Ask a Librarian: Why are some books labeled "In Library Use Only"?

This question comes from library patrons like you! Do you have a question for our librarians? Ask away online, by phone, or mail on our Contact page!

Hi, this question comes from Chelsea B of Junior High School. Answering is our cataloging librarian, She of the Labels:

Library materials can be found in many places. Most are on the shelves, like books and DVDs. Some are processing (getting labels put on them as well as being entered into computers), while a lot of them are at patron's homes just like yours! A very small amount, though, are labeled "In Library Use Only" for many reasons. Here's a few!

1. Cost

Some books are in the library for special reasons. These books, often reference items, cost a lot of money for the library to purchase or replace. To keep them from being damaged and available, the library keeps these to be used only inside our buildings.

2. Rarity

Other books are valuable for different reasons. Age and lack of global interest in a subject can make it so some subjects, often local histories, are no longer published. These items are kept for library use so that they can be kept in great shape for years to come.

3. Fragility

Some books really are just old. They have faded writing or brittle pages. Still, for various reasons, they may need to be kept around. They are local treasures stolen from far off lands that will never be returned. To protect them, we do not allow them to leave the building.

4. Mind Dangerous

Ever read a book and sat there thinking about it for days after? Maybe a character died or a concept was explored and you cannot shake the emotions? Well, there are books that go farther than mere trivial cause of wonder. They twist and wind your mind into pretzels and cause your thoughts to become a cheese dipping sauce that oozes down onto the hands of greedy children from far off borders of reality. These books must never be read, or at least read under the supervision of a librarian.

5. Summon Those Beyond the Stacks

Ancient texts speak of beings that desire our flesh and our waking dreams. These beings can be called forth by the retching sounds of dead languages called forth from tongues that do not understand the naked hunger. The ink in these tomes is blood written on the flesh of the living. They cannot leave the library as they do not exist outside of the library. Ask a librarian for help with these.

6. In-House Library Copy

Libraries often keep one copy of a popular book back for reference. Most often these are nonfiction books, like an almanac, but some fiction books can be put to "library use only" for reasons like book clubs. This is often just for a limited time.

Remember, if you have questions about the library, our librarians, or just in general, contact us!

The Librarians: Season 2

Starring Rebecca Romijn, Christian Kane, Lindy Booth

Buy on Amazon

CDC's Guide to When You've Been Fully Vaccinated As Interpreted by Library Staff

So you made it to your two appointments for the COVID-19 vaccination! Couldn't make it or bother to even make a curbside library appointment, but you made it for those shots, huh? Good to know. Good to know. Anyway, now that you are somewhat protected from the deadly virus, here's what you can and cannot do, according to the CDC as interpreted by library staff*. 

Gather Indoors with Other Vaccinated People

You got a church group and all of you got your shots, well then it's time to meet up. You don't even have to wear masks. Maybe even kiss and hug. Really hold on to these people. Talk about everyone who is not there, like the ones not vaccinated yet and the ones who died after the Christmas Pageant everyone really thought was safe to hold when all the kids came in from other states.

Gather Indoors with Some Unvaccinated People

Got a small group of people that do not qualify for the vaccine yet? It's fine to be around them without masks as long as no one there has an active virus. So load up the car and crash in on your kid and that dumb son-in-law that would not let you around the kids. Make sure to tell him slyly that he could not keep you from your grandbabies. Not any more. Dumb liberal son of a bitch with his "science."

Don't Have to Quarantine if Exposed to the Virus

Did someone in your bible study or that stupid son-in-law come down with COVID-19? Well, don't worry too much. You got a vaccination. You do not have to quarantine or get tested just because someone else got the virus from up there on their high horse. However, if you live in a group scenario (prison from ignoring a restraining order or cult-like barn), you should stay isolated for at least 14 days for the protection of others in your living area.

Don't Be an Asshole About It

Okay, here's where we need to reach some of you. Just because you are suddenly less capable of dying from an easily preventable virus does not mean the rest of us are. So if you do not want to be treated like a teenager having unprotected sex on prom night, please keep a mask on, stay six feet away, and avoid crowds in public, large gatherings, and around people who are unvaccinated and at increased risk. Just imagine you care about other people and are still capable of transmitting the virus, which you should and kinda are.

