I am astoundingly happy to report, I got a new job today and that the new job is in a library! If you heard a high pitched squeal about 1:00 central time today it was probably me after I hung up the phone from talking with my new boss. The rest of my afternoon at work was shot of course because I couldn’t sit still. I gave my two week’s notice and then told my coworkers who were excited and happy for me but some of whom also looked like they wanted to cry which then made me want to cry. I’ve worked at this place for a little over eight years. While I wasn’t always happy there and sometimes my coworkers drove me to the bathroom where I would cry for a few minutes, wash my face and return to battle, there are still a lot of people there I like very much and will miss.

The sadness is pretty diluted right now by the overwhelming happiness. I start my new job on January 7th. I am the Circulation Assistant at a university law library. The law program is less than ten years old and the university is committed to making it into something that gets national attention. The library is still very new and with lots of empty shelves. The staff is small and excited about making the library into something amazing. They encourage everyone on the library staff to get involved in library projects and they like to utilize the skills of staff across library duties whether or not they have that MLIS degree under their belt. They are very excited I know how to do website stuff and also excited that I am concentrating my studies in digital libraries.

The only downside is that my two-week reading vacation is only going to be one week now. I could not, in all fairness to my current employer, take two weeks off, come back and work two days, and then leave for good. There won’t be many people around the week of New Year’s so I am hoping to be able to finish up a host of projects and tie up loose ends.

This also means my winter bike commuting is over. The library is downtown, just down the street from the public library I volunteered at, I could drop by and say hi to Librarian Mike. Yeah, right. I will be taking bus and train. In the spring though I will see what biking to the train station is like. I don’t feel safe doing it now because I am unfamiliar with the roads and traffic patterns and slick winter streets are not the right time to learn about them. Doesn’t mean I can’t take a snowy ride around the lake though.

Now I have to figure out how to celebrate. Hmm, some book shopping maybe?