The speeches have already been said, so there’s no need to repeat them here. We all know how amazing Eva is. But it’s hard to believe that this day would ever come, even though it really has. Today is Eva’s last day of work before her well-deserved retirement.

Eva’s coworkers in room 122 couldn’t let her leave without planning a little surprise for her. And in grand library tradition, we celebrated with food. We ordered a build-your-own taco buffet from Quesada, and it was a hit!

While none of us have the rapping skills that the 6th floor staff demonstrated at Fern’s recent retirement, we are blessed with a staff member who is pretty amazing with Photoshop. Some of you may not be aware of this, but Eva loves to talk about the movie Ladyhawke. Apparently it was quite the hit with her kids back in the 1980s, and the Wong family watched it frequently over the years. The tragic story of star-crossed lovers Michelle Pfeiffer (who is a hawk during the day and a woman at night) and Rutger Hauer (who is a man during the day and a wolf at night) is apparently quite relevant to the daily work of the Murray Library, since Eva somehow manages to bring it up all the time. So we knew that her retirement party had to have a LADYHAWKE theme! The image you see below is the classic movie poster, with Eva’s face in the place of young Michelle Pfeiffer’s. Quite the resemblance, isn’t it?

Eva quite enjoyed her movie poster surprise.

And because nothing goes better with tacos and 80s movies than cake with faces on it, we also had a cake made with the Eva/Ladyhawke poster on it. (For some reason, no one wanted to eat the piece that had Eva’s face on it though.)

Eva, we will miss you more than you can imagine. We’re sad to see you leave us, but extremely happy to know that you will enjoy your well-deserved retirement after a long and successful career in the library. We hope that you and Jimmy enjoy your yardwork, your fabulous vacations, and more time with kids and grandkids. Just don’t forget to invite us all to that Ladyhawke viewing party, okay? We were serious when we said that there should be one.

Lots of love, from your coworkers.

The Murray Library is currently undergoing renovations to some of its public spaces. Here’s what’s been happening lately.

Ground Floor

The large brown sofas with the high red backs have been taken out and replaced with new individual armchairs and tables. Other furniture was also taken out and will be redeployed throughout the library. The new chairs on the ground floor are lighter and easier to clean (and clean around!) than the old ones. And there is now more seating than ever available for students on the ground floor.

Old ground floor seating

New ground floor seating near Starbucks

New ground floor furniture along west wall

6th Floor

A capital project to refresh the area on the 6th floor near the staff offices is also currently in process. On May 17th, staff from Materials Handling came by to remove the three large tables. You may have heard some loud banging throughout the building on that day! They had to use a sledgehammer to bend over the metal table legs so that the tables would fit into the elevator.

old 6th floor layout and furniture

Years of old gum under the old table on the 6th floor

FMD staff taking away the old tables after sledgehammering the legs down

Most of the furniture from this space on the sixth floor will be going to surplus or to the recycling bin, but the six grey easy chairs and the stacking black chairs will be kept and used elsewhere in the Murray library.

Now that the old furniture has been taken away, some renovations to the space will occur over the summer. New furniture has been selected, which includes powered study tables for laptop docking and two soft seating areas. Carpet will also be laid, which will help to reduce noise. We hope to have this project completed by the end of the summer, but in the meantime there will be reduced seating.

It’s hard to believe that it’s been over 3 years since we first posted our Murray Sticks picture. (Hard to believe, because somehow the image is still sitting on my desk. Someone help me clean up please!) There have been a lot of changes to the Murray Library’s staff complement, and there are more changes that will be coming in the summer, with a few impending retirements! So here they are, the employees who currently call Murray 122 home:

Completely accurate representations of real people.

It may seem like there are a lot of us, but if I consult older stick images, there are currently two less librarians than in past versions (not including sabbaticals), two less supervisors, one more operations manager, one extra Aboriginal intern, and four more freeloaders using up all the good offices. 😉

1st version – March 2014

2nd version – August 2014

Self-checkout machines – how much do they really get used? At the Murray Library, we decided to promote ours a little bit to encourage students to try them out. Since our machines are located in a darker space, surrounded by Learning Commons computers, we worried that students didn’t even know they were there. So we’ve brightened up the space, and made it a bit more fun. The self-checkout machines are now dressed up to look like they come from a grocery store, cookies, carrots and eggplant included.

Stop by the Murray ground floor to take a look, and let us know what you think! Ugliest promotion ever, or kinda fun?

Staff at the Murray Library enjoyed the Marquis Christmas lunch very much. We all ate way too much food and needed naps afterwards. Unfortunately we were not allowed to do so, as “napping” was not a good enough reason to shut down the library on the last day of classes.

Jo Ann, Donna, Barb, Christine, Justine, Iffat, and Duane’s arm (not in photo – Eva)

Lara, Amy, Racheal, Kelly, Donna and Susan

In other news, just as we finished setting up our Take a Break room yesterday, a nice young man from Global News arrived to get some video of relaxing students. Since there were no students in the room yet, several Murray staff members were obliging enough to let themselves be videotaped pretending to be students taking a break from studying. Start at about 8 minutes in to see quick shots of Iffat, Justine, Lara, Racheal and Kim’s arm on the evening news: http://globalnews.ca/video/2391858/evening-news-december-9-5.

286: That’s how many people took a tour of the Murray Library in September!

We’re very excited that the number of participants for the Murray drop-in tours keeps growing and growing. Over the past month, Eva, Lara and Amy have been teaching new (and returning) students all about our spaces, services and website. 153 people came on September 1st alone (as part of the Orientation activities), and then 133 others came voluntarily to one of 36 available drop-in sessions.

Take a look at our improvement over the years:

September 2013: 48 participants
September 2014: 88 participants
September 2015: 286 participants

This number does not include registered group or class tours.

To celebrate this achievement, Eva, Lara and Amy will now be taking very long naps. 🙂

Today is Miss Justine Eritz’s last day of work before her wedding on Saturday. When she comes back to the Murray Library next week, she will be a married lady named Mrs. Justine Sturgeon.

To send Justine off, her Murray Library coworkers threw her a mini surprise wedding shower. There was food, games, and lots of fun. Even without our social committee director’s input, I think we managed a pretty good party! Thanks to everyone who brought potluck items, decorated, and prepared the games.

We wish you all the best, Justine, on your wedding day, and throughout the many years of wedded bliss that are sure to come!

Justine practices cutting the cake ahead of the big day.

Thanks Christine, for bringing in such a beautiful cake.

Everyone was well-fed!

The 2nd annual Murray Library Mini Golf Tournament was held at Putt n’Bounce yesterday evening. The event was followed by a burger dinner at Fuddruckers.

This year’s event was a rousing success, with 16 participants in the tournament. However, there can only be one winner, and that winner is:

DUANE

Congratulations Duane, on winning for the second year in a row! Duane had the lowest score, an impressive 38 strokes (and 3 holes in one in a row!). Honourable mention goes to Angie, with a second-place score of 42.

Just like there’s only one winner, there can only be one loser. This year’s worst score was also a repeat from last year:

AMY

Congratulations, Amy, on winning the worst score trophy for the second year in a row! Amy had the highest score by two points, at 64 strokes, and no holes in one.

Will someone else be able to unseat our champions next year and win the tin foil trophies? Stay tuned!

Read below to see all final scores.  Continue reading →