Stay Away from Crowds

This one is for those in the cheap seats: If you walk into a room and haven't seen five or more people in that room in over a year, leave that fucking room. No large gatherings, vaccinated or not. Don't be an example to stupid people.

Don't Travel

This includes domestic and foreign travel. Guess what? This virus is sneaky and is getting better all the time. Maybe the virus in your little town is not as bad as in your stupid son-in-law's little town. Maybe the virus he's been talking about is worse than what you have been vaccinated against. Now you are a carrier for a virus that may or may not kill everyone you know as you breeze back into Sunday school with baby pictures.

Watch for Symptoms

Feel like beating a dead horse here, but keep on the look out for symptoms of the virus. Just because someone stuck something in your arm does not mean you are safe. You are just safer. Think of being safe like a seat belt on a car. You can drive without one, but if you hit a virus going the wrong way at thirty miles per hour you are gonna fly through and crack your head on the cement and be put on a respirator.

Obey Your Boss

Don't be a dick. That's most of this, just be kind. If you work in a place with COVID rules in place, that's amazing. So few people front facing do and what safety rules they do have is mandated by the profit margin or the visibility of control. If your boss says to wear a mask and not spit on people, then do that. 

Your work, your family, your bible study group, even your dumbass "look at me read a book" son-in-law are part of your community. Until everyone is vaccinated please try and be kind. Be responsible. Wear a fucking mask so we can't see your dirty plague infested mouth.

*Like all other medical information, call your doctor not the library, but whatever, don't be a dick about it.

Hit Me With Your Best Scot (The Wild Wicked Highlanders Book 3)

By Enoch, Suzanne

Buy on Amazon

How to Check Your Email

Everyone needs to check their email if you live in the 21st century. You might need to pay an electric bill or send a crazy conspiracy message to your grandchildren. Despite this need of the modern person, many are unsure how to perform this task. Read the following instructions to check your email like a professional email person in the emailroom of big businesses like Amazon and Wal-mart without asking a person born post-2000, regardless of their obligation to you as a family member (although it would be a whole lot cooler if you did*).

Find a computer

One of the hardest things to learn about email is that it exists as a digital nothingness. There's no physical envelope to cut open. There's no postage to save like a silly person. There's not even paper. To find a computer in the pandemic, maybe ask your family or friends or see if there's a computer browser on your smartphone.

Honestly, before we even begin, have three things: some way to access the internet, your email address, and your password. 

Open a computer browser

The big three computer browsers (so named because they are used to "browse" the internet like a drunken dad at a Chuck E Cheese buffet) are Chrome, Mozilla, and whatever Microsoft is pushing these days**. The most used browser is Chrome, so use that. It looks like a circle with green, red, and yellow around a blue dot. Mostly if the thing that opens up is advertising something, you probably got close.

Type the domain

At the top of the browser, type the name of your email (also called a "domain")***. You will recognize the domain because it is at the end of your email behind the @ symbol. For example, "contact@bannedlibrary.com" is the library's email address, and "bannedlibrary.com" is the domain. Your email address domain will probably be one of the following: gmail.com, hotmail.com, outlook.com, or mail.com. 

Find "Login"

Once the computer browser does its thing, you should be taken to the website of the domain. If you are taken to an all-white screen with a list of shit on it, that's Google. Click something that looks like what you tried to type. On this screen, look for the word "Login." Click on that word. Only that word.

Type your email address

You may be taken to a new screen asking for your email address. Click on the line where it wants you to type your email address. Type your email address. Make the @ symbol by holding down the"shift" key and typing "2."**** Make sure there are no spaces. If there is no line for a password, click whatever button you see that says something like "continue*****."

Type your password

Click the empty space provided for the password, and type your password. If you do not remember your password, we will be providing you with instructions soon to reset your password. Maybe you wrote it down? Look around at the stuff in your pockets. Either way, nobody but you and the company whom you email with knows or cares about your password. The librarian did not do shit with it. 

Anyway, after typing your password, click whatever button you see that says something like "continue*****."

Enjoy your email!

If you now see a list of even more advertisements, congratulations! That's your email. Now read through each one and if it feels like it's selling something it is! Even the emails you need will read that way, except maybe important ones. Those will be sent to your "Spam" folder, so check that, too.

