An Introduction

If I were a regular reader of a blog and discovered that, for whatever reason, the creator wasn't going to post for awhile and instead had a "guest writer" come in to keep it active, I would probably avoid it until he came back. That's just me, however, and since I've only got about a week here, and I will try to keep you moderately entertained. I will also keep it PG-rated, as I promised Scott before he left.

Instead of speculating about what Scott's doing on his honeymoon, I will instead begin with how I actually met him. I had spent the previous two months being trained at another library in the city, and I wasn't prepared for how different it would be when I started at the brand new library where Scott would train me. It was packed, and kids were running all over the place. The books were not in any kind of order. Kids would ask for a book, I would get the Dewey number, and lead them to a shelf where the books were crammed into random spots. The computers were using a program that I wasn't familiar with, and things were a hellish chaos. I needed someone to make sense of it all, and I could not have been paired off with a worse person to guide me. I would ask Scott a question and would get a short, mumbled answer, which only vaguely helped. The impression I got from him was that he wished I would just leave him alone so that he could get back to doing whatever it was he was doing at the time (whatever it was, I can assure you that it wasn't what he was being paid for). When one of the printers stopped working, he walked over to it, pressed a few buttons, and got it to work again. When I asked him how he fixed it, he rubbed his finger in a circle on the side and said that I just needed to touch it the right way. I later learned that the best way to fix the printers is to do exactly as he did: randomly tap at the buttons until it starts printing again. After two years of the same printers, that system has yet to fail me. I usually leave off the part where he gently massaged the side with his finger.

A couple more things. For those who have read the book already, yes, I did carry around a notebook, but I didn't write down everything Scott said, since very little of it was of much help. Also, the interview in the book took place in our break room, and was suddenly brought to an end when the boss walked in and started talking to us. Thus, it never had the chance to morph into "My Dinner With Andre," which I was hoping for.

You may now start speculating about the honeymoon.

Till next time,
Roland Saint-Laurent