Friday, March 4, 2011

The Name Game

Sometimes working in the reference department has its downfalls, such as I no longer know all my patrons' names.

However, we have come up with some odd nicknames for our patrons in the absence of knowing their actual names, or in the apathy of wanting to use them.

Some of our patrons' nicknames are as follows:

Booktalker
(he talks to the books, among other things)

Train Scanner (he takes Briana's train and he likes to scan his own card when checking items out, whether you're ready for him to do so or not)

Worse Than Betty (seriously, RUN!)

Pajama Lady (the days when she wears flannels and slippers are good, but often it's a low-cut nightgown and slippers... gag)

Best Buy Guy (wants us to be Best Buy for him)

Creepy Craigslist Guy (CL troll, watch out)

80s Hair Lady (frizzy, crispy, crunchy perm, THICK black eyeliner, and makes Tammy Faye look au naturale)

Slacker (tall, anorexic-looking blonde guy with an ill-fitting and dingy wardrobe)

Slacker's Mom (his mom, duh)

The B.O. Lady (you smell her before you see her)

Handyman (uses his hands in his lap while surfing porn)

Tin Foil Hat Guy (now banned, was totally off his meds)

Serial Killer (odd, lumbering, special guy who leers and frightens people)


These are some of our regulars. Do you make up names for your patrons/customers too?

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hang on, this is familiar. A little tooo familiar. Are you sure you work at a library? www.peopleofwalmart.com

Anonymous said...

We have

Smelly Guy (what are they feeding you)

Ass Crack (fond of stools)

The Monitor (she would surgically attach her face to the monitor so she could sit closer to it; refuses to use the accessibility options to enlarge the screen)

Anonymous said...

Yes,

1. Guitar man (carries 2 everywhere)

2.Cowboy Josephine (among other aliases) He once demanded his quarter back when he tried to buy a maxi-pad!

3. Smelly lady (banned until she takes care of her problem

4. Stalker(s) We had at least 2 stalking 2 personnel.

Jane in Edmonton said...

The Darryls. Two brothers, straight out of the barn (the minute they opened the library door the smell entered before them), who used to come in and look things up in the cost guides.

I wonder what they'll think next time they show up and the entire library has gone and not left them a forwarding address? Sigh. I guess I'll never see them again... oh, wait, there's another up-side to the stupid merger/move!

Kate P said...

When I worked for a public library, yes, but privately (and on the blog). However, the circ manager at the time was pretty open about hers (as she was about pretty much everything and you were entitled to her opinion). The main one I remember she had was "Blondie" which was a late/middle-aged woman with faded blond coloring and a sour look with a personality to match. All she came in for was wasting time online while supposedly looking for a job, and there was lots of fights with her and the staff as well as with other patrons over the computers.

Kate P said...

Sigh. There WERE lots of fights. Jeez, I can't proofread this late at night.

Anonymous said...

FUMA-(Future unwed mother of America) Any teenage girl who dresses like a hood-rat and is always locking lips with a series of slack-jawed, dropout, Romeos—Hide the books on teen pregnancy since she’ll steal them (her library is stopped for lost materials) since she’ll soon show up in a ‘family way’ and be totally clueless.
Library Hood-Males and females who adopt a gang persona even though they live in a fairly comfortable suburb and would piss themselves if they ever met a REAL gang member from, say, Chicago.
Red-Faced-Pervo-The guy from another suburb that comes to your library to use computers since he’s been banned from his library for some unspeakable act of depravity.
Heavy Breather-Patron who calls (unknown name, unknown number) and wants the reference librarian to talk dirty to him or her.

Anonymous said...

the Whiner, whose questions are always whiney in tone & he won't come to the point

Marylin Monroe, blonde hair & breathy voice

Bart Felch, reverse the initial letters

Rachel said...

Bicycle-pants man (self explanatory!)

Info-guy - always calls asking the most bizarre questions. Usually wants information on businesses, or maybe an artificial sugar... basically something really hard to find. It's really rare if you can get him off the phone in 10 minutes.

Anonymous said...

We have:
The CEO (he uses the library to conduct his business, charge his phone, even his business card has the library's address on it, I am not kidding!)

The Bedazzler (she has bedazzeled everything she owns, she is also paranoid-schizo)

Bird-Flu (was a man with an awful cough, he actually died last year)

...of course these are endless, these are just the most memorable.