We’ve all taken the chance during lockdown to get to some of those big jobs done that we never really get to. This was no different for a well-meaning cleaner who took the chance to do a deep clean of the closed library where she worked.
Librarians at the library in Suffolk (UK) returned to work and a bit of a shock. The cleaner had returned the books to the shelves by order of size!
No surprise that staff said it would take a “bit of time” to fix (lucky she hadn’t quite finished the job before a staff member did her weekly check).
Fortunately, library staff saw the funny side and appreciated the cleaner’s intentions and didn’t want her to feel bad.
How do you order your bookshelves at home – genre, author, other? (I bet it isn’t by book size)
May 25, 2020 at 8:55 pm
When I first moved in I ordered the fiction by author name, alphabetically, and non fiction by subject. I can still find things, more or less, but as my collection has grown…and grown… I have just been glad to find an empty spot!
May 26, 2020 at 8:08 am
That sounds exactly like me, Sue. I had the Barbarians bookshelves ordered like that since they were little and now they do it naturally. I would if I had the shelf space, but I ran out of that years ago…
May 25, 2020 at 9:48 pm
I’m sorry – but who doesn’t know how library books are arranged? I have a feeling this was done on purpose….
I don’t have a bookshelf at home. My books are stored under my bed in suitcases 😂😂 easier to move when they roll lol! At school, the class books are organized however the children shove them in. My books are slowly being organized a little bit. I think it will be by series/author/subject next year. National geographic books all together, Junie B Jones, Dr. Seuss, levelled readers. That will be the hardest part of September – organizing them.
May 26, 2020 at 8:19 am
I wondered if the cleaner isn’t a native English speaker. That’s very common in Australia in Government departments/commercial locations.
Oh yeah, having always had more books than anything, my Barbarians kept “rearranging” their bookshelf when they were young.
May 26, 2020 at 12:56 am
The little gestures are always “HUGE”!
May 26, 2020 at 8:20 am
My gosh, Ronald, aren’t they! It’s like when the Barbarians were young and would make me brekky in bed for mother’s day. The clean up was only made worthwhile because of the love in the gesture.
May 26, 2020 at 1:58 am
That’s hilarious. Me, I stick them where I find an opening. Once a year, my daughter organizes them. It seems to work nicely!
May 26, 2020 at 8:21 am
That is a great arrangement, Jacqui. If I were you, I’d never try and arrange them because it sounds like you have the system working perfectly 😉
May 26, 2020 at 6:56 am
I read about that. Didn’t the cleaner realize… I guess not. The cleaner probably just wanted it to be neat. Sigh.
May 26, 2020 at 8:22 am
I’m thinking the cleaner may have had English as a second language. I can just imagine her not thinking past “I’ll clean” when she pulled the books off, and then the realisation of “uh oh” when she had to put them back, lol.