A Jerk in Any Other Language...

So, this man just came in and asked me if I speak Spanish. I told him I speak a little bit of Spanish. (we conducted the rest of this conversation in Spanish) He told me he was looking for a movie. I asked him for the title. There was a verb in the title I didn't recognize but that didn't stop me from looking for it. I couldn't find it in our system so I searched other ones. It never showed up. Finally, I asked him if the title could be slightly different since I couldn't find it. He finally told me that the whole thing was a joke.

He said, "The movie title means "Spank the Librarian."

I gave him a withering look. Thanks for offending me and wasting my time. I guess jerks are the same in any language.

Library as Local Nerd Repository

A young woman just came in and asked my co-worker G. to summarize the Odyssey for her because she was on her way to class. A five-minute summary probably isn't the best course of action. And it probably isn't entirely ethical for us to do someone's homework for them. But hey, we love to talk about Greek mythology. So, G. and I started telling her the story of the Odyssey. It was a bit overwhelming for her. When we got to the part about Odysseus proving himself by the stringing of his bow, I joked that:

"Of course, we really know that Xena was hidden under the table and she was really the one who helped Odysseus prove himself by helping him to string the bow."

The girl said, "Oh really?!"

G. and I laughed and hurried to tell her that no, Xena was not really part of the Odyssey.

But wouldn't it be funny if she brought that up in class?

As I Lay Trekking

A customer just came in and asked G. to renew one of her books.

"Yeah, could you renew it? It's a book by William Shatner."

G. paused.

"You mean, the one by William FAULKNER that is check out on your card?"

"Oh, yeah. Faulkner."

It's an easy mistake to make.