On being a Librarian, not just about books

JAN: April Cushing, a reference librarian for 22 years, is my favorite librarian. This has a lot to do with the fact that she's also the unofficial head of my book group and not only offers us terrific recommendations (The Well and the Mine by Gin Phillips, I'm reading it now, it's terrific), but also procures the books for us. She also used to write the funniest Christmas letter, ever, spoofing the form to a degree that my daughter and I would rip through the Christmas mail every year waiting for it. But now she's turned her wit to column writing called "Nothing Personal" for the DAILY TRANSCRIPT. And here, she agreed to make fun of her library patrons for me.

APRIL:When Jan asked me to write a short blog for her writer’s group, the only blog I could think of was Julie Powell’s. I actually met her before she became a big cheese at an event arranged by Porter Square Books. We had a three-course French dinner at Chez Henri in Cambridge, met the author and got an autographed copy of Julie & Julia. But back to the blog. Hers just happened to turn into a book and a movie and made her a millionaire so naturally my first reaction was, do I have to? But when Jan threatened to interview me instead, suddenly the blog thing didn’t seem so bad. She said to just write something light and funny about the library.” Does the word oxymoron come to mind?

Library patrons, on the other hand, are another story. I could write at length about them but I don’t want to cross the line. OK, I really don’t care about crossing the line; I just don’t want to lose my job. It goes back to that fear of being sent to the principal’s office. I know the correct spelling because I was taught “the principal is my pal” although we all know he’s anything but, and when you’re summoned to see the principal you can be sure he’s not thinking pal-sy thoughts of you either. But I like working with the public, mostly, and it’s fun to talk books with other readers. I recommend stuff, they tell me what they liked, and I get good suggestions for my book group.

The part of the job I like least is teaching the Dreaded Computer Classes. We all hate this because the patrons we attempt to teach are generally not your model students. Take John, the guy I had last week for the hour-long Basic Computer class. Mid-seventies, affable in a too-loud sort of way, and completely untainted by prior computer experience. The supposedly self-guided Palm Beach, FL “mousing around” tutorial (you can Google it) takes the tyro through the fundamentals like holding the mouse, clicking, scrolling, dragging, double clicking (now we’re getting into advanced territory) and right clicking. Intentional right clicking, I mean. Tedious, but not what you’d call taxing.

Boy, was I wrong. I could not get John to successfully click on a link, any link, to save my life. I adjusted his hand, demonstrated how to hold the mouse gently but firmly, described the motion in excruciating detail and tried every trick in my admittedly modest arsenal of teaching weapons. I could not get the guy to click. “I don’t know what else to say,” I told him, practically in tears. “I don’t know why it’s not working.”

What I somehow managed not to say was, “how can you not know how to click, for Christ’s sake? This isn’t rocket surgery,” as my friend would say.

The one remotely amusing moment was picturing my daughters as flies on the wall watching my near meltdown. I could hear them say, “Are you serious, Mom? You got a master’s degree for this?” The other thing that kept me from totally losing it was the arrival of 25-year-old Jenna, fresh from URI library school and a whiz at computer training. Sensing my desperation, or maybe it was the way I grabbed her arm, Jenna, with infinite patience, taught John to click. Kind of. When I asked how she did it she said, “I could tell right away he wasn’t an auditory learner but a visual one, so I just showed him how I did it.” Right.

After almost two hours the tutorial was mercifully over. I was back at the reference desk grateful that John was finally gone and no one had gotten hurt when I heard a familiar voice bellow, “I want to sign up for the Internet class next.”

Then he proceeded to walk out the emergency exit door and set off the alarm.

JAN: I feel very lucky, not only do I get to hear some of April's war stories first hand, I get to drink wine with her at book group!!

If you want to read more of April's unique take on the reading world, check out some of her columns. Scrabble lovers, especially, should follow the below link.

http://www.wickedlocal.com/norwood/fun/entertainment/books/x749207446/From-the-Library-Hooked-on-Scrabble-at-the-library

Are there any other librarians out there with some good war stories?? Anyone else want to tell us about their least favorite jobs or cute Luddite patrons??

Julie and Julia and Jungle Red

HALLIE: Last week I went to see "Julie and Julia," which I would have gone to see even if it weren’t my sister Nora’s movie. It was lovely and sweet—and Meryl Streep IS Julia Child.

