Pwnage from Yesteryear

[LingualMonkey]

I was reminded of this story today when I was discussing research with my students. Way back in that tacky decade called "the 80s," when I was finishing up my undergraduate degree, I worked in the main branch of my college library at the circulation desk. Great job. Except for the last couple of weeks of the quarter, the place was empty, and I got paid $.05 above minimum wage to do my homework.

Anyway...

While I worked at the main library, we had other libraries as well. Connected to us via walkway was the law library, and halfway across campus was the music library. Our college has a fantastic music school (really), so they have their own library.

Those who don't know the Library of Congress classification system will need to understand that in general, it doesn't make a lot of sense. Books listed under "S," for instance, are about agriculture, and world history is listed under "D." The one thing that does make sense is that "M" is for music and books about music. ALL of the "M" classification, and almost nothing else, was in the music library. Since they were in a regular campus building, their hours were vastly different than our hours--they closed at 9, we closed at midnight, and the main library stayed open until 2. It's also worth remembering that this story takes place before the glory of the Interwebs--we still had a paper card catalog.

One night, I am working the circ desk with a couple other undergrads and Joe the Malaysian Grad Student. The following exchange (to the best of my memory) occurred around 10 pm:

Dramatis Personae
MSDTF: Moronic Student Doomed to Fail
JTMGS: Joe the Malaysian Grad Student

MSDTF: Hey, I was just up on the third floor, and the collection goes from L to N. Where are all of the books listed under M?
JTMGS: They're in the music library.
MSDTF: Where is that?
JTMGS: In the music building.
MSDTF: Oh, okay. (Picks up things, prepares to leave.)
JTMGS: It's closed. They close at 9.
MSDTF: CLOSED! I HAVE A PAPER DUE TOMORROW AT 9:00! WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO?
JTMGS: Fail, I guess.

And that, friends and neighbors, is when Joe stopped being Joe the Malaysian Grad Student and became Joe the AWESOME Malaysian Grad Student.

[Amina516]

World before the internetz. Scary indeed.

[rageaholic]

Wow, a library open till 2 in the morning? 9 is a standard closing time for a lot of libraries.

And oh yeah, epic fail!

[JoitheArtist]

Those who don't know the Library of Congress classification system will need to understand that in general, it doesn't make a lot of sense.

YES! This is SO TRUE, but you get all these random library snobs who won't use anything else! Pffft, as if anyone could be too good for the Dewey Decimal system. *grumble*

Why, yes, I *was* a librarian in college! And my dad was a librarian from the time I was 6 till I was 21. We care about these things. And yes, that DOES mean that we are hopeless geeks.

JTMGS was awesome--music students can be FRAKKING ANNOYING. I used to work at the media desk, and they'd whine if we didn't have the perfect headphone splitters available for every single one of them. Good grief, splitters don't cost that much, buy your own!

[Magpie]

YES! This is SO TRUE, but you get all these random library snobs who won't use anything else! Pffft, as if anyone could be too good for the Dewey Decimal system. *grumble*

It's not me that's too good for it, it's my books that complain. And not so much that they're too good for it, as that they're too numerous. When most of the library is in the same 100 series, you really need a better system.

[McGoddess09]

What is this paper card catalog you speak of?

[Pagan]

Wow, a library open till 2 in the morning? 9 is a standard closing time for a lot of libraries.

A lot of university libraries are open late. The especially towards the end of the semester (or whatever they use), they'll be open even later.

I rarely ever went to the library to study. It was too quiet for me.

[Green_Fairy]

MSDTF: CLOSED! I HAVE A PAPER DUE TOMORROW AT 9:00! WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO?
JTMGS: Fail, I guess.

i'm reminded of a quote oft used here
"a failure to plan on your part does not make an emergency on my part"

what kind a person waits til the night before to do a paper, anyway? jeeze...

[El Pollo Guerrera]

Books listed under "S," for instance, are about agriculture, and world history is listed under "D."

Makes sense to me...

Agriculture = stuff that grows = "S"

World history = dead people = "D"

what kind a person waits til the night before to do a paper, anyway? jeeze...

I used to, through high school... Pressure makes diamonds.

[Magpie]

I used to, through high school... Pressure makes diamonds.

In high school I never had a paper over a thousand words or so, so I would do the same, but that's high school.

[CaroPhoenix]

What is this paper card catalog you speak of?

*creekily raises her cane and shakes it at the yung'un*

Why by jiminey! No makin' fun o' the older peoples on here!

Paper card catalogs were just that - little pieces of paper with information on it. You had to look and look and look for what you wanted.

You had to use those "little grey cells" in your head.

*lowers her cane*

[Chromatix]

For the group project at the end of my first year at university, there was me, one guy who was an average coder, one guy who admitted he wasn't a programmer, and one guy with a massive ego.

I made myself the de-facto project lead, and took on the tasks of writing the main report and gluing the pieces of the project together. Average Coder was given a chunk of back-end code to do, Non-Programmer was assigned to test and document the finished product, and Egomaniac was given the graphics system.

It turned out that Egomaniac was a first-class procrastinator. Two weeks later, we hadn't heard a peep out of him, while the other parts of the code were, if not polished, at least working. By the end of the third week, I had written the graphics system myself, and used it to polish and refine the project as a whole, and Non-Programmer was hard at work on his part of the pie.

Two days before we were supposed to demonstrate the project... Egomaniac showed up, with a pile of code for the graphics system. I plugged it in... and it didn't compile. After a very rapid debugging session (which revealed that he hadn't even *tried* to compile it), I determined that it also implemented only the most basic features, whereas my version had by now gone beyond them.

Egomaniac's code was not used for the demonstration. A description of events was added to my report. We got the runner-up prize for the class - and Egomaniac did not share credit for it.

[Imogene]

what kind a person waits til the night before to do a paper, anyway? jeeze...

Ask my brother about the time he won first place in the science fair by doing a 'study' on different models of paper airplanes the night before the fair.
Also, I tend to do 'last minute' papers because I don't usually need a rough draft.

[Pagan]

Also, I tend to do 'last minute' papers because I don't usually need a rough draft.

I do pretty much the same thing. I can crank out a 10-page paper in an evening.

I do do a rough draft and a final. Mainly because when I first start, it's pretty much a stream of consciousness and I have to hand-write it, I can't write on a computer.

I had an English class in high school that drove me up the wall. The teacher insisted on a thesis statement, then an outline, a first draft, a second draft, and the final. I honestly just didn't see the point of it and it distracted me from doing a good job on the paper.

[Thuringwethyl]

I had an English class in high school that drove me up the wall. The teacher insisted on a thesis statement, then an outline, a first draft, a second draft, and the final. I honestly just didn't see the point of it and it distracted me from doing a good job on the paper.

You might be interested with what this person has to say on the five paragraph essay. http://kemthemerciless.blogspot.com/...beautiful.html