Saturday, December 15, 2007

The dead animal at storytime

By now, many of you have read our Christmas letter and may be wondering, was Alex serious about the dead animal at storytime? Let me assure you, he was dead serious.

A little background: During the summer, part of my job at the library is to meet our Bookmobile at its various stops throughout the week, one per day, and do a storytime. Really, these storytimes are fraught with all sorts of peril: chiggers, biting ants, running dogs, extreme heat, enticing playgrounds, the list goes on and on. Well, this year we faced a heretofore unknown challenge--what do you do when there's a dead rabbit's leg in the middle of your storytime spot?


I set up our storytime mats as far away from it as possible, but for two weeks, my storytime was interrupted with, "Did you know there's a dead rabbit over there?" And this would come mid-sentence while I was reading, mind you. I left it alone, figuring for sure the trailer park's groundskeeper would pick it up. Or maybe one of those dogs!

But when I came the third week and it was still there, I decided no more. (Now you understand this means there had been a dead rabbit's leg in the middle of their playground for three weeks and no one had moved it.) So I took a plastic bag, picked it up, and put it in the dumpster. Then all we had to contend with were the chiggers, ants, enticing playground equipment....

2 comments:

Dr Nate said...

As fascinating as disembodied lapines can be, I would personally rather listen to you read. I think you should hop in your Bookmobile and drive to Maine so that I may be regaled w/ Terry Pratchett on a daily basis. (Rachel, oddly, will not do this for me...)

thanks for the letter!!

lee said...

We remembered the address!!! We had a lot of fun seeing you. Thanks for all the effort and planning that you put in for some great "family time". Talk to you soon, tambra