Change

Today's the first day of the library's transition to a new catalog, and that means we can't do a lot of things that are normally routine. A simple question like "Do you have this book in?" becomes tricky. If it's fiction, you just need to figure out the author's name, if it's brand new or older, if it's general fiction or a genre like mystery, and if we own it in regular type, large print, or paperback. If you get that far, then you cross your fingers and hope like the dickens that there's a copy on the shelf.

If it's nonfiction, things get a little harder because you have to figure out the call number. Luckily, we can check the catalogs of other libraries and see where they put the book. Hopefully, we've given the book approximately the same call number, so once you've found that number, you go to the shelves doing the hope-like-the-dickens thing again.

Most of the time customers are pretty patient and understanding. But it's never fun to be the breaker of bad news. Even with all the announcements and signs and web postings and one-to-one talking we did to prepare our customers for this short down-time, we couldn't get the word out to everyone. There will always be a few folks extremely disappointed that they can't check out a book without their Champaign Public Library card itself in hand or they can't get the book they were first on the waiting list for right now.

But come December 8, we hope to be new, improved, and sparkling brightly. So please bear with us. Fingers still crossed, we think the change will be for the better!