WILL UNWOUND #123: Librarians, Books, and Sex – What does the May Poll Reveal?” by Will Manley
May 26, 2010Although the May poll was primarily an experiment in how to use the survey function on this blog, it did produce some interesting results.
Where, given their choice, do we librarians prefer to read? We like our comfortable easy chair, our bed, the great outdoors, the beach, and our bathtub. I was glad to see that the bathtub picked up votes as the month went along because I was beginning to think that my bathtub preference was a little odd. What does all this mean? Well we’ve been obsessing in this blog about on-line everything…educating, reading, writing, and researching. To me our little May poll speaks “volumes” about the longevity of the traditional paper and print book. Do you want to take a machine to bed? No . Do you want to take a machine into the bathtub? A thousand times NO. Do you want to take a machine to the barcalounger. No, no, and no! How about the beach? Forget it. So our wildly unscientific research has confirmed that real books have a real role to play in real lives. Nuff said.
Next question: where do librarians prefer to have sex? The answer unsurprisingly is in bed where God intended it. But, did anyone else raise an eyebrow that 6% of our wildly unscientific survey universe prefers to do the deed in the library? What, in the name of Sigmund Freud, is up with that?
Finally, do we prefer to snuggle into bed with a good book and a steamy cup of Earl Grey or do we prefer to cuddle our partners and watch a steamy video of the aristocratic Earl of Grey? The numbers for this little dilemma show that the book wins decisively, and the numbers for this preference were constant throughout the month. Very interesting? Yes. Very surprising? No.
If you’ve been paying attention to the remarks of many librarians when the subject of the future of the book comes up there is always the chatter about the touch and feel and textures of a book…the tactile pleasures of a book. Some wax on rhapsodically about the richness of leather covers and the pleasing tautness of a perfectly sewn binding. I could go on but you get the point. Librarians love real books for more than the mere words. Too bad Freud isn’t around to explain it all to us.
In Freud’s absence here are my theories about why you prefer the book:
- Books don’t talk back.
- Books don’t snore.
- Books don’t have headaches.
- Books don’t have annoying personal traits although some books smell bad.
- You can dump a book that you don’t like and not have to see a lawyer about it.
- Books are always there on the nightstand when you wake up in the morning.
- Books don’t get jealous. You can involve yourself with several books during the course of a day.
- Books don’t expect anything in return for pleasure given.
- Books don’t wrinkle and sag over time.
- You don’t have to buy jewelry or a hunting rifle for a book.
- Books don’t roll over on to your side of the bed.
- Books don’t pull the covers away from you.
But books do have one big limitation: they can’t be your soulmate for eternity. Hmmmmm.
Now unwinders it’s your turn to play Dr. Freud. How do you interpret the results of the May Poll? Here are some questions to get you started.
- Do you agree with my conclusion that books are here to stay because basically who wants to take a battery driven machine to bed and all the other places where librarians prefer to read?
- The easy chair scored high as a reading venue. Do you have a special reading chair with a special reading lamp in your home?
- 6% of the respondents indicated their favorite place to have sex is in the library? Please, Dr. Freud, tell me why!
- I gave you my theory why a decisive majority of librarians prefer reading to cuddling and snuggling. What is your theory, Sigmund?
- Anything surprise you about the May poll?
- Anything more you want to comment on the May poll?
Before you get away, please keep working on the answers to yesterday’s post. I have decided to change questions #3 and #4 (on the basis of the logical comment of an anonymous unwinder) from “Which celebrity would you most want to marry” to “Which celebrity do you consider sexiest?” Does that change the answers you have suggested for those questions? Please post new comments on yesterday’s post to today’s comment area. Thanks. Keep working on it. We will get there. BTW, I’ve pretty well settled on Cheney for question #1 but need an equal to Cheney on #2. Not sure Anne Coulter is the answer. Think hard. I know you can do it.
REMEMBER…THIS BLOG IS A GROUP EFFORT. THANKS FOR YOUR HELP. LET’S HAVE FUN WITH THIS. YOU ALL NEED MORE FUN IN YOUR LIVES AT THIS POINT IN TIME.
