I had a letter published in a paper of note this week. Still glowing from that. Not quite sure why it was so exciting. It was inconsequential enough in an ephemeral form that will soon disappear. I'd emailed them a couple of times before but this one was a bit more thought out and obviously hit the mark for whatever reason.

The letter itself was responding to an article I'd seen two days before celebrating one of their crossword compiler's 40th year. I recognized him as my old music teacher at school and commented on his still haunting me and still teaching me all these decades later.

Most amusing was my wife's response. Despite the professional book chapters and peer reviewed articles I've had published; despite the hobbyist books and articles I've had published and even earned the odd cent or to for; this was the first time she admitted finally a modicum of being impressed. Ah well. Such is life. Sic transit gloria.

From one end of the personnel process to the other. Yesterday, along with two others, I was shortlisting candidates for my assistant's assistant as it were.

All internal, all very capable.

But as I have to deal with personnel from this end of the works, I suddenly see why everything seems to take so long with them... .

To a party at the weekend thrown by the map librarian who has turned 50. He'd invited quite a large number of people from several of his different 'lives'. So there was a good gang from the library there.

Fun evening. But as some of us were the last to leave a little after midnight, and I had a couple of boxes of books to drop off, and I was doing the driving for three others, we took a turn around the Library at 12.30 to see how 24/7 opening was going.

We were all somewhat taken aback by just how full the place was on a Saturday night and how much actual study seemed to be happening rather than just chaos and rambunctiousness which we were expecting.

Bit of shame the the library system had fallen over. It happens very rarely but did mean self-issue was a non-starter for those who wanted it. But it's good to see that with exam period on us, the extra opening certainly seems to be being used.



[1] Well, old Science Fiction magazines from the 50s that I accumulated somewhere along the line) to give to the SF society.

Just an update although the news is still officially embargoed I think.

Didn't get the job - but really the best of outcomes. Performed really well, didn't let myself down and was apparently considered 'appointable' which was encouraging. But beaten by more experience of leading
large teams and managing big projects.

I think I'm relieved really as not at all certain I would have loved the job. I wish the candidate who got it all the best and will watch with interest. But surprised to find it wasn't who I thought it would be.

All done now.

50 minutes of grilling.

Actually, it wasn't as stressful as it might have been. I had feared I might have been humiliated as I was in an interview a couple of decades back for a school library post. (You can get away with not being able to answer one question, two might look a bit bad... but three? Really they wanted a teacher not a librarian.)

I think I did as well as I could and it's now down to the panel (four, not three as I expected, the head of IT was there too) and what the other candidates were like.

At least I'm not too stressed about the outcome either way! But I'm relieved not have let myself down.

Book group now. Definitely time for a drink!

They're running way behind now. So still not been in.

On the up side though, several people have told me that my presentation was by far the most interesting. Which is encouraging. (Not that 'interesting' necessarily equates to 'good', and even if it did may only say that it was in poor company or not be what they were looking for.

Good grief. I can no longer run on adrenalin for 9 hours straight. Used to thrive on it.

Well, I'm through the presentation, sit-around-making-polite-conversation and lunch stages.

I think my presentation went well. Nervous, but I kept to time, didn't hurry and enjoyed my first outing with Keynote and the iPad direct to the screen.

Now it's the interview (brought forward to 3pm as one of the five candidates has chosen not to come). Not sure that I'm at all prepared for the searching questions about my (in)ability that I'm expecting. OK, maybe not inability - but lack of management experience. And one of the other candidates seems very strong from chatting with him...

Nerves have definitely set in now.

But I'm as prepared as I think I can be. For the presentation at least; not at all sure about the interview later this afternoon.

Time to go...

New Year and back to work.

Atrocious weather, awful headache - it's not boding well already.

But I've sorted some outstanding problems I couldn't fix before Christmas so that's good and I've had an eye-test that's unsurprisingly revealed that I do indeed need new glasses - of the varifocal kind - not so good.

But before I go home I thought I'd better write about the next BIG thing.

Last year one of our two deputy librarians retired. Off to sunnier climes. We duly advertised his post - managing cataloging and acquisitions and systems.

Now for some reason I managed to miss the adverts and even the fact that they'd reached that stage in the proceedings so I accepted that what with health and not being at all sure I'd really want the job, that was that and it wasn't meant to be.

However, only two people applied - one internal - and we didn't appoint anyone. Human resources and the Library Head decided to review the job spec and see if that was the problem. I'm not sure they changed it much, but by the time I did catch the advertisement second time around I was wondering if I shouldn't give it a go. Several factors came into play:
- I'd been stung by former colleague S, somewhat dressing me down for not applying for the other Deputy post when it had come up
- I can't let illness put me off - it's up to them to tell me they don't want me
- what if they had appointed the internal candidate and I'd not even bothered?! (The fact that he was the guy I beat to my present job also confuses things!)
- can I really keep doing what I've been doing for the last fifteen years?

on the other hand:
- would I be promoted to the level of my incompentance? (the Peter Principle)
- would it be all the tedious bits of my job and non of the fun bits?
- (related to the last) would I mind no longer being an 'academic'?
- and related to that and the differing pay scales, is it worth it for the small increase in salary?

Well, for better or worse I put in an application. And although it took an astonishing amount of time before I heard from HR, I was offered an interview.

That takes place on Thursday. I'll keep you posted.