Meanwhile, in Philadelphia...

This is the quote of contention, now restored, from Elie Wiesel's Nobel Peace prize acceptance speech in 1986:

I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.

Mr. Wiesel was a Holocaust survivor who wrote numerous moving books. I particularly suggest his book Night, which chronicles his experiences as a teenager during the Holocaust.

Librarian says he was told to remove poster of Holocaust survivor’s quote for violating Central Bucks ‘advocacy’ policy

This is beautiful

I haven't seen this before. It's lovely. There was an image with it on Facebook, but it wasn't the whole poem. Here it is:

Epitaph

by Merrit Malloy

When I die
Give what’s left of me away
To children
And old men that wait to die.
And if you need to cry,
Cry for your brother
Walking the street beside you.
And when you need me,
Put your arms
Around anyone
And give them
What you need to give to me.

I want to leave you something,
Something better
Than words
Or sounds.


Look for me
In the people I’ve known
Or loved,
And if you cannot give me away,
At least let me live on in your eyes
And not on your mind.


You can love me most
By letting
Hands touch hands,
By letting
Bodies touch bodies,
And by letting go
Of children
That need to be free.

Love doesn’t die,
People do.
So, when all that’s left of me
Is love,
Give me away.

I’ll see you at home
In the earth.

Not used to this yet...

One of my Gen X groups had a post about how someone had bought a mood ring, and I brought out the one I have, which I usually have to put on my pinkie. It doesn't fit any of my fingers--it's too big for my pinkie but too small for the ring finger as of yet, as I've lost weight. But that got me thinking, so I tried on my other rings, as I usually don't wear them at all because they're too small. I've been a size 10 for ages (when I got married 31 years ago, both my husband and I had size 10 white gold rings, which we switched because my women's ring fit him (he was 115 lbs dripping wet) and the men's ring fit me better). I was about 50-70 lbs less than I am now at the time.

Oddly enough, one ring fits really well or was even loose, and it was a size 8. It's my high school ring, something I haven't been able to wear in ages. I'm not sure why it's fitting, but hey, yay!

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Well, they do have a point

Grim Anniversary

Thirty-seven years ago, I was a sophomore in college and dating a computer science major who dearly loved NASA and even had simplified schematics that were in available for the shuttle. He was pole-axed by the explosion, and we watched it over and over as it was replayed for hours. He pointed to a section of debris as it fell and said that it was the crew cabin and that they were alive during that part of the fall. He was right--that came out some time later.

Remembering those who died that day: F Richard Scobee [Commander], Michael J Smith [Pilot], Ronald McNair [Mission Specialist], Ellison Ozinuka [Mission Specialist], Judith Resnik [Mission Specialist], Gregory Jarvis [Payload Specialist], and teacher Christa McAuliffe [Payload Specialist]. Because McCaullife was participating in the Teacher in Space Project, children were watching the launch on television all over the world and saw the explosion live. I did not, I'd been in a lecture, but heard about it at the Student Center at UK and went straight to the TV room with my boytfriend. The Space Shuttle programme was paused for years, resuming eventually until it was finally shelved for good after the Columbia disaster in 2003.

The three worst disasters in the American space programme all happened within a single week in different years. The Apollo 1 fire killed three astronauts in a test on January 27 (1967). The Challenger happened on January 28 (1986). The Columbia shuttle, which broke up on re-entry was on February 1 (2003). We are approaching the 20th anniversary of the Columbia disaster.

Remembering the men and women who sought to touch the stars and their loved ones at this time.

Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster.

'Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.'--George Santayana

We are failing to teach the Holocaust, not only as a country, but as a world.

Of the 140,000 Jews who lived in the Netherlands before World War II, 102,000 were killed during the Holocaust, according to the U.S. State Department

Though most Dutch respondents – 89% – were familiar with Anne Frank, 32% of millennials and 27% of all adults surveyed did not know she died in a concentration camp. Anne Frank was a German Jewish girl whose family hid in an attic of her father's Amsterdam business office until they were betrayed to the Nazis and sent to a series of camps. Anne and her sister Margot died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp of typhus in 1945 just months before the camp was liberated near the end of the war in Europe.

Netherlands joins 'disturbing' trend of decline in Holocaust knowledge, new survey finds

Well, I never expected to read that headline...