* If you get stumped at any point, just go find a young person and try not to get angry or cry while asking them for help. 

** Microsoft had the first big browser with Internet Explorer and now uses Edge, but they both suck so hard they could pull a golf ball through a garden hose.

***For everyone saying, "well that's not really called a domain," shut the fuck up and teach your own grandma the Internet.

****Let go of both buttons before you keep typing.

***** ANY word that maybe resembles continue. Go, Yes, Forward, Make It So, Click Here You Dumb Bastard******.

****** Fun fact, the original line from Casablanca was "Play it again, you dumb bastard." No fooling.

What Happens When You Don't Return Library Books

Everyone, even librarians, have library fines. Even if you have never used a library card a fine has been added to your soul in terms of your humanity. The items in the library, the value of them, are counted as a piece of civilization. What can that be worth if those items are not returned? Here are the steps if a library book is never returned.

Charged a Fine

Right out the gate, you are charged a fine. A flat fee of ten cents a day. There is a cap of five dollars per item so do not worry about breaking the bank.

Charged for Cost

After three months, however, an item must be replaced. A fair market value of a replacement will be assessed and charged to the patron. A small fee of five dollars is added to cover the cost of processing the lost item record and the new item. This fee is struck if the item is returned intact and the fine reverts to the five dollar amount. Replacements cannot be substituted.

Charged for Time

Should an item never be returned and the cost of the item never paid, the library gods will assess the amount of time lost by the item from the community. This time will be deducted from the offending patron's life.

Charged to Cross

Some men pass before their time. The library gods await at the River Libros to collect from those unable to give the community's time back to them. They will render from those souls a payment of half before allowing the patron to cross into the Fields of the Never Return. Those partial souls will understand no great joy or knowledge of the universe as they wander those fields without ceasing until the gods turn the planes of existence cold.

Charged to Enter

Once the beauty of existence ends, the Fence of Phobos will be revealed around the Fields of Never Return. That fence will have a gate creak open to welcome those wandering souls. Those partial souls will be harvested, their heat gathered to power a new universe of infinite light and sound so that the full souls will be able to live once again. 

Staff Picks: Dark Winter Overlord Edition

Now that the world is in the full grip of winter, you must choose a demonic or otherworldly overlord for which to serve. Do you want fire to warm your home or animal servants to bring you food? What are you willing to give up, blood for blood or do you have a spare virgin lying around? The staff of the library is here to help you make these easy decisions.

Karryn the Vampire Queen - Brenda from Circulation

Overview

Karryn's pretty cool overall. She's immortal, loves to laugh, and makes the best bloody mary's. If you need someone to call up and hang with, there's no beating this dark overlord. Plus, she's a voracious reader. If you let her in, she will satisfy all your needs on those lonely nights.

Cost

Couple pints of blood once or twice a week

Pros

Good drinks and good times

Cons

Little woozy after hangs, and she mmay tell the same stories over and over

The Tome of Ancient Sorrows - Chris from Reference 

Overview

The only reference book you will ever need. It's big and heavy, easily capable of bringing a grown man to his knees with one overhead blow, yet light enough that it can be carried around by any library staff. Just one look in these pages will show you secrets that will melt your brain.

Cost

A melted brain.

Pros

Unlimited knowledge and awesome potential for destruction

Cons

Reading too often can lead to cackling insanity and ooze in ears

Sheila the Book Cart - Freddy the Page

Overview

Built in Detroit in 1956, this book cart has survived to today on wheels of evil and shelves of determination. Giving your soul over to this cart means never having to say "I can't carry that." Sheila will bring light unto your heart and death unto your enemies.

Cost

One Soul

Pros

Great carry capacity, space age design

Cons

May lose passion for all things

Marquis the Butterfly King - Jamie from Children's

Overview

Once a small butterfly, Marquis slaughtered fields of enemies and stomped six bloody boot prints onto the souls of the dead. With his coal and fire inlaid wings he carries the souls of the undying to their places of torment. Hear his forlorn wail and tremble.

Cost

One gumdrop

Pros

Never fear when you know true death

Cons

May destroy you

The Futility of Cleaning a Keyboard

Look down at your desk. Do you see your keyboard? See the keys, all in a row. See them raised and separated. The letters just off center so you know where they are. Little bumps on the "f" and "j" keys so your hands know where to rest. 