1. I agree with you, Will, on why books are here to stay. They feel just right in the hand. Also they have been a constant in my life – when I think of my parents spending time together, my mother is in her chair with a book and my father is in his chair with a book. Lovely memories of our family reading together.
2. I have a wonderfully comfortable chair in a well-lit room.
3. Really? Personal or the one in which they work??
4. I would like a mix of cuddling/snuggling and reading. However, it isn’t easy to meet eligible men in middle age. sigh …
5. No.
6. Not that I can think of.
Ellen, I think they mean a real library, not just a home library. But…on the other hand you might be right. Maybe it doesn’t matter. Just a place where books abound.
Do you agree with my conclusion that books are here to stay because basically who wants to take a battery driven machine to bed and all the other places where librarians prefer to read?
No. First of all, it’s an economic issue plus a “Green” issue as well. It doesn’t make sense to cut down trees to print books only to have to haul them across country by diesel truck, not knowing exactly how many you are going to sell. Given that books are now bytes, there is too much pushing the electronic alternative. It’s just a matter of time. Kindle is getting close. A Color Kindle would be better.
I don’t think this is all good, mind you. We have DRM and copyright issues, plus the ability of providers like Amazon which have the ability to erase your content (which they have done). The scariest thing about this is the lack of a hard printed page. When “historical facts” can be changed in a second, the truth is whatever the current editor thinks it is. Wikipedia is a good example of variable truth as people duke it out on what the proper point of view is.
You may buy a book instead of download it when a book costs $30.00 and an ebook costs $12.00, but when a book costs $100 and an ebook costs $20.00, you’ll change your mind.
Secondly, although you and I would never want to give up books, the next generation that grows up with the Kindle and iPad II are not going to have that emotional attachment. People can change. It used to be if you made a phone call and got an answering machine, you were angry. Nowdays, if you don’t get one, you’re angry. Technology has a way of sneaking up on you.
Besides, you’re reading this online, right? You didn’t print it out first, did you? See? You’re already half way there!
The easy chair scored high as a reading venue. Do you have a special reading chair with a special reading lamp in your house?
Not really special, but it is “My” place. I spend more time there with my laptop than a book, though.
6% of the respondents indicated their favorite place to have sex is in the library? Please, Dr. Freud, tell me why!
It’s a form of challenging authority and reaffirming the proposition that people are more important than work as a wage slave. If we can get away with doing it on the Board Room table that’s a little secret we can keep. It’s sticking it to the man! (Cough!)
I gave you my theory why a decisive majority of librarians prefer reading to cuddling and snuggling. What is your theory, Sigmund?
They must be anal-retentive control freaks who have difficulty forming meaningful relationships. I’ll tell you, if my Spousal Unit suggests we go to bed early, books are the last thing on my mind. Are these guys nuts????
Actually one of our branch librarians was interviewed by the local paper when computers began to get big. She made some joke about taking a computer to bed. Her husband read it and made up a sign that said, “Which do you prefer to take to bed? A Computer, a book, or a MAN!” and he wouldn’t let her in bed until she made her choice.
Anything surprise you about the May poll?
Books instead of snuggling? I have a hard time believing that.
Mick, I wasn’t having a particularly good day but you’ve managed to move my face from a grimace to a guffaw in the twikling of a diode. Thanks for the grins. I needed that.
Re; Why we like books.
1. Books have a better memory than I do. Usually I remember the book before I remember the fact.
2.I can mark in a book–I don’t think I can mark a Kindle.Marking phrases I like and ideas I agree or disagree with and even words I like the sound of or don’t know yet is an important part of reading for me, so I think I will not be getting a screen to read thru.
L.S. – I always feel like I’m defacing a book when I mark it.
A quick response to Mick–Yes, I do very often print out things I want to read and keep–not everything–but a lot of the important stuff. Filing is not easy though. I do agree that the next generation will adapt to mechanical books better than my generation and the reasons for eboks are sound. Maybe that is why I hang on to so many books–When the power goes out My books don’t disappear.
Linda, My guess is you’re in the minority in terms of printing things out. Did you print out this exchange? Ahh! But don’t get me wrong personally. I love my 2000+ books and wouldn’t part with any of them on principle–cold dead fingers and all that. If I didn’t have my books I’d have to redecorate. This is MY library and I built it, and my worst anxiety about my own trip to the great beyond is, “What’s going to happen to my books?”
