I think I've mentioned here that I've been trying hard to economize, with varied results.
I've managed to pare my own expenditures (for myself and the family) by about 25%. But some other family members are having trouble getting with the program.
"I have to read a book for my history project," my daughter announced on Friday. "So I need you to take me to Borders."
Uh, no.
She's been working on an in-depth report on the 1969 Native American occupation of Alcatraz Island, an event that captured her imagination in December, when we did a tour of the former prison. Even if I wanted to spend the money, a book on this topic might be hard to find in a store. This was a job for the Los Angeles Public Library.
A search on the library's online catalog turned up a number of likely resources. Unfortunately, none were available at any of our local branches. We would have to go downtown.
I have always had a soft spot for the Central Library, which was originally built in 1926 and features an Egyptian-influenced tower designed by architect Bertram Goodhue. It was extensively renovated and expanded following a 1986 arson fire and is was subsequently renamed the Richard Riordan Central Library (after the mayor who was in office during its 1993 grand reopening) - but I don't know of anyone who calls it that.
I spent a lot of time down there as a college student, taking advantage of cheap bus fares on weekends (an early '70's RTD response to the first oil crisis). I don't get a lot of opportunity to go down there much these days, thanks to the nasty traffic that chokes our freeways these days nearly 24/7. So I was kind of happy for the excuse to go down there and explore.
So was my husband, who loves to take photos of the architectural gems and natural features around the city (yes, the image above is one of his).
The only person NOT enamored of the downtown library was our daughter - but I guess I can't blame her. The only time we had to go was on Saturday afternoon, right after she finished her four-hour gymnastics workout -- and she was tired.
"Can't you check it out without me?" she whined.
No. It's her project, and I thought she should have the opportunity to browse the available books before deciding which one(s) to take.
We found a couple of good volumes fairly quickly -- but then, we lost my husband, who wanted to explore the library further. My daughter moaned when she realized we weren't leaving right away. I thought she was going to break out into a toddler-style tantrum when her dad returned.
"Did you know you can check out DVD's too?" he asked.
Yes. But with movies on demand, Blockbuster and Netflix, I never thought to actually do it.
"I want to check out 'Once Upon a Time in America,'" he announced.
Some background: My college major was Radio-TV-Film. I am the cinemaphile in the family, and when I was single, I went to the movies once or twice a week. Since marrying and becoming a mom... I don't go so much. Every so often, I organize Mom's Movie Days, where a bunch of us head to an early matinee while the kids are in school.
But my husband can take it or leave it (mostly the latter). We go to the movies together maybe once a year. (and it's always a "guy" flick - anything with Star Trek or X Men or Bourne in the title). We hold on to our Netflix selections for MONTHS because I keep hoping he'll watch with me (and in most cases, I give up and watch the DVD alone so I can return it and get the next one that I want to see).
But when he was in college, he saw this Sergio Leone cult classic and has always said it was the best movie ever. Ironically, I've never seen it and it's not on my list, because the older I get, the less tolerant I am of viewing violence on the screen.
So anyway... my husband wanted to check out "Once Upon a Time in America," even though he NEVER wants to sit still for a couple of hours to watch a movie. But there was a hitch: It wasn't at the Central Library. We would have to pick it up at the Hollywood branch.
Now the kid was whining about how tired she was. I reminded my husband that we could add the movie to our Netflix queue and he could have it in a couple of days, but he was determined to get it from the library... because he COULD.
So we drove out to the Hollywood Library (which was on our way home) and eventually found parking on a scary street a couple of blocks away. The kid and I opted to stay in the car while he went in. And we waited. And waited.
Eventually, he returned with THREE DVD's, which he showed me proudly. They all had stickers reading "2 DAYS."
"How long did they say you could keep these?" I asked.
Most library books can be checked out for three weeks. Hub didn't think to ask the librarian about the DVD's. It turned out that they were ALL due on Monday. On top of that, one of the DVD cases contained the wrong disk.
He didn't watch ANY of them and on Sunday night, he asked ME to return them for him. He had confirmed that I could bring them to our local branch, so I figured it would be easy just to slip them in the night deposit slot.
"I think you need to go inside and show them that wrong disk or they might charge us for it."
I didn't think that was necessary (they give you the wrong disk all the time at Blockbuster and nobody makes a big deal out of it) - but I agreed... and it's a good thing I did, because the librarians at Mid Valley thought it WAS a big deal, and their first suggestion was that I take it back to Hollywood . This is something I was unable to do on Monday as it was my turn to drive gymnastics carpool in the opposite direction and besides -- why should I have to drive all the way back there when it was the fault of the Hollywood library?
It took about 20 minutes to get it sorted out so I could return that last DVD without a penalty.
So... I love the library, but in the future, I'm going to stick to checking out books.
Recent Comments