Obsession, office supplies and the library service desk.

The library where I work is moving from temporary quarters into the newly renovated building. This is as good a time as any to stop, reflect and reassess services. I don't mean the big ones that involve furniture, or computers or giant budgets. It is almost too late in the game to change those and, quite frankly, out of my control. No, let's take a quick look at some of the odd services we offer at the reference desk, the ones that make me feel like I work in an office supply store.

Photo © Katura Reynolds. Taken at The Evergreen State University Library in Olympia, WA

I will not lie. I love office supplies. Fresh reams of paper, new pencils to sharpen, Post-it notes in fun colors and shapes. I love the story behind Post-it notes - a manufacturing mistake turned into profit. I love knowing that Liquid Paper was invented by the mother of Michael Nesmith, from the Monkees.

But do we really need to have so many office supplies available for students? Paper clips, scissors, highlighters, tape, 3-hole punches. Without scissors, our service desk would never have had to create the "use it here at the reference desk" rule, established to keep community users from using said scissors to cut their hair or toe nails in the bathroom.

Some days the *only* questions I get are about office supplies. Can I borrow a pencil? A pen? Do we have folders? Is there tape? In these days of service trainings, should we have specialized session on how to politely tell a student they may have 1-3 paper clips, but 25 is asking too much?

Some of you are nodding your heads or rolling your eyes. Here, for any doubters who are still reading, is a visual example. I got obsessed the other day with staplers at the service desk, specifically how many different kinds seemed to be available.

Exhibit 1: manual operated staplers. Why do we need so many different types? Is the ref desk the final dumping ground? How many of these are unjammed at any given moment?

Exhibit 2: electric staplers. While there is only one style of electric stapler, there are 2 available for use. They don't look like staplers, students walk right past them, and quite frankly the noise and speed of the punch are a little frightening. Should we still keep the manual staplers in case of a power outage?

Exhibit 3: heavy duty staplers that punch through 50+ pages. So abused by the public they are kept behind the desk and must be specifically requested. So why do we need three?

Appendix: inevitably, once you share your obsessions, people will continue to bring you things they find at the back of cabinets well after you have run out of paper in your sketch book and you are forced to draw on the fly leaf.