and squirm until the numbers get up to at least the daily average, at which point I can start concentrating on whatever the hell I'm going to write next to keep you all coming back.

Anyway, today was fairly standard on the stats front, except for one visitor. Hello mysterious visitor! I see you have come from a govt.nz domain, spent nearly two hours on the site, and must have at least skimmed every blog entry I've made!



Now the hope is, of course, that you aren't my employer, digging for dirt on my exploits to use against me as reasons for dismissal. Oh please please please don't let that be the case. It's slightly worrisome that the entry you chose to read first was indeed my post on my Veil of Anonymity slipping askew last week, but, on further analysis, I can also see that you've come from Jonathan's Liverstone, so chances are you're actually a random government employee using the taxpayer's money to surf blogs all afternoon.

But, really, it's the not knowing that's gnawing me up. If you - Mysterious Government Employee - do drop in again, feel free to drop a comment, or email me so I can put my paranoid musings to sleep.

Mrs Oolong was supervising the makeover of the library's display area out in our foyer.

We had some new promotional material we wanted to put up in 'the eyeball zone': straight above and as part of the main entrance doors. A full-on spring-clean had been ordered to do all the required poster and notices shuffling to necessitate the new material, and to cull all of the out-of-date posters and information flyers that had built up over winter. 'Arrr', as we librarian's like to say on Talk like a Pirate Day, 'there be nothing like a nice cull'.

So I was well up for it. And Mrs Oolong, who despite a lack of prowess in some of technological areas of the world, can still organise a nice-looking display for the Summer Series Thing, was overseeing the last step in her creative project, with ex-superstar boy librarian Josh in tow as the muscle.

First we read the Occupational Safety and Health 'Safe Ladder Use' guide which Josh seemed to find amusing for its repeated use of the phrase 'all practicable steps'. Then Mrs Oolong handed over a couple of what I can only describe as handi-librarian utility-belts. Both Josh and I got one, and each had a hooks and slots and pockets for any number of gadgets. To mine was appended a hole-punch, a steel ruler, a transparent plastic ruler, various pens, pencils and erasers, four Phillips and two flathead screwdrivers, gaffer and duct tape, and, best of all, a staple gun dangling jauntily from the hip. There was also some pendant-looking thing on one of the hooks - I took it off and looked at it. It was a thin, long metal box, which contained a plastic tube filled with blue water. It was on a long bit of string, so I took it off and hung it around my neck. Quite nice, I thought.

"Natalie," said Mrs Oolong, "spirit levels are not usually worn as fashion accessories."
"Oh."

I replaced the level on its hook, and slung on the belt, only to discover the whole thing weighed about 10kg. I removed everything but the various tapes, the level and staple gun, which made it much more manageable. Josh and I tried a few quick draws with the staple guns to see who was the Fastest Librarian in the West, until Mrs Oolong stopped us with a flash of her furrowed brow.

Primed with the finest in Occupational Safety information, and with all the tools we required at our fingertips, we marched to the foyer to tackle the job at hand. Mrs Oolong gave us a general idea of what had to go where, told us she'd be back to check up in an hour, and left us to it.

It went pretty smoothly, at first. We culled the old stuff, then removed the still-current material we thought we'd have to move to make room for the new display. Then we got to the part of the foyer where the second floor mezzanine gets used as extra display space, and the ladder was going to have to get put to use.

"I'll hold the foot of the ladder if you want to go up, Nat," said Josh, propping up the said device and gesturing for me to climb up.
"Uh-uh. I'm not going up there," I insisted.

Boys, ladders and my bum are a combination usually best avoided.

"Okay," said Josh, "just make sure you brace the legs at the bottom. Remember, 'all practicable steps'."
"Okay."

So Josh started to climb up, with me holding the ladder as firmly as I could. And yes, I took the chance to check out Josh's bum, which looked quite good actually, but probably led to a slight lapse of concentration on my behalf, and, before I knew it, the feet of the ladder were slipping backwards between my legs, and my efforts to steady the contraption by pressing forward with my arms only seemed to worsen matters. Josh let out a small wail and rode the ladder down as it continued to slip and then fell to a horizontal position on the floor where it landed with an almighty smack.

