Quiet, It's The Library

Have you seen commercials for that new MTV show, Silent Library? It's a game show where they do outrageously loud things IN A FREAKIN' LIBRARY, like blow up a giant balloon under a guy's shirt until it pops, and have to be quiet to win prize money. I swear, I was looking for hidden cameras today when I took the #1 son to the local library.

We are not such hard-core nerds that we routinely hang out at the library on Saturday mornings. The Pony has been having issues with a computer game. I bought him three games on Tuesday, because we sent #1 to basketball camp, and he claims that new 4-wheeler is his, and, well, The Pony just doesn't rake in his share of swag. He was excited about he games. He chose two for his computer, and the new Indiana Jones Wii game.

On Wednesday, he beat one of the computer games by afternoon. He tried to install the second one, but it would not comply with our dial-up. He couldn't install it at school, because I got a less-than-sweet request from the tech dude to immediately unplug my or my son's laptop from the blue phone wire thingy (OK, Tech Dude knew the real name of it, but I can't remember) as the school does not allow personal laptops on the network. Copy to my principal, dated last freakin' week. I resisted the urge to inform him that the only reason my kid brought his laptop to play games was because the school computer that he used to use was broken in February by a student, and had not been fixed after three requests, and I was not about to let him use my only working computer, the one which my gradebook program in on.

On Thursday, my mom took The Pony to the library when it opened at noon, and they called me at school several times trying to pick the technology out of my brain, but I have limited resources up there, and could only help them with "agree to the terms of service" and "confirm email address means type it again in the other box." They left after about 10 minutes of loading the game. The Pony thought it was done, but I think he only loaded the installation program. Anyhoo... the game would not play in offline mode.

On Friday, I planned to take The Pony to the library when it opened at 10:00. We passed right by it after dropping off #1 at school, and saw a note on the door. I circled around the post office and came back, letting out The Pony to see if they had changed their schedule. "Don't worry. It still opens at 10:00. This just says the internet is down." Which kind of defeats the purpose of coming back at 10:00.

So... #1 and I were at the library 10 minutes after it opened on Saturday. We were greeted by Ruthusela 1, the elder with the hunchback, and Ruthusela 2, the one who was merely ancient, and almost spry. #1 and I passed the desk and hiked down the 25-30 stairs to the stacks and computer area. There was some weird dude at a table by himself, probably loading high-speed pr0n on his laptop, so we sat a bit away from him at a bigger table. I whispered a couple of questions to #1 about the game. We were in a LIBRARY, you see.

Then Ruth 2 came down the elevator (with a sign taped to it that says it is only for the staff) and met a lady who hiked down to the canyon floor to make a copy for her. They spoke right out loud. I was shocked. Then Ruth 2 told her, "That will be 15 cents." Geez. Talk about penny-pinching. Then Ruth 2 went to a staff computer behind us, and hollered up to Ruth 1, "I DON'T HAVE THE PASSWORD. WHAT IS THE PASSWORD? CAN YOU WRITE IT DOWN?" What good this would have done, I don't know, because either one Ruth would have needed to take the elevator to get the password, or maybe Ruth 1 could have flung it over the railing at the back of the desk area. But no. Ruth 1 hollered back, "I CAN'T WRITE IT DOWN." This mystery escapes me. Could she not write with her gnarled old fingers? Was it against policy to write down a password, what with Missouri ruffians eager to latch onto that confidential info? Did she merely lack a pen? I don't know how they solved this problem, because I moved to what I thought was a quieter corner to read while #1 worked his techy magic.

But no. They continued to holler back and forth, discussing the detonation of those WWII mortars Friday evening. Maybe that had hurt their hearing--though Ruth 2 stated that she never even heard it. I needed industrial headphones to slow the damage to my eardrums. From the Ruths, not the mortars. Any time somebody came in, the Ruths hollered like they were talking to foreigners, or were co-keynote speakers at a convention for the hard-of-hearing. I swear, #1 and I could have held a private concert with Ozzy The Prince Of Darkness Osborne, and nobody would have noticed. We could have barreled through the stacks in a game of tackler football, and nobody would have noticed.

Silent Library might as well film here. They won't even have to be silent. Prize money for everyone!

My original title was: Shh...It's The Library. But I took a good look at it, and imagined Darrell Hammond as Sean Connery on SNL Jeopardy saying, "I'll take Shhit's The Library for one hundred, Trebec."