OLA SSD Conference Hotel

The 2012 OLA SSD conference hotel, Valley River Inn, is offering a discounted room rate for conference attendees. The discounted rate is $109 single and $119 double. Other room packages available at a discount. Use the link below to make reservations at the conference rate.

Valley River Inn Conference Reservations

Book early! Conference rate is available through June 13, 2012.

Although you will feel like you are miles away, Valley River Inn is a hotel conveniently located near downtown Eugene, Oregon, in the heart of the city. The Willamette River, Eugene's largest shopping mall, and miles of scenic bike paths are just outside the doors. Valley River Inn is concluding a renovation of its guestrooms, meeting space, public space and Sweetwaters Restaurant. Everything will be renovated by the beginning of June, in time for the conference.

Fix-it Friday (Repair Manual Edition) : "One On, Two Off" Hollow Tube Recase

Welcome back to Fix-It Friday!  Today's post presents an illustrated guide to recasing a hardcover book using a single piece of paper and some PVA.  This procedure may be old hat to some of you who are already repairing books in your collection, but it is so useful (and simple) that I hoped it'd be worth sharing again.

This repair reattaches a hardcover case to a text block without replacing the endsheets and super.  A strip of paper, folded thrice, is used to rejoin the text block and case at the spine without losing the important open "tube" along the spine.  "One on, two off" refers to the three sides of the folded paper -- in this version of the repair, one of the three folds will be glued onto the spine of the text block, while the other two will be off the text block and glued to the spine inlay of the case.

If it sounds complicated so far, fear not!  Let's look at what we're dealing with and gather the tools we'll need.

Announcing Our 2012 Conference!

Conference 2012 

Support Staff: Changing Lives Every Day!

Friday, July 20, 2012 | 7:00 am - 4:00 pm

Valley River Inn, Eugene, OR http://www.valleyriverinn.com




Cost of attendance is $70 for OLA members and $85 for non-members.

We are pleased to announce that our keynote speaker this year is Brian Doyle, editor of Portland Magazine at the University of Portland and author of Mink River, his first novel and finalist for the 2012 Oregon Book Award for fiction. Bill Baars, Director of Lake Oswego Public Library, says

“Mink River is ‘northwest literature’ in a joyous, exuberant, Ken Keseyesque way, with an emphasis on uniquely Oregon characters, history, flora, fauna and rainfall.” 

Brian Doyle’s previous books have been finalists four times for the Oregon Book Award.


We are offering the following sessions at our 2012 conference:

• Intermediate Book Repair for Libraries, an all-day workshop. Registration limited to first 8 participants.
• Internal Customer Service – Support Staff Working Together 
• Connecting with Youth – Oregon Libraries Care 
• A Day in the Life – Support Staff in the Digital Age 
• Coping with Change – Support Staff Striving for Excellence 
• Beyond Books – Oregon Libraries Reaching Out 
• Tek4U – Oregon Libraries and the eBook Explosion 

Conference attendees are provided with a buffet breakfast and choice of luncheon entrée.

Registration open soon!

Read more about complete session descriptions, and local information, including instructions for booking at the conference rate, and exciting financial aid news!

Congratulations, Rea!

At the Oregon Library Association conference last week, SSD member Rea Andrew received the Library Employee of the Year award.  Rea has served SSD in many ways, including as chair, and as chair of the Conference Committee.  She's currently SSD treasurer.  She's a major force in her job at Newberg Public Library.  The introductory comments by her co-workers emphasized her flexibility, adaptability; and ability to rise to any occasion; I'd never heard a plunger referred to in an OLA awards presentation before!  Rea received a standing ovation from the crowd.

It's great to see the contributions of support staff celebrated at the OLA conference.  OLA president Abigail Elder also lauded SSD in her opening remarks, saying how impressed she was by the SSD conference last summer, and by this blog, especially Fix It Fridays.

Huzzah, Rea, and huzzah, SSD, for continuing to serve and Oregon library community in so many ways!

Magical meat?

Grilled unicorn detail from a newly discovered
Medieval cookbook at the British Library.

In case you missed it, an article over at American Libraries has an April Fools roundup, with this year's best from libraries around the globe. 

I especially like the Really Advanced Search from google.  Technically not a library, but since it's google, it's only a matter of time, am I right?

Greg Landgraf, the articles author, says libraries and pranks have a strong tradition.  Did your library "celebrate" April Fools?  What is your library's best prank?

And since it's the season for Peeps, this really never gets old.

-Rebecca

Fix-It Friday : Be Square

This month's Fix-It Friday book mending topic is short and sweet: some quick ways to get straight, square measurements without taking down a lot of numbers. 

First of all, it's useful to know how wide your regular metal ruler is, and to use a cutting mat that has grid lines printed on it.  You can use the width of the ruler as well as its length as a measuring tool, and the paper or stock you are cutting can be placed square on the grid on the cutting mat to ensure a straight cut.

A trick I learned recently was to install a jig onto the cutting mat that can be used to jog up paper and hold it true and straight while cutting or folding.  Such a jig can be made easily with a piece of thick, stiff board (here, a strip of Davey book cover board), attached with strips of double-backed tape.

The library of the future

Images courtesy Yi ARCHITECTS

This is the floor plan for the 8th floor of the new Stuttgart library designed by Yi ARCHITECTS.  It's been described as the Apple store of libraries.  It's very modern and very, very bright.

As a support staff person,  one thing I always want to see, and rarely do, is the work space and how it will be used.  On the above floor plan, the sorting area is denoted by #7.   There are other sorting areas on other floors, but they are pretty much the same size.  Is it just me or is that really tiny for the size of the library?  Take a look at the pictures and let me know if you can figure out where the rest of the work gets done.

What do you think of the library of the future?

-Rebecca