Gift

Guess what was waiting on the doorstep when I got home today?

This great mug, all the way from the US – very generously sent to me by Alan Gray of Darien Library. (A far better picture of the mug is available if you’re interested – on Flickr, of course! The design on the mug uses an image from John Blyberg’s catalogue card generator.)

What cool schwag – and it is easily the largest mug I now own.

What did I do to get this mug, you might be asking? Well, the thing is I didn’t really do much of anything at all. Some time ago I noted that several library people in the States were planning a library version of a Bar Camp, an unconference, if you will. I looked at their wiki, and wished I could go, but as I didn’t (don’t) have any spare cash for a plane ticket, there was no way I was going to make it. They had a sign-up page, and I saw that there was a category for people “who would love to come but cannot”, and I thought “Yep, that’s me” so I added my name, and thought no more of it beyond waiting for the blog coverage.

Imagine my surprise when Alan emailed me to ask for my address, because the camp folks “would like to send you a mug from Library Camp East in honor of the fact that you registered your interest from farthest away.”

How wonderful!! Thank you very much, Alan and all the lovely Library Camp East people – I feel very honoured to have such a special gift. I haven’t drunk anything out of the mug yet. It feels like it needs something other than an ordinary Dilmah teacup bag in it.

And the other gift for the day: our Broadband connection was switched on in the new house today! Woot!