Librarians everywhere hate me

[Alex]

Quick comment as to why people should become librarians, it needs to be pointed out that there are a whole lot of librarians who never go near a reference desk.

I love reference librarianship (if only I hadn't been able to make twice as much money not working in libraries, I'd still be doing it), but I couldn't do pubilc library reference work, because:

1) Too many kids. I still don't know why people under 25 are allowed out of their bedrooms.

2) The questions tend too much to the banal ("what is the capital of Peru, it would be amazing if you actually knew how to find such secret information") for me. I much more preferred academic reference desks (in universities) where you still get boring questions but you also more frequently get to actually be a part of the research process.

So there are lots of reasons to become a librarian and lots of places your preferences can take you. The second worst reason, in my opinion, is "I like to read" because there aren't many librarians in the world who actually get to do much reading. The worst is "I like books." If you like books, become a bookseller or a preservationist. Being a librarian is not about books, it is about information.

Just my opinion, recently irritated by yet another person saying, upon hearing that I was once a librarian, "oh, I'm considering going to library school because I really like books, and quiet, and reading." Of course, this same person was complaining that she didn't understand why being a librarian should require a masters degree when she learned how to use the library in second grade. (There is a valid debate about how necessary post-graduate degrees should be, but she was simply irritating me.)