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A couple of days ago a U-Haul truck pulled up in front of the hospital. One of my coworkers saw it, said, "Oh shit, I'm outta here!" and headed for a room in the office with much better blast resistance.
I, on the otherhand, took my place behind the bullet resistant glass and cheerily asked, "How can I help you?" when the driver of the U-Haul and his girlfriend came into the foyer.
"Yeah, can we donate some books? We were patients here, and we know you always need stuff for the library." (our hospital is something of a match.com for lunatics)
"Sure," I said, having no idea what I was getting into ...
Several handtruck loads later there were eight banana boxes crammed full of books in my already cramped office.
Donated book rule is this ... staff goes through them first and removes anything that would be inappropriate for our unit ... (I sure hope someone pulled "Audrey Rose," "For the Love of Audrey Rose," and "The Exorcist" out of the boxes before they got to Activities ... I would have, but I already have all three of them).
The mix in the boxes was a lot better than we usually end up with ... plenty of mysteries, lots of science fiction, some stuff that would be appropriate for adolescents, and the customary ton of romance novels.
There was even a book on MC68000 Assembly Language lurking in the textbook box.
So, right now I am screening some classic Ellery Queen Mysteries for content prior to delivering them to the unit.
Most of the books of the "I really would want these" category were ones that I had already read, and for the most part, still have in my book closet. I already finished the Archie Double Digest and the Betty and Veronica Double Digest and have passed them onto my coworker's 10 year old daughter.
(she's ending up with a couple Hardy Boys mysteries, and at least three of the Black Stallion books, and the obligatory copy of Island of the Blue Dolphins.)
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