More predictions of the future

 

Like in a boring, stupid Science Fiction story, I can predict the future, but only dumb things that no one cares about.

Here I am at the front desk of the library. A man comes up with his phone to talk to me. "I want to print something out from my phone." the man says.

I reply "It will be a lot easier if you can print it out from a computer, but if you need to print it from your phone I can give you a complicated list of instructions that the librarian in the teen room can help you with if you have trouble." I point out where the librarian is. But I know he is going to say: "Yes, can I have the instructions?" 

A second later the man says "Yes, can I have the instructions?"

I hand them over to the library patron. "They can help you with it in the teen room." I say. But I know he will immediately begin working on trying to print from his phone on the desk, right there half in the way of the people needing help at the desk, but not entirely in the way. 

He does exactly that, because I can predict the future.

I help a couple of other people at the desk and start this blog post all with him hovering nearby. Nine minutes pass while he pokes at his phone. In my head I count down "Three, two, one..."

"It says that my file can't be printed?" The man says to me questioningly. 

"They can help you with that in the teen room."

I know he will now ask me where that is.

"Where?" The man asks in a confused manner since no one has told him anything about anyone else being able to help him before now.

So I tell him. 

He exits the scene.

(Actually, he asks "Where?" again, but I didn't want to draw out the story).

And...

Our amazing Science Fiction story is complete.

I warned you it wouldn't be that good.

I mean, I can predict regular general stuff from the future of humanity and all that too, but, seriously, you don't want to know.

Nearly as heroic as Cory Booker

 

As I start to write here, in between patrons at the front desk of an actual still functioning public library in the USA, the Senator Cory Booker is making history as he nears to making the longest filibuster speech in the history of the Senate. And though this may not seem like it will actually do anything against far greater forces of fascism and chaos raining madly down upon this country, there is no reason we cannot take inspiration from the bold act of a figure in opposition.

I myself take inspiration from it.

Indeed, I am going to blog here, uninterrupted, for as long as I can to support the fight! 

yes...

I am going to blog here, uninterrupted, for as long as I can to support the fight! 

While I don't know the official uninterrupted blogging record, I make my solidarity with this cause by committing to this demanding blogging process for as long as I can physically keep going. Whether that comes out to some kind of a record or whether it doesn't isn't the point here. The point is all of us standing up and putting ourselves on the line. So buckle up because not only do I have a few things to say, but I am going to be tal

Ooop. Pinkie cramp. Ow.

No, it's a bad one.

Gotta wrap it up.

Ow.

Thanks for staying with me this whole time.

Carry on the fight.

 

Visit our other library branches

 

While the abilities of my photo generation tools leap forward in quality at an alarming rate, there are picture series I haven't yet gotten around to showing you that feel positively ancient to me, but are really only a week old.

I have been making a ton of stuff.

Which I may have mentioned here a few times lately.

But despite these being from another era altogether (of a week ago), they still have their delights, and one of these pictures is actually up at the front desk of my library right now. Sometimes people think these are references to real places, which is alarming, but not totally without charm. And one person saw the "Paris" version at the desk and spoke French to me and I understood it!

Which is promising.

For most of the life of clerkmanifesto I scrupulously did not mention the name of my library, but I am close enough, I think, to the end of my career there, and have now featured it in so many photographs, that I am okay with it appearing here. We do not actually have any oversea branches, alas, but dreams count for something too...

Note: I didn't realize/remember that there were nine cities! Nor did I realize I would have to choose between as many as nine variations for each one! But so it is. I have tried to make them harmonize.

Quotable classics!

 

Clerkmanifestoland announced

  

I continue to work on so many projects that none of them are exactly finished. And a lot of them I'd like to finish, but they're... involved. So while I've been showing you some one-off pictures outside of usual posting times, I don't want to do that here, even if it's a little tempting. 

So instead I will just tell you about one of the biggest projects: Clerkmanifestoland.

It's my theme park!

I thought it would be super nice if clerkmanifesto had a theme park of the multi billion dollar variety, and so I have sort of started developing Clerkmanifestoland. It's always been a idle daydream of mine, but now the photo generators are just (barely) good enough to use to help sketch it out. So here's what I can tell you, as I am mostly holding off on showing the pictures for now.

A. Clerkmanifestoland has five lands in it: 

1. Saint Minneapolis (home of the ride "Voyage to Catcher in the Rye") 

2. Bugheart Sur Mer (home of the ride "Fox and Skunk in Arles")

3. Dreamland Rome (home of the ride "Condeluded")

4. Library Storyland (home of "The Maze of Cataloging")

5. Clerkmanifestoland Wilderness (Home of the ride "Stunt Road Wild Ride")

B. The symbol of Clerkmanifestoland is the bugheart (of course), and the entry plaza has a huge bugheart fountain.

C. The mascots of Clerkmanifestoland are Fox and Skunk (naturally).

D. The Clerkmanifestoland gift shops obviously have all kinds of merchandise, but specialize in tea bowls.

Oh, you want to see a tea bowl?

I don't want to give too much away, but I can show a tea bowl certainly:

You might be thinking: "That's pretty expensive!"

Each one of these is bespoke. 

But don't worry. We have cheaper stuff like this:

"Oh." You say, a little taken aback. "And does this stuff sell?"

Well, these shiny young couples in the land of Bugheart Sur Mer, which has some nice gift shops, seemed to make quite a few purchases:

My guess is they just got off the charming dark ride "Fox and Skunk in Arles".

But that's a story for another day.

Addendum:

In case you forget the five lands of Clerkmanifestoland, here's a handy reminder:

Wishing they were there

 

My God!

 

Vintage pictures of the library

 

I'm so absorbed in the vast powers and capabilities of ChatGPT's new photo generator and editor capabilities that though I am accumulating huge amounts of images, I don't have time to polish them or even add them as extra posts here. But in the interest of letting you have a taste of the kinds of things I am working on, I do have a little series of library pictures (one of many, many series) that I will call the "The Daguerreotype Series". These are pictures of the library from the second half of the 1800's.

I was tempted to say "from back when I started" but that's a kind of a joke that's vastly older than these photographs pretend to be!

Anyway, here's our little trip down memory lane (if you're 150 years old). There are so many! And I'm sorry about the damage, but all of these pictures were metaphorically dug our of our oldest archives, stored in damp County basements for decades and decades. But despite all that, if you look carefully you will see that for all this time, libraries really haven't changed as much as we might think.