One of my favorite weirdos had never caused a major problem, for either the staff or his fellow computer users. But still...he qualifies.

Adam was different -- not to mock people with learning disabilities, but you can tell who they are, and he was one of 'em. Despite his friendly attitude, Adam could set you on edge with his booming voice and crazed staring.

Several times he would come to my station and yell at me about politics, the weather, surfing (both on and off-line) and I would be forced to remind him to use his "inside voice". His tendency to stare shamelessly at my chest was another one of his endearing charms that you just had to accept.

At one point during the summer we had a mysterious patron printing out graphic pornography for us to find on the printer -- a very cheap thrill for us librarians. In order to discover the culprit, we began viewing the computer histories. which is how I discovered what Adam really was interested in.

His computer was chock-full of farting girls websites -- from the bathroom humor to the erotic. Personally I say "to each his own" and until someone complains, I think I should just "butt out".

Another favorite of mine was Pretty Girl, an early forties woman with a short term memory and even shorter temper.

Pretty Girl came several times to the library just to use the Internet, like many do, and asked for assistance in creating an email account. I'm sure other libraries have a policy about how much time can be spent per person, which ours at the time was no more than ten minutes, especially since there was only only staff member on duty in the area. I sat down with Pretty Girl and got her started. Repeatedly I told her that she would have to create her account, including email name & password, on her own and that I wouldn't watch for her own privacy.

Next time she came in, Pretty Girl was irritated. Seems she'd forgotten her password and needed help. With greater patience than I'm known for, we looked at her screen and clicked on the "forgotten password" section. Not only did Pretty Girl forget her password, she had no idea what her login name was.

She became extremely agitated when I told her that she'd have to either remember her information or create a new account. Her response was that it was my responsibility to keep up with such information, since a) I had helped her to begin with and b) I was the "expert".

Librarians and staff know how to play this game: you stand firm and the policy will back you up, so I did. Not ten minutes later she was back, asking me for her password. With great restraint and a pleasant smile I explained that we'd just gone through this and that I couldn't help her.

Pretty Girl decided that I was just the worst librarian she'd ever seen and everybody in the room should know. She began complaining about me, quite loudly, to anyone who would listen, until I was forced to approach her. Leaning down close to her I informed her again about our policy -- no more than 10 minutes, we are not responsible, etc. You could see the shame fall dAugust 24, 2006

Pretty Girl wrote down her email information after that day.

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