     You lucky bastards might even have a 10-Key set up over on the right. Real lucky lefties get the opposite.

     Now, you brave library souls, do a thing for me. Pick up your keyboard. Tilt it until it almost is upside down, the keys facing the desk. One edge touching the surface while the other is held by your hand. 

     Tap the back of the keyboard.

     If nothing happened, good for you. You live a charmed life full of joy and no regrets. Santa will come visit you and leave nothing but joy and oranges in your stockings. Your lovers will always know your secret spots.

     For the rest of us, one of two things happened. Either a fine dusting of dandruff and dust drifted out and onto the desk. You recoiled, but understood this is the way of things. Your keyboard, your mess. A wet cloth, and you can continue living your day.

     But some of you have been pushed out of shared work spaces. Some of us are at patron machines. Shared workstations. Multiple hands touching the keys of our 21st century prisons all day long. 

     For all those people, I apologize. You have just seen some shit. Fingernails and small peices of food fell to the desk. Ancient crumbs of humans past spilled forth on the desk like a mosaic of evil tidings. Ghosts of hands past rattled onto the desk and said "Howdy."

     You have three choices, my brethren.

     Pretend you saw nothing. We are all creatures of the devine and shed ourselves. Where others have left, so shall you. Insanity is just what we accept.

     Pry off all the keys and go at it with every cleaner you know. Then spy those keyboards around you, all filled with the same. Your futility is understated here. One down, one to go, and those damn spacebars are a bitch to put back right.

     The rest of us will just say "gross" and order a new keyboard from IT. IT will groan and grumble, but a small sacrifice to get a relatively cheap asset. When the new keyboard arrives, take the old round back and burn it clean with fire.

A Guide to Library Curbside Printing

The library has implemented a new program for printing for curbside. It's a very simple fifteen step process that begins and ends with you never coming into the library. Let's work it out shall we?

1. Make a decision

     The first thing you must do when printing is deciding what to print. Do you need a certain document so much to go through the next fourteen steps? Government documents, legal forms, potato soup recipes. All of these are very fine things to wish to have a hard copy of in these uncertain times. The entire filmography of the cast of Monkey Island 2 can maybe wait.

2. Have a computer

     Or a smartphone. Something that can connect to the internet.

3. Connect to the internet

     Use that computing device to connect to the world wide web. Sometimes this can be done with wires. 

4. Go to the library's website

     This can be accomplished by typing an "h" and then a "t" and then a "t" and then a "p" and then… you know what, just google "library."

5. Find the printing section

     On the library website you should find a button called "Wireless Printing." Click that.

6. Read the instructions

     The printing instructions should be displayed. Read them one word at a time or six if you are nasty. When you get to the bottom, re-read them again from the bottom to the top. 

7. Find in the instructions the printing bit

     The printing bit should be a button of some kind. In the instructions it should show you the button. Like with an arrow or just a big red box that says "Print" or something.

8. Click that button.

     Click that button.

9. Upload something

     Per the instructions, click something that says something about "Upload" or "Browse" or I dunno, "Gimme file." This should open a box that has all the files on your computer. Find the file you want to print and click "Open" or "Do."

10. Click the big thing

     There should be a big thing that will make printing go. Like a red thing? After doing that you will see a big smiley face. It might be eating a file.

11. Call the library to make an appointment

     Once the file is eaten by the library website, give us a call to set up an appointment. We will confirm the library website's tummy is full of files and that we can access them. If not, we can walk you through it again maybe. If everything's cool, come on down at the appointed time. If you cry, continue to step 12. 

12. Tell yourself it's our fault

     Silently or very loudly curse the heavens and the library person on the phone. Wish and hope that things could be different. Better. That the world is not how we make it. That hope is out there and within your grasp. Hope springs eternal.

13. Find a small child

     Maybe a grandchild or some urchin off the street. Make it someone you trust if you can, but honestly anyone under the age of 25 should be great.

14. Let us talk to the child

     They probably won't need to talk to us, but we would like to thank them. 

15. Come and get it

     Come down to the library and pick up your print job! Or send the child. Whatever makes you happy.

