Summer Hours:
Mondays – Thursdays: 7:45 a.m. – 9:00 p.m.
Fridays: 7:45 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Saturdays: CLOSED
Sundays: 1:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.

Image Credit: flickr user LOLren (CC BY 2.0)

The easy answer is that there’s only one answer, and that’s to invoke the inimitable Anna Lane:

Her Highness Anna

Who is Anna, you might ask? If you haven’t had the pleasure of meeting her, Anna’s official title is Assistant to the Dean. This title doesn’t begin to convey the thousandfold implication of her duties, though. Simply put – Anna is why the library doesn’t resemble a post-apocalyptic landscape on any given day of the week.

Which is to say – we think she’s pretty awesome, and she was recently recognized for all which makes her Anna and us her mere subjects.

At the end of April, the Tennessee Library Association held its annual conference in Chattanooga. A handful of awards were given to individuals who exemplify the field we’ve all given our lives to. One of those was the Library Support Staff Award, now in its 7th year. Sponsored by the TLA Honors and Awards Committee, the award recognizes an outstanding performance in four areas of librarian support:

a) Ability to demonstrate superior and/or creative knowledge and skills in a staff support position;
b) May have assumed duties formerly performed by a Librarian;
c) Promotes the Library with a positive attitude;
d) Performs above and beyond the call of duty in the role of support staff when assisting a Librarian in serving the needs of the Library.

When the numbers were tallied and the dust settled, only one regal individual was left standing and that was Anna. In addition to a plaque, Anna was conferred a tiara. We also feel she’s entitled to additional honorifics, but we’ll have to run those by university HR. Post-conference, we asked Anna a few questions about the award and her time here at the library:

1. How long have you worked at the Library?
I transferred to the Library in 2003 but I have worked at UTC since 1999.

2. What’s an unexpected joy about working here?
I am a “people person” so I really enjoy getting to know my colleagues and being able to share a laugh (and sometimes a tear) with my work family. I would also say I am excited to move in to our new library after many years of planning.

3. What does winning the award mean to you?
Knowing that colleagues and Dean Liedtka thought enough of my work to nominate me for this award was very gratifying and actually winning the award meant someone outside the Library thought my contributions were worthy of an award. I received many congratulatory e-mails from colleagues when it was announced I was the recipient of the award and those comments made me feel special. I have saved the e-mails so when I am having a particularly challenging day I can re-read them and get a boost. And, of course, how often does one receive a tiara for a job well done?

4. Now that you own a tiara, how would you like to be addressed?
Even without the tiara I wanted to be addressed as Princess or Queen but now with the tiara I am going to insist on Your Highness.

5. What song title best describes your years at the library?
Going strictly by song title and not necessarily lyrics I am going to narrow it to four:  She Works Hard for the Money (Donna Summer), You Can’t Always Get What You Want (Rolling Stones), Working for the Weekend (Loverboy) and Spread Your Wings (Queen).

6. When you aren’t working hard for the money, how do you kick back & relax?
I enjoy watching movies, playing pinball, reading, crocheting and spending time with my dogs. My children are grown and live in Nashville so I like to visit them and try new restaurants. And once a year I go to the Alabama Gulf Coast Zoo to play with tiger cubs (NOTE: This last part is not a joke. This happens. –Ed.).

Public profiles, web browsing results and advertisements tailored to you based on email content and other browsing histories, check-ins, public wi-fi, location-based services, billions upon billions upon billions of pictures and videos, public records … yeah … thinking about privacy in the digital age can be overwhelming, scary, and really, really interesting.

Since libraries hold stake in privacy issues, it’s no surprise that the American Library Association (ALA) sponsors Choose Privacy Week. Head over to the Choose Privacy Week blog to access daily tips, videos, and forums all about online surveillance and privacy. For example, check out these tips for using public access computers or any of the videos embedded below.

Now, if you’ll excuse us, we’ll be huddled in a cave with our tin foil hat.

“Choose Privacy”

“Vanishing Liberties: The Rise of State Surveillance in the Digital Age”

“Data Mining, Government Surveillance, and Civil Liberties”

Congratulations to Paige Broussard, our judges’ pick for best haiku:
fallen white petals
dance in cyclones underfoot.
ghosts of the winter.

Honorable Mentions:

Sleep, a sweet repose
To forego sleep, a burden
Sleep quiets the anxious mind
by: Anonymous

Round and round its spoke
The circle spins to the end
Round and round again
by: Teddy Jones

Advert for Contest
Oh why Just but one mistake?
twenty-secondeth
by: John F (who pointed out an editorial oversight on our part)

Book: Winnie-the-Pooh (PR6025. I65 W56, 3rd Floor)
Movie: Winnie the Pooh (PN1997 .W564, 1st Floor)

Seriously late nights? Brain scrambled from studying? News getting you down? These are Winnie-the-Pooh moments (or more likely Eeyore moments, but he’s not the title character).

Few children’s stories are as popular and widely adapted as Winnie-the-Pooh. Inspired in part by a real bear named Winnie at the London Zoo, A. A. Milne wrote the book in 1926 for his son — you guessed it — Christopher Robin Milne.

Despite its popularity as a movie (or movies, since there have been many versions and spin-offs), I don’t get the sense that a lot of people have read the book. This is a total shame because the book is really very clever. It plays with the frame narrative structure (stories set up around a common situation a la The Canterbury Tales or the 1001 Arabian Nights). Trying to figure out what is “real” — perhaps things that are “inside jokes” between father and son — and what is “story” is a really fun exercise. Plus, much of Milne’s play with language is lost on the screen. Pooh.

The Disney movie, Winnie the Pooh, which really began as separate features based on chapters out of the book and other continuations of the Pooh Bear story, is still a good movie. No doubt about it. I mean, really, I don’t remember half the crap I watched on Cartoon Network, but you better believe that Hunny jars and Heffalumps will forever trigger fond childhood memories.

All in all, I think I appreciate the book more now as an adult (wait, am I a grown up? Oh bother) than I did as a kid. But honestly, whatever gives you the warm fuzzies in times of great stress is what you should cling to like Tigger up a tree.

Winner: you, once you’re done with finals

Feel like you need some cartoon time? We’ve got you covered. Join us for Cartoons & Cereal this Monday, April 22, 5-8 p.m. in room 207.

The school year is coming to a close and we’d be pretty ungrateful library folks if we didn’t take a minute to say thank you to all of our amazing student workers this year. Our students do all kinds of jobs within the library- they shelve the books you return, check out your laptops, help you print that pesky double-sided brochure, and generally try to make your life easier while you’re here in the library. This year we have over thirty student workers and we’d like to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of them for the great job they’ve done throughout the year!

Please be advised that we will be performing an upgrade to the ARTstor Digital Library on Tuesday, April 16th between 6:00 AM and 1:00 PM EST. During this time, users will be able to access the Digital Library but may experience some slowness. This upgrade will eliminate the need for Java in the ARTstor Digital Library and single image downloads will be delivered in Zip files (find out why here).

Many versions of Windows come equipped with a built in zip program, but if you need to install a program on your PC, ARTstor recommends 7-Zip, available free at 7-zip.org. Mac users will not need to install software to handle zip files as it is already built into OS X. If you experience any difficulties, please clear the cache on your browser and restart your Web browser.

Kind regards,
ARTstor User Services Team

 
Image from Flickr user Dave-F‘s photostream (CC BY 2.0)