08.00 Cycle to Work
I cycle to work and catch the glorious sunrise being reflected on the River Thames as I pedal over Folly Bridge and then past Christ Church and the beautifully illuminated Radcliffe Camera.
08.30 Opening
I start my day by checking each floor for any shelving. I also check the carrels on the third floor for any lost property, unplugged computers, or to move any chairs that have mysteriously meandered and found their way into other carrels overnight.
Once the shelving is completed, I head back down to the second floor for my first shift at the Enquiry Desk with a lonely phone charger that I found in one of the carrels. After updating the missing property book (hoping that the charger will be reunited with its owner later on), logging in to my computer and saying good morning to colleagues on Teams, I collect the keys to open the library and let in the eager readers waiting outside.
9.00 Enquiry Desk
Top of my list today is to finish making the ‘New Publications by Oxford Authors’ display which lives on the second floor of the library and showcases a list of books written or edited by law faculty members. I make sure that the document is neatly presented with photos of the new book, the author, sometimes a QR code for books that are only accessible online, and a little biography of the author. I hope to print and laminate these pages later on today so that I might put the display up before I go home for the Christmas break.
For the rest of my time at the Enquiry Desk I work through a couple of boxes I picked up from Official Papers on the ground floor, barcoding items that do not have barcodes. I also work on some reading lists – reviewing online reading lists to see if links to e-books are working, and to see if the Bodleian Law Library has the latest edition books. Every now and then I am also approached by a reader who would like to see a book from the Reserve Collection (which is kept behind the desk) or needs directions to find the PCAS (printing, photocopying and scanning) machines, or a specific book in the library, or the water fountains in the building or the bathroom.
11.00 Break
Usually, I sit with my book in the staff room and have a snack. Today, however, I hurriedly make my way out of the library and speed-walk to Blackwell’s where I pick up a signed copy of the much talked about Babel by R.F Kuang.
11.20 Books, journals and more books!
Back at the library (with my new prized possession – the signed Babel!), I check the shelves in the WIP (work-in-progress) room that are my responsibility. These are the shelves that have donated or purchased books waiting to be processed, or books awaiting labelling. Processing involves updating our book statistics spreadsheet (marking down how many purchased, donated or legal deposit books we have received), edge-stamping the books, stamping the donated and purchased books with the appropriate stamps, tattling, labelling the books that are in need of labels, and then returning the books to the cataloguing shelves or the shelves for books waiting for their labels to be checked.
I also need to check the shelf in the WIP room where the journals for the ‘New Journals Display’ sit. I collect the journals and go through each one to find or create corresponding QR codes, and then laminate them. Using QR codes means that readers can access journals online with greater ease. This is one of my weekly tasks, and I will be putting up the display tomorrow.
The last shelves I need to check are the ones on my trolley. A collection of books have recently been donated to the Law Library. I process, download bibliographic records and create gift orders for these books in preparation to pass them on to a colleague so that they can be properly catalogued and then returned to me for labelling at some later date.
12.40 Scanning
Readers can request scans of certain pages or chapters in books, just as long as their requests fall under copyright law. It’s important to keep on top of the scan requests to make sure that there is not too much of a build-up later on. Armed with information about which books and which pages need to be scanned, I make my way to the small room in the library where the Bookeye Scanner lives. Once the scan is completed, I check for missing pages, fill in our spreadsheet of completed scans, and then send the scan to the appropriate reader.
1.30 Lunch
Lunchtime! Usually, I would try to sit outside but since it’s drizzling I decide to sit in the warm indoors and continue reading my newest bibliomystery.
2.30 VBD Books
Every week on a Thursday, the VBD (Virtual Book Display) books arrive at the Law Library – usually at 2.15pm on the dot! These are a selection of law-relevant legal deposit books that are chosen by the Information Resources Librarian. Once the books have been unpacked and brought back up to Information Resources, a number of spreadsheets need to be updated, and then the VBD books need to be processed. The size of the VBD book deliveries varies – sometimes there can be as few as five books and other times there can be over seventy!
3.40 Break
I take a later break today because I find this keeps my energy up for the 5-7 evening shift.
4.00 Printing, Laminating and Book Processing
I print off and laminate the ‘New Publications by Oxford Authors’. I also fit in a bit of end-of-day book processing since there are some books on my desk that I need to expedite. This just means that the books need to be quickly processed (counted, stamped, tattled and labelled) usually for a scan, a reader, or so that the books can be shelved in the Reserve Collection.
4.45 Enquiry Desk Shift and MOYS
For avid readers of the blog, you might already be aware that the Law Library is undergoing a very large re-classification project. Essentially, we are re-classifying books from an old in-house classification system to MOYS – a classification system specifically designed to organise legal materials. With my sheet of 32 titles in hand, I head upstairs to the Jurisprudence section of the library and swap a shelf and a half worth of books with a small piece of paper telling readers where the books have disappeared off to.
I have an evening shift from 5-7 on Thursdays so, with my trolley, I head to the Enquiry Desk and work through the books I have temporarily taken from the shelves. I end my evening duty shift by ringing the library bell one final time to warn any straggling readers that the library is closing.
7.00 Home
I head home – looking forward to finishing the last episode of the new season of His Dark Materials.