     And that's it! A simple process we hope will make your life a little easier provided by your library.

That Other Drummer Boy

As I am sure all of you do, around the holidays I start to look at all the nonsense that clouds us from each other. The decorations, the pageantry, and that guy in the red suit surround me with a stench of gingerbread that I cannot escape. The most insipid is the Christmas carol.

     That's a long way to say that I hate "The Little Drummer Boy." I wake up early on Christmas morning because my hate for that little bastard is so strong it gives me energy. 

     Written in 1941 as a choral arrangement for amature and girl's choirs, the song was recorded first by the Trapp Family Singers in 1951 as "Carol of the Drum." You may know that group because the last time you saw them they were escaping Nazis over the Alps to the sound of music. Not the most popular version, though, as Jack Halloran's arrangement took the world by storm. His version is the one you know today, just as you know all his other songs such as "That Other Drummer Boy" and "Jesus Take the Wheel."

     Later, Hendrix fucking rocked that shit.

     But what the hell is that song about? It's a little drummer boy, sure, but what's he up to? Why is he drumming?

     Motherfucker is playing to a baby.

     From the lyrics, the story goes that the magi invited along a kid with a drum to see the baby Jesus. They've got gold, frankenstein, and murray, but the kid is like "I'm not giving no baby my drum."

     The magi are like "well, we all brought something."

     And the little drummer boy is like, "I'll play him some shit."

     So he does. Mary nods because there's three weird dudes and a drummer kid. You can debate all day about where they showed up. It's popular to say the manger because that looks cool, but from what I found the magi showed up months or even years later.

     Imagine that conversation:

     Magi: Hey, we heard there's a baby king dude here.

     Mary: I mean, I have a baby and some shepherds and an angel said some stuff.

     Magi: Cool. We brought him some shit.

     Mary: Awesome! We could use diapers and a stroller and a camel seat…

     Magi: We got some smelly stuff.

     Mary: That's nice.

     Magi: Also we brought along this kid who was playing a wicked drum solo. Figured the baby king would dig it.

     Mary nods.

     Little drummer boy plays.

     Magi: Wow, that did not go over well for a baby. Here's some gold. Sorry about that.

     And that's how Christmas began.

Hunting for Good Porn Science

There's something about stalking around a nursing home looking for a sign that makes me think my life might be going somewhere I might not like.

     I understand that might need some explanation. It's not a long one, but it requires knowledge about 'geocaching." What's that shit, you ask?

     Geocaching is where sad nerd science meets hiking. Long ago, satellites were for more than just broadcasting porn and the Great British Bake Off to the masses. The military used them for many things, including broadcasting porn and British porn.

     Those satellites were also used to locate things on earth with a system called GPS (Good Porn Science!). With a device on the ground, science was able to talk or something. Anyway, eventually they let the people at RadioShack have it.

     Some of those nerds thought, "what if we used the GPS signals to hide things? Then we can tell other people about the GPS and see if they can find the things we hid." Then they made an app because there was not much to do with the first Iphone.

     And so geocaching was born. It used to be free, but then App stores allowed for subscriptions and people got bored, so now for thirty dollars a year you can find things other people hid with your smartphone. 

     Cut to this weekend with me wandering around an old folks home while Martha with the Walker wonders if I'm some kinda old person sex deviant. I'm not despite the fact that I was wearing a hoodie.

     See, some people who hide the geocaches get cute with it. They hide them in public areas so you have to be all weird about it. Slinking around while other normal not-strange people go about their day looking for a film canister or some magnetic whatsit with a small paper log inside. Then you write your name on the paper, high five your cell phone, and go find another.

     Some are more complex. Like the one today at the old folks place.

     Of course I woke up a little hungover. It's Sunday. So I decided to get some coffee and go on a long walk. Because golf is the only real way to spoil a walk, I pulled out my phone and went for some caches clad in the first things I found that were comfy, some old jeans, a black hoodie, and a cap that says CAT on it because I was once a gopher at a construction yard.

     I found two right off. Some Cub Scouts hid one in a little sandwich box near where they meet. The second was hidden behind a fake power outlet on a light pole in a parking lot of a medical building. The third coordinates lead me to the nursing home where I got stuck.

