OK, the first month of 2019 is now over and it's time for another update.

Tue Jan 1, One last horrible hoorah for 2018 came in the form of a bad cold that dropped me yesterday and today.  As I write this I'm feeling better than last night.  I was feeling pretty lousy.  I went to bed at around 8am.  That's how sick I felt.  I did wake up during the night, just before midnight.  I uploaded the update to this journal and went back to bed.

I'm still sick.  I still feel down, tired, and sore from this cold.  All I can do is rest and let this thing take its course.  But really I wish I could take some strong meds and get this out of my system.  Hate being sick.

My aunt and I went to the laundromat today, despite the fact that I was still sick.  I shouldn't have to go to any laundromat, but we still don't have a working drain in the wash room.  ARGH!  Why must I be cursed with things that just don't work?

Wed Jan 2, Since I didn't go into work today I took my aunt to her doctors appointment way up in Sylmar.  Her appointment was for 9:40am, which meant she had to take the bus super early in order to get there on time.  There was no way was I going to rest at home while I could be taking her to her appointment and rest in the warm car.  Which is what I did.  Her appointment was about an hour long, and the good news for now is that the tumor that they thought she might have could not be detected by the doctor.  However, she is not out of the woods yet.  He is going to check with his colleagues and he will call her to tell her what the consensus is amongst them.  Keeping my fingers crossed.

I'm definitely feeling better, but I'm still achy from coughing so much.  I also have no voice, so I would not do very good at the reference desk where I have to talk to people.  I called out sick today in order to be ready for the route tomorrow.  The worst thing about missing work on a Wednesday is not being able to have dinner with TheGirl.  Dinner with TheGirl is the highlight of my week, so it really stinks to miss out on that.

TheGirl is moving soon.  I don't remember the actual day she's going to be out of her current place, but it's possible that by next week's dinner.  She's moving just down the street, and won't really change things all that much.  Certainly not our dinner choices.  She really needed to move out of her current place.  The landlord has just been wrong for over a year.  The only reason why TheGirl was able to stay this past year was because she employed some help from a real estate expert she knows from work.  But, now it's time for her to get out of the poisoned place.

In my old Flickr days I obviously followed some people.  I had this itch to check out some of the old folks I used to follow on Flickr.  I did some searching and found a couple of the people I used to follow.  One, shown above, was this gorgeous woman that posted many self portraits.  Thankfully she is still in "business."  I found one other person that is still posting on Instagram.  I hope to find a few more, but one other that I found on Instagram is not really posting pictures there, but is STILL posting on Flickr.  Incredible.

Thu Jan 3, In the past the start of a new year meant that I would be going into work at 9am instead of 8am.  This is because it's Pasadena's turn to come and pick up the books from Glendale, instead of the other way around.  But, these dopes at work have zero knowledge of this sort changeover.  No matter how many times I've said it to everyone.  This is why I decided to take this ignorance by the library masses to my advantage.  I don't like going in super early, but I want to try something out by still starting at 8am instead of 9am.

I'm not sure what matchbox school the architect that worked on the library project actually attended, but they missed a lot of things during the renovation.  Little things that just make you know that they aren't detail oriented.  But really they aren't big picture either, because the place is a mess.  Big picture: new elevator should have a way of limiting access to the basement to only employees.  Detail oriented: walkways should be direct and complete, without dead-ends or meandering.  This part of my entry is about the second, detail oriented, item.  The side of the building was designated to be the main employee entrance to the building.  It's closer to the parking structure than any other entrance, and it actually made to serve this function.  So why would the most direct route to said entrance be more of a long roundabout walk?  Because dopey architect didn't think that people might need to walk from the sidewalk to the entrance without having to make a long trek.  Ever since the library opened every employee would just cut across the plants and made their way directly to the entrance.  Yes, they would get their shoes dirty, but it was the most direct path.  Well, after nearly two years someone finally decided to put some sort of path in that garden.  But is the path a good solid piece of cement?  Nope.  It's some half-assed slates joined together.  Oh that doesn't look slipshod at all.

There is an ebb and flow to things at the library.  Like take the delivery.  If a day is missed it's not the next day that's impacted, it's the day after that's impacted.  This is why Friday is busy because Wednesday was missed.  This is why I get the brunt of this stuff today.  And as I think about it, I seem to get that hit quite a bit.  Mainly because I now drive on Fridays.  Which means if someone misses Wednesdays, and since Benedict and Huckster (as I'm now naming the Monday/Wednesday driver) took over driving those days I find that this happens a lot more than when my buddy was driving those days, I get hit on Fridays.  Wow, I'm not sure that sentence is kosher, but whatever.  What I'm trying to say is that driving Fridays means when the person driving on Wednesdays calls out I get hit with a large load.  And when Benedict drove he missed quite a few Wednesdays.  And now Huckster is following in that tradition of missing days.  Whatever.  I know that I need to adapt, as I've always adapted, to the changes in the route.