"Jeeeeesus," said Josh, with admirable restraint.
"God, sorry sorry sorry!" I wailed. "It slipped at the bottom!"
"Where you were bracing it with your feet?" he asked, prising his fingers from the rungs, mercifully unscathed.
"Err, no."
"Jesus. Well, could've been worse I suppose. At least no-one was walking past, and Mrs Oolong wasn't here."
"Yes. Sorry."
"No harm done. I thought these ladders had no slip feet, anyway?"

We looked at the rubber soles at the bottom of each ladder leg, and, indeed, they appeared as if they'd been put there as a non-slip measure. Josh ran his finger over one.

"Hmm, that might be it, covered in dust. Should've given it a wipe before putting it up."
"All practicable steps, eh?"
"Heh. Yes. A well placed foot may have been just as useful, though."
"Err, yes. Sorry."

Josh did the rest of the ladder work on his own, utilising the no-Natalie-needed technique of opening both sets of legs, and turning the ladder sideways to wherever he was working. I continued to toddle around the displays within my reach, and, before long, we had the place looking sparkly and new. The new material looked great around the main entrance - all bright red and impossible to miss. Mrs Oolong arrived back just as we were admiring our handiwork.

"Excellent work, you two!" she enthused. "No problems?"

Josh cast a glance at me. "No," he said.

Phew. He may have just regained his superstar status.

I was on issues, working on my repetitive strain injury, when I spotted Artemis in the queue. He was quietly scowling at the elderly lady in front of him, as she struggled to retrieve her library card from her handbag.

There were two of us on issues, so as Artemis worked his way to the front of the horrendously long queue, I juggled it just so to get him onto my desk.

"Hello Artemis."
"Hello Natalie. I like your brooch."
"Thank you. How did you go on your project?"
"Very well thank you. I got a 'commended'."
"Congratulations. That was a lovely map you drew. I was hoping I might be able to see the final product. You said you were going to add some streets and building features to it?"
"Thank you. Yes. I did. I found a map at home that had all the information I needed. I did two overlays onto the tunnel map on some transparent film paper. I'll bring it in next time I come to the library if you want."
"Thanks. Sound great."
"It is. It looked a lot better than those poorly photocopied versions of the original map that ended up in some of the other's projects. Do I have you to thank for hobbling the opposition?"
"Ha! Yes."
"Not that I really needed it, but thank you anyway."

Such gratitude. It verged on heart-warming.

During all this I was absent-mindedly checking out his books without taking any notice of what he had pulled from the shelves. It was only as I printed the issue slip that I took a proper look, and was mildly intrigued to see his selections: a book on wilderness medicine, something about scuba diving, and, most interesting of all, a book on museum, archive, and library security.

"Another project, Artemis?" I enquired, nodding down at the pile.
He paused, then, deadpan: "Yes."

Another moment passed as I waited for more information, but Artemis just grinned fiendishly and piled his books into his school bag. The length of the queue meant I couldn't quiz him on his book selection any further. Not that I'd have been able to anyway - he was already headed towards the exit.

A book on library security. I'm sure he was just winding me up.

[ continued here... ]

Previously: [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ]

Okay, I must admit I don't drive too often, but this morning I was entrusted with my flatmate's car so I could run a couple of errands before work, and got myself into a bit of a give way dilemma at one of Wellington's more notorious intersections: Cuba St. & Abel Smith.

Foreign readers will no doubt be nonplussed by NZ's bizarre give way rules, but I thought at least I had a pretty good grasp on things as I pulled up to the compulsory stop. Indeed, the intersection is an excellent test of everyone's understanding of the road code, as all four intersection points have compulsory stops, meaning you often get, as was the case this morning, three or four drivers eye-balling each other across their steering wheels, mumbling to themselves along the lines of...

"You're on my right, but he's turning, and I'm going over there, so, err..."