     Some of the places are puzzles, you see. The coordinates get you to the starting point, and the description gets you along with hints from there. Once I found one in a cemetery with multiple grave names, the dates of which lead to more coordinates. Clever.

     Today's however, I could not solve. Without giving too much, it had something to do with the city and a corner. I checked all the corners, lapped Martha with the Walker, and found nothing. Even asked Martha, who nodded at me and said her son was coming to get her for church. 

     Several staff members were getting a smoke. One knew what I was talking about, but she did not know where the cache was on the property. 

     Head down, I left and got a chocolate milk. Not a bad day, but looking back maybe I should find a friend to go with me. A six foot three dude in a hoodie cursing while he stomps around some bushes looks less intimidating if he has someone with him to wave and wish people a nice day.

Wipe out Coronavirus?

I read today in the New York Times that maybe we don't have to wipe down everything so hard that we take the varnish off grandma's kitchen table. Seems our lovely cootiebug is more of an "in the air" thing than has been told.

     This makes me feel a little weird. For months now, at work and at home and at the I don't go anywhere else, I have been wiping people down and not shaking hands with any surface I see. Avoidance and bleach, that's my motto.

     But now, it seems it was all for *shrug*.

     The messaging has changed for sure. Instead of the news telling you to separate your groceries, burn the packages, and shower in Lysol as soon as you walk through the door, most seem to be rather laissez faire about the whole thing. Of course, it could be worse.

     "How should people continue not infecting their loved ones and pet turtles, Blonde Newsperson?" says the Newsperson in Clothes.

     Blonde newsperson says,"Well, not with toilet paper."

     Everyone has a laugh.

     Blonde newsperson, face falling, "But for millions of Americans, the best way to stop the plague is to wear a mask and think about Jesus while covering your children in hand sanitizer."

     "I don't think that's the best-"

     Newsperson in Clothes gets their shit shut down, Blonde Newsperson continuing, "Then what do you do? Welcome those little plague monsters into your home? Tell them you love them and kiss their germy faces? I fill my hands full of that alcohol gel and just wipe. My kids say it burns, but I tell them that's God's love."

     Newsperson in Clothes looks off camera.

     "But that's just me," Blonde Newsperson ends. "Now for the weather."

     I saw that one time. Not in the news from some crazy person (which I feel is the outcome of all this because if you are not crazy while reporting the news after this year, you are a stone cold sociopath), but someone slathering their child in hand sanitizer.

     Wasn't even a plague. Just filled their hands and rubbed it on the child's head and face and neck like it was lotion made by Everclear.

     I said, "Ma'am, that's not great."

     "Well, it's free," the woman said.

     She was not wrong.

     Latex gloves in libraries seem the ultimate waste if this "we don't have to disinfect everything" is true. I worked with gloves a lot in college while cooking in restaurants. 

     A coworker back then compared gloves to condoms. "They keep you in and everything out." My coworker was a moron at comparisons.

     Use gloves in a library for two reasons: you don't wanna wash your hands and you need a reminder not to touch your face. I get not wanting to wash: soap burns. But if you are still touching your face you have to reconsider your life choices.

Songs I Liked For Reasons

Haven't watched anything new or done much, so I'm gonna put my playlist of "liked" on shuffle. We'll see where it goes. Paragraph per song, some might be better than others. Titles are song links on Youtube if you want to listen along.

You Really Got Me by the Kinks

That junky guitar and the marijuana meter that builds reminds me of a bar in New Orleans. One of those little hole in the street places that has a name only for tax purposes. Music plays from a speaker on the bar at half volume because some band out in the street is always better. Some little weird band half assing what they can do or whole assing all they can.

Just Really Wanna See You by Shudder to Think (First Love Last Rites)

Best soundtrack to sit and hold hands to, to sit close to, to kiss and touch and hold and laugh and dance. Specific memories coming are probably not for public consumption. Just really want to let this one roll on by with a smile on my face.

Marquee Moon by Television

Deception in a song because it sounds like a sweet surfer rolling fluttering tune but down there is a darkness that beats like a heart on that drum. "Don't you be so sad," the sings and the guitar cascades into a thumping rant to "I an't waiting, uh uh."