Fri Jan 4, These dopes at Central were obviously too busy last night after I dropped off the bins to sort them.  Not sure why they didn't have enough time, given that they had about four hours to sort a few bins.  Bins that would have only taken me about half an hour to sort.  But, what do I know?  They were, "busy."

I received a message from my security camera and when I checked it turned out to be my cousin walking up to the house.  She happened to show up with the rest of her family at JUST the wrong time.  We later found out that they had come to invite my aunt to get some food.  Well, the thing is, my aunt had other plans.  Yes, my aunt spends most days at home now.  But there are times when she has doctor's appointments or needs to run some errands.  Today she went to the market via dial a ride.  My family happened to show up during the two hour window that my aunt wasn't at home.  Now if they had done something as simple as CALL BEFORE JUST SHOWING UP, then maybe they wouldn't be disappointed to arrive to an empty house.  I love how informal my cousin is with these like this.  She can't assume that my aunt is at home all day every day.  This has happened many other times, but they don't learn their lesson.

This morning my aunt reheated some spaghetti and a meatball.  The sauce was horrible, and I could barely finish my so-called "breakfast."  I actually tossed some of it out.  I figured I would treat myself to something different today.  Forgoing the usual pastrami sandwich from a sub shop near city hall I decided to try something else.  Well, my food whoas continued.  The sandwich I picked today had good meats, but the spread was super yucky.  I took as much off the sandwich as I could, but the damage had been done.  I couldn't get that flavor out of my mouth.  Today was just not my day when it came to food.

When I arrived at Brand the people there told me that they had boxes of "donations" that they wanted me to take boxes to Central.  They wanted to throw these books out, because they just can't sell them.  But, under the new DrDeath decree of not throwing away donated books these dopes now have to hide the fact that we're throwing away books.  As one of the Brand people said to me, "They want to discourage dumpster diving individuals."  Yeah, right.  This goes right down the marking alley of wanting to make things look one way while they're actually another way.  DrDeath doesn't want people thinking we toss books out, but in the meantime we'll box them up and have the trash man pick them up in the middle of the night.  This way no one knows what we're doing.

I have been sick all week.  The other day I was trying to take my temperature and while I was shaking the thermometer I broke it.  My old glass thermometer, which I've probably had for fifteen years, finally broke.  I ordered a new fancy one and it showed up today.  It showed up today broken.  Now I can't tell if I'm running a fever.  I sure felt like I was running a fever after I got home from work today.  Replacement thermometer arrives on Sunday.

Mon Jan 7, Because I was sick I hadn't visited TheGirl and Cheyenne in about a week and a half.  Too long.  I think Cheyenne missed me, she bounced around when I showed up tonight.  I certainly missed her.  She and I played hard, and she was pooped at the end of the night.  Everything back to normal.

Tue Jan 8, There isn't much to say about the route today.  It was pretty standard.  But, what I do want to say is that I'm considering rethinking the entire route.  I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't change much more than I've already changed the route.  But, perhaps it's time to trim some of the fat.  Like perhaps visiting the Chevy branch on Thursdays and not on Fridays.  Perhaps skipping Adams on Fridays, since it never has any books.  These are just thoughts right now, but I'll let those thoughts stew a bit.  I think I have an opportunity to remake the route for the better.

The photo above is of the library's main entrance.  A crew was using it to film some scenes from a TV show.  The building stood in for a court house and a library.  One of my coworkers mentioned that they had him in a scene taking a book from one of the actors.  Pretty cool.

Wed Jan 9, My aunt made some chili again and this time it wasn't as good.  The beans feel hard, like they haven't been cooked enough.  The only other thing to eat is rice.  I mean I guess in a pinch I could make a meal from just rice, but I didn't want to.  And hence me going to work without any food in my lunch bag and relying on the emergency stash at work.  In that stash I have chili and soup and a frozen meal.  Today I had the chili.  It really hit the spot.

It has been two weeks since I had dinner with TheGirl.  Illness causes me to miss last week's dinner.  This week, no excuses.  We didn't know where to go eat tonight.  TheGirl thought we should leave Cheyenne at home, because it was going to rain.  But the forecast didn't have any rain for tonight.  Cold, but no rain.  We went to the Counter and yes it was cold in the patio.  But the wind died down and things were fine after that.  Also, I had some booze in me.  After dinner TheGirl drove over to her new place.  She'll be moving in pretty soon.  I stupidly didn't get any pictures of the new place, but it's nice.  It has a nice big backyard for Cheyenne.  The place itself is tiny, but feels to me that it's a little bigger than the one she's living in now.  Certainly a different configuration.  All-in-all it's a nicer place, though it is more expensive.  It's not going to be easy for TheGirl to afford this place.  But she had to get out of her current situation.  Things have hit a new low there, and she wants to get out.

Thu Jan 10, The route was pretty standard today.  I did get a good jump on it, but then a few things slowed me down today.  Like having some idiot park in front of the driveway at Grandview.  It wasted so much time.  Having them give me a bunch of stupid boxes didn't help either.