Needless to say, it was a bit of a mess, and there was a bit of finger-pointing and fist-waving, and I ended up pulling up in traffic beside the guy responsible for the finger-pointing at a two-lane traffic-light stop around the corner. Windows were wound down, and in our brief civil chat, he remained adamant that he was in the right, and I was in the wrong, even after I had pointed out my understanding of the road code to him. He accused me of gender-specific driving traits. I may have said something unsavoury about his mental capabilties.

Anyway, was I right or wrong? Take the test. The picture as at right. I haven't indicated who was me, so as to remove any hint of bias. The directions the cars are intending to go is indicated with arrows (essentially, the only car turning is the one at the bottom, the other two are going straight). In what order should the cars pass through the intersection? Try it without reading the road rules first.

Answers in the comment box please.

Before you get all excited, let it be pointed out the semi-naked librarian in question is a man. Actually, feel free to get excited anyway...

For the last two weeks, Achal Singh has attended to his duties while wearing only underpants and one slipper.

The 43-year old, who works at a government library in Morena, Madhya Pradesh [India], is still a temporary employee, despite having worked there for 12 years.

Visitors to the library react with shock when they see the barely clad man hard at work, according to the Deccan Chronicle.

Mr Singh said: "I belong to the backward caste. Hence my job has not been regularised. I will not wear clothes until I get justice."

You go Achal! And I like the one slipper touch. And Y-fronts or boxers, I wonder?

I highly recommend you check out this pic that Tam I Am has unearthed. The first comment from The Saturnyne is also a gem.

Yes, the picture had to go - as one of my email correspondents pointed out to me the other day, why make the effort of obfuscating your place of work and co-workers names when you've got a mug-shot taking up pride-of-place at the top-left of the page? And there was one request for a crab photo, but I figured this was a nice compromise.

The switch was spurred on by a near outing in the weekend when I was catching up with some pals at a cafe down Cuba St. One of my good friends - 'Roslyn' - is an avid reader, and always (much to my pleasure), brings up my latest stories when we sit down to gossip. It's nice for me, as I'm not much of a talker, Roslyn does all the work of actually telling the stories, and my rampant egotistical streak isn't so apparent when it's someone else doing the hype.

Anyway, after a couple of stories, a middle-aged lady came over. She was almost certainly old-school librarian: pink suit, shoulder pads, sensible shoes...

"I couldn't help but overhear you talking about Natalie Biz," she said, "are one of you her?"
"Ah...no," I stuttered, casting a few complicitous glances around the table. "We just, er, read her blog."
"Yes, she's quite entertaining. It's a small old world, isn't it? You'd never think you'd hear people talking about a blog you read yourself at a local cafe. Anyway, sorry to have interrupted."

Quite entertaining? Humph. The Pink Librarian went back to her table, from where I noticed her quietly checking us all out. Argh! The photo. Thankfully I was wearing my glasses, had some outrageous pillow hair, and the glitter-speckled blusher I'd put on my cheeks the night before had spread like some sort of sparkly skin disease around my face. And despite the fact that the old photo didn't look like me in the first place, I shuffled my chair around so my back was to her, and frizzed up my hair a little bit more.

So yes, a more anonymous image for now. Having reviewed the last couple of months worth of posts, I'd hate to have to front up to my boss to explain how my blog is just an embellished re-imagining of my workday life, when, in fact, it'd be pretty easy to make a case for saying that a good deal of it is exactly how it happened. Ah, it's a fine line to tread, this blogging caper...

Humph. Turns out Artemis's 'scheming' was a school project after all. He's failed to show up for the rest of the week, but for the last couple of days we've been inundated with other kids from one of the local schools looking for resources on the big stormwater project and various other big Council initiatives. They're doing some sort of project related to civic amenities, probably sparked off by the local elections that are taking place at the moment.

Soooo much more boring than potential underground exploits by a pint-size potential crim.

Artemis, then, was just being a studious little guy, and getting his homework done early. If my own experiences of school is anything to go by, this project is due at the end of the week, as the rush started on Wednesday, and got really busy on Thursday.