Japanese YouTuber's Pet Fish Commit Credit Card Fraud Against Owner While Playing Pokémon

A reflective metaphor for the dangerous times in which we live

Scientists set Doomsday Clock closer to midnight than ever before

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists — a nonprofit organization made up of scientists, former political leaders and security and technology experts — moved the hands of the symbolic clock 10 seconds forward, to 90 seconds to midnight.

Grrr...argh

I just went through six pharmacies to try to get one of my diabetes medicines. My regular pharmacy is very small, so some of the brand names are an issue in terms of getting reimbursed enough, so I was getting this one at the University of Kentucky. which you would think is pretty big, so they could get it. And it wasn't any trouble before. But, no, they couldn't this time.

One had it (Kroger) but it no longer takes my medication insurance (head's up to you all at Shriners, as I'm pretty sure Express Scripts is used for both of the main plans). I finally found some at Walmart and am working on getting it transferred, although they won't know the price or anything until they run it and can't guarantee they'll be able to get it from here on out. Everyone else just had it on backorder. So it will hopefully work out as I'm supposed to take my weekly dose (it's a once-a-week injectable) tomorrow.

It's Ozempic, which has really helped with my blood sugars, but as I'm sure you've heard, recently perfectly skinny TikTok influencers who want to lose weight have been going crazy over it, and according to my main pharmacist, doctors are apparently writing prescriptions even when it's not needed, and in some cases, insurances are paying for it. Or maybe these people are just making so much money on TikTok that they just have the money to pay $1500-$1600 a month for it without batting an eye. Kroger did say they could sell me theirs for their retail price ($1500) if I wanted to pay without running insurance.




UPDATE: I did get my medicine in time for the scheduled dose, mainly by calling around and finally getting it at Walmart, a store I stopped going to years ago except for runs to get items for a friend who was dying of cancer.

The pharmacist did take me aside and explained that given the shortage, I should call them about three weeks ahead to get a refill started. Mind you, the pen lasts for four weekly doses, so I need to call them next week. I speak with my doctor this week and will let her know what's going on.

Are you still a librarian if you don't work in a library?

 

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I'm not sure who did this, so I can't credit them, but it's brilliant.

It's been five years since I've worked in a library. In that time I have had one contract position and then four regular positions at the same company I was a librarian for 20 years.  I also have moved seven times in five years as they've tried to get the right mix of office layout.  For three floors, it's pretty mobile.

I was laid off for six weeks before they asked me to come back.  My library gig was always part-time, first at 35 hours a week, then 20, and I eventually got a data entry position entering medical charges that made $10 less an hour, but I was finally able to stop taking extra jobs such as working at the gas station (I did that for five years, standing for hours through tendinitis and plantar fasciitis issues and worrying about being robbed).  I was finally full-time for the first time in my life anywhere.  I'd worked for 10 years in a 'real' job to finally get that.  All because we started taking insurance to reduce the draw on our endowment.

But those charges weren't going to be needed once we were an outpatient medical centre rather than an inpatient hospital, and the library wasn't going. So I was laid off.

Six weeks later the manager of patient access called me asking if I'd come back as a consultant as their numbers were through the roof now that we were getting paediatric fractures follow-ups from the University of Kentucky and other referrals for orthopaedic issues in numbers we hadn't had before.  When I'd been a data entry clerk, I'd helped out with patient access when three women went on maternity leave at once.  So I didn't have to be trained as much as a temporary worker, and they'd have more faith in giving me access to the electronic medical record system (at that time it was Cerner; we recently went to Epic).  I did contract work from May 2017 to October and was hired on again in the job I was performing, check out.  The next spring I was hired as a specialist to do insurance authorisations of office visits and schedule offsite imaging such as ultrasounds and MRIs.  Two weeks later the lady training me's husband got the best job offer he'd ever had, one tailored and created for him in a very small niche area, and they had two weeks to go to another state.  So I wound up getting her job, which was basically the same, although authorising surgeries, as we have an ambulatory surgical centre as well as medical and rehabilitation clinics, although it was a higher grade.  Eventually, we wound up changing the positions so the coordinator (me) did all the pre-authorisations, and the specialist did both offsite scheduling and their authorisation.  That will become important, as this summer HQ took over all inside authorisations, i.e., what I was doing, but my boss (who is great) argued that they keep me on in another position that had opened up, back in checkout.  Although it is technically a lower grade, they kept it a lateral move so I wasn't demoted or taking a pay cut.  For which I'm grateful.  HR and my boss really went to bat for me.

