My Thursday:
8:40AM: I arrive at work and get a parking spot. Yeah! I am happy that the parking situation should return to normal tomorrow.
8:50AM: I sit down at my desk and start to read through my emails. I also read my RSS feeds and think about the day.
I try and print a label on the new Zebra printer that I was configuring yesterday. ARGH!! It seems to be printing fine, but nothing actually gets printed on the label. Serisouly!! I hate label printing. Config sheets print fine.
I start putting together a spreadsheet of library staff computers with their original date of deployment. I have 9 more new computers for staff, and I need to decide where they are going to end up so that I can give this project to the new library systems technician.
9:25AM: I get an email from one of the reference librarians with a link to an article on Boston.com about an upcoming Snuggie Pub Crawl. I got a Snuggie from my mother-in-law for Christmas that I keep in my office. This is a great topic of conversation in the library.
9:30AM: I get an email from the person who is digitizing art slides on campus. She will be on campus next week and can meet. I respond with times that will work for me.
9:35AM: I start to get ready to walk across campus for a meeting. I remember to grab our library system backup tapes to bring over to IT in order to switch tape sets. I set out.
10:00AM-11:15AM: I attend my weekly system’s group, IT meeting. I report on the issues with our digital asset management system on Monday. One of our sys admins suggests to me that it might help to automatically reboot the server on a schedule. I write this down so that I can think about it and come up with an appropriate reboot schedule.
There is also a push to make sure that older records in various systems that might still contain social security numbers are purged. We used to have SSNs in our library system, so I need to discuss purging old patron records with our circulation supervisor.
11:30AM: I am back in my office. I debate about the efficacy of throwing the label printer off the balcony (my office has an door to an outside balcony). I decide that this course of action would only make more work for me.
I read through emails and delete most of them.
I continue to work on a schedule for computer rotation. There are several question marks. I think that I might want to discuss this with the Manager of Desktop Support. It might help to know whether or not I will be able to get additional desktops next fall.
12:00-1:00PM: I go have lunch. I decide to go out and get pizza. This affords me the opportunity to return my vehicle to the parking lot behind the library. The pizza makes me happy.
1:05PM: I return to an email from one of the reference librarians about editing web pages in the content management system. He is having a problem making changes. I send an email asking him to let me know when he is at his desk so that I can look into this.
1:10PM: I start a list of items that I will need to go over with my new employees next week. It comes to mind that I need to find out about getting keys, about getting his voice mail set up and about his schedule on Monday.
1:25PM: The reference librarian calls. He is at his desk. I ask him to log into the CMS and connect to his machine. I see the issue – a link to a survey does not display in the editor. I can see the link when I open the CMS, but I have the admin client. I look around and the link is there in the HTML. I start to walk him through editing the code when I have a thought. The link in question is actually an anchor or bookmark link. These types of links do not work well in our XML-based site. I go into the code and delete the anchor reference. Lo and behold, the link itself is now visible in the reference librarian’s CMS client. Very weird, but the problem is now solved.
I continue to work on training materials for next week.
I try the label printer again with no success.
2:40PM: I am copied on an email from the circulation supervisor about some transfer students that are not in our library system. This means they were not in the file of active students that we received from IT last week. The circulation supervisor requests a new file from IT. I’m included in the email because I am the one who uploads the files.
2:44PM: I get another email from the circulation supervisor about a new laptop that the tutors in the writing program on campus use when they are working with students in the library. The laptop will be kept behind at the circulation desk. The circulation supervisor wants to know if the laptop can be stripped. I reply that I will get back to her about this later.
2:50PM: I get ready to head across campus for my 3:00PM meeting. I walk through the snow which is actually rather pretty.
3:00-4:30PM: I attend a meeting of our campus’ portal implementation team. We launched a portal for finance employees last July. The portal will be launched to students this semester. We are working on finalizing content for the portal.
4:30PM: The meeting ends. I go downstairs to the help desk to pick up the IT welcome letter for my soon-to-be employee.
4:50PM: I head home.
5:10PM: I arrive home to find that my mother in law had stopped by the house today with American chop suey and tortellini soup. I am very excited because I love both of these – and more importantly, I don’t have to cook dinner. Yeah!
5:47PM: I remember about the emails that I needed to send regarding employment issues for my new person. I get out my laptop and do this.
6:02-6:30PM: I see an email from the reference librarian who I worked with earlier saying that he finished editing several web pages. Because of the time invovled in publishing changes, I decide to approve and process the updates tonight. I vpn into the CMS and approve the changes. Now, I am really done for the day.
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