Artemis has also presumably been put up a class or two in his time, as these other kids are all 10 or 11. And, with the occasional exception, generally pretty useless and/or lazy....

"Can you photocopy that for me?"
"Could you find me all the statistics for this?"
"Will you get this for me? I can't find it."
"Wipe my bum. I can't be bothered."

Well, not that last one, but hell, it wouldn't have surprised me. What happened to the work ethic kiddies? Do your own damn homework!

And my fantastic map find for Artemis has totally backfired on him, as word has got out that there's a 'great council map of the Wellington tunnel system' in the library. All the reference librarians have been bugged to death about it, and the source of the map was eventually narrowed to me. I had to pull it from my collection, go down to the copy centre where they rescaled it down to A3, and then I made a pile of them scaled down to A4 that ended up getting plonked on the kid's reference desk for anyone who wanted one. Poor little Artemis, who was the one who had instigated the discovering of the thing in the first place, and who had painstakingly copied the whole thing out by hand is now going to be confronted by a ream of no-effort copies come school on Monday morning.

Having said that, his map was hand-drawn, A3, had his own series of annotations on it, and has no doubt had a few extras added in the meantime. God, I'm wishing I'd photocopied his now that I think about it. Anyway, I'm sure when it comes to give out the marks, and if there's any justice left in the schooling system, that Artemis will score pretty highly.

Stood up by the wee guy though! What's with that? I had the terrible thought that he had been washed out to sea in a stormwater drain, but that's the sort of story that usually makes the papers, and there's been no missing kid stories this week, so I'm fairly confident he's ok.

Be nice to see him again though, just to be sure.

[ continued here... ]

Previously: [ 1 ] [ 2 ]

'Sexy Librarian' is a look that involves inherently really conservative clothing, with a super sexy pair of shoes or net blouse, anything sexy and contrasting. It's sexy because of the juxtaposition of preppy conservative clothes, with one or two super sexy accents.

So says the slideshow that accompanies the eBay Sellers' Opinions about "Librarian" Clothes: Frumpy or Bumpy, a presentation given at the Annual Conference of the Medical Library Association in the USA last year.

The authors of Frumpy or Bumpy had set out to assess the public's attitudes about the clothing librarians wear, and to characterize attire that is considered "librarian-ish." To this end, they scanned eBay clothing auctions for items that came up with the word librarian in the title or description, and discovered, surprise surprise, that the many of these clothing items had book or tweed themes. Some of the adjectives for the attire and the librarians who wear them included: conservative, proper, academic, intellectual, bookish, chic, sexy, and shapely.

Shapely. Indeed.

The researchers' conclusion: "Librarian stereotypes abound in eBay clothing auctions. Two contrasting fashion statements emerged: a conservative, bookish look and a sexy, seductive look."

But can't one be both?

Here's a direct link to the presentation slideshow (plenty of good fashion laughs to be had, I assure you).

[via Sex and the Library]

I was down in the Dungeon. I'd remembered to load some fresh batteries into my discman, and was celebrating with some very loud Grace Jones through my headphones. I was doing my best growly-voiced impersonation of the Jamaican diva, grooving away to 'Pull up to the Bumper'...

"Pull up to my bumper baby, in your long black limousine, pull up to my bumper baby, and drive it in between."

...when I felt a tap on my shoulder.

"Aaahhh!" I screamed, wildly spinning around to get a look at my assailant, sending my headphones and discman clattering to the floor as a result.

It was Bella, one of the younger and newer library assistants.

"Ahhh!" she screamed back.
"Ah! Sorry. You totally took me by surprise. Just about had a heart attack."
"God, sorry," said Bella. sheepishly. "Me too. You weren't answering the phone so they sent me down to check you were ok."
"Ah, right, probably listening to my discman too loudly."
"S'ok. There's a visitor for you at the information desk. A school kid who says you were helping him out with his school project? Says his name is [Artemis]."

Aha! Artemis was back. And did I have a surprise for him.

I followed Bella back up to the info desk, where, yes indeed, Artemis was waiting for me, tapping his foot impatiently.

