5.9.07. 3.30pm.
superfine.
more tales from the facilities of sf state. i just came from the library, where i was returning books. "this one's a week overdue," i said, "and i'd like to pay the fine now." she scanned it in. "well," she said, "it looks like the fine's only up to $1.75. you don't really have to pay it until you get to five dollars." "oh," i said. "um, thanks."
does this strike anyone else as kinda weird? i mean, what's the point of a fine if you don't have to pay it? on the other hand, now that i think about it, i suppose the point of a fine is to deter you from keeping the book overdue, and in my case, i knew it was overdue but deliberately kept it because i needed it for a paper, and thought i'd just pay the fine. but hey, i didn't even have to pay the fine! maybe she realized that in my case the fine hadn't been a deterant, so why bother making me pay it?
as a side bar: the combination of computerizing library records and making it internet accessible is genius. genius! i can, from my kitchen, search the public library's records, and have them send a particular book to the branch down the street from my house. and when it arrives, they email me! how great is that? even better, a few days before it's due, they email me again to remind me, and have a helpful little button to renew it! and people say taxes are too high. how much do these library services cost a user? nothing! it's free, to everyone! oh, unless you, despite the ease of renewing and remembering to return, happen to keep something too long. then it's a whopping ten cents a day. and sometimes, apparantly, you don't even have to pay it. libraries rock.