This week marks the end of Ref Grunt, everyone’s favorite place to read about the day in the life of reference librarian, Peter Burd. He recorded, to the best of his ability, “every reference desk transaction from May 14 2003 to May 14 2004.”
Don’t be confusing this with sound-alike, Ref Grunt-inspired Refgrunt.com where reference librarians can post, anonymously, the most inane, befuddling or enlightening of transactions at the ref desk.
I love Ref Grunt
I love that site, I never laughed so hard in my life. I would call up non-librarians and read passages from it to them (they never found it as funny as I did though).
I’m glad it was kept up as long as it was. Thanks for the memories.
God, I will miss Ref Grunt!
I used to visit to vicariously re-visit what it was like (and how annoying and fun it can be) to be a reference librarian.
Peter-PLEASE, take some time off and come back!
We need you.
In tribute
Here’s my refgrunt from last week:
A regular patron, who is not the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to technology, came up to me and asked if I could help him (since, apparently, I am his personal IT advisor). He showed me printout from Mapquest. It had point to point driving directions and a map. When I asked him what the problem was, he said, “I need to get from 231 xxxxx Drive to Peoria and that’s not what I got.” I looked at the print out and saw that it was from 233 xxxxx Drive. I assured him that the directions were valid and that he might want to pretend that he was starting out from his neighbor’s house. “You sure?” he asked. I’m not sure he was convinced of my crazy idea, but played along like he did.
What does this have to do with technology? Absolutely nothing, except that it came from a website. But he thought there was some awful high tech error that was about to get him lost. I didn’t suggest that he probably just mistyped his starting address.
Re:God, I will miss Ref Grunt!
Thanks to Peter, I will never believe Edna when she says, “The computers at the X branch don’t act like this!”
Take a well-deserved rest, you have given us the strength to carry on…