Which led me to drag out my copy of “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”--my copy is a 1967 edition, 15th printing, and is inscribed from friends of my parents on May 11, 1969. A wedding present.

My husband and I used to meet every few months with friends and, in advance, come up with a menu that involved each guest making a single dish that took as long as a normal single meal to prepare. Needless to say, lots of our recipes came from Julia. It's easy to see which, because those pages are warped and stained and the margins are scribbled in.

All in all, I made it through about 34 recipes--nowhere near Julie Powell's record setting mastery of all 524. But still.

Standouts were Onion soup (start by roasting bones for broth). Soup au Pistou (an incredible concoction made with zucchini and fresh peas, cooked with lots of garlic and run through a hand mill). Duck a l'Orange and Creme Caramel. And the extraordinary and extraordinarily expensive Tournedos Rossini (filet mignon, home cooked artichoke hearts, truffles, a slab of foie gras, and a Madeira sauce--Oh, baby!) Every recipe had a meltdown moment…as when the duck flew off teh platter on the way to the table or when I renverséd the crème caramel all over the kitchen counter.

Still, I can’t remember a single dish that failed, though Lobster Thermidor did not seem worth the trouble when compared to how delicious a plain old boiled lobster with drawn butter can be.

Have you cooked Julia or are your culinary triumphs more of the Galloping Gourmet variety…or are we talking green been casserole with mushroom soup and canned onion rings?

RHYS: I too used to belong to a supper club for which we had to prepare one dish. And Tournedos Rossini was the first reeeely expensive dish I ordered as an adult. And it was worth it! We used to entertain a lot and I was always trying out new recipes for guests (much to John's horror when I hadn't tested them first) My only spectacular failure was a turbon of sole, stuffed with shrimp and crab. When I turned it out, it collapsed into a nasty pink mess. I had to make a hasty sauce to cover it!

I believe that Julia herself once threw a duck across the kitchen on the way to the table, didn't she? That was why she was so popular--she was so human and really enjoyed every part of the cooking and the eating. I once had an important meeting with the head of my publishing house and the head of marketing back in the days when I wrote YA books. Julia Child and husband were at the next table and I sat almost touching her. All my table-mates wanted to know was what she was eating next. I remember she started with a dozen oysters. And she never shrank from using the butter. My kind of lady!

HALLIE: Oh, gosh, elbow to elbow! I'm jealous. My friend, chef Lora Brody, actually COOKED for Julia once. I can only imagine how nerve wracking that would have been.

JAN: I remember making a stuffed roast after watching a Julia Child episode. It was very complicated, delicious, but very rich. Although I love to cook, I usually avoid recipes that involve too many steps or too many ingredients I have to go to special stores to find.

Tonight I'm throwing a dinner party and all the recipes center around the herbs in my garden, starting with a melon sald with cilantro and fresh mint.

I spotted Julia Childs once, though, at a WGBH Wine tasting fundraiser. It was very exciting. I think she waved.

HALLIE: I also have a garden full of fresh herbs like now, and in honor of same have become an expert at making mojitos.

HANK: Oh, I've made that onion soup. Fantastic. But you know what I learned from her? Very important. Before you start a recipe, read the whole thing, and sort of--imagine how it's going to work and what you need to do in advance. There's nothing like making, say, lasagne, and then getting to the part of the recipe where it says: "add marinara sauce, see p. 233." Ahhh....

And my copy is newer, the 23rd printing from March, 1973. (The onion soup page is a crinkly mess! So is the page for souffle a la vanille.) And I just reread the first line of the foreward: "This is a book for the servantless American cook who can be unconcerned on occasion with budgets ,waitlines, time schedules..."

Hilarious.

HALLIE: Culinary triumphs? Please...dish!

Summer Gold

ROBERTA: It's been such a weird summer in New England, cool and wet. Doesn't it seem like we haven't hit the summer food season with the same gusto as usual, even here on the blog? I did make a killer blueberry pie and we've had a terrific lettuce and asparagus season, but everything else in the garden is slow, slow, and slow. And then today, I read a horrible article in the New York Times food section about a late tomato blight that's expected to wipe out a large percentage of the tomato crop in the northeast. Yikes! I ran right out to inspect my crop: no sign of fissures and sores so far!
So let's hear it from you Jungle Reds: what's your favorite summer treat so far or what are you looking forward to for the rest of the season?

