Insanity sets in...

OF COURSE I was very excited to be an actual librarian. BUT nearly 20 years of experience brought the realization of how much I DON'T know! The excitement of a newbie with the clarity of experience. I had to come into not one, but two buildings. Luckily I knew the staff and routine of one building already, so that did simplify things a bit. LPS implemented a new checkout system this last fall, so it was nice that I didn't have to learn the old one, but could just jump in with the new one (which was not without tweaks...a thorn in my side for many months. I learned very quickly to always have a Plan B...and C...and D--maybe even Plan E!!) August was spent making each media my own and trying to figure out all that was required of me in this new position. I was exhilarated and overwhelmed. Then after ONE official week, I got the call--I had $20K in orders to place for each building--and they were due in ONE WEEK--WHAT??!!?? I knew that Title I schools were all getting a cut of stimulus monies to pump up their library. Originally we were told $10K for nonfiction; I figured I'd get my feet under me before I tackled that huge task. GUESS NOT! The wonderful feds gave us $20K for both fiction & nonfiction (plus $5K for EXCITE) BUT pushed that deadline up. WOW!? We were given subs for the next Friday, and our orders were to be DONE by 4PM that day. I cleared my schedule in both buildings (except those that covered teachers' plan times) and spent nearly every waking moment of the next week pouring over catalogs. I got that order in about 3:45PM that Friday...What a start!