"Hello Natalie."
"Hello Artemis. Shouldn't you be in school or something?"
"It's 3.30. Traditionally, school finishes at 3 o'clock."
"Oh."

I don't know what it is, but confident young boys are infinitely more unsettling than confident young men. I blanked out.

"Any progress on the tunnel diagrams?" Artemis prompted me.
"Oh. Oh yes! Come with me."

I got him to sign in for access to the non-public areas of the library, and then led him down to the dungeon where my find of the week was waiting to be unveiled.

"Phew. Bit smelly down here," Artemis complained as we entered the room.
"Yeah, some of the maps are a bit old and musty. They give off an odd odour."
"No, I mean B.O.," Artemis said, scrunching up his nose. "Do you use deodorant?"
"Yes."

It probably was a bit whiffy though. As mentioned in a previous post, ventilation in the Dungeon is non-existent, and I do tend to get a bit energetic while going about my map-sorting duties. A quick dance does wonders for getting the blood flowing and avoiding occupational overuse syndrome, but no favours at all for the air-freshness front. Time to invest in some industrial strength potpourri, perhaps.

Anyway, Artemis had seemingly put the atmosphere behind him, and was poring over the tables where I had been working on cataloguing the latest bunch of maps.

"A rainfall distribution map," he observed.
"Um, apparently so."
"Well," huffed Artemis, "this is all very interesting, but you said you'd made some progress?"
"Ah yes. Now, actually, I have to ask, I've talked with some people..." [you bunch, actually] "...and I have to be clear that you're not planning any sort of illegal enterprise or something that might be dangerous. I don't want to be responsible for you going down a stormwater pipe and getting swept out to sea and killed or anything."

Artemis actually pulled out a surprisingly effective 'what, me?' look - all wide-eyed and high eye-brows.

"It's just a project I'm working on. There's nothing dangerous about it. I certainly won't be getting swept out to sea in a stormwater drain."

Now, in retrospect, he didn't really answer my question the way I wanted him too, but, at the time I was actually hankering to show him what I had dug out of the library's very own collection towards the end of last week, so I took his answer as good enough, pulled open my increasingly well organised 'Wellington City and Region' maps drawer, slid the top map out and placed it on the table in front of him.

Artemis smiled for the first time since I'd laid eyes on him. In fact, smiled is too light a word. He was beaming. Under his happy gaze was a detailed map of every stormwater drain, utility pipe, effluent and sewage pipe and access points for all sundry for Wellington City. The Council had sent the map our way during the planning for the big new stormwater system, presumably for consultation purposes or as yet another de facto archive deposit, but, whatever the reason, we had it, and Artemis was looking at it.

"This is great!" he exclaimed. "Perfect. Can I take this out?"
"Aha. No. If that's what you're after, we'll need to organise a photocopy. And I will need to check with the boss about it as well, to make sure we're actually allowed to do wholesale copies of maps like this."
"Can I make a sketch of it now? Since I'm here and all?"
"Well, I don't see why not."

Artemis pulled up a stool, unfurled a piece of A3 from a map tube he had stowed in his backpack, and started copying the map. I left him to it and went back to my cataloguing chores. After about half an hour, I leant over his shoulder, and was amazed to see he'd done a near-perfect scaled down copy of the original map, with his own annotations written in a tidy serif script around some points of interest.

"That's amazing!" I said.
"Yes," Artemis agreed. "Have you got a street plan I could see as well? I'd like to overlay some of the major routes on top of the underground features."
"Er, yes, but not right now. I'm off home. Do you want to pop in tomorrow after school? I'm on shift down here then as well, and I can let you know whether or not we can get you a proper copy of this then."
"I don't think I'll need it now," said Artemis, truthfully enough. "But I will come in tomorrow. Thanks."

I packed up my stuff, Artemis rolled up his map and stowed in back in his bag, and I walked him upstairs and signed him out.

I'm itching to find out what his scheme is. I'm definitely going to put the hard word on him next time to find out what he's up to. He owes me now.