I had a panic attack shortly before transitioning to the new position, because when I'd done it before I was largely alone, handling up to 200 patients some days, as well as the phones and e-mails.  We have a second person in checkout now and a scheduler who handles most of the rest, letting us focus on checking out and scheduling new appointments, getting calls when we can and acting as a backup when she's out.  So it's much better, and despite being an introvert, I've discovered I enjoy making a difference directly with patients and their families rather than doing it on the back end by wrestling with insurance companies.

But that isn't the point of this post.  It's that I have been doing other things outside of librarianship. Am I still a librarian? Yes, I'm trained, I have a piece of paper that says I am, and I worked 20 years in a professional position beyond work-study and graduate-assistant jobs.  I am still very interested in the library world and books, censorship, publishing, and other library-related topics.  Have I tried to get another library job lately? No. I did when I was laid off, and I did during my return at first, but I discovered three things (in addition to the long-known issue that I live in a city with a school of library and information science that puts out scores of new librarians three times a year, and you almost have to wait for someone to retire or die to get a library job).

1. I was a solo librarian all the time I was in my position. I did all aspects of library work.  That's great, right? But no one wants to give me an entry-level job because of my experience and won't give me a mid-career job because I've never supervised anyone except some students over the years.
2. Of the libraries in my area, most (except for the University of Kentucky and the Lexington Public Library) pay less for master's-level library salaries than I make at checkout at my current job.
3. No one I've seen has had the level of health coverage that I have. I have an HMO that doesn't require referrals, never have had problems with them covering any of the doctors I have across multiple systems, has a deductible of only $150 (which I've already met for this year) and an out-of-pocket maximum of $1500. That, along with a flexible spending account, means that I have money on January 1st to cover my out-of-pocket max that hits quickly with my medications (I'm diabetic, on insulin, among other things).  I usually put a little more on the card for contacts and maybe some dental work.  The money is taken out of my pay pre-tax in instalments over 26 paycheques.  Considering most of the places I've looked at have a minimum of $3000 deductibles, I can't beat that, really.  (Our workplace also offers a high-deductible plan for those who don't need the breadth of healthcare coverage I do, such as occasional trips to the doctor or maybe one or two medicines, that are lower in cost per paycheque). Although mine's not bad, either.  Essentially, I work mostly for my healthcare.

So my plan, if I can, is to retire from here. For one, I love my co-workers and what I do.  But I have twelve more years before I can retire fully.  Sixty-two isn't really an option, due to needing healthcare.  Sixty-five might be, so I could go on Medicare, and that's ten years away.  I'd make a little less for the rest of my life, but 1) my health is not the best, so I don't want to push it out too far so I can actually enjoy some of my retirement and 2) I have one of those rare things, nowadays, a pension, that could make up the shortfall.  I don't know if social security will even be a thing by then, but hopefully, it will.  Gods, it bothers me that I'm Gen X and I'm already looking at how my retirement will go.

Sometimes I regret not working in a library anymore. I derived a lot of validation in my identity as a librarian, and I found the work very rewarding. As a medical librarian, I helped with research, education, and clinical care that made a difference in evidence-based outcomes.  I was a member of various local, state, and national groups and served on committees, and chaired a couple, including a national awards jury. I was my state representative to the Midwest region of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine for five years, going annually to represent the Commonwealth in Chicago, except for the year I was laid up a few months due to being hit by a car right before the trip.  So I gained a lot of experience.  I published a book chapter, two chapters in a major medical collection development guide, spent over a decade working on Doody's collection development tool for Orthopaedics and Paediatric Nursing and wrote one article and numerous book reviews.  I think I have a total of 43 publications, all but one as a medical librarian (as an intern at the Kentucky state archives, I did a finding aid under my former name). It was a good run.

So, I will always be a librarian to the core, and the Rabid Librarian at that.

Pow! Pfft!

I went to Kroger this morning and this little boy saw my cane in the cart and thought it was a grappling hook. I think that makes me Batman.

Love this song

This song speaks to me, as I was once in a relationship where I was dying inside due to my partner.



