Sushi!

Last week for my anime club I brought in a professional Japanese sushi chef to demonstrate to the teens how to make sushi. He made cucumber rolls, California rolls, hand rolls and there was something else that I can't pronounce or spell if you paid me. Sushi is not something everyone likes, it's kind of an acquired taste. However, these teens gobbled up roll after roll of it.

I'm glad they enjoyed the sushi. It's good to expose the teens to something other than cheeseburgers, Red Bull and those flaming hot Cheetos (where they come in and spread Cheeto dust everywhere.) It was also fascinating watching the chef roll the sushi in his special bamboo mat. Making sushi truly is an art. I just hope the teens don't expect me to feed them like this all the time. I already had a teen ask me the other week for a cheeseburger...

Roaming 'Rovers'

Over the past two weeks we've had two stray dogs roam right into the doors of our library. The first time I saw one it took a second to register that the mass of fur jogging among the stacks was not an unshaven patron but was a four legged animal.

Having a dog inside the library excites the teens who immediately adopt the dog as their own and want to start petting it. I'm sure some of these teens would pet every stray dog they saw even if it was foaming at the mouth.

The first dog was caught by our security officer who leashed it to the bench outside the front doors amassing a crowd before animal control arrived. The second dog was much smaller and cuter. It was a tiny brown chihuahua who wandered behind the reference desk and growled at us whenever we approached. We barricaded the entrance of the reference desk with trash cans so he wouldn't escape and prayed he wouldn't use the bathroom. The little guy was rescued by animal control soon after.

One staff member suggested we keep the chihuahua as a pet but after all this I have learned that you can't get any work done with a dog in the library.

Library Daycare

Our library is many of our patron's own personal, free, daycare center. Why pay childcare when your child can go to the library for free and stay until you feel like picking them up?

For the past two weeks on Friday night there have been packs of children left stranded when we close at six pm. Last week there were two ten year olds who were at the library for 4-5 hours and told me that their parents worked and could not pick them up. When I inquired how they would get home they said they would walk but that it was far.

This week there was a larger group of a 7, 8, 5 and I believe a four year old who were left at the library for 3-4 hours with no adult supervision. As kids are wont to do, they were destructive and left the toddler books in complete disarray. When the library closed at six pm there was no adult coming to pick up this group of children. I asked when their parents would pick them up and they said it would be any minute. Six o'clock came and went, the staff was getting ready to go. I told the staff I would give it one more minute and then I was calling the sheriff. Just then the pack of kids darted out the door and ran off. I called after them and they yelled at me that they would walk home. Then they continued to run down the street, four year old in tow.

What do you do in a situation like that?