Where else can a book lover add to their personal library and support their community library all at the same time?  The Friends of the Chelsea District Library Book Sale has a huge selection of used books and media to browse through and proceeds benefit the Chelsea District Library.  So come on by and do something nice for yourself (and your library!)  on Saturday, September 11 from 10 – 3 pm in the McKune Room.  –Sara, Head of Adult Services

Check out this article in the New York Times magazine about farms and internship programs, featuring Chelsea’s very own Tantré farm!  The article also includes a panade recipe to help you utilize this fall’s crop of leeks and butternut squash. YUM!

Ignite Chelsea is taking place Thursday, Sept. 9th at 6 pm in the Clocktower Courtyard.

Ignite events are a worldwide phenomenon that developed out of the idea that a forum was needed where people could share interesting ideas in casual, fun environments, and to keep it short and sweet.  They have been held all over the world in major cities like New York City, Los Angeles, Seattle and now in Chelsea, which will be the smallest city yet to host an Ignite event!

The format: Speakers have 5 minutes to progress through timed presentation slides lasting no more than 15 seconds each.
The topic: Wellness
The partners: Chelsea Area Wellness Foundation and the Chelsea District Library
The goal: To bring the community together and share exciting new ideas and approaches to the issue of wellness

Before the speakers begin, we’ll have entertainment by the Chelsea House Orchestra, food and beverages for purchase, and opportunities to win prizes through games, trivia, karaoke and more.  Join us for what is sure to be a a great – and enlightening – event.  See you at the Clocktower!  – Sara, Head of Adult Services

photo courtesy of RunnerJenny’s flickr photostream

The Library will be closed Sunday, September 5 and Monday, September 6 in observance of Labor Day.

We open again Tuesday, September 7 and resume our winter hours: Monday-Thurday: 10-9 pm, Friday: 10-6 pm, Saturday: 10-5 pm and Sunday: 1-5 pm.

Welcome to autumn!

Jonathan Franzen’s new book Freedom makes its appearance in bookstores and libraries today. There’s been a ton of buzz about this book due to Franzen’s successful first novel in 2001, The Corrections.  People scrambled for advance copies, President Obama being one of the lucky few to get an early look.  Franzen even appeared on the cover of Time magazine in advance of the book’s release.  Check out the Washington Post’s video book review below:
 

So, what do you think?  Are you going to read it?

–Sara, Head of Adult Services

Support Chelsea’s local heroes by donating at the Battle of the Badges on Wednesday, September 1st at the Chelsea District Library.  The blood drive will be held in the McKune Room of the library from 12-6pm.  Please log on to Red Cross and enter the sponsor code “badges” to make a donation appointment. The red cross will honor your time and will take appointments first.

Have questions about donating or wonder if you are eligible to donate? Get more details about donation from our Blood Drive blog post.

This is a non-Library program.  For more information please contact Sgt. Mark Pulford at 475-9122.

7PM, September 9th, come to the Library to uncover football tales you’ve never heard before. Click HERE to register!

1942 Football Program. Football Program Database, Bentley Historical Library.

Where did the Wolverines play football before Michigan Stadium was built? Why does the Stadium capacity (109,901) end with a “1”? Was the “Little Brown Jug” once white? How many football players from Chelsea played for the Wolverines? Who does ESPN call when they need classic Michigan football films? The answers to these questions can be found at the University of Michigan’s Bentley Historical Library which houses the university’s athletic archives. Greg Kinney and Brian Williams, two archivists from the Bentley Library, will answer these and other questions while showing photographs and documents from the archives and sharing interesting anecdotes about the Big House and Wolverine football history. Greg Kinney joined the Bentley in 1986, and since 1988 has been in charge of the Athletic Department’s archival records. Brian Williams came to the Bentley in 1994 and works with university records.

To see more football program cover art, you can visit this online exhibit, featuring a number of football programs from the 1890s up until 2000.  You can also search the Football Program Database (How cool is that!) for specific covers from different years or teams.

Go Blue!

It’s Fair Week in Chelsea! The list of events goes on and on (view the schedule here) and includes all the annual favorites like the Demolition Derby, the Tractor Pull and Chainsaw Wood Carvers and of course, the ongoing livestock and exhibit judging.

The Library has a booth on site staffed by members of our Library Board as well as members of the Friends of the Chelsea District Library. Please stop in and say hello and share your thoughts about the Library. We’d love to hear your feedback about what we’re doing right and ways we could improve. To encourage visits, the Friends are giving away free books, so drop by and look them over!

If you haven’t already casted your vote, please help make the Chelsea Community Fair the #1 Festival in southeast Michigan! The contest is run by Channel 4’s website – help make our Fair #1 by voting now!

–Sara, Head of Adult Services

Maybe you’ve walked right past the Robot Supply and Repair store on E. Liberty Street on a visit to Ann Arbor.  It’s a wonderfully creative front for 826 Michigan, the state chapter of a national organization committed to youth literacy through tutoring and writing programs.  The trick is to get them in the door–hence the ROBOTS!!!!!  Each year, the folks at 826 Michigan host a fiction writing conference for adults, as a fundraiser for their youth programs, most targeted to kids age 8-18.

If you’ve got writing projects that you have been working on and would like to attend as a full conference participant, you’ll have to wait until next year; applications were due on the 15th of July.  However, there is no deadline for nonconference applications, however.  The workshop runs from September 24-26.  Auditing the conference would be a relatively affordable way of learning more about the craft of writing and observing writers interact with their work; auditing costs $50 for the whole conference, of $20 per day, and remember, it raises money for a great cause!  To learn more, visit the Fall Fiction Writers Conference information page.  You can purchase tickets for the event here.

~Rachael, Adult Services Librarian

Use GetHuman to avoid the automated directories when you call a large company’s customer service and move right to speaking with a person!

GetHuman is a database of phone numbers, along with lists of tips and tricks, to help frustrated customers bypass the maze of automated options on customer service lines.  They also publish hard-to-find phone numbers, most famously for online companies such as Amazon and Facebook.  Most phone numbers are accompanied by step-by-step directions, telling you what combination of 0, # or * you should push to continue past the numbered menu options to get to an operator more quickly.

GetHuman began as a collection of numbers and tricks collected by a web developer and gained popularity as he shared it via his personal webpage.  Since then, it has grown to include reviews of companies and forums about ways to improve your service experience with hundreds of companies.

This resource might be useful in dealing with any one of the 18 Companies That Consumers Absolutely Hate, as compiled by Business Insider.  The companies topping that list include: AT&T Mobile, DirecTV and Citibank.

–Sara, Head of Adult Services