Weyburn and Yorkton Law Libraries

One picture of all the material we had to throw out in Yorkton

As promised, here is a post about my recent trips to two rural law libraries that are a part of the Law Society of Saskatchewan Libraries.

This summer one of the things I got to do at my new job was visit and clean up two rural libraries in Saskatchewan. The first was in Weyburn. The Weyburn courthouse had just been through a major renovation and the library had been moved to a new location within the courthouse. Because of all these renovations the new books for Weyburn (over 90 boxes!) had all been stacked on the floor of the new room. What wasn't known was that there was some sort of water problem in the basement and all these boxes had been absorbing water for a few weeks when we arrived!

Unfortunately, we had to throw out quite a few boxes which included numerous sets of old law material. With law, the primary sources are the most important, so it was quite a big loss to have to throw out all this valuable material. What we worked on for the next day and a half was throw out all damaged books and re-shelf all the material that was still useful.

The next library I went to was in Yorkton. The Yorkton library was going to need a clean up because the users wanted to turn it into a sort of lounge area with a fireplace (around books?) and big boardroom table. So they asked the LSSL staff to come and re-arrange the books around the perimeter of the room. For a day and a half we recycled most of the old textbook collection and kept the more recent textbooks and some of the old but "pretty" leather bound books. We also worked on relabeling the textbook collection as they were still in the old moys numbers.

Visiting these two libraries was a great experience and I'm glad I was able to participate, even though we had to throw all those books away!

The next few posts will be about some of the old material in the Law Society Library of Regina, my next book club meeting + my book review of my book club selection and maybe even a post about my vacation this week! 

Also me and my library co-workers have issued each other the challenge of keeping an updated blog and so hopefully you will all see an increase in posts here!

My new job

So I thought I would make a post about the job I got back in June and have been working at since.

I did a three week practicum (work study) at the Law Society Library of Regina in May to finish my SIAST programme, and it was the best of the three practicum's I've had. I finally got to work in a special library, which is a library with material that is specific to a field (law, medicine). I got to do all the neat things library technicians do (cataloguing, labeling, data entry, check-in/out) and some not so fun things (invoicing, filing) but all of it was useful to know for future job positions!

While I was there the person who I was shadowing was in the process of leaving her position, and so there was a job posting up. I applied and because I was basically being trained to do the job being advertised I was one of the preferred applicants.

I finished my practicum, went and graduated (yay!) and scheduled a meeting with the higher ups of the Law Society (parent company of the Law Society Library) for an interview. The interview went smoothly (although I was a little nervous) and about an hour later I got an email with a contract!

I had been worried about finding a job as the end of my programme got closer, because I kept hearing how bad the job market was out there. Some of my past classmates hadn't necessarily found their jobs right away and that made me a little worried about the future. I had only applied at two places, the Law Society and the library at my old high school.

The timing of getting this job was perfect and I am settling into the workforce quite easily. My coworkers are great, I always have work to do, and I get to learn about a subject I had never thought of being interested in!

Next post I'll talk about the two trips I made to two of our rural libraries.

I'm baaaack!

Well, after over half a year of absence I am back!

A lot of things have changed for me in recent months. I graduated from the Library and Information Technology Programme at SIAST in May after four long years of schooling. It felt so good to finally have something concrete come from my studies as I have had problems before with school. Here is a picture of me with my "diploma"!

During the month of May I did a three week practicum (internship) at the Law Society of Saskatchewan Library in Regina and it was wonderful! I got to do all of the things a Library Technician would do in a special library : cataloguing, filing, reference, labeling, shelving, indexing, invoicing and more! Not only was the work great but the people who work there are wonderful!

There was a job position opening up at the Law Society that I applied for during my practicum and I am glad to say that I got hired as a full-time Library Technician! I started in June and everything is going great so far.

Although this is just a short blog post I am hoping to post more in the coming weeks so keep an eye out for new posts!

Very excited!!

Like a lot of others, I have read the fantastic series by Suzanne Collins called "The Hunger Games".

The Hunger Games is a trilogy set in a dystopian world (a society in a repressed and controlled state, often a ruined world) where North America has fallen, now called Panem, and has been separated into 12 districts. The Hunger Games are an annual event that is put up for the enjoyment of the people living in the Capitol because of a rebellion that once occurred in one of the districts. Each year two tributes are picked from each district, trained in combat and then put together in an outdoor "arena" controlled by the Capitol to fight until  only one remains alive.

The main character, Katniss Everdeen (16), lives in district 12 and has had to put her name in once each year since her 12th birthday. Her sister, Prirose, has just turned 12 and it's her first year putting her name in. Among the thousands of names she is picked, and fearing for her life Katniss volunteers as the tribute. Along with her, Peeta Mellark is also picked and they are shipped off to the Capitol to begin training.

The series follows Katniss and Peeta on their journey of fighting and rebellion. 

This series has really set a new standard in YA fiction, as hundreds of new "dystopian" novels have popped up since claiming to be "the new Hunger Games". In a world currently obsessed with "Twilight" this is a refreshing change in reading trends for teenagers and lovers of Young Adult Literature.

The series has also been picked up by Lionsgate and their theatrical trailer came out this week! It looks amazing and from what I can see, seems to follow the book. I'm linking to the video so everyone else can enjoy!

Awesome site I stumbled upon

I wanted to find a tumblr for books that I could show to everyone, and I stumbled upon this awesome tumblr of "The Lisa Simpson Book Club"!

As we all know, Lisa Simpson is the most well read of the family, and always has a clever title around. Sometimes, other brilliants characters have moments with awesomely witty books.

My fovourite post so far and one of my favourite memories from The Simpsons: Christopher Walken reading "Goodnight Moon" to a group of terrified children.

"Don’t make me tell you, again, about, the scootching."