Beach Party in December

For my last anime club I decided to have a "Bleach Beach Party" for no other reason than that the two words rhyme. At the words "beach party" the girls in my club immediately asked: "Can we wear our bathing suits?" I immediately thought of 14 year old girls walking around in bikinis in the library with all our leering older male patrons. I put a stop to that train of thought but the girls were disappointed.

At this "Beach party" I decided to have the teens make their own smoothies. I bought strawberries, blueberries, orange juice, vanilla ice cream and bananas in bulk from Costco and let the kids have at it. But I specifically told them that I would control the blenders and that I would do the pouring. This of course was ignored by most of the 30 teens scrambling for smoothies. So the inevitable happened: one teen poured smoothie all over the blender, table, and their hands.

At the same time some of the girls got it in their head that they would put makeup on the boys. One boy consented and so the girls assumed that ALL the boys would want eyeshadow, eyeliner, base, mascara, the whole works, slathered on their face. While I was trying to deal with the smoothie situation girls were forcefully pushing boys to the ground so they could apply makeup. One boy was crying "no, no, no" as three girls pulled on him. So I had to rescue these hapless boys from the girls and explain to them that not every boy wants makeup on their face. Once again, I disappointed the girls who if they had it THEIR way would be dancing around in bikinis putting makeup on every boy in the room.

Sparkly Teens

It's been a while since I've posted! Things have been so busy.

Anyways, I had an anime club meeting this week and we were having a Death Note day. Death Note is a popular manga turned anime that's about a notebook where if someone's name is written in it that person dies. So I had the teens decorate their own mini Deathnote notebooks. I had paint, stickers, fabric markers etc all laid out for them.

I had also bought glitter spray as a finishing touch. The girls were extremely excited about the glitter spray and they liked making their notebooks sparkle. I carefully supervised the using of the glitter spray because it is similar to spray paint with toxic chemicals. However, my attention wavered for a minute because there was a commotion in another part of the room and I left the glitter spray for a moment in the hands of 14 year old girls. Big mistake. I turn around ten seconds later these girls are spraying these toxic chemicals on their hair and all over their bodies just like it was a perfume. I had to snatch the glitter spray up and lock it in the closet. Thank goodness that we only had sparkly teens and not half blind ones.

Dark Dark Box

This week I had a Halloween storytime to celebrate the season and my second favorite holiday. Attending were an assortment of costumed kiddies from fairies to pumpkins to Captain America.

During the storytime I told the story "In a Dark, Dark Room" The story goes "In a dark, dark woods there was a dark dark house where there was a dark dark shelf" well you get the picture. At the end there is a "dark, dark box" where in the book a ghost pops out. I didn't have a ghost but I had a box and I found a stuffed witch in the closet. However, the box was full of dozens of frisbees and I did not want to dump them all out so I just stuffed the witch on top of the frisbees and closed the box. At the point of the story where I said "and in the dark dark box was a..." I pulled out the witch and all the kids clapped their hands in delight. But they all wanted to see what else was in the box. I thought kids pulling frisbees ouf of the "dark dark" scary box would kind of ruin the mood and they probably would start throwing them so I whisked the box away. Of course a toddler was pawing through the box and as soon as I pulled it away she let out a screech...kind of like a witch. The scary mood was over.

Cosplay!

At my anime club the other week we had a cosplay. I was hoping more would come and dress up but as I've learned working with teens, they have very short memories and if you tell them something at a meeting two weeks before they are most likely to forget it. However, some remembered and we had fun playing anime charades. They were screaming and laughing so hard (teen girls have this scream that is a particular pitch that can't be duplicated by anyone else) that by the end of it my ears hurt.

I even dressed up for the cosplay the other week. I wore cat ears, a black shirt, black leather skirt, fishnets and black leather boots. I found the fisnet stockings extremely uncomfortable. My feet were in pain in those boots by the end of the afternoon. My coworker told me you're supposed to wear little socks with the fishnets so they don't hurt your toes so much. It's amazing the things you learn at the library!

Toilet Turtle

Our library made a strange discovery this week. Thursday morning we found a small green turtle in our bathroom. We have absolutely no idea how he got there. Did some kid bring his pet turtle to the library and leave it accidentally? Or did the turtle somehow wander into the building, crawl (slowly) past the DVDs and sneak into the bathroom? Or was it a prank of some sorts? A few kids tell themselves: "Hey, I got an idea, wouldn't it be funny to leave a turtle in the library!" Each scenario is unlikely and the turtle could not have crawled up from the toilet, it would not have fit. We are stumped about how he got there but either way we ended up with a small water turtle swimming in an aquarium in our staff room. We named him Lou after the name of British toilets.

Chopstick Races

This week for my anime club's first meeting of the school year we had a chopstick program. For the last few weeks I have been sneakily stealing chopsticks from the local Teriyaki Bowl each time I go. I would go up to refill my drink and slip several pairs of chopsticks down my purse. After a few visits, I got 22 pairs of chopsticks. I was ready for the races.

I divided the teens into two lines and set an empty bowl at the end of the line. Then at the other end was a bowl full of mini marshmallows. The teens were to take a marshmallow with their chopsticks and then pass it to the person on their right down the chain and into the empty bowl. This proved to be difficult and I had to reprimand a few teens for their cursing. So then they decided to curse in Japanese, and I had to reprimand them again.

Eventually they got into it and we did the race a few times before they had enough and wanted to resume eating the food I brought with their chopsticks. I made a bowl of jello for them to eat just to watch them struggle to pick up the wiggly stuff with their chopsticks. The challenge of the jello only spurned them on. It was an entertaining and successful afternoon especially considering that some of the teens wanted to throw their chopsticks and no one's eye got put out.

Empty Libraries

It's going to be tough for me to post as much since I'm back in school this semester and my professors are loading me up with tons of papers. But I'll try.

Our library has decided to delete all VHS, Books on Tape and Book Cassette kits by the end of the year. Then CD-Roms will be gone by the end of next year. I read in American Libraries that they estimate that CDs will be mostly gone in the next decade. 75% of Americans have internet at home and the number is increasing and eventually there will be less need for computers at the library. DVDs are streaming too. With all of these things fading. What are we going to do with all this extra space?

Libraries can fill their extra space with a cafe, or couches and make the library more like Barnes and Nobles or a Starbucks. But will people really go to a library to get their coffee or hang out? I really wonder what the future of libraries are going to be, I imagine they will be more like community centers.

Whatever the case may be I suggest to all librarians to start working on a second degree so they can have a plan B in place. It's what I'm doing. You really never know what the future is going to bring.

Two Week Accent

I was talking to a cute teen girl at the library the other day. She was talking to me in a British accent. She has never stepped a foot in England in her life. I asked her why she was speaking in a British accent. She said that she had been speaking in the accent for a week and that she had a week to go. She was convinced that if she spoke in the British accent for two weeks straight it would stick.

I know that people say that you can develop a habit in two weeks but I do not believe you can develop an accent in two weeks. I did not want to burst this girl's bubble since she was working SO hard at it so I just smiled and said, "Wow, you're really good." I'll see her this week and we'll see if it "stuck." I'm more than doubtful.