You Really Got a Hold On Me by She & Him

"I don't like you, but I love you. Seems like I'm always thinking of you." Zooey's haunting push on this one really does have a hold on me. Part of me wants this acapella in a big tiled room. Just hold me, hold me and hear that voice echo. I'm reminded of coming home across a desert on this one. A long drive that needed quiet in the night. A good trip ending in that lazy drive through nothing. This song coming like a lone cry in the speakers of some distant animal begging to be held.

Blue Moon by Elvis Presley

Playlist is playing with my emotions on this rainy afternoon. Of course when I hear this quiet croon against the soft base and drums, I think of Joe Vs the Volcano. Tom Hanks, sitting on those trunks in the middle of a big dark ocean. He stands and sees that giant moon above. So small are we that we think gazing on the moon from our own rafts means something to anyone. Not gonna lie, I kinda hate the falsetto Elivis rocks here though.

No Rm. 9, Kentucky by Shudder to Think

Here's a falsetto I can get behind. Playlist seems to think I want quiet singers telling someone they're missed. Shudder to Think always reminds me of my friend from long ago. Last time I talked to him, I called and he said we'd hang out some time. Then we did not. Over a decade ago. Follow each on Instagram for whatever that's worth. "Tongue kiss through the kitchen screen." The lyrics mesh with the tonal guitar shifts. More memories of riding in cars and smoking cigarettes and laughing and turning it up loud on the weird parts. 

Highway to Hell by AC/DC

Guess me thinking about all this driving influenced the playlist. Different devices so no crossover. Of course I'm turning this one up and flooding my brain with that guitar. This is one of those ever present songs. No specific memories, just sweaty beer soaked smoke filled bars where (if this was a movie) things would go really fast and people would appear and disappear while taking shots and shooting pool. Hyper color green walls and red dresses and wooden floors that drink the shadows of shaking lights. Someone writing "Highway to Hell" with an arrow pointing to the bathroom.

I'm Gonna Put You Down by Gangstagrass

Virginia hiking with frustration and loneliness. Putting down boots with the beat. Singing to the chorus "Dig a hole in the meadow, dig a hole in the cold cold ground. Dig a hole in the meadow, I'm gonna put you down." Tonez's lyrics protecting art and profanity are just damn fun to hear.

The Way You Make Me Feel by Michael Jackson

Goddamn it, I'm not having the art vs artist debate. This song, like most of Jackson's, fucking rocks. Still, though, this one has some shame attached to it for me. Eighth grade dance this song played. She wanted to dance with me, but I couldn't. I was scared. I think she cried, and my friend danced with her. Two years later, I made a vow to always dance with anyone who asked. It's worked out so far. I'm sorry, Vicky.

Time After Time by Cyndi Lauper

We were laying on my bed watching My Name is Earl. Randy, Earl's brother, plays this song on a boombox as a running joke in the series every time he gets dumped. The air in the room was tense because we both knew it was over between us. Still, we held hands and watched and waited for the show to end so she could leave and I could drink myself to sleep. An episode where they go to Mexico. Randy gets heartbroken. No boombox, but there's a guy with a guitar named Pedro who starts playing this. The last hard laugh we shared, both of us rolling. It's good we had that.

Pet Semetary by The Ramones (live)

I mean, yeah. Stephen King and the Ramones. Two of my first loves when I started breaking out of my shell. I just like the way Joey damn near growls in parts of this song.

Rolling in the Deep by Adele

Everybody has this on their like list, right? "There's a fire starting in my heart," indeed. I'll be honest, I like other of her songs more. This one probably got more play by me because the damn beat is so good for jogging. Plus, sometimes while exercising I need an angry woman telling me to fuck off.

Rockaway Beach by The Ramones

Another jogging song. Sorry, playlist, already did that today. Still, I can bop along with this somewhat surfer kinda song. It's even got the "ooo's" that every great beach song needs.

And that's where I'm gonna end this because I gotta clean the bathroom. Y'all let me know what you listen to! What should I add to my "Like" shuffle?

Horror for Halloween

Early afternoon, the sun obeying daylight savings and dipping low in the sky, when along came a woman and two kids. Little kids, the kind that you have to hold their hands, or they go off climbing god only knows. Some high thing like a slide or a giraffe. That little collective walked up to me outside the library where we were doing curbside.

