Well, I got to cut out of work a little early on Thursday to attend a holiday party put on by the local LIS and KM networking group. At first, the event consisted mostly of the standard schmoozing around the chocolate fondue fountain, and swapping war stories with the current MLIS students. Then after mingling and nibbling, we met several young men who had got doused with pepper spray earlier in the afternoon, we got to see a demo by the K-9 team, and watched the kids of one of the other attendees race McGruff the Crime Dog robots around the hallways.
You see, the holiday party was held at the local police academy, as it was hosted by one of the coolest (and most well-armed) librarians I have the privilege to know--Officer Tom Rink, Librarian for the Tulsa Police Department. Unfortunately I was a doofus and left my camera at the house that morning, but I believe some piccies of the event will be going up at the website in the next few days (which I will link to, don't worry!). In addition to good food and good friends, I learned a lot about the travails of running a VERY special collection with a minimum of resources, got a tour of police facilities that most "civilians" never get to see, learned some interesting factoids about our police department (ours is one of a relative minority that requires all officers to have a bachelor's degree, and about a third of the department has a graduate degree), and generally learned a lot about the folks who keep my city safe.
And, I ask you, would I have gotten to go to a shindig that cool if i still I worked in telecom? :-)
