Library vignette # 1

I had to update a lady's library record in our system. "Could you give me your phone number, please?"  "Sure," she said, and gave it to me, "and can I have yours?" "No, I replied, but I'll give you my wife's"

Alzheimer's Husband Dilemma

Gave a seminar today and a lady had to bring her husband who has Alzheimer's with her as the granddaughter who was supposed to look after him didn't show up.  We got talking - she has only just started getting 1 hour a day respite care, and she can't afford to pay any more.  She can't put him in a home, because that would take all of his pension, and she wouldn't be able to live on just her pension alone. So sad.
He seemed quite happy, though - he was singing or whistling the entire time he was there.

World Naked Gardening Day

World Naked Gardening Day offending picture!

World Naked Gardening Day fell on May 4, this year. A little early, I feel, but in the spirit of the day I took my clothes off and my wife Louise took a couple of pictures of me with a rhubarb leaf strategically placed. As I am somewhat of an idiot, I then proceeded to post the picture to Facebook. Interesting what happened.
I ended up with 20 likes, 49 comments, and one share. Comments ranged from "Oh my god" to bible quotes to "what the heck were you thinking" to expressions of admiration for being so free and easy, sort of an expected mix for this sort of post.
What was unexpected, however, was a phone call that I received a couple of days later. I am chair of a local library board, and one of the board members called and said how embarrassed he had been when a friend of his had slapped the picture down in front of him and said "That's you board chair?" I was given a lecture on the proprieties of being a chair, and the responsibilities that go along with it.  (I did offer to resign, but he quickly backpedalled and said that wasn't necessary).

 In my workplace, none of the people in the department that I supervise mentioned anything, although my boss and a couple of co-managers did make joking comments. I later learned that one staff member had put the picture up with a rude comment, and the others made her take it down because they didn't want to encourage me.

Justin's take on the picture

My daughter lit into me about how disgusting the picture was and that she had reported it to Facebook as inappropriate, my older son created a meme out of it (at side) and said if |I hadn't already totally messed up his life this would have done it. My youngest son just rolled his eyes as he's come to expect his father to do silly things.

Somehow, the picture ended up in the Summer 2013 edition of Going Natural, the magazine of the Federation of Canadian Naturists (OK, I did submit it, I confess). When I announced that on Facebook, I got 27 likes and 19 comments - a number were just conversational ones, but that's still quite a number. They were all of the tolerantly amused variety.
Fast forward to October - I was invited to go sailing with a friend. Although it was cloudy and sort of miserable, there was a very brief period of sunshine.  As I don't go sailing very often, I thought it would be a great idea to take my clothes off & get a picture of nude sailing. My friend wasn't very happy about it, but did agree to take a picture as long as I put my clothes on in a hurry. That's fine, as I don't want to impose my growing fondness for naturism on others.

The cropped Facebook version

The original "keeping a look-out" while sailing naked
picture 

I decided to crop it and add it to Facebook, so that I wouldn't receive the criticism that I might otherwise have got. I ended up with 8 likes and 16 comments - pretty well all of the tolerantly amused variety, including one from the photographer mentioning how he'd kept his eyes shut for the photography session!  I was surprised, though, to receive a phone call from the very same board member, and although he talked about something else dealing with board business, I knew that he had heard about the picture and this was his subtle way of reminding me of my responsibilities.
I'm really intrigued by the reactions that people have - those that know me and tolerate my often weird sense of humour tend to just laugh at the pictures and say "what's he going to do next," while others question my judgement. I agree, I am overweight and lots of people don't find that attractive, but that's who I am.
I was talking with a couple of good friends about the board member and his reactions. My question to them - which did they think I would choose between being a board chair with suit & tie & following all the proprieties or to be free to do the naturism/nudism thing? Both quickly agreed that I would choose the naturism option.
Apparently, the older I get, the less inhibited I become. I'm never sure what's going to happen next!

Society for Ethics in Librarianship

So eons ago, back when I was a brand spanking new, idealistic librarian, I ran across the Society of Ethics in Librarianship. It was based in Britain, and cost £10 to join. Anticipating scintillating conversation with like-minded colleagues, I got an international money order and sent it off.
Here I sit, 30 years later, still waiting to hear back from them.
I'm assuming the letter was lost in the mail, any other explanation would shatter my naive belief that there are ethics in the Society of Ethics in Librarianship.
Crap.