May 28, 2008
{ Referencing what? }
-ExcellentI know this girl is a college student. Either she is a college student or she is wearing the super-dorky community college t-shirt to try to make herself look smarter.
"Where are your books about history?"
"Any specific period of history?"
"Just your books on history."
"Geologic history? American History? World History? "
"NO. You know, HISTORY."
"Ok. Those two aisles over there are pretty much all history. Also, those two there. Is this for a project?"
"Yeah. I need like the history of civilizations from 100,000 B.C."
"Ok. Ummm..... I don't think that there were too many civilizations around in 100,000 b.c. Geologic history maybe?"
"Like evolution and stuff then."
"Is this for a college assignment?"
It went on from there..... And then I went in the back room to regroup. What bothers me about the whole thing is not the inability of the student to have the slightest inkling of what she wanted me to find for her. What bothers me is the reaction of my coworkers when I tried to tell them about my "reference question."
"She wanted books on civilizations from 100,000 b.c."
"So did you find them for her?"
"Umm. No."
"Well why not? Didn't you look in the history section?"
So then I start to second-guess myself. Maybe I really am incapable of doing reference work. I look it up: Human civilization is estimated to have began around 10,000 b.c. with the appearance of Homo Habilis, and the advent of agriculture and the use of tools. (Only about 90,000 years off.) But what the fuck would I know?
Now I have to go help the woman who smells like shit and cauliflower find mystery books about cats........
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