Definite sense of history passing today.

First up was one of our regular Wednesday morning training sessions. But this one was run by a couple of the loans team who were doing an unexpurgated version of the history of the Library. The one they'd produced for the opening of the new extension had had to be glossy and they wanted an outlet for all the fun/interesting/controversial stuff they'd found. And apparently we wanted that too as we turned up in huge numbers (perhaps it was the cookies on offer). Highlight was a video produced a few years ago in the style of an 80s tv treasure hunt game show where a pert, attractive presenter raced into and around the library in an effort to find what she needed. Only the video didn't work on the PC so as I'd happened to bring my laptop, I was able to save the day by running it from that.

Then I spent half an hour joining in with the last bit of a three day job to clear all the science and technology abstracts out. Given we're a bit tight for space on this floor and with summer moves meaning things arriving from the closure of the last remaining 'branch', this is an obvious way of gaining space. In fact, ever since I've arrived I've been saying they're not long for this world as far I'm concerned. TheOldPlace got rid of printed abstracts a long time back. Certainly no one is using the ones here. I'm sure some of the dust dates back 40 years. I wouldn't be surprised to hear we were the last HE place to get rid of them. But as we filled a third huge skip (three times the size of normal ones), it was hard to think it wasn't a waste of... well, something. Just think of the binding costs if nothing else. This is one part of librarianship that I have no problems with going electronic! Much more usable, useful, sensible to access these vast abstract volumes virtually. Death to the abstract, long live the abstract!

Finally, our systems librarian had a little presentation as it was his last day. 'course the usually reliable catalog will probably fall over tomorrow. (He's not been replaced yet - that kind of thing doesn't seem to change from one job to another.) Fifteen years in post, less than five minutes to say adios. C'est la vie.