Wednesday, January 14, 2009

One of my coworkers was a voluble man- fueled by caffeine and white hot curiosity. We were driving through a tiny town and saw a sign outside a realtor's office: Free Coffee and Maps. This set off a long riff about the obvious trap to catch him, how his enemies had perfected their lure, and how he could be dangling upside down from the ceiling, swaying gently, still inquiring about his promised beverage and topo quads.

I feel sort of like that about the map room in the library. It's quiet (so blessedly quiet) and full of wonderful wonderful maps. Lovely quiet people greet me pleasantly, ask if I need help, and then say nothing for hours at a time. Sometimes they stop near me to show off a particularly interesting map. Also there are nooks and crannies and the internet does not work. It's like heaven.

Until today.

Some professor thought it would be nice if students could use library resources, so he gave his class a scavenger hunt. Twenty odd people breezed through the room, asking loudly about call numbers. I had to wait for a librarian! They kept making apologetic eye contact while whisking off to intercept another teenager intent on defiling a rare map.

Eventually, I formed an impromptu class on the basics of latitude and longitude, namely: they exist, they occur in degrees, and they are a way of finding a unique point on the globe. Eventually, I did their worksheet to make them go away. It was the only way to get someone to pull out the 1:100,000 geology maps.

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