Reddit Post: Buy a Book from Borders With Coupon, Help a School Library

From Reddit: If you buy a book on March 19 or 20 at Borders (and use this coupon), money goes to help build a school library!

Since we're about to have a big book-centered Secret Santa, I thought it made sense to share this. :)

A nonprofit I volunteer with is doing its 3rd annual book drive, and this year we are doing something special! We're building an entire school library at a new elementary school in Brooklyn, NY. Seriously, the library is currently a big empty room.

Borders has generously teamed up with us and on March 19 and 20, if you use this coupon ONLINE or IN STORE, $ will be donated to get shelving for the library. It does not save you money, but it is a free way to donate to a good cause! And it can be combined with other coupons you might have.
Note: The coupon doesn't work with pre-orders and I'm not sure if Borders stores that are closing will take it.

You can also donate books if you feel so inclined. It's a K-5 school and they need every kind of book a school library needs, including non-fiction and reference books. (They are also learning Latin! So maybe a few easy Latin books would also be awesome.) Used are fine if it is in good shape and not hugely out of date. You can read more on the campaign and find the address here: http://thehpalliance.org/action/campaigns/deathly-hallows/horcrux-5/.

Thank you everyone! And I'm happy to answer any questions. :)

Screwy Decimal: Sometimes It Gets Real

One of the LISNews Blogs to Read in 2011 is Screwy Decimal, a name which I am so sad I didn't come up with first. Now it's lagomorphs when I wanted leporidae and dithering about changing again and there's really a limit on how many times you do that. In any case, I read a few entries - I really thought this one was quite touching - and decided to follow the blog, which I will put on my links list on that sidebar over there sometime when I'm not about to plant my face on the keyboard.

E-Readers in Ghana

Hey, it's my favourite bugaboo about the digital divide turned on its ear! Worldreader.org is sending e-readers to students in Ghana and it seems to be going well so far. They also have a project in Florida. One thing both projects have in common: kids are great hackers. There are some differences, too:

One of the differences is in motivation. If a teacher in Florida doesn't want to bother with the training or believes the technology is a distraction, it is probably because they already have access to the paper books the texts are from. In Ghana, that is not so. In Ghana, the e-reader program has made the difference not between one type of book or another but books or none.

Chocolate Library, Library of Alexandria, and Condiment Crime Updates

Those upset that the Chocolate Library store was asked to shut down can rejoice: Chocolate Library is go. The shop will also be adding books to its wares... books about chocolate. Everybody wins!

In other good news, the Library of Alexandria (the new one opened in 2002) has thus far been kept safe - people have actually been guarding it.

...When unrest broke out on Friday, a cordon of young people rushed to surround the Library complex (which includes conference halls and a planetarium) and protect it from vandalism.

...The move to protect the Library—as with similar efforts by protesters in Cairo to protect the Egyptian Museum after a group of looters smashed display cases and destroyed two mummies—is not only a matter of guarding the books and other splendid collections housed beneath its circular roof: it is a matter of guarding an idea.

(Read more about the vandalism of the Egyptian Museum.)

In other news, the woman accused of condiment crimes has plead guilty to the charges. The reason for dropping condiments in the book drop? Past conflicts with library patrons and staff. Way to ruin it for the rest of the people, lady. But then, what made her want to ruin the library for others in the first place?

Canadian National Book Count

Hockey teams and Hollywood moviemakers measure success by head counts and ticket sales. So if you’re trying to prove that books still matter in an increasingly post-print society, then maybe you have to join the ratings game.

Which is why, when Canadians buy and check out their books this week, the numbers will be counted as part of a campaign to turn the solitary act of reading into a more public display of solidarity for books and the bookish.

Read more at the Globe and Mail!

If you are not from Canada, just go ahead and buy and borrow books anyway. It's okay. I said so.

Buy India a Library

Buy India a Library is an appeal from four librarians on Twitter. We want to raise enough money via PayPal donations, to buy a mobile library in India, or even a permanent library with books, furniture and staff!

Please get involved, give as much as you can, and spread the word to as many people as possible. Let's make this happen!

They have a site which includes an FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions). I'm going to guess this isn't going to involve e-readers.

The library in India will come from the Rural Literacy and Health Programme (RLHP), set up in 1984. To quote the organisation’s website, the RLHP “…operates in 56 slums and 25 villages in Mysore, Mandya & Chamarajanagar districts of Karnataka State in South India covering a population of 50,000.”

The donkey drawn libraries are delivered by the African Educational Trust a UK registered charity formed more than 50 years ago, dedicated to support education in Africa. The mobile libraries are aimed at kids, and contain around 100 fiction, non-fiction and reference books – the libraries travel to schools in Somalia, Sudan and Uganda (all of which are low on supplies of books, due to being former war zones).

Donkeys. See: not everyone can afford technology.

Thank You Notes

When I was little, my mother insisted we write thank-you notes after Christmas and birthdays. My brother and sister and I hated doing it, but we did it anyway. I can't remember when we were 'allowed' to stop, but my brother and I did so. Maybe my sister did for a while, but she took it up again. She even went so far as to write thank-you notes from her baby daughter for gifts we gave her, which were hilarious and which I kept. I started thinking that it was sweet of her to do this and wondering if maybe I should take up writing thank-you notes again.