The reason I have a black and white picture of some book carts is because of what one of my coworkers told me today about the books.  There are some sorting shelves in circulation that were being used to sort the children's books.  Apparently AD and Mala came down from on high yesterday to say that these shelves are exclusively to be used for donations.  Never mind that we should just be tossing these donations.  Now we have to take a resource offline, so to speak, and use those shelves for stupid and useless donations.  Fuck the donations.  We aren't about donations, we're about our collection.  But whatever.  AD gets EVERYTHING wrong.  Her priorities smack of lack of any library knowledge.  I openly asked my coworker if AD had ever really worked in a library, because she can't library.

My coworker continued to tell me that AD doesn't care much for sorting of the books.  She has this plan where the books will go directly from Cerberus and on to a book cart.  The pages are to NOT put them in order immediately.  But rather take them out into the stacks and only then sort them and put them back on the shelves.  I think I'm getting the details straight, but I might be wrong.  But the gist is that the pages won't be sorting books.  Somehow they will magically return to the shelves.  This is another disaster waiting to blow up.  But, I told my coworker, who was not happy with the situation, that she just needs to walk away from this.  She needs to stop caring.  She needs to just not give a damn and simply do what they say.  We're just there for a paycheck.  Fuck AD's plan at its core, though.  It's idiotic.

I have a problem with everything AD has pushed through her tenure here at the library.  She's leaving this place worse for her efforts.  It's apropos that she's here though.  Because the President is a malevolent force of nature, and so is AD.  Only in her case it's more a force of stupidity.  Fail!

Mon Jan 14, The rain returned today.  The weather people mentioned that there would be rain until Thursday.  I just hope I don't get too wet on the route.  Today I was back on the reference desk at San Marino.  The person that was covering had to go back to school.  So, despite having a lot of work to do for the open house on the twenty-sixth, I had to be on the desk.  Hey, I rather do that these days than most of what I do for the Foundation.  I'm tired of it all, but yeah.  Reference desk is where I can be a know-it-all.

I went to visit TheGirl tonight.  She's nearly all packed up for her move to her new place.  She says that Saturday is the last day.  She's found things among her things that she hasn't seen since she moved into her current place.  She found an old automated vacuum robot that she "won" from a TV talk show.  TheGirl wanted to see if it worked, but it kept on failing.  We put our heads together and got the vacuum working.  Cheyenne was not happy with the robot vacuum.  She kept barking at it.  I was holding her back, but she kept on barking.  TheGirl doesn't know how Cheyenne will handle it when the robot starts to vacuum by itself during the day.  Most likely she would just smash it up.  It was too funny to watch Cheyenne get mad at the robot.

Tue Jan 15, DrDeath doesn't say much to the troops, so when he does there is some weight to it, if only by default.  In reading this so-called letter to the "troops" in this month's so-called newsletter, I feel that he is using this opportunity to distance himself from the idiocy of the previous administration.  The whole, "I take no credit," thing comes off initially as him being humble about what came before him.  Vagabundo and I feel that the deeper meaning is DrDeath distancing himself from what he thinks are failed projects.  Because the list of the "initiatives" that were underway before he showed up are a list of failures.  Self check-out, which he calls "self-check," is a huge failure.  I've said it here before, but in short, having about "half" of the books not tagged to be read by the self check-out machines is nothing but a failure.  Vocera?  That is a future failure that he is already distancing himself from.  Mobile hotspots?  No one cares about that shit.  AD?  Oh yeah, she's been the champion of all these things, but really these are things Maleficent started.  She sold out to the dopes that sell the self check-out machines.  To the dopes that sold her on the giant sorting machine, aka Cerberus.  She's the one that signed off on a half-assed renovation that left the library with a leaky roof, lights that flicker like disco lights, and no way to get down to the basement from the main floor other than going outside the fucking building.  These are just some of her "crimes."  DrDeath is smart to distance himself from all these current and potential failures.  Because he wants to have deniability.  He's a carpetbagger, a traveling salesman.  A charlatan that comes into town promising that he's going to fix all the problems.  But the only problem that he fixes is the problem of a city having more money than sense.  And of course that's all that Glendale is, more money than sense.

There isn't much I can say about the sorting machine that I hadn't said before.  What I wanted to point out today is that it still doesn't work.  Despite what AD wants to say about it "working."  It doesn't.  AD can try to polish all turds, but she can't.  These turds are WAY too big.  But, the writing is on the way.  Neither DrDeath nor AD are going anywhere any time soon.  Or so it would appear.  Their plays might differ, but they have a common goal... to destroy the library from within.

Wed Jan 16, I went to the market before going into work this morning only to run into a pair of dummies that are a good example of the stupidity of people these days.  This pair of dopes parked their shopping cart in the middle of aisles during their entire visit, which happened to be during my visit to the market.  I did the cough move to get these dopes to move out of the way, but when that didn't work I just gave up and went around them.  This is what I have to live with these days.

