October – AH!

Despite my poor posting skills, I’m still here. It’s been crazy in LCARS-land. I have a lot going on this month both professionally and personally, so I feel like I’m just waiting for it to be November so I can sleep. Despite my Salem location, October is a really lovely month here in Massachusetts, so I don’t want to wish it away. But . . . I do want to rest some more. (Isn’t this a little funny that I’m wishing for rest after I posted about how important it is? I feel like I don’t have time to rest right now – I guess I did all of that in September!)

So just for funsies and so you all will be nice to me this month, here’s what I will accomplish by the time October is over:

-I will have done all of my usual programs for the library which includes Book Babble, Teen Advisory Group, Teen Writing Group, Craft making Halloween String dolls and Harry Potter Halloween.
-I will have finished the Massachusetts Cultural Council Grant to try and get some grant money for Leslea Newman to come to our library in the spring. (If you haven’t read Newman’s October Mourning: A Song for Matthew Shepard, you really should. It’s amazing and completely heartbreaking.
-I will have attended a college and career fair at the high school in my library’s city. My presentation’s title? “Library science – more than just a backup plan!” I kid. But, really. I do have some information about Simmons and being a librarian in general. I’m also using lots of pictures like this one:

-I will have attended MLS’ annual Teen Summit in Worcester to hang out with Marissa Meyer (Cinder was a NaNoWriMo book!) and learn about programming using STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art & Design, and Math). You thought it was STEM? Me too, but now they’ve added Art & Design into the initiative which I think it even better. I’m all for injecting art into whatever we can!
-I will have gone to see Over the Rhine in Somerville. Huzzah!
-I will have attended the NELA conference in Portland which means hanging out with NELLS people, seeing Leslea Newman in prep for hopefully getting her to my library, and hopefully learning a lot of new skills! Plus, I’ve never been to Portland, so that’s exciting.
-I will have run a marathon and then hopefully will be able to walk to my car afterward. Fingers crossed.
-Finally, judging from my experiences walking and driving around Salem, I’ll probably get arrested for slapping a tourist at least once.

What are your plans both professional and personal, for the second half of October?

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