Reblogging, With Love To My Sweeties!

National Poetry Month continues!  I saw this recently, and it seemed like the perfect companion piece to Shel Silverstein's Invitation.  Here is a Monstrous Manifesto by Catherynne M. Valente.  Stand up!

I guess Mr. Snowflake there needs to just move along from McDonalds.

You have the right to vote safely!  If you have been avoiding registering to vote in the US due to domestic violence or threat of violence, please check out the resources for your state.  In Wisconsin, this includes threats to someone in your household, as well as yourself and your child/ward.

[image description: a tweet by user @indigenousAI saying

“fun fact: as a DV survivor i cannot register to vote because doing so makes my address public. anyone who is fleeing or hiding from an abuser is automatically disenfranchised from the political process and this is a feature, not a bug”]

Please vote! Even if it feels like you are only voting against the worse candidate or voting for the Less Bad candidate -- we need those votes to make sure we don't get the worse candidate.

Also, vote in all of your local elections if you can. Those are the people who decide whether books get banned in your community's schools and libraries. They decide whether your local police department gets training on de-escalation procedures or bigger guns. They are behind your community's social safety nets (or lack thereof), what types of community events are held, what's in your local parks, and much more.

Voting for Democrats is the "leaving the house, getting some exercise, and drinking more water is good for your mental health" of societal change. Everyone keeps telling you to do it, worst of all your mom keeps telling you to do it, and it's not a magical cure-all, but it actually works and rotting in your room shitposting does not help in either scenario.

This explains the situation of e-books in libraries much better than I did.  It’s incredibly frustrating for librarians, most of whom just want to connect people with books!

It’s been an increasing source of frustration for many library users: waiting weeks, sometimes months to get to the top of the waiting list for a popular eBook or e-Audiobook.

Why does it take so long? After all, it’s not a physical object, it’s a digital file that lives in the “cloud”, why can’t multiple people access it simultaneously instead of only one at a time? Barring that, why doesn’t the library just buy more copies so that the waiting list is shorter? Getting people access to books and information is what libraries are all about, but the struggle for acquiring lendable e-content is very real, and it’s getting harder all the time. Why? What’s the big hairy deal? For that answer, you have to look to the “Big 5” Publishers, who are responsible for close to 80% of trade book sales. 

Publishers have been extremely wary about allowing library users virtual access to their books. After all, digital copies of books never wear out or have to be replaced, and are more vulnerable to unauthorized copying (“pirating”). Publshers were afraid if they allowed libraries access to their books digitally, they would be losing money. Individual publishers came up with their own sets of rules for libraries to access their e-content, and they have been tweaked many times since 2006.

In addition, the prices libraries must pay for ebooks and e-audiobooks is very high. Libraries must pay up to 4X the retail price for digital versions of books (which only one user can have access to at a time).  Meeting the library patron’s needs for downloadable content is a very expensive enterprise, indeed! Take a look at this comparison of the prices for various versions of the same book:

It becomes easy to see that acquiring ebooks for public use is a very expensive endeavor…

Read more on The Cheshire Library Blog.

As I librarian, I love the idea of the queer community being more like a library than an exclusive club.  Huge thanks to FYA for choosing libraries as examples of open, welcoming, inclusive places!

Any aspec feeling down because of the posts telling not to go to pride, I've seen plenty of posts banning enbies, trans people, pans, bis and in one particularly baffling case, lesbians from attending. With literally the only group escaping these posts being cis gay men, I think it's safe to say they're rubbish. Gatekeepers can have their own super exclusive pride in some dark cave with rest of the council of evildoers.

I told my friend today that I think people see the queer community as this exclusive club and you must dress and appear “gay enough” to be allowed in, when I think the queer community should be more akin to a library that can host events. Because the exclusion of any dampers the pride I feel down until I don’t want pride symbols and colors everywhere because I don’t want to think about the heartbreak we do to each other 24/7.

I laughed so hard I woke up the cat.  Now he’s staring at me, trying to decide whether he needs to be concerned about this.

I laughed a lot. (x)

Your flat tire is more likely to happen during difficult conditions, when it’s harder to see the road and any hazards.  If you can, keep an old blanket or sleeping bag in your vehicle so you have something to kneel or sit on when you’re changing the tire.

I would love to see a Wild West version of the Scottish play!  That sounds like it could work extremely well.

Cowboys are witches and horses are their familiars

I love the expression on the one second from the top on the left: “Now that I control the household finances, there will be no more of that cheap cat food!”

Money Cats masterpost, to have your LIFE!! filled with money.