     "Do you have an appointment?" I said.

     The woman's eyes rose over her mask. It was a floral thing that made me think of my grandma's garden. Ugly and unkept and forgotten under a window made for dumping out ashes and regret. "No," she said. They wanted DVDs. 

     What kind of DVDs? We had all kinds written on a big board. People could not be allowed in. We gave them a choice. No longer could the rabble run through the stacks. Like good cooks, we kept them out of the kitchen. Only the rain and the cold.

     "Some kids. We like Legos. And horror for Halloween," she said.

     I left them. Kids bags were easy. I had no idea if the bags had legos in them, or movies with legos in them, or if the movies would explode and drive some entertainment by killing the family pet. All I knew was that the bag said "Kids," and someone had drawn what looked like a dying duck. I hope the family did not have a duck.

     There were no goddamn horror bags anywhere in the library. I checked. Twice. We checked them all out.

     I walked around the staging area for the bags. Scratched at my head, right up top where it itched. Why horror? Why now? Halloween is dead and gone for another year. Lost in the minds of children gazing forward to Christmas. Lost in the minds of adults thinking about the holidays. No traveling this year because there's a virus that might kill grandma. Might as well kill grandma by making her learn how to talk to her phone with pictures. Skype, WhatsApp, Hangouts, all the mess of phones now when the Jetsons made it look so simple. Now Halloween is dead and Thanksgiving will happen over a screen and somehow the bastards in charge are worrying about Target's next sales year.

     Some still have that Halloween spirit. The freaks, the weirdos, the goths, the splattergeeks, the open-minded just enough to dance among the wreckage of a summer camp they never wanted to go to or the bloody carnage of a suburban neighborhood they hated. My people. Those beautiful souls who look and feel just right with the world having dark corners to poke at. Dark corners filled with screams and holding someone close and knowing that while monsters exist in this world, the one on the screen can not get us. 

     Depends on the screen, I suppose. The bastard Trump shows up on more scenes than he has any right. Gotten a fair number of people. Casualties in this war for politeness stuck up there. The dead from a virus and the dead from racism and the plain dead. Ghosts who haunt Facebook wondering where their friends and family went. Ghosts who get no response.

     I had a kinship with this family. This woman with her hideous mask and two little girls who like movies with Legos.

     So I went about putting together some movies. But what do you put in a bag? Do I go with only movies I like, or the big commercial appeal? What kind of horror? The slow and the plodding, or the right out of the gate I'm gonna melt your face and violate your stuffed animal? How long had I been in here looking while the sun dropped even lower?

     I had to pick Crawl. Picture this: You're daddy is not picking up the phone, even though a swirl of atmospheric hell is coming at his house. You drive down there. You're a damn good swimmer and about to make the team at some Florida college. You are capable and love your daddy and what's that noise under the house? It's daddy and a goddamn pack of alligators! Enjoy that fight for your life.

     Second, something creepy and violent to offset alligators eating people in Florida. California. Sunny, bright. A black family goes to the beach and sings in the car and overall has a good time. Then come some people in red suits that look just like them. Attacking them. The followup to Get Out, Us is a damn good, slow burn, thinker of a movie that has some logical issues. In the spirit of most CHUD (Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller) movies, it's best not to think about it and enjoy a damn well made movie.

     We had a copy of John Carpenter's The Thing. Throw that in there.

     One Cut of the Dead. I don't even know how we got a copy of that Japanese zombie flick, but I'll be damned if I will not throw it in. Funny, dark, fast moving, it's the best comedy zombies since Shaun of the Dead.

     Last, Invisible Man. It's new, it's stylish, and I will be damned if it is going to sit on a shelf in my library and collect the dead skin of library employees. Once slated to be a big part of a franchise release, Invisible Man was brought down to a simple story of a man torturing a woman. And he is invisible. It's not just a clever title. 

     So I threw those in a bag, checked out the lot of them, and headed outside. No idea how long it has been. One of the children is upside down on the bike rack hanging there like a christmas tree ornament. Told you they climb stuff.

     "Thank you," said the woman and fucked off with her two kids into the dwindling day.

     I never saw them again. I assume the Lego movies scared them off. Never trust movies with moving parts. Flesh and blood humans all the way.