[ continued here... ]

Previously: [ 1 ]

First up is the British Library team who have won the inaugural 'University Challenge - the Professionals' competition in the UK.

The tournament, which began in April 2004, featured teams from 22 of the UK's brainiest professions (including diplomats, journalists, lawyers, politicians and zoologists), and culminated in last night's battle of the 'bookmen'.

Had to bite my tongue hearing at least two of those professions described as 'brainy'. Anyway, those 'bookmen' (err, bookpeople, perhaps?) were the aforementioned Library team, and their opposition, a group of professionals from the Oxford University Press. The librarians, naturally, took out the final 220-160 in what was, apparently, a 'thrilling' match.

The outcome was not surprising when you consider their credentials. Legends, one and all. Kathryn Johnson, Curator of Theatrical Manuscripts has, amongst other geeky endeavours, won the Magnum trophy (awarded to the winner of the Mastermind Club annual competition) five times. Ron Hogg, a Slavonic specialist can speak six languages and has a working knowledge of another ten. Colin Wight and editor of the Library's website (the weak link, one might argue) is another multi-linguist (great trivia: he was brought up in Java and the Wirral). And team captain Bart Smith, a humanities reference specialist (my dream job) "...is notorious among friends and work colleagues for his memory for trivia (such as telephone dialling codes) and an ability to identify within seconds the day of the week upon which a particular date fell."

Such incredible library geeks - I am in awe.

The other bit of more local library news that has been making a bit of a splash in the New Zealand media - to the point of being one of the top items on the TV news the other night - is the gang of book thieves that has been busted after having stolen at least 350 valuable and rare books. They used numerous nefarious methods to nick the precious and usually irreplaceable volumes from various university, public and special libraries around the country. They then sold them to unsuspecting (and not so unsuspecting, it turns out) second-hand book dealers. No doubt a few also went directly to private dealers or onto ebay and trademe.

Determining just which books have gone missing is proving to be a logistical nightmare in itself, with the collections involved obviously being massive, and a quick shelf-check/stock-take not being on the cards. Likewise the true value of the books that have been stolen...

Canterbury University Librarian Gail Pattie, who has been helping police searching for stolen books, said determining the value of a book was a relative exercise and depended on what the market wished to pay.

"Sometimes they don't look valuable at all," she said indicating an anonymous-looking dusty tome of Persian history, which had a $US200 ($NZ295) price tag inside.

She also gets the prize for best, if not most obvious, quote of the week.

"Libraries collect these things to share them and to use them," she said. "To have them stolen is completely different. We don't mind loaning them to people, but we do expect them to come back."

Bless.

Seven people have been arrested so far, although police are hinting a few more might be picked up in the next few days.

I hope they, err, throw the book at the lot of them.

UPDATE. As I suspected, online auction sites have been used to try and sell some of the books. The Police are combing through Trademe's auctions, and have identified the username "thetrenches" as being one of the suspected ring members. More info here.

[Thanks to Cracker and Mr K for links to those stories]

I wandered into the tea-room and saw Mrs Farnum - one of the older librarians at our branch - with her head down in the newspaper. I made myself a nice milky cup of hot Milo, and settled down on the couch with a pile of French Vogues. French Vogue, by the way, has far nicer clothes than the British edition. I also had a couple of New Scientists, which may as well be written in French for all that I understand them, but, still, I always think my brain must be benefiting from even being exposed to the latest theories on quantum physics.

Mrs Farnum has either ever attained, or never wanted to get herself into, a cushy management position, despite over 30 years in service in the local library network. As a result, or maybe because of, she has developed an odd quirk or two. The oddest, as far as I know, is her tendency to just rabbit on, all the time, about what she's doing and thinking. There is no valve between brain and mouth. Here, for example, is a description of our tea break 'conversation'.

My head is buried in a Vogue, and I am a good 3 or 4 metres away from Mrs Farnum , who is reading the paper at a table across the room. We are the only people in the room. Suddenly, she speaks...