It's been raining this week.  When I arrived at work I saw the following sight.  A pair of channels used to drain water away from the side of the building were propped up against the drainage outlets.  The water was falling behind the channels, rendering having them useless.  I don't know what genius thought it was a good idea to do this, but there you have it.  they literally nullified having these plastic channels.  The fuck has the world come to?

TheGirl and I went to dinner tonight as we do almost every Wednesday.  During dinner I showed TheGirl a picture from back in 2010 when we were "flirting" with each other.  The above photo was taken when we went to lunch at CityWalk.  The truck TheGirl is standing in front of is from the movie "Twilight."  Not sure which version, but yeah, she wanted a picture in front of the truck.  It's been a good near decade with TheGirl in my life.

Thu Jan 17, I hadn't texted TheDesire in about a couple of weeks.  I wanted to contact her about what's been going on at the library, because she did say that she wanted me to tell her the gossip.  I texted her today and in the midst of the conversation she texts the above series of texts calling me, "Amazing."  Oh if only those words had translated to some interest in me in the past.  These days I don't really think of relationships and such.  But back when I had the biggest crush on TheDesire I wanted nothing more than to have her reciprocate the feelings I felt for her.  Or at least thought I felt for her.  These days I love that we're friends.  I need her to stay in my life.  TheDesire is special, and I only wish we could actually interact more than we have in the last couple of years.  Too bad we can't have a friendship like TheGirl and I have.  Perhaps some day.

It's my own fault for staying up late at night.  I'm tired.  I get super sleepy during the day.  But even when I go to sleep early I'm still tired.  Probably because one day of going to bed early isn't going to make up for the rest of the nights I go to bed late.  In the past I've had to drink those high caffeine sodas.  This week I instead tried drinking espresso.  I wish I didn't have to do this, but it really does help me get through the day.  I guess I'm late to this coffee game.  Since it seems like everyone else does it.

Fri Jan 18, It's dark when I get up in the morning, but there is always something that emanates light.  In my room that's a clock that has red glowing numbers.  Everything else is dark.  Today I woke up and it was pitch black.  The only light was coming from my phone, which was buzzing because the alarm was going off.  I had to pee.  Sure enough, I walked into the kitchen and the night light was off, but the flashlight that comes on automatically when the power goes off was on.  I checked out the window and the entire street was dark.  I got some glow sticks and grabbed my fancy bright flashlight.  My aunt woke up a little after I did and she asked me what I wanted for breakfast.  I told her that the power was out, and I left her one of the glow sticks in her room.  I told her to heat up some lentil soup since it was something she could heat up on the stove.  She will usually heat me something up in the microwave.  When it was time to shower I used the bright flashlight to see what I was doing.  It's super bright, so I had no problem with that.

The route wasn't that bad today, but it tired me out anyway.  I did have to go to Pasadena to pick up some books for an author event next week.  When I went to Pasadena I stopped off to get a burger and I ran into TheLamp there.  She is a pretty girl, I have to say.

After work I stopped off at TheGirl's place to pick up my cap and a fan that she doesn't need anymore.  It's the last time I'll be going to her place.  She moves into her new place tomorrow, and when I visit her on Monday it will be at her new place.  So many good memories at her now old place in Toluca Terrace.  But it's time for her to move on.  Where she was living became a toxic place.  What with the dispute with her landlord.  What with terrible neighbors, she had to move.  TheGirl feared that her landlord might try to harm Cheyenne.  She's going to be paying more at her new place, but it's nice.  It has a bigger back yard, but no patio like her old place.  Still, looks like it should be a nice place when she moves in.

On the drive home I could see at least two helicopters buzzing in the vicinity of my house.  It turned out it was just east of my house, on the other side of the freeway.  When I finally got some information on the news it turned out to be a barricade situation with a man that police thought might commit suicide.  Once the news helicopters showed up there was a constant buzzing above my house.  It turned out the man did commit suicide.

Sat Jan 19, The teachers here in Los Angeles have been on strike all week.  Because of that my cousin's kids have not come around the house all week.  No showing up at stupid 6:50am.  In short, I have NOT missed my cousin's kids showing up for school during this strike.  The teacher's union and the district have not been negotiating that much this week.  They didn't start talking until this past Thursday.  There are hopes that both sides are close to a deal, but who really knows?  As of me writing this entry they is no news of the kids returning to school on Monday.  It's likely that they will still be out of class this coming week.

Glendale posted a library assistant position this week.  A couple of people thought I should go for the job.  They seem to be super sure that I should go for the job, but I'm not so sure.  I suspect that the job is already slated for someone not me.  I have some candidates that I suspect might be the frontrunners for this job.  There was talk this week about how the new administration dopes seem to be favoring new people.  And yes, I believe the same thing.  AD is all about loyalty to her, not to the library.  The same goes for DrDeath.  He's just here to get a few bucks, market himself, and leave nothing but the salted Earth behind him.

