11 April 2007 ? Wednesday

It is the last day of Spring Break week here at AUK. The campus is very quiet, as one might expect. Amna and Hana are here at work with me as we do odds ?n ends to keep busy. Reham is taking the week off to be with her children, both of whom are quite young.

Amna and Hana had a great trip to the ACRL Conference in Baltimore, after which they spent a couple of days at Dartmouth College. This trip opened their eyes to the size and scope of librarianship in the USA ? it has broadened their outlook on this profession in all the right ways. One always hopes that colleagues benefit somewhat by your presence on the job, and at the very least I know that supporting this type of travel and growth has been beneficial in both the short and long-term for these two fine librarians.

I just came back from doing the Library?s budget presentation for next fiscal year. I?ve been doing budgets for forever, so this one no different than any others. I do find it interesting how little people know about how a library actually runs, which I suspect is not to our credit as librarians. It does look like we?ll add another staff member next year to work the evening schedule. This will go a long way to providing better student support, and I?m optimistic that we?ll be able to find a local hire that has the right skill set and, more importantly, the right attitude (as in likes to work).

As noted previously, Terrie & I along with Kurt & Abby spent 5 days in Oman. What a great trip! The Omani people are so gracious and hospitable ? Kurt has taken to calling it the world?s standard for hospitality. Isam, our host, was fantastic at keeping us happy and busy. We stayed at his family?s home in Seeb, just beyond the airport ? it is a very lovely home, groomed grounds and a nice swimming pool to boot ? hard duty, not!! He also loaned us a very nice van to get around in, and yours truly didn?t get us lost at all. Our itinerary included dinner at his family?s home (twice), a boat trip down the coast, a wadi bash into the interior near Nakhl (which was very vertical and a new place for me & Terrie), a tour of the interior including Nizwa and Jabrin fort and Misfah (like walking though the pages of National Geographic). We also toured around the capitol area and just had to shop at the Muttrah souk, always a must for an Oman visit. Isam had several of his work colleagues help us, and our thanks go to Yaser, Mohamed and Abdulkarim ? all nice young men and now new friends as well.

The semester cranks back up on Saturday, with just a month and a half left for classes. I imagine we?ll start getting very busy soon, as papers will need to be written, databases searches conducted, works cited, pages proofread ? all part of the job. The academic year does have its own rhythm.