Mick, don’t you have some heirs? BTW…Just started Falco 20 minutes ago. It’s great!
Helena is the Janine Turner of the first century. I have one daughter who is a reader. I taught her to read sitting on the stairs in front of a heating vent. It was our “camp.” She is my only hope, Obi Wan Kenobe!
Mick–Exactly–My biggest worry also is what will happen to the books. And yes, Mr Manley, I have family members, but none of then give a rats patootie about my Arizona collection, or the gardening or craft books or Timothy Ferris’ books on the universe. Or any of the hundreds of others. And Mick, I did not print out this exchange–only because it isn’t over yet. But I extract lots from the internet and tend to squirrel information away for future reference.
Cheney = Ann Coulter??…C’mon!…What about Rosie?
Bill, I just see Rosie as an object of empathy after Trump went after her so badly. I feel sorry for Rosie. Trump bullied her.
Wait a minute. Rosie went after Trump. She started it by calling him a ‘snake oil salesman,’ claimed he went bankrupt, and insulting his personal life. She made fun of him and parodied him. Rosie deserved a broadside from Trump.
Come to think of it, put ‘em both on the list. (Hint: Trump wins. With Rosie, the human race dies.)
Trump is all of those things. I side with Rosie.
Will,
Rosie and Trump probably deserve each other, but I hear you on the empathy for Rosie. There’s a vulnerability in her not found in Roseanne. It might be mean to use her…..I can’t believe I’m saying that.
Bill, I’m really getting desperate here. Can’t someone come up with Dick’s match?
I got it! Lady Gaga!
She’s actually quite attractive, but her weirdness is repulsive….so, no hard feelings.
You nailed it. Thanks, Bill!
She should satisfy the premise for most. But there’s a lotta sickos out there!
What do you mean by that…sickos?
Guys who are turned-on by the Lady’s weirdness.
Where did the name Lady Gaga come from?
I’m guessing it’s just a play on the idea of “going ga-ga” over her. She really is a pretty girl. So it’s just a bizarre stage persona caricature that would be the object of revulsion. Does that work? It’s kinder. Not mean.
OK, Will, in the 21st century many folks take a book AND a battery driven machine to bed. Other unscientific polls support this
I think we all have our ‘reading places.’ I have my couch, but away from home Starbucks provides a great reading spot. I don’t really like their coffee, but love their ambiance, and the noise level works perfectly for me.
Dunno about preferring reading over cuddling/snuggling. May have something to do with who is available for cuddling/snuggling, or how good the book is. And sex in the library? Perish the thought– books out of order or in need of repair would banish lust from my mind.
Jeanne, oh, forgot about THAT machine. Duh! The remote control channel changer.
3. Just the amount of time in a week spent at work might be one reason the library ranks so high. Everyone is far too busy. Why add to the scheduling difficulties if you can have a really really good break? Although I’d love to know if the people choosing libraries meant on break or in the wee hours of the morning. If so, how did they get around the security system????
2. I have a really comfortable arm chair that I grew up with from my parents’ house. It has a lamp next to it with a good bright bulb and it is heaven to read in, not to mention full of sentiment from a lifetime of being used. Forget this here blog, where’s my chair and book (paper not machine)????
The book is here to stay because it doesn’t “freeze” up unless you get the pages wet from reading in the bathtub. You can write notes in it without wondering if they will be here tomorrow or whether the Great Kindle is examining them somehow. And yes, Will, I can’t write in a book. I keep looking for the librarian to kill me if I do that! Oh, right, I’m the librarian. Doesn’t change the instinctive reaction.
Off to go read the old fashioned way. Especially since I’m reading something old fashioned: Ancient Rome. Maybe I should reread Silver pigs next in my chair. Freud be damned, I like my chair because it is comfortable!
Joan, you like your chair because of the free association with your past. That’s why it’s so darned comfortable. It’s your own personal time machine back taking you to your childhood. That’ll be 200 dollars please.