And p.s., one of the food-related treats I'm anticipating is the new movie directed by Hallie's sister Nora, based on the book Julie and Julia, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Cannot wait to see Meryl Streep as Julia Child!

HALLIE: As I look out my window, it's raining again. Sigh.

Cherries. Have they been incredible this season or what? And last week we had some amazing peaches. Barbecued chicken! We never drag out the charcoal grill until summer. And my friend Maggie just brought me three vine ripened tomatoes and I remembered what they're supposed to taste like...essence of summer. The tomato blight is very scary and, I gather, widespread.

RO: Are we talking food or something else? Summer means white wine sangria and bbqs with friends, big kitchen sink salads and lots of grilled chicken. A good friend just turned me on to something called Sekt. Never heard of it before but it's a German sparkling wine like cava or asti spumante(in these tough economic times, I save the bubbly for special occasions.) Nice and summer-y.

Non-food treat? I can't wait for my month in Wellfleet. No phone, no cable, no obsessive checking of emails.

HANK: Oh, summer. Are we having that this year? It's so rainy around here, people are just--defeated. Walking around in the rain, no umbrellas. Just--getting wet. Forget about it. Fuzzy hair and damp clothes and flip flops. And usually during the summer we have dinner outside on the patio every night--not this year. But we are saving a LOT on irrigation.

Anyway--food. Peaches! I found some wonderful ones, and when they're good, they're so terrific. And blueberries. And oh, we've had lobster, and I do love it. And proseco with elderflower liqueur. Like a kir. And rose wine from Provence...cold cold cold.

And how about iced coffee? And iced lattes? Got to love them. And right his very minute--we're grilling fish and asparagus outside. Not raining! Yay! Gotta go..

RHYS: I've experienced enough heat to share with everyone who has had a rotten summer. Book tour in Houston, Scottsdale, LA and now over a week in Florida. My biggest treat so far--swimming in the ocean twice this week as we drove around Florida and abandoned drive by signings for an hour or two on the beach. The water was incredible--warm, gentle waves, just right. We did pay for it a little with sunburn as we stayed in for an hour and the sunscreen was gradually washed away.

We've also had some amazing food on this tour--cold seafood platter on a dock, and dinner in a very trendy South Florida restaurant with decor right out of a movie (speaking of which I also can't wait to see Julia and Julie. I love movies about food, and I love everything Nora has done.
Incidentally, cherries have also been fantastic in California this summer. One of my favorite fruits, along with peaches, mangoes, papaya.

ROBERTA: Tomatoes, peaches, blueberries, lobster, cherries...what summer treats are you enjoying?

on what we're reading

“Wear the old coat and buy the new book.” ^{- Austin Phelps}

ROBERTA: full disclosure, last week when I was in charge of coming up with brilliant blog topics or scintillating guests, I was on vacation in Greece. Reading. Having run out of reading material in a Spanish-speaking country on my last big trip, I know how important it is to pack the right books. And enough of them. As a big fan of Mystic River, I chose a review of copy of Dennis Lehane's new book, due out in October. It's a whopper. 700 pages. I started it on the plane and became immediately discouraged by the historical context and the heavy emphasis on baseball. Hours and pages later, I couldn't bear to put it down. Don't expect a mystery or crime fiction or the kind of puzzles Lehane has crafted in his other books. This a grand historical saga following several families through the years at the end of WWI. Babe Ruth is an actual character. (I didn't know you could do that!) Exquisitely written of course, though I don't care for his depiction of women. Is that the era or the author? Anyway, John plowed through it too and we passed it off to our traveling companions to avoid repacking in the carry-on bags that were already overweight.

Then I launched into a mini-series of foodie books, including THE LAST CHINESE CHEF by Nicole Mones about a widowed food writer on assignment to cover a banquet that will determine the top chefs of China. This will make you hungry for Chinese food, and you'll be hard put to accept the local takeout joint.

And I finished up with JULIE AND JULIA by Julie Powell, a memoir by a woman who decides to spend the year cooking every recipe in MASTERING THE ART OF FRENCH COOKING by Julia Child. This woman is nuts! But I found it highly entertaining (liberal swears and a cache of maggots in the kitchen aside), and couldn't help marveling at the brilliant concept of her project, her blog, and the ensuing book deal!

That's it--you're up! What are you reading?