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Sunday, April 26, 2015

Housewarming party

The week at work was pretty intense. I doubled most of my regular chores because other people were absent. I had to drive the storage round twice. While I was there I managed to shelve the contents of 13 boxes also. It was video cassettes with interviews done more than 20 years ago. For some odd reason we have to store them, even though most of them probably can't be viewed anymore.

I have a tendency to get involved in other colleague's projects. Either by invitation or accident. Friday I was asked to join some colleagues who were going to pick up some books at an estate. The owner of a printing house had passed away and he had wished our library to get his personal books. We couldn't take all of them (he had hundreds of shelf meters in his apartment and a basement storage), but we picked out a total of 16 boxes. I was invited on the last visit to scan the remaining shelves to look for books we didn't have. I added to the load by about 20 books.

Thursday we had the annual social club meeting. I have been the chairwoman for a few years now and the meetings tend to get shorter and shorter. I think we broke last year's record and finished in 18 minutes. Afterwards we had a great buffet with salmon and shrimp.

Friday evening a colleague had invited eight of us for a housewarming party. He had made broccoli quiche and rhubarb pie, and we were all very impressed by all of it. We had a very good time and I came home rather late. The weekend has been slow, I did some washing and I brought down the balcony furniture. I have also washed the windows, which was very much in need.

Monday, April 20, 2015

Spring party

Last week quite a few things happened at work. Like usual, I attended a few meetings, but I also did a user study. I stood near the reference collection and watched how the students use those books. The results were very disappointing. They hardly ask for them. During one hour a total of two students looked for reference books. There is no crowd. There is one major reason for this - the internet. Many encyclopedias and dictionaries are online these days. We have 1650 shelf meters in our reference collection and we have to downsize it. As far as I know the collection has never been weeded, so we are some librarians who will look into that matter. It's a long term project.

There was a new exhibit opened Friday, with a large selection of ephemera print. It's calendars, postcards, catalogues, instruction manuals, timetables, posters, phone books, flyers, local community prints and much, much else. They want to make the ephemera collection more widely known, so they have spread this material out all over the library's open spaces. It was interesting to see, the focus was Sweden in the 20th century.

Thursday the library closed early (very unusual) because we were going to have a spring party! It was some sort of a party to celebrate the fact that some of us got new offices. Any reason to have a party at the employer's expense is embraced. We had a quiz about university buildings and I didn't get many of those answers right (even though I pass by some of the buildings regularly). The food was very tasty: Italian style meal with chicken and lots more. There were leftovers and many of us got lunch the next day.

Last week I got a parcel in the mail. It was a consolation prize in a consumer competition. I'm guessing my mother had entered my name in it. I won a DVD set with a TV-series. Too bad it wasn't the first prize - it was a trip to London.

Today I cracked a very difficult case at work. It was a question about a person's correct name. I had a misinterpreted last name and first initial to start with, along with the street name (no number) where this person had lived in 1986. It was challenging, but I found it by going through all the people living in this street according to the 1990 Swedish census.

Monday, April 13, 2015

Shopping day in Copenhagen

The first workday last week was Tuesday. My colleagues in the manuscript reading room had called a meeting at 8.15 that day and less than half the staff members attended. For obvious reasons. Way too early in the day after a long weekend.

The physiotherapist visited me at my desk Wednesday and she had complaints about my chair. So do I, but we will get new ones so it was not a big issue. Apart from that everything was fine. I attended a few other meetings last week and especially one was frustrating because no one understood that I was right and everybody else was wrong...

The visit at work over the weekend was short. I only went there to book some tickets for a trip in May. Spent Saturday afternoon in Lund, going to several second hand stores. No major purchases, though. Since I have too many overtime hours, I had to take time off today. I went on a shopping trip to Copenhagen. It takes about an hour to get to one of the malls (two train rides and one metro ride). One of my favorite stores is a small shop in a suburban mall, where I usually get very nice clothes. Also this time, a long tunic in green pattern. I also visited several other shops in the city center and the biggest mall in Scandinavia, Field's. I'm pretty tired now after all that walking.

Monday, April 6, 2015

Easter weekend

Last week at work was shorter than normal, we worked until Thursday afternoon. All the staff members in the stacks were pretty tired on Tuesday, after having shelved such a large number of books the previous day. Again, my back problems were clearly noticeable. Tuesday we also noticed that our dear colleagues hadn't succeeded in doing our job to 100% on the Monday, so we had some catching up to do. Mainly sorting returned books. I think I sorted six carts on the Tuesday, which is a lot for one day.

Friday I went to the summerhouse by train and bus. My mother and two of her friends were there. Easter is traditionally the time when painters, sculptors and other artists display their works to the public, either at open houses or gathered at a venue like a hotel lobby or community center. Saturday we went to Ă…hus to look at some of it. It was bitterly cold outside even though the sun was shining, so it was a short round. We did some garden work later, clearing away fallen branches and old leaves. Sunday was my birthday and several people came for afternoon coffee and cake. My aunt, my father and a few friends showed up. I got some nice presents also: three egg cups, a cushion (made by my mother), a kitchen towel, two event tickets, a bracelet (made by my mother from an elastic band and colorful buttons!), a toiletry bag and chocolate & candy. My father also brought the paintings he has which were painted by Arndt (his grandfather). I took photos of them, some will be included in the book I'm writing about Arndt.

Apart from this, Easter was a lot about eating. Swedes consume an enormous amount of boiled eggs during this weekend. We had eggs every day, plus lots of pickled herring, smoked salmon and Jansson's temptation (potato dish with anchovy). Today we visited some of my mother's friends for lunch - chicken. Not a single egg in sight! It tasted great though, especially the dessert, which was apple pie. I returned home this afternoon by train.