Today's lessons

1) Putting "Could you help a brother out" as the subject of your e-mailed request for research help gets your question answered first.

2) On crappy, stress-filled days (er, weeks), seeing this:

helps a lot.

Today's lesson

Referencing the title of a 13-year-old rap song at a vaguely appropriate moment will give you mad street cred amongst upper-middle-class white boys in Connecticut. Yo.

Today's lesson

Receiving a challenge to Beloved* one day does not mean you won't discover
Lesbian Cowboys: Erotic Adventures in a pile of donations the next day.

*Very informal and quickly and easily resolved, for the record.

Today's lesson

Over-reliance on spell check means that you will spend two pages of your paper talking about a book in which characters were sent to be re-educated by pheasants, making it very difficult for your proof reader to stay focused on your paper, distracted as she is by images of pheasant-run educational institutions.

Today's Lesson

Even if you obsess over where to put your barcodes, you will still forget where they are when checking out new books. You will also forget five minutes later when you have to do it again.

Today's lesson

A book of Zombie Haiku can be a fast and effective means of calming anxiety.

She is still begging
But no longer for my help.
She wants her nose back.

Today's lesson

Just because you keep your overdue library book for two extra months, and then send a teacher to return it rather than bringing it back yourself, does not mean I won't notice how badly you damaged the book. 'Cause dude, the pages aren't connected to the spine at all; I'm going to notice something like that.

Today's lesson

Just because you've finally convinced a teacher who used to always bring her class to the library unannounced to sign up for info lit sessions in advance does not mean she will actually show up for the time she scheduled. Or for the time she re-scheduled after missing the first class.

Today's lesson

If you go to a kid's wrestling meet, he will bring back the book that's been overdue since December.