harpy
Har·py (här′pē)
n. pl. Har·pies
1. Greek Mythology One of several loathsome, voracious monsters with the head and trunk of a woman and the tail, wings, and talons of a bird.
OK, not that definition. That would be an especially interesting library encounter, but I really mean sense 3.
3. harpy A shrewish woman.
Image credit - but wait, is that one of @meesterboom's relations?
There is a frumpy red-headed woman who occasionally visits my library. Sometimes she is accompanied by her daughter, essentially a younger version of herself, but with extra teenage angst and rebellion. They tend to argue loudly between themselves or rudely make demands of us beleaguered librarians. Thus, imagine my trepidation when she tromped through our door the other day.
I know this description will trigger some PTSD flashbacks for @generikat. I also couldn't help but notice my co-worker and my manager both very conveniently disappeared. Traitors!
I steeled myself for chaos, consciously shifted to neutral customer service attitude, and asked how I could help. Fortunately, it seemed simple. She needed to print some kind of shipping label. People use the library for this all the time, whether they are e-Bay sellers or processing Amazon returns.
In this case, it was a return label for Birkenstocks.
The easy way to handle this is for the patron to to log into our computers, access their e-mail, and print from there. She didn't know her e-mail password. Tensions rose. No problem. I am fairly adept at defusing human bombs. Option 2: e-mail the label to my work address so I can print it. All well and good if the attachment forwards with the e-mail.
It didn't.
She then took a screenshot of the image and sent that. It looked like garbage, but she paid for the print, took the paper, and headed out the door.
Whew. Back to the tasks she had interrupted... And then my e-mail pinged another notification. She had found how to forward the attachment! Yay, but also AAAAAAAUGH! SHE WILL BE BACK ANY MOMENT! PANIC! I sent the file to print, dashed to the back office to grab the sheet as it spat out from the printer, and scowled at the staff members who had abandoned me to my fate while cowering there in relative safety. Nevertheless, as she walked in the door again, I had timed her arrival well enough to hand her the fresh page as she approached the circulation desk. No muss, no fuss. Was it telepathy or technology? You be the judge. I think I actually surprised her.
All told, there weren't even any raised voices, much less the dreaded shrieking of the harpy. The only downside really was realizing how expendable I am to my comrades-in-arms. Next time, I will seize the initiative and betray them first!