"Well, I don't know what they're doing putting this sort of frivolous scandal on the front page of the paper. With all the things that are going on in the world, you'd think the main metropolitan paper in the capital city of one of the world's developed nations could come up with something that might have some actual impact in the wider world beyond some love trist!"

I look up. Does she want a response? What the hell is she talking about, for starters? (This, as it turns out).

"Err, yes."

No reply. I go back to my Vogue. Mrs Farnum continues to mutter under her breath at a barely audible level, but then, a minute later she launches into it again...

"These people! I don't know. What are they thinking? It just doesn't seem right that people can come to New Zealand from the sorts of hardships and horrors they've faced at home and then still have to put up with a few thick-headed locals who obviously have no idea how hurtful their actions can be. I do hope the police catch them. Nasty pieces of work, by the sounds of it."
"Mmm," I concur, not looking up from my magazine.

And then, after a couple more minutes of incoherent mumblings...

"If my house was worth that much, I'd be selling up now and moving to some sunny spot in Gisborne! I think a lot of this real estate speculation has got out of hand, and a lot of people are going to get burned when the reality of the situation hits home!"

Why, oh why have I not bought new batteries for my discman yet?

Finally she folds the paper up, goes to the sink and washes her cup, and starts to head out the door, and I'm thanking the stars that at least the last of half of my quarter hour break might be uninterrupted by random verbal rantings, when she actually notices that I'm there.

"Oh, hello Natalie. Have you seen the fund-raiser we're organising next Thursday night?"

She gestured to the wildly over-populated noticeboard.

"Err, no."
"We're putting on a screening of The Corporation. Have you heard about it?"
"A bit."
"Quite compelling. Maybe not quite in the same populist league as Fahrenheit 9/11, or as eye-opening as the End of Suburbia, but very interesting nonetheless. It's quite depressing actually, how the current system of oil-dependency is inevitably going to bring the current system of capitalist growth to a crashing end at some time in the near future. Oil prices will hit a record high, oil-funded investment in places like China and Asia will stop, and, well, from there, who knows what will happen: chaos!"
"Umm, yes. Actually, I thought oil prices were at an all-time high now?"
"Oh no, not compared to the 70s, with inflation taken into account."

I shouldn't have baited her, should I? There followed a five minute explanation of inflation-adjusted price comparisons. At some point there was a pause. It was, perhaps, a cue for me...

"Oh," I nodded.

I looked down longingly at the very latest edition of French Vogue that I had been saving as my 'best-til-last' treat. Mrs Farnum ranted on...

"So, it's $20 for the movie, but you get a bit of a nibble and a drink as part of that."
"Ok."
"Just leave drop me an email if you want to come along. With all the local body electioneering that's going on at the moment some people are a bit busy to make it out, so it'd be great if you could make it along."
"Yes. I'll try. I'll let you know."
"Excellent. Actually, have you seen the End of Suburbia?"
"No."
"I have it on DVD. I could bring it in for you if you wanted to see it. Might give you a bit more context for the Corporation."
"That'd be great. Thank you."
"No worries at all. As I was saying, it's a bit of a depressing watch. Might change your mind about how you use your car!"
"I don't have a car. I bus."
"Aha. Even then! I'll get you onto your bike yet!"
"Yes."
"Have you heard anything about the Critical Mass cycle event?"
"No."

But I'm sure I was about too...

"A big group of cyclists gather at Civic Square on the last Friday of each month and then head out to reclaim the streets. It's all good fun - we just cycle about nice and slowly, holding up traffic during rush hour."

She chortled away to herself as I tried to think back to any previous Friday evening bus trips that took longer than they should have, giving me further fuel to feed the fire of resentment I was now feeling towards for Mrs Farnum for ruining my tea break. As if sensing she'd now used up the last remaining moments of my precious break, she bade me farewell and sauntered out the door. I collected up my unread magazines and headed off to the Dungeon, where, admittedly, I would finish them in peace on work time.

Critical mass, eh? I must make a note of taking extra reading material for the bus on the last Friday afternoon of every month.

And get new batteries for my discman.