Odds and ends at work today. I checked the prices of the religion department's requests on vendor and publisher web sites; contacted Baker and Taylor about their binding options for paperbacks; sold some transparencies to a student; filled out an application form for Library Journal reviewing; read The Chronicle of Higher Education; dealt with an overdue notice from a CD club; and sat at the reference desk. I also spent a half hour talking about poster art with a coworker; not a very productive use of time, although it is an improvement over yesterday, when I spent an hour in a conversation on anime with student workers. (One of them is going to loan me Princess Mononoke, which I've been waiting a long time to see.) The non-librarian staff are not afraid to pursue their own interests while on the job. The acquisitions clerk reads romance novels and browses crafts catalogs; the cataloguer will surf the net and talk to her boyfriend on the phone; the computer technician likes to come downstairs and banter with the aforementioned personnel. To an extent socializing is good in maintaining a friendly atmosphere; I just want to avoid getting sucked into a conversation that eats away the entire morning or afternoon.

That application form for reviewing in Library Journal asked the following question: "If you are interested in reviewing books in politics, philosophy, or religion, please describe your beliefs." I answered the question, but it shouldn't have been asked in the first place. At best LJ will use the question to avoid sending me books to review which contradict my opinions, an insult to the intellectual integrity of all those with political, philosophical, or religious beliefs--why are art historians or literary critics more immune to bias? At worst, they will reject my application altogether because I am a conservative Christian.