I never thought that a library could have so much drama.  Moral is super low, lower than I thought it could go.  And I can see a schism developing between us old timers and the new dopes.  The new dopes have come in and want to change everything.  They are eviscerating the library I knew and replacing it with an empty shell.  The new dopes want to focus on getting rid of the service desks and have patrons check out books by themselves.  This is a vision that will never fully take hold.  People come to the library expecting to see someone there to help them.  The library is a place where some people don't visit often, so to them a trip is something unique.  They don't know where the books are by heart, so they need help finding something.  They also don't go and check out books every week, so they need help checking out their books.  That's the reality of things.  And that's the reality that these new dopes don't see, or rather don't want to see.  They want a shiny new heartless building to be shinny and be perfect, but without a single employee.  Case in point some libraries going to fully automated models.  There are more and more around the world that just have some big vending machine taking care of patrons.  But it's impersonal and cold.  And where is the knowledge?  Where is that PERSON that enables finding knowledge?  Where is that person that enables finding a book that a patron would never have thought of getting by themselves?  Where is the person that gives the library a heart and a conscience?  In the world envisioned by the likes of DrDeath and AD patrons don't need help finding a book.  They don't need anyone to help them check out.  The library doesn't need a heart or a conscience.  In the world of these dopes the library just needs 3D printers, self check-out machines, and VR computers.

Sadly these are dark times around the world.  Sadly these dopes are in control of the library.  Sadly they will be for a long time.  Us old timers will eventually leave and they will have their technology filled cavern and no books.  There will be no people except them sitting at their desks killing time until they have to go home.

Mon Jan 21, As is the "tradition" at San Marino for MLK we had our "training" day.  Every other year we have to be recertified for CPR.  This is because, as I've many times here, the city does not recognize MLK day.  For years I worked fucking Easter as well.  These dopes ain't right.  So here I am, going over CPR.  Which is a GOOD thing.  But it's an excuse to show up here.  Whatever!

As I stood in the middle of the community room preparing to sign in TheLamp walked into the room.  Her figure was so curvy.  The jeans she wore were nice and tight on her body, and her top had a circular cut that showed off a little cleavage.  I wanted to get a picture with my phone, but the above picture will have to do for a representation of TheLamp's figure today.  Not going to lie, TheLamp has her appeal.  She seems to have a good head on her shoulders, and is feminine as all get out.  I'll never know what it's like to be intimate with her, but it goes without saying that I would really like to find out.

As if ordering bad pizza wasn't enough, they also didn't order enough pizza.  There is a joke on an old TV show where the manager of an office says he has ordered pizza.  One of the workers asks if it's from "Pizza by Alfredo or Alfredo's pizza cafe?"  Of course the manager orders from the wrong place, in this case Pizza by Alfredo.  This is what the boss ordered up for us today, "Pizza by Alfredo."  And as I said earlier, it wasn't even enough for all of us.  This is such bullshit.

After work ended I ate my dinner, which was just the food I planned on eating for lunch, and went over to TheGirl's new flat.  It's a nice place.  It is certainly different than her old place.  I think I like it though.  I don't have to go through a fence now.  The neighborhood is super quiet.  There doesn't seem to be too many issues with street parking either.  In short, es bueno.

Tue Jan 22, Even before I entered the library I could see something new had been added.  About five or six years ago, in a meeting about the renovation and the changes coming to the library.  There was talk of something called the "marketplace."  What the marketplace was aiming to be was a collection of display bookshelves that would have the most popular books.  They would be placed near the entrance to convenience and exposure.  Well, the "marketplace" has finally arrived at Glendale.  But as with all things the execution is done half-assed.  Yet another fail.  Last week DrDeath was in a huff about certain books not being placed in the "marketplace."  This is what he's worried about.  I love that this bullshit is something they care about.

My aunt decided to make spaghetti.  But, as with so many of her culinary concoctions the food turned out to be dry and flavorless.  I felt obliged to take some for lunch today, but only a little bit.  I went to some stupid fast food joint in order to supplement my sorry ass portion of spaghetti.  I ordered a terrible little burger and some chicken "nuggets."  I haven't been eating that much lately, so it surprised me when I ate everything you see in the picture above.

These library dopes keep giving me donated books to take back to Central.  There's no room there for any more books.  Not only that, most of the donations just need to go right to the trash.  Which is why I just take the books to the trash bin.  But, they took those bins way at Central, because the stupid bosses have this idea that the public should never know that the library throws out books, even though it's a common practice.  They literally have had people throw books away in secret dumpsters picked up in the middle of the night, I assume, so that patrons won't know that the library throws out books.  Well, I hate this donation shit and I decided to take the middle man out of it by taking the books straight to the recycling center.  Thankfully they have a bin specifically for books.  Now any time these dopes give me donations I'm not going to fight them, I'm just going to take them to the recycling center.  Fuck this shit!