A lawyer named John Kralik decided to write more thank-you notes; one each day. He wrote a book about it called 365 Thank-Yous. Included in the article is a list of thank-you note writing tips. I think I should read this book; it's about time I got back to thanking people via real notes.

After the holidays, it's easy to view thank you note writing as a chore, but Kralik says that sincerity is the best approach — he encourages people to focus on one true, meaningful sentence about the gift or the person. The notes don't have to be long, Kralik explains; sometimes limiting yourself to just a few sentences forces you to distill your sentiments.

A long time ago I went through a very difficult period in my life; I suffered from clinical depression. (I still do. I'm just very well medicated now.) The importance of lots of little things hit me: the small things people do that are thoughtful and kind. Things I should be grateful for. We take a lot of things for granted, including people. When it was hard for me to feel cared for or worth caring for, I decided to try to make sure people who were kind to me or provided some kind of service to me were thanked. I figured maybe if I took a few seconds to be thoughtful, maybe I could make someone's day a little better or at least more tolerable. Little things like that wound up making a big difference to me when I was miserable.

Stroke Victim Credits Librarians for Helping Him Read Again

Bruce Searles says librarians helped him read again.

Johnson said that the library's services - including story hours and summer reading programs - are exciting, but working with individual people is also a service to the community.

"It's something like (working with Searles) that can really change somebody's life, or just being here for somebody who's lonely or maybe grief-stricken or just looking for something to read. ... It may not be glamorous, but those are also in their own, quiet way incredibly important," she said.

Frugal Sisters Leave One Million Dollars to Public Library

In the end — after living long, frugal lives — Elsa and Marjorie Goodyear, of Eugene, wanted to show appreciation for the community organizations that were important to them.

That fondness became public Friday when officials announced that the sisters had left $1 million to the Eugene Public Library and a combined $700,000 to three charities: Goodwill Industries, Eugene Mission and Greenhill Humane Society.

These two sisters pinched pennies (they lived in the same house, rode a three-wheel bicycle around town, and made their own clothes) and lived frugally; they had no living relatives, so they left their money to the library and a few charitable organizations. How nice!

The Kindness of Reddit

I am posting so much stuff from LISNews today. Anyway! Here is an article about the Top 25 Most Awesome Things Reddit Users Have Done. I'm only at item four and I'm already sniffly. I should check Reddit out more often.

And Now a Public Service Announcement for November 17th

Off topic, but important to say:

Clinical depression is a real problem. Clinical depression cannot be fixed by 'mind over matter'; that mind is wired a little weird and doesn't make the proper chemicals to be happy. Yes, there are ways to cope, but serious clinical depression is not an imaginary issue.

If you are feeling alone, if you are making very final plans, if you do not feel you have a place in this world and you are hurting, please take a moment and listen when I tell you you are not alone. It happens to some people. A lot of people, actually - more people than you think, and the more of us who speak out and say we have a problem, the more people out there realize they aren't alone and they can get help. It may not feel like it, but this, too, shall pass. And even if you don't believe that, you might want to stick around just to see if it's actually true. Just one more day. Or one more hour, or one more minute, or one more second if that's what it comes down to.

You are a part of everyone you have met, and your loss would be a huge, terrible tragedy for everyone around you. People care about you more than you might think. They are not better off without you. We're all better with you.

If you are feeling depressed, take a moment to read. Even if you're not depressed, you probably know or will know someone who will go through this, so take a moment to read, too. One good thing about the internet is that we can find information and connect to people who have been through what we have been through or know how to help even if we're far away. Take advantage of that.

Goodyear Reading

Though Elizabeth Goodyear passed away, you can still read about her in this New York Times article from 2008: In Strangers, Centenarian Finds Literary Lifeline. The story goes that a yoga instructor befriended her elderly, blind neighbour. She eventually put up signs at various yoga studios downtown (New York, believe it or not) and sent emails asking for people to come read to Goodyear. And people answered, and it brought them together in a wonderful way, and hooray for reading, etc.

Joe Halderman and the Rikers Island Library

So the guy who tried to extort two million from David Letterman works as an inmate librarian at the 'standing library' run by the New York Public Library on Rikers Island. Just about the only useful thing he's done recently, then, is to bring about an article on the standing library.

I like to hear about inmates reading. It keeps them out of trouble and I really do want to believe that prison programs can educate and rehabilitate people.

Inmates were brought down from one section of the jail at a time and browsed the books. One of them, John Ferris, a 41-year-old Brooklyn man sentenced for stealing a car, was looking at books about auto repair — not so he could steal another car when released in August, he said, but so he could get a job at a garage.

The inmates showed their jail identification to one of the librarians who logged their names and books. Then they sat in plastic chairs with rounded edges, reading their books, waiting to be taken back to their cells.

