What a Difference a Branch can make...

My branch had our dreaded monthly staff meeting this week. Our new branch manager stopped by to sit in and meet every one before she officially starts which I thought was really nice. She's been with the library for awhile so I was bound to know someone who has worked with her. I got all the "dirt" on her before when I just found out she was a candidate. Good thing is, is that there is not "dirt," she's good peoples. She's coming from a bigger branch to our smaller one, a move I also made. After the general staff meeting, we broke up into departments and one of her first questions was, "Any problem patrons?" I couldn't hold back a laugh, I've seen the incident reports from her branch, it is in a sketchy area of the county. As a general comparison the median income difference is about $40,000: the median income for her branch's zip code is $25,000; our branch's is at $65,000. Our childrens librarian answered her question by going on about how some of the little children can be loud and tend to run around, but hey, there little kids. My supervisor chimed in and mentioned that it isn't the children but the parents and nannies faults. My laugh made my info coworkers look at me, and I told them upfront, "This is a nice easy branch, this is a great place to start out in or to retire from." It is a library branch with training wheels. You will get those atypical disgruntled patrons, but you will not get the extreme crazies. If the biggest patron issue of the branch is noisy little kids, you've got it pretty easy. That's my new nickname for the branch, "The Big Easy"!

You Belong To The City

You belong to the night... Okay, enough Glenn Frey. 

I now have my old position out at the City library, so now I will have more stories about the library to blog about HUZZAH!

I went in today to fill out all of the paperwork and today was also the first day they switched their program over to an older version of what I work with at the County.  Boy, was there a LOT of problems with that upgrade.  It's like going from Win 95 to Vista.  With me being the only one with "extensive" working knowledge of the program, I was put to work, as one of my newly regained coworkers put it --- "before the ink even dried."

Week in Review

So I've been at my temporary branch for a week now and have a pretty good feel for the place.

Overall, it's an "okay" branch.  I wouldn't be willing to stay here permanently. 

The patrons are more patient, I guess they've been trained to be that way with 3 self check out machines and only 1 full service computer.  Lines can get pretty long in a short amount of time, but I have never seen or heard any complaints about the wait.  That is completely different than my home branch.  If a person has to wait for 30 seconds for assistance, they go into full ballistic mode. 

The branch is set up like a big square with the stacks on opposites sides, so there really isn't any where to hide.  I'm not saying I hide all the time, but it is a good distraction to disappear into the stacks for a few.

The backroom set up is wide open, it's not the cubicle farm I've come to like.  Info and Circ staff are interspersed among each other but there isn't much interaction between the two camps.  At least we joke around and talk to each other at my branch.

Even though I already have a maternal coworker at this branch, I'm counting down the days to go back to my original ones...

I Should Be Transferred More Often...

So I can get more going away presents. Can't wait to see what I get when I come back.

You Don't Trade Your Best Player

Yesterday before I started my shift, I stood in the doorway of my Circ manager to let him know that I needed to talk to him sometime about him messing up my schedule.... Again.
And then he stood up and told me that HE needed to talk to ME about MY scheduling.  He told me to take a seat and I was completely taken aback by this because "fixing my schedule" just involved me standing next to him while he moved my hours around on the spreadsheet. 
I seriously thought he was going to fire me by the way he was speaking.  He then told me that a decision was made and that I would be transferred to another branch to help cover under-staffing.
I was relieved I still had a job, and it's only 6 weeks.  The County is going to hire a handful of the 2000+ applicants who applied for the 14 positions open.  This branch I am transferring to isn't all too far from where I live and I haven't worked there before so I'm open to the experience.
Some things I don't understand about this decision, is that my current branch is much more busier and we are already understaffed.  So my departure will be rough on my coworkers.  I also found out that someone from my first branch is also going to be transferred with me, so why me as well?
I think my P.I.C.A.W. (Partner In Crime At Work) is more affected by this decision than I am.  She looked at the daily schedules to see if we were working the desk together and if we weren't, who either one of us could switch with.  For some reason, management hasn't rarely been scheduling us to work the desk together.  I don't know why, nothing bad has happened, we do our work, we don't mess around---ageism I tell ya.
One of my coworkers compared this situation to when she was in school and a student was being sent to a different class.  The teacher would pick the brightest, smartest, best dressed student on their way, telling them to, "make a good impression."  Well, hell yea I'm the brightest and smartest.  But I think it's mostly because I am not taking any classes this semester and my availability is wide open, whatever, I'm still the best dressed.  I know I will be sorely missed not just because of my greatness but because I actually work hard and pull my own weight.
Apparently the Assistant Circ Manager felt the need to email the WHOLE branch about it, so several Info staff have talked to me about it.  Miss L first found out about it when Miss S told me that she'd miss me and Miss L turned to me and said, "You're leaving??"  Miss S pointed out that there was an email from the Assistant Circ Manager, to which Miss L replied, "Oh, I saw it was from him SO I didn't read it."  Her first question for me was if they asked me, no, they didn't ask they just did.  This instantly sent her on a rant about the mismanagement of our branch.  Too bad they didn't ask because one of my coworkers has been itching to transfer to that branch PERMANENTLY.  And I am sure she would have jumped at the chance to work there even if its for 6 weeks.  The branch manager came up to me TWICE during my shift to talk about it.  She kept going on and on about how much I will enjoy it there and they are a bunch of great people, and that the branch manager there is her friend, and that I am a great worker and I am going to make a great impression on them.  I felt like she was being facetious and in reality I am going to hate it and she knows it.  She also kept thanking me and in my head I was thinking that I didn't really have a choice in the matter.
I will be missing Halloween and the bi-annual booksale which is always fun to work, but it'll be a good distraction.  More importantly, I'll be back, they can't get rid of me that easily

Today's Weather Outlook is...

It's a nice, cool 74 degrees outside.
Then WTH is it a stuffy, warm 80 in the backroom?!?
I feel like filling my cubicle with sand and wearing my beach gear.