Library Cards

Others and I were commiserating with Spunky about library fines and the case of the disappearing books. They've been known to reappear at the next cleaning (semi-annual)of the bedrooms.

Illinois must be a flukey thing because I know people in other states are amazed that some of us here have to pay for a library card. In my family's case our little farm is 3 miles out of our little farmtown and we're not in a library district. So we have to pay $25, think it went up to $35 this year to be a library member. I rarely go to that library. I'd link to it, but it doesn't have a website. That and the one week checkout period (last time I checked), explains part of the reason that we don't get over there much. My kids would still go there to check out the Garfield books and such if it made a difference for the local library and their usage tracking, but the librarian says that isn't an issue when I asked.

What I did was take my card over to the two neighboring college towns and we have bar code stickers on the back of the cards that say we're members there, as well. Free there because Illinois libraries can be part of the Reciprocal Borrowing System. My absolute favorite is this library. Very homeschool friendly. Actually just plain friendly in that they have the school districts' textbooks there in case the school kids have homework due the next day and they're locked out of their school w/o a book. They also a month long checkout period for most books (including Saxon and other textbooks that some homeschoolers like to use). Might have something to do with the head children's librarian Janice Harrington, who can change her whole physical appearance just by telling a story and knows how to write a good story too. The rest of the staff have been great too, and no surprise, at least a couple of the staff happen to be homeschoolers.

The other college town whose twin city is named Normal isn't as user friendly or resource friendly as Champaign's library. They do have the Teaching Company courses which I would LOVE to watch for endless hours. And they have lots of Hank the Cowdog books on cd which crack us all up as they're read by the author, John Erikson the cowboy.

Bloomington Library doesn't send email reminders of soon to be overdue books like Champaign does. My pocketbook says so.