Wed Jan 23, TheGirl mentioned how her new place is costing her $300 more a month on rent than her last place.  But I must say that her new place is nicer is many ways.  The backyard is bigger, and Cheyenne has a bigger place to play.  It's not as shaded as her old place, but it's certainly bigger.  The place itself is about the same size as her old place, but it's just that the shape of the rooms are different.  Which means her bed is a little big for her bedroom.  If she cornered the room like I have in my room, she could have more room.  But she doesn't want the bed in a corner, so the bed sits in the middle of the room, leaving little room.  But, it's home.

I mention the money she's spending because she mentioned that on her dinner night we might stay in more often.  I'm OK with that.  We used to stay in all the time, until something changed and we started going out almost exclusively.  Tonight I thought would be a change back to eating in on her night, but we ended up going to the Counter in Toluca Lake.  I bought her some wine and gave it to her as a housewarming gift on Monday.  She chilled it in her fridge but didn't drink it.  She saved it for our dinner tonight.  I should have bought her two bottles.  Dinner was good times, as always.

Thu Jan 24, As if these stupid self checkout machines weren't stupid enough I see this scene when I arrived at Brand.  They have had a self check-out machine for a while now, which of course no one uses.  On the machine the side bar on the giant screen had some instructions that were distorted.  It's hard to see in the picture I took, but I think you can see that the image on the right is distorted.

Speaking of stupid Brand, they tried to give me some donations today.  Last week the other driver told them that there is no room in the dock for the books.  But of course they couldn't leave that alone.  They called AD and told her about their stupid donations.  Meanwhile I had four boxes from Grandview.  I took them because my plan was to take them to the recycling center.

DrDeath has made it an important thing that his book shelf have the proper books in place.  Well, no worries, DrDeath, those books you put front and center aren't circulating.  Sure, there are a couple fewer books, but the shelf should be near empty.  And it's not.  This idea would have worked in a better environment.  But to just have some random shelf in a random place on the floor makes zero sense.  These idiots don't understand that a building like this needs to have a flow to things.  As it is there's no flow.  Just whatever.  And this is why they fail.

Fri Jan 25, I don't watch as many movies as I used to do in the past.  I have an account to get DVDs sent to the house, but I've watched probably one of those DVDs in the last year.  I had a movie for nearly nine months.  I am paying for things I'm not using, and that has to end.  Every cent that leaves my pocket like that should be going to the mortgage or savings.  Not down the drain.  So, I quit the DVD part of my plan and I'm keeping the streaming.  If I want to watch a movie that isn't online I figure I could go to a video store.  There's one in South Pasadena that has a lot of obscure titles.  So yeah, that will be better.

I saw this post on social media.

Sat Jan 26, Today is finally the Open House day.  I don't want to sit here and say I'm a Nostradamus or anything, but I could see this fail coming a long way away.  The thing is, Pseudo supervisor was the good indication of what was going on.  Everything she tries to get some money coming into the library seems do well at first, and the peters out.  Like seemingly all these these days.  She wants to leave the Foundation on good footing, but she's ready to leave as well.  She's good at what she does, but she's hitting a wall.  People have given to the library and it would be investing to see and hear if they think the library is using those resources in the proper way.

I don't really want to get too bogged down in the details from today, because there were too many little things.  However, overall I will say that this open house was a flop.  We didn't have very many attendees.  Not many people even cared that there were food trucks outside.  The whole thing was disruptive to the daily working of the library.  Also, it didn't generate as much money as Pseudo supervisor was hoping it would.  In short, it was a flop.

One of the things we had planned for today was a photographer was going to take pictures of people that gave a certain amount of money in donations.  They would get a photo for each $25 donation.  Well, the photographer came up to me saying that he needed a darkened room and that the lights in the copy room (where we placed him) was interfering with his lights.  The photographer insisted that the florescent lights be taken out of the light fixtures.  I told him that he had to talk to the boss.  About five minutes later a bunch of the lights in front of circulation went off.  I immediately knew why they had.  I told Pseudo supervisor about it and she just shook her head and said, "I'm never doing that again," referring to the photos.  It was much more trouble than it was worth.

I've been waiting for this day to be over.  This fucking Open House shit has been one of the best and worst projects I've worked on.  I was ahead of the curve for most of the project, but it was the least enjoyable project I've had to work on at the library.  It was zero fun, and of course the day was anti-climatic.  But, I'm glad it's over.

Sun Jan 27, I took the day off from work today, because I worked the open house yesterday.  I was pooped and I knew I would be after that event.  But the problem is I can't just take a day off with my aunt around.  I had to hide the fact that I was off.  I did everything as before.  But instead of going to work I just went home.  I jerked off and drank a little.  But then time ran out.  I spent time going to the market and that meant less time at home alone.  When it was time to leave to try to find my aunt I went up into the hills and drove around looking at the super nice houses.  Then I drove Mulholland drive to the Hollywood bowl overlook.  Well, that was the plan, but it was packed.

