Tales From The Circ Side

Titillating Tech Support

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After a week off from the library, I found myself quickly swinging back into my routine. There was an entire shelf of books to mend, yet another shelf full to process for check out, and of course there were my favorite part of my job, the patrons.

That said, it was rather nice to settle back into my work repertoire. The usual characters showed up for me to interact with. There were the summer computer herd boys, a group of preteens and teens that monopolize the computers for a couple of hours, the only sound heard out of that crew is a bunch of mouth breathing as they gape at Youtube videos and Roblox games. I happily shelved the materials that came in from the drop box, a contented skip in my step as I wove my way around the screen starers and shelved DVDs.

My old not quite nemesis Almost James Bond showed up yesterday, and as I was in a congenial mood, I looked him dead in the eyes and sweetly said, "Hello." He responded in kind and only bolted from the library two whole times as I had a bit of benevolent mercy on him and refrained from shelving anywhere near his super nervous form. I'm pretty sure that one day Almost James Bond will work up the nerve to actually have a conversation with me, and I totally await that day with relish.

There were two incidents that happened over the last two days that were not the norm. Well, parts of them weren't the norm. Both of them revolve around another facet of my librarian job, tech support. It seems that I and my co-workers are constantly trouble shooting all manner of tech related questions, from accessing the WIFI to printing documents from all manner of sources. We have all gotten pretty used to it over the years, but yesterday and the day before added a couple of new incidents to my lengthy dealing with the public incident archive.

The first moment came when a woman in at least her sixties strolled up to the counter and asked if I could help her connect to the library's WIFI. "No problem!" I chirped in reply and started to check her network connection settings. Now, one of my little personality quirks is that I hate it when too many programs and tabs are open, so as I needed to go to another screen to fix something, I started closing out some of the open programs and screens relating to what I was working on.

I noticed that Ms. Chromebook was getting a little agitated as I did so, and before I could reassure her that I was just cleaning up my work-space and not leaving her a cluttered desktop, I closed the last window.

A healthy pair of mammary glands perched gracefully upon the chest of a blonde woman peered back at me.

Now, as I work with the public, this is was not the first time I have spied nudity, nor will it be the last, but my first concern was for the demeanor of the lady I was helping, for she erupted into an embarrassed monologue that was not very eloquent in its dictation but quite meaningful in its delivery.

"I'm so sorry, this is my husband's computer, I'm so, so sorry!" she repeated over and over again.

"Oh don't you worry," I replied with what I hoped was a reassuring tone, "it's no problem at all."

I just felt bad that I had made the lady uncomfortable. I mean, all she wanted to do was check her email, so I quickly opened a web browser to check and see if my work was finished. Everything ended well, but I did spend some time wondering if Chrome Book Wallpaper Girl suffered from chronic backaches...

Source

The next incident happened last night. It was nearing closing time, and my esteemed coworker @jacobtothe was speaking to our manager about some adult programming things when I noticed a patron come in and walk up to the counter. I was sitting in a chair in the back office when he loudly said,

"Hello?"

I looked him in the eye and hopped out of my chair, "What can I do for you?" I replied as I walked towards him.

Now, I know that I am not completely homely, but the man's eyes widened as I walked toward him and I swear his entire demeanor changed as I drew near to the circ counter. I quickly wondered if I had left some of my lunch on my face or something.

"Hi, how are you doing today?" he replied with a strange intensity, which was probably the name of his body spray, because that stuff about knocked me over as I got within smell-range.

"I'm doing very well thank you." I responded, "How can I help you?"

He then, in his very intense and I am assuming at this point flirtatious way, launched into an "I need to print something speech," but as the dialogue continued it became apparent that he was not only interested in my technical offerings. I pulled open the circ desk drawer and removed a guest pass and led him over to the patron computers, the whole time he was making conversation with me like we were at a coffee shop or a bar. Every time he would try to get a bit on the personal side with his inquiries I would divert him back to professional help land, but I have to admit hi manner was a bit unnerving.

The way our printing system works also meant that I had to interact with Rico Suave some more, for whenever a patron prints something from the computers it routes it to our circ computer and we send it through to the printer. Most of the time this is not a big deal. Only when printing resumes in Russian for Almost James Bond has it ever caused discomfort. Well, the discomfort meter achieved greatness as I processed Rico Suave's print job. I swear I felt like the Earth beneath the English Channel underneath that man's drilling gaze.

Now, I am very happily married and not exactly a school girl, so the whole incident was somewhat amusing, but I have a strange feeling based on the man's obvious interest that he will probably be back. At least I have time to hatch a scheme that will let me provide quality customer service whilst also discouraging his interest.

It's days like the last two that make me snicker whenever someone says to me, "Oh! I've always wanted to be a librarian. I want to sit around and read books all day."

The Actual Look I get on my face when someone utters the above sentence to moi.

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And as mostly always, unless otherwise cited, all of the images in this post were taken on the author's fatigued and somewhat bemused iPhone.

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