Except I’m perfectly aware of the association with my past. I’m keeping that 200! Shrinks are supposed to tell you something you don’t know. And before you try again, it is rounded and cozy and Freud would say I’m going back to the womb. Let Western Civ fall, as long as I have my chair, paper library and cats. Although I wouldn’t mind a crank generator so I can have a lamp next to the chair. Oh wait, you mentioned time machine. Can I make the crank generator an Asimovian robot that can crank the generator he just built? Joe, Mozart, et al will be fine. They are stored in my robot….Asimov made them impossible to destroy without some real effort.
Comes the revolution, you will be taking orders from your robot.
Nope, the Three Laws of Robotics says robots can’t hurt people, including their feelings, so no direct orders from robots. Forget the I Robot movie. From what I heard, it had almost nothing to do with Asimov. I suppose the widow is getting hard up or else signed wo getting authority to deny certain changes. It was a travesty of the books.
Here’s my nightmare about the future.
Yes, ebooks make a huge amount of sense in terms of accessibility, greenness, and ease of use. We have to keep in mind that the technology is still in its infancy. Ebooks are only going to get better. Much better.
The model will be that everything — books, music, essays, articles — will be stored in the cloud. For reasons of scale or economics, all of it will end up in one vast server farm somewhere, without anyone noticing. One night, a janitor in the vast server farm will trip over a power cord and, poof!, all of the output of Western Civilization, if not of All Civilization, will vanish. Everyone will assume someone else backed up the stored items. But no one will have done that, because each will have assumed someone else did.
Mozart . . . gone. Shakespeare . . . gone. Tolstoy . . . gone. Even Howard Stern . . . gone. The few surviving librarians will be reduced to scrounging thrift stores and rummage sales for surviving pieces of the Western Canon, and maybe the Eastern One too, to try to piece back together some of our intellectual and artistic legacy.
Given my nightmare, there is just something about the notion of an idea fixed in a permanent medium that appeals. Sumerian clay tablets abide, as do 4000-year-old papyri. But electrons?
So, yup, I may take my iPad to bed. But I’ll have books stashed somewhere just in case.
Actually the janitor tripping over the power cord is to much like a scifi novel. Here’s what’s really going to happen: Greece goes under, a couple of oil rich sheikdoms go under, then Portugal, then Spain, then Germany pulls out of the European Economic union, China invades several of its neighbors starting with North Korea, the United States becomes an economic orphan unable to access off shore industrial and technological production centers, our government tetters, totters, and collapses. Regional militias arise. North America turns into the Western Europe of 800 AD. Our technological systems degrade and disappear, and those of us who worked in libraries 40 years ago and who stowed away discarded hand cranked ditto machines in our garages begin to reorganize society into workable units of food producing communes protected by random bands of mercenaries.
Not that you’ve thought about this, or anything
Civilization is due for a complete collapse and do over.
1 – I know a lot of people who take batter powered machines to bed. Geberally not to read.
2 – all my chairs have reading lamps next to them. The beds, too. My whole family likes to read.
3 – because the person they like to have sex with is at the library and their spouse at home doesn’t approve? Convenience?
4 – reading IS cuddling. And books don’t get done before you and then roll over and go to sleep.
Other comments – if you lose a paperback at the beach, or drop it in the bath you are out $7.00, if you lose a Kindle or drop it in the batch, you are out $400.00. You can shake sand out of a book. You get to buy another Kindle. You don’t have to carry spare batteries with a book. Kindles aren’t backlit, and they do wash-out in sunlight.
Oh – you can make marks and margin notes in a Kindle, but they immediately become the property of Amazon.
Suggestions for female versions of Cheney: Janet Reno. Also, Camilla, the Duchess of Cornwall. Barbra Streisand without her makeup. Joan Rivers. Phyllis Schlafly.
Deb…you mean the t.v. channel changer? Forgot about that. People do take that to bed. Sorry.
Phyllis Schlafly, hmm, I hadn’t thought of her. I’ve been thinking maybe there just *is* no female equivalent of Dick Cheney. (While I don’t share Bill’s and, if I remember aright, Mick’s admiration for her mind, I have to agree Ann Coulter doesn’t qualify.) — Maybe Ayn Rand if she were alive.
We have to get someone in her childbearing years to make the premise of the question work.
OK – sorry about the typos in that post – fingers are not working well today.