Since I was in the area I ended up visiting my Grandmother's grave.  I don't know the last time I visited, but it's been too long.  And of course, as I do EVERY TIME, I didn't take her flowers.  This was a significant visit since I'm not all together well.  I'm tired all the time, my eyes have been itchy and tired.  It's hard to focus sometimes, and other times my eyes are fine.  I can feel my body slowing down a bit.  I can see my aunt slowing down every day.  It's been twelve years since my Grandmother passed.  I've been preoccupied with the thought of my death.  I don't want that day to come.  I don't want to slow down, or have my body fail me.  But they will.  They will as they do for everyone.  When I don't think about this stuff I'm fine.  But then the thoughts creep up and I don't want that day to come.

After visiting my Grandmother's grave I thought to find my aunt.  But just as she was close to home the stupid tracking showed that she was in the ocean, miles from Santa Monica (as shown above).  I mean come on!  First off, I just saw that she was traveling south on Van Nuys.  And two minutes later she's in the ocean?  The stupid app never recovered until of course she was already home.  I found her as I drove up to the driveway.  Fucking bullshit!  I hate it when my technology fails.  I tried different settings on the phone to see if it would prevent this wrong location stuff.  Because of course it wasn't just tonight, it's every week that this happens, and it's almost always at the end of the journey when I NEED to be able to pin point her.  And even when I try calling her on her phone, she never hears it.  Bullshit!

Tue Jan 29, Cerberus has many problems.  The short version is that it's just a waste of money.  Think about how it only does two things, and it can hardly do those two things.  Checking in books and doing a rough sort.  Well, since there are times when it can't read a bar code or the RFID tags that means a human still has to do the work.  Also, the rough sort is just the first of many sorts a book goes through.  And above all that, the fucking machine can't keep failing.  It has a tendency of crewing up paperback books.  Paperbacks get stuck in the conveyor belts and that stops the entire machine.  Not only that, but the machine is eating itself.  One of the belts is traveling around the drive shaft incorrectly, and it's causing one side to be slowly chewing up the belt.  One day that thing is going to break.  No one in charge has mentioned that they need to repair that belt.  Oh well.  Fuck'em.

These dopes are all set sail to fail tomorrow for their little "tech launch" event.  Well, actually its two things at once.  At Central it's tech launch BS, and "Customer appreciation" day.  Fucking hate that they call the visitors "Customers."  It's telling that they don't say patron.  Both words men the same thing, but there is a subtext that is different.  Customer implies someone that consumes, that buys stuff.  A patron implies someone that supports.  Oh well.  for their "Customer appreciation" day they had me deliver about thirty cases of bottled water to the branches, for them to give out tomorrow.

The people that do the flies at Central are a bunch of dopes.  Since this new marketing woman started there is always some issue with the fliers.  The biggest problem is that nearly every flier printed has some mistake.  It's become a running joke.  Today the administration dopes would have me bouncing back and forth between the route and going to the graphics department.  They sent me an email last night mentioning that they had a job for me to pick up today.  They always start these emails with the implication that I don't go to graphics EVERY FUCKING DAY I DRIVE.  They will ask, "Are you going to graphics?"  Yes!  I fucking go EVERY time I drive.  I'm not just going because there might be a job to pick up, I have other things I do there.  Like pick up the mail.  Whatever.  These dopes tell me to go.  I show up and the guy at graphics tells me that the job isn't ready.  Apparently these dopes in administration didn't send the file until yesterday.  They "thought" they had sent it last week.  But of course why follow up and ask if graphics received it?  Better to just assume.  I asked the graphics guy how much time did I need to give him so he could finish the job.  He said and hour, so I told him I'd be back in an hour.  I went back, picked up the stupid fliers and figured I would distribute them.  Mind you, in the email I received yesterday it mentions that I should pick up the fliers and then distribute them to the branches.  A little before noon I get the above text message asking if I could go to graphics.  Again, I'm not sure what they think I do on the route, but their stupidity knows no bounds.  They can eat shit with their stupid fliers.  These things should have been distributed last week, if not earlier.  Dopes.

I'm pretty tired at the end of the route, but of course these dopes can't help but pile on the work.  I received a text from Mala asking if I could distribute some balloons for tomorrow's event to all of the branches.  ARGH!  I told her I couldn't deliver the balloons to all the branches.  Perhaps two, I told her.  So I took the above displays to Pacific and Adams.  Now, my first thought was why didn't they simply send the stand and the balloons to the branches and have the employees there fill the balloons up with air.  It's not like they filled them with helium.  But of course these dopes in administration don't know what they're doing.  And that means they really don't know what they're doing.  I floated an idea to my buddy that it could be that these dopes are actively trying to destroy the library from within.  That they had some master plan to do so by just focusing on the wrong things.  But then I thought about how they're not that thought out.  I went back to my original hypothesis that they're just inept idiots.

Wed Jan 30, The price on my stock went up today.  Too bad it couldn't go back up the point where the was a few weeks ago.  But, it's better than a couple of days ago when the amount was about $10 less.  Still, I'll honestly never understand how people will cut down a company for only making $84 billion instead of $90 billion.  Yes, that a lot of money, but they don't see the $84 billion.  Like not seeing the forest for the trees.

