Learning to do the cryptic crossword with a couple of like-minded colleagues in lunch and coffee breaks goes on apace. Last couple of weeks we usually get to the end of it by the end of the day. Sometimes just with a couple we can't quite work out. But much improved over a few months ago. None of us can quite do it regularly by ourselves. Just occasionally. So there's still some way to go.

Meanwhile, for those who sometimes ask what librarians actually do (aside from in their breaks) I've been wading through a spreadsheet today listing ebooks. Now this particular list is from a supplier who have had a particular publisher decide that they're going to remove all their books and only place them back with the supplier if we pay for them. Again. (We've already bought them in the job lot we paid for from the supplier.)

Now is it just me or is there something rather shady in being made to pay for something twice like that?

Of course I don't have to buy the books (back). And I won't be buying them all. But I have usage statistics on all the books and while I can ignore the 'dusty ebooks', some of them warrant the cost of making sure they're still available.

One thing that surprised me in the last year is discovering that I now work at the university which has the highest usage figures for ebooks in the country.