1. Yes, but maybe us older folks are just programmed that way.
2. Yes, for reading puzzles, TV, and naps.
3. The right place at the right time? Maybe it’s the only time those two paths cross.
4. Actually, if you had left out the video, my answer would have been different (i.e. for the cuddling & snuggling) — there are tactile pleasures and there are tactile pleasures, and there are usually time & room for both, but you have to set priorities!
5. No.
6. No.
E-books and readers will continue to grow. While I foresee the demise of the book, it still has a few more generations – perhaps another 100 years? My granddaughter loves to play and learn on her Leap Frog machine, but when it comes to reading, she still prefers to snuggle into an adult’s side and read (She’s 4. I was reading one of my books at her place last week. She crawled on my lap and started pointing out the “w”s she found on the page. It worked, I quit reading and gave her attention…) The book will disappear when parents start substituting electronic for paper when teaching their children.
There is one easy chair in the house that is just mine and anyone who visits knows that as well. The room lighting is good. I use it for reading, using my laptop, and watching TV.
Intimate in the Library – there’s a romance novel name for you. I would guess choosing the library is a mixture of lust and convenience.
I’d rather have the reading followed by snuggling. But as you say, the book is more predictable than the partner.
No and no to the last two.
Vicki…you make a very perceptive point about little kids. They can play with electronic toys all day but when it comes to reading they don’t want a machine. They want to snuggle on your lap and look at a book. Books are the best parenting tool in the world.
I think the female counterpart to Cheney should be in the same age neighborhood. Let’s stop pairing younger women with older men. How about Elizabeth Dole or even Barbara Bush?
No, the woman has to be in childbearing years to make the premise of the question plausible. Presumeably Dick can still hold up his end of the procreation equation. I’m not saying biology is fair.
Re: sex in the library, if there happens to be a backlog that has overflowed the shelves and is packed into a lot of boxes in a back room … (pause to assure the world that that is *not* the case at my library!) … then adventurous librarians have the chance to join the Pile High Club.
(Sorry. I’m going to get a second cup of coffee and come back later with a more-or-less working mind.)
LOL! Pile High Club is what I need to call the floor near my reading chair! I irritate my hubby with the light, but I cannot sleep without a dose of my current read. My reading chair reminds me of my mom (RIP) and the “ottoman” is from my childhood. It’s so comfortable that I get up from my expensive bed to fall asleep in the chair! Somehow I can’t imagine cozying up to a Kindle (but if I could read it in the dark…no more spousal complaints.)
Boom…Alice a glow in the dark Kindle for married nightowls. You’re sitting on a fortune!
RA…LOL
(I should mention that some of the reasons you give for having books mirror those I have for having cats, not kids. Cats [and books] are easily toilet-trained; they won’t have kittens; they don’t do drugs or hang out with undesirables; and I don’t need to send them to college and grad schools . But I digress.)
In answer to two of your queries:
# Do you agree with my conclusion that books are here to stay because basically who wants to take a battery driven machine to bed and all the other places where librarians prefer to read?
Absolutely. If I took an e-book reader when I have a bath, I’d probably ruin it if it fell in the water.
# The easy chair scored high as a reading venue. Do you have a special reading chair with a special reading lamp in your home?
No – I do most of my reading in bed. I multi-task, since I also serve as a cat mattress
cat mattress…lol.
… and the pleasing tautness of a perfectly sewn binding…
I’m stimulated just reading the above…
Thought you’d like that, Walt.
I have converted almost totally to my Kindle or IPad. I can take them anywhere. I can get a new book anywhere. With the addition of a Ziploc bag either can come into the bathtub with me. They work fine in bed. They can be wiped clean after dining with them. They don’t smell. They do not inhabit my car for weeks after reading. They do not require shelving in my tiny house. I do not have to manage them after having managed hundreds of thousands at work. I can carry several books and magazines without looking like a hunchback or a librarian. They are used frequently and do not require dusting. I can travel without an additional 30 pounds of weight paid for at time of check in at the airport. I spend no money on “comfort books” defined as those books purchased to make sure that I always have something to read.
I love my gadgets and only read an actual book when that is the only format available. My life is simpler and way less cluttered this way.
Sandy…thanks for the testimony. You are the face of the future.
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