Saturday At the Reference Desk:

I had to deal with our dotty part-time librarian who for some reason decided to be helpful to a young patron and log him onto a computer. I still don't get this. Normally she doesn't want to go near the computers, let alone help anyone with them!
Anyway, the patron who was scheduled to be next on the computers took exception to her logging on someone who wasn't even here and words were exchanged. So the guy came down to the desk asking for the manager--which today was ME--and I had to take care of this. I got him onto the computer, but Dotty got upset and flounced off, slamming the office door. Meanwhile I apologized to the guy--he'd been upset, but not as much as Dotty!

Next, one of our regular homeless guys, who I have had some interesting exchanges with (!) came up saying that he'd have to wait a half hour for a computer, so couldn't I just look up this address on Mapquest for him?  "This address" proved to be that on a driver's license on a wallet he was holding out to me--not his own.  I told him that I couldn't do that, and that if he'd found the wallet, he could give it to us and we'd put it in the lost and found. He shook this off and said he'd just have to wait. I don't know whether he'd found the wallet or been given it by someone else who had "found" the wallet, but my guess is that he was planning on taking it to the house and trying to get a reward!

Several minutes later the security guard came up to tell me that a little boy's father said he'd seen a naked man in the men's bathroom. (Note to parents--don't send kids into public bathrooms alone!). We went with the father to investigate, opened the bathroom door, and reeled at the smell! By then the guy had apparently scuttled into one of the stalls, and when he eventually came out, our guard identified him as one of the homeless guys who falls asleep regularly upstairs.
For those of you who aren't familiar with homeless in libraries, odds were that the guy was trying to take a bath. We get this a lot, especially during the warm weather. From the smell, he needed one. But he also had no bag and hence no change of clothes to put on.....

Homeless Guy with the wallet came over and reported he'd found the address and that it was a "very nice neighborhood". I hope he took the bus down there and found no one home!

All of this took place in less than half an hour.
And I'm gonna get the reference manager come Monday. He left early and said everything was quiet upstairs!!!!!

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