“Being able to read helps keep incidents down and keeps the inmates’ minds occupied because they’re doing something constructive,” said Juan Rosado, a corrections officer who helps inmates access the library. “It helps keep their minds at ease, and helps avoids fights.” The program has been credited by the city’s corrections commissioner, Dora Schriro, with keeping inmates focused on learning and enrichment, and with curtailing fights, misbehavior and other distractions.

More Gay-Friendly Books in Libraries, Please!

Brent writes for a blog called The Naughty Book Kitties and guest blogged at Pinched Nerves, neither of which I'd heard of before but will be bookmarking for use later. Brent's guest article is about how he found the lack of gay-friendly books in libraries unencouraging; he was even told he'd have to go somewhere else for 'inappropriate titles'.

There were a couple of parts of his article I found interesting: there's his explanation of how reading made him feel - comfortable.

I felt comfortable with books, with the characters. I knew that they didn’t care whether I was different or not. They were just characters, after all, and they were too busy telling me their story to care whether or not I was gay. Reading was my escape. I felt normal while reading.

I remember that feeling, too. It's an especially valuable one when you're a teenager and any misstep might earn you humiliation. It wasn't so bad for me personally, but I think if I'd been in a high school where most kids had a cellphone that could take video, I'd've been worse off. The second was this:

People really write about this stuff? I thought. It felt . . . great. Imagine that you are an alien on your own planet. And imagine you find out that there are more aliens, just like you, on your planet. And imagine what it would be like–to know that someone knows what it’s like. What you’re going through.

This is one of those things I love about reading, how it can take you away and maybe that place you go is somewhere you'd think you'd fit in for once. Or even just somewhere you'd want to go. All the adventure, none of the bugs and injuries.

I think feeling alone is one of the hardest parts of growing up, and I think gay kids have it rough in that regard. That's why it's so important to have books there for kids to turn to, to help them feel better about themselves, to tell them they're wonderful and just fine the way they are when maybe the world around them doesn't. I'm thinking maybe I should take down the titles of some of the books on Naughty Kitties and check if my local libraries have them. If they don't, I think I'd like to put in requests for them.

Children's Library in Liberia

Just a neat little story about setting up the first library in Liberia. This one's for children. While I have to wonder if they really never had a library before (really?), this is still most definitely awesome. Students in Arizona schools collected more than ten thousand used books and teaching materials to donate, while others donated backpacks, supplies, and teaching aids. In Yekepa, where as many as five children share a photocopied textbook, this will be very helpful.

'Help Me Help My Friend in DC'

Through the efforts of various posters on MetaFilter, two Russian women were possibly saved from human trafficking.

Newsweek reported on their blog and a site called Mother Jones ran an interview with the original MF poster.

This is an example of the good power of social sites.

Google Adds Suicide Prevention Hotline Result to Suicide Queries

Google has added a link to a suicide prevention hotline to results of a suicidal seeming query. I approve of this. It seems like a step toward responsible information access without censorship.

Library Social Workers

The San Fransisco Public Library has hired a social worker to help it's homeless patrons.

"Public libraries are trying their best to serve their users and people who have traditionally been non-users," Alire said. "I hope that what the San Francisco Public Library has done by hiring a social worker serves as a model, because these people are educated and trained to help these patrons who have every right to use the public library system."

More libraries across the country are hiring therapists to train staff members how to handle stressful patrons. Edmond Otis, a psychotherapist, trains librarians how to talk to patrons who may be mentally ill or on drugs.

"There is a gigantic homeless population that basically 'passes' except nobody knows where they sleep," Otis said. "That population is growing. But we're looking at the mentally ill and drug addicted. And there are ways of talking to someone." That includes remaining calm, treating all patrons with respect, and setting rules and sticking to them, he said.

I hope many more libraries follow San Fransisco Public Library's example. I would definitely appreciate training on how to deal with high or mentally handicapped people. That is some scary stuff.

Harry Potter, Freedom of Speech, and Failure

JK Rowling gave a commencement speech at Harvard University about the fringe benefits of failure. You can also watch it here:

J.K. Rowling Speaks at Harvard Commencement from Harvard Magazine on Vimeo.

I thought one of the most interesting parts was when Rowling spoke of the time she worked at Amnesty International's headquarters in London:

Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power. I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard, and read.

And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.

Amnesty mobilises thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have. The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners. Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet. My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people’s places.

Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathise.

Mean Cold Lady

I found this letter to the editor in which a woman with a cane claims she got to the library five minutes early on a cold day and the library wouldn't open despite the people waiting outside. I was sympathetic; poor woman, handicapped, c'mon, just five minutes, people! Then I started reading the comments.

It turns out this woman knows exactly when the library opens and could have waited in her car until the proper time; it seems people often want to get there first so they can get to the computers. The comments from other library goers indicate this woman is unpleasant to deal with and prone to complaints. My sympathy waned.

Then, of course, there were the comments about how handicapped spaces should be moved further away from the doors because 'many peoples' only handicap is being fat and lazy'. Ouch.

I believe libraries should be accessible to people with disabilities. I also believe having a disability doesn't mean a person can use it as an excuse to be a jerk.