Generally, I don't post about every appearance I make, but I do like to promote exceptional libraries. I was in attendance yesterday on a panel sponspoed by the American Association of University Women and Sisters in Crime at the Thousand Oaks Library. It was a great event, well attended, books were sold. But the star of the event has to be the library itself. A library is an important cultural center. After all, it contains the world's knowledge within its walls. It's run by people who cherish this knowledge and are supporters of literature, even when that literature is a medieval mystery by a southern California author.
It's also a social center with computer banks for locals to get on the internet, apply for jobs, comminicate on Facebook. These are people who can't afford a computer or the internet in their homes. And, as you surely realize, you can't do anything these days without one.
Most libraries also have a used bookstore. Its sales helps raise money for the library to buy more books.
Many libraries are struggling with dwindling budgets, just like the rest of us. Some supplement their income by having passport offices in the library where one can apply for a passport. Others use other ingenius solutions. And some are even luckier to have been built in the boon years. Much like this one, the Grant R. Brimhall branch. Take a look and drool in envy.
The lobby. Wait, there's more.
Then you pass through a tunnel of sorts with a huge saltwater fish tank.
It goes on and on from there. You can't get the scope of it from these pictures.
And the audience for our event in one of the community rooms.
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