I went on the library's social media and found this sorry little picture of the event.  It's telling that there were only two posts today for these supposed big event.  Even the dope that runs the social media couldn't get it up to take some pictures of the shit event.  One of my coworkers later texted me to say that this was the "Tomfoolery" launch.  I told him that it was more like the launch of the Titanic.  I told my buddy that for sure this thing is going to be a milestone to mark the beginning of the end.  These dopes have hung so much "hope" on these things.  But they fail to do the work when it comes to running a library.  They fail to understand that tossing 1/3rd of the collection out the window in favor of these stupid "services" isn't going to help the library in the long run.  If anything they're shooting themselves in their collective feet.  But hey, go right ahead dopes and keep "launching" some bullshit.  Nothing will come of it.  No one cares.  I told my buddy that what these dopes don't get is that they're talking to a mirror.  I think I described it as an echo chamber in a previous entry.  If not I'll just say it here.  They are too far removed from being a patron to know what a patron would want.  They're just shoveling these things out there hoping to hit on the one thing that will succeed.  Well none of this is going to succeed.  It's pretty much all shit.

The above is a screen capture of a social media post from the library.  Only they took another post from the teen social media account, slapped a horrible filter on it, and reposted it.  If you click the image it will open the original posting.  Those few seconds are cringe worthy.  Let me try to explain what's going on in the clip.  The over the back photo clearly shows the size of the so-called "studio" is tiny.  This is why I call it the "Sound Closet," instead of the stupid name these dopes have given it, "Sound Space."  Aside from that you can see the kids in the studio are absolutely bored.  One kid in the shot is leaning on the wall.  Another girl is spinning in her chair.  Everyone else is just there.  The kid in the middle of the shot is trying to figure out what's going on.  He fumbles with the mouse, as the guy in "charge" of the closet sits there watching him flaying.  The poor kid awkwardly tries talking into the microphone, making a half sound.  It's all tension and boredom in that closet.  Moreover, who is this sound closet for?  Most people can use an iPad for things like this.  Or they have other means that are more state of the art than this horrible little set-up.

At TheGirl's new place Chan can't quite sit on top of the TV like at her old place.  At her new place she has a router and a modem behind her TV, which means more separation between the wall and the TV.  For now Chan has been sitting at her table.  I may have to buy him a little chair.

Thu Jan 31, I had a feeling that yesterday's stupid tech bullshit event was going to be a huge failure, but just how much of a failure remained to be seen.  Today I set upon trying to gather the information and gauge just how bad yesterday's stupid event really was.  Thankfully it was such a colossal failure that not many people were tight lipped about it.  It seemed like many people wanted to spill the beans about the whole thing.  Spill they did.

One of the first people to spill the beans was Kvon.  Someone you would least expect any truthful comments from.  But he even admitted that the whole thing was so poorly organized that no one showed up.  Kvon was in the mockery space and he said that only four people showed up, and one of those people was DrDeath.  Kvon said, "So I guess that really means only three people showed up."  Fail!  Gitmo also told me that there were very few people.  One of the clerks I talk to said it was lightly attended, and called the whole thing, "Tomfoolery."  One of the main complaints is that there was not enough notice or advertising.  Well, I've already pointed out that they foolishly thought that they had sent the order to graphics last week, but they didn't.  They scrambled to send it on Monday, giving them zero time to disseminate the information.  Not that it would have helped much.  These things are not important to average patron.  To paraphrase pseudo supervisor on something I was working on, I'm not talking to the patrons, I'm talking to other library people.  And yes, all these fliers have an intended audience, and it's not the general public.  This is why the general public doesn't care.  These idiots have to keep it simple, but instead they complicate things with their horrible fliers.  In short, Vagabundo and I predicted this would be a huge failure and it was.  Even bigger than we thought it would be, I might add.

One of the librarians pointed out this morning that the URL on the top of the flier is wrong.  There's supposed to be a dot between the E in Glendale and the first of three I's.  To me this is absolutely perfect.  Another perfect fail.

It did rain today, and I got soaked.  I was doing well until I reached Brand.  There was water coming down from an overhang and I walked under it.  Next thing I know my whole back is soaked.  My gloves were already soaked before that, and so was my cap.  But that moment made it complete.  I was soaked.

I was asked to pick up some games from Pacific, but not the library it turned out.  From the recreation department.  The games were not heavy, but they were bulky (as seen above).  I think they're for the teen thing next week, but I can't be sure, because no one said anything about anything.  They just said pick this shit up.  When I went back to Central Kvon told me that he knew nothing about this delivery.  We didn't even know where to put them.  Kvon tried to get a hold of Mala, but she was out of the building.  So he just told me to throw them in the mockery space.  Aye aye!  This teen event next week is just another fail waiting to happen.

Thu, Jan 31st entry.