This candle is not a joke! It is real! You can buy it for $18 here. Frostbeard Studio also sells “old books” scented candles. I don’t know how either kind actually smells. If you know, tell us in the comments. Also available: sprays etc. and another candle. Thanks, Diane Westerfield!
Colorado College’s Tutt Library will begin a major renovation in the summer of 2016, and the college will of course provide naming rights to high-level donors. For now, though, we notice that several spaces in the current building have acquired home-made honorifics. Suddenly this week we have rooms, nooks, corners, and even door knobs named for librarians both real and fictional: S. R. Ranganathan, Louise Kampf, Manly Ormes, Carol Dickerson, Melvil Dewey, Rupert Giles, and Starr Lackawanna.
No one has taken credit for this shenanigan. Perhaps several people are responsible? We look forward to seeing who else might be judged worthy of a naming opportunity. We expect that not all the names will belong to librarians. Perhaps I’ll name my office after Doctor Who companion Ramanadvoratrelundar, or Project Runway mentor Tim Gunn!
Addenda, November 18: B.R. Coad and E.J. Josey.
In honor of World Book Day 2015 (March 5), Argentinian artist Raul Lemesoff created an “Arma de Instruccion Masiva” (weapon of mass instruction), a tank-like vehicle full of free books. He drove it around the city of Buenos Aires, giving books to anyone who promised to read them. Thanks, Geordie Lishman!
I only get about half of these, but I’m guessing some of you will get them all. And they take submissions! I know some of you are talented LOLcat-makers. Thanks, Lynne M. Thomas!
Flight of the Conchords plays a gig at a public library in New York City (“The Tough Brets,” Flight of the Conchords, Season 2, Episode 3). We find out at the subsequent band meeting that there were some complaints at the library about their loudness.
The Truro Public Library in Truro, Massachusetts may be responsible for this excellent jack-o-lantern. Thanks, Esau Katz!
Not sure where or when this photo was taken, but with Halloween coming up it seems apropos. Thanks, Emily Lloyd!
Now and then I myself perpetrate a library shenanigan. I’ve been making a lot of diagram poems lately, using images from old library books and other things. Ohio Edit recently published my “roots” series, which includes a diagram showing my library roots. (It also includes one for my book roots.) The illustration is from: William Austin Cannon. The Root Habits of Desert Plants. Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Institute, 1911 (full text available from Google Books). If you’d like to make a similar diagram poem showing your own library roots, email me the image (jessyrandall@yahoo.com) and I’ll collect them in a separate post.
The Kansas City Royals and the Toronto Blue Jays are facing off in the American League Championship Series, so Libraries in Kansas City, Toronto are waging a Twitter war using photographs of books. (It’s kind of like this, but with baseball.) Thanks, Joan Petit!
Weddings in libraries, bookstores, and other bookish places. I suppose it’s not really a shenanigan if the library makes money by hosting weddings — but it might feel like a shenanigan to the brides and grooms and their guests! I wish BuzzFeed had found some photos of same-sex weddings in libraries, though. They do happen.