Here's a version by the Brigham Young University women's a capella group, Noteworthy, that is beautiful. And I love what they did with the shirts.

I find it very sad that in all of 2022 I wrote exactly seven posts

I won't give you the standard 'I want to make 2023 better in terms of this blog'. You know the spiel. What I'm going to do instead is write. I am 55 years old. Mature, middle-aged even, but not really old. But I felt old this week due to finally making the decision to buy a cane. I have very bad knees (I have since high school, actually) and need a knee replacement but have about 50 more pounds to lose before they'll do it (I've lost 50 already since November 2021). But more importantly, my balance is really off. I've fallen three times in the past year, two on ice, so maybe they don't count, and once off a Lextran bus servicing the University of Kentucky. But a lot of the time I'll be standing on a completely solid, even surface, and if I turn my head at all or move a bit, or just stand completely still, I will start to fall over. Put me on an elevator and it's worse. So...I ordered a quad cane from Amazon using my flexible spending account. It's not aluminium, it's steel, all of two pounds, which several reviewers complained was too heavy (it took me a couple of days to get used to it, but I get that an older or less strong--and while I'm pathetic in terms of strength, I'm better than some). It can handle someone who's 500 lbs, which I'm not, of course, but I did need one above the standard ones that bear up to 200 or 250 lbs, as I'm about 30 lbs over. So I wanted to make sure it was sturdy enough.

Behold!



I've used it for a couple of days now. The first thing I did the night it came was to watch YouTube videos on adjusting, walking, and dealing with stairs while using a cane. The next day, I went to work with it and definitely made sure I took it to our physical therapy department to make sure all was well. I'd changed the height that morning, and gotten it right (it was a little too short). The cane should come up to your wrist. On a quad cane, there are four legs on the end, not one, and usually (as in mine) the inner ones are aligned narrower than the outer ones, so that shows the orientation that should be used, and if it has a curved section, it should face curving to the front, not towards you. You use it by the opposite leg from your weak one. My left knee is worse, for example, so I use it on my right, but bring it forward when I step forward with the left for greater stability. Lastly, you go upstairs with the good foot and downstairs with the bad one, and the PT secretary actually helped me remember this by saying, 'I always think of heaven and hell', so the good ones go up, the bad ones go down, and that mnemonic has done more for me than anything else.

What I have discovered is that it slows me down somewhat (I can walk smoothly with it, or at least did after I did a little experimenting), but that's good because I need to slow down due to my loss of balance, as I usually fall when I'm rushed.
One thing I discovered years ago when I broke my ankle after being hit by a car while crossing a busy street in a crosswalk (and with the light!) is that adaptive device like walkers, canes, and wheelchairs are a boon because they help maintain or increase mobility.  I initially felt bad about being on a walker and in a wheelchair then, but it helped so much.
This seems to be much the same thing.

Anyway, I'm going to try to embrace this and remind myself that people of all ages use canes, crutches, walkers, etc
This is a step up from my hiking poles, I guess.

But it will help me a lot in the long run.  I still feel a bit decrepit though, and I hate that feeling, but this will help me by preventing dangerous falls, I'm sure.

It also means that the bus drivers tend to remember to kneel the bus (the bus incident involved me coming down from a greater height on the step off the bus because the driver had not lowered that side of the bus, which they call kneeling), as they recognise I'm having some difficulty.
This, along with getting ADA [i.e., handicapped] parking this summer, including a general placard and a university hangtag, has really helped, along with riding the Lextran buses at UK, which kneel and are easier to navigate than the UK-run buses [almost all of which have stairs at the entry; the Lextran buses only have stairs if you go all the way to the back of the bus].

Also, the Lextran bus route takes me right across the street from the medical centre I work in, rather than being dropped off at the UK hospital employee entrance by the emergency department and walking all around the ambulance bays and the hospital itself, which is difficult for me. So it's a win. I park in the Blue 'K' lot near the stadium, and it takes me about 5-7 minutes to get from there to work once the bus comes.
The Orange buses that UK runs at the healthcare lot run more often, but they took about 10 minutes to do their route to my stop and then I took 7-10 more minutes to walk around the hospital slowly and get to my workplace.

I just wish I'd figured this out three years before when I struggled with those staired buses for all that time.