You might think...

[quizcustodiet]

You might think that libraries are there to help people access information. You might think that thus people being able to get at books is a primary attribute of a library. You might therefore think that locking all of the textbooks for the graduate course inside the library office and going off on two week's holiday would be a bad idea. But you wouldn't be the librarian at the Clarendon Lab.

Comments

[loreid.livejournal.com]

Ah, but if you were in fact a librarian, you would know that the whole point is to keep the users away from the books, thus protecting the books and (only incidentally, of course) minimising the amount of time the librarian has to spend reshelving.

[thalassius.livejournal.com]

I don't remember a librarian ever admitting that before, though it's something that book obsessives learn within their first couple of visits to a library, at age three or so.

[herringprincess.livejournal.com]

heh. know the feeling.
you might think that academic libraries with large acres of desk space in individual cubicles (dont ask me how you get a large acre pedants!) would be for working in? you might think a general attribute of such libraries would be quiet. you would be at odds with the librarian with an office of the third floor of the arts and social sicences library - the office may be soundproof and he may be enjoying raucous conversations, accompanied by much belly laughter, but he opens the window into the main library, and sometimes the door, so that all of us foolish students working in the work cubicles can hear how much fun he's having. (i stared in his window once and he came out to ask if i needed any help and i said i was wondering why he was making so much noise in a library and he gave me a blank look and said 'we're just talking about work.')