This blog post is more of a PSA than anything but might help some of you out there.
As many of you know I read a ton of books. Last year I read 400+ books (mainly graphic novels). What you might not know about me is I am pretty frugal. Out of those books I purchased 4. Since books cost money I go to this thing some of you might have heard of, the Library.
Many libraries in fact. Besides my home library, I have library cards for the 4 surrounding cities. One of those cities has multiple libraries giving me total access to 9 libraries. Not to mention I will on occasion take advantage of those chairs they put out at Barnes & Nobel treating it as a library.
Libraries are amazing! All of the libraries near me have an online catalog of their books. And most will let me reserve a book, notify me and have it held for me so I don’t even have to look for it. I say most because Bedford will only let you reserve something that is not currently available.
Also, Texas has a system of libraries that participate in a program called TexShare providing me even more access to books around our great state. All I have to do is present my TexShare card and I can check out a limited number of books.
But it doesn’t end there, oh no! I saved the best for last.
The Inter-Library Loan. This is a goldmine. Any book I want that is 6 months old they will get from a participating library around the world (although I have only received from the continental United States).
When I found out about this I was super excited and like a chump, I wrote out all the requests at the library’s reference desk on their form. But after getting a little chummy with the librarians I found out a little shortcut. With access to this site, I was able to make my own requests and keep track of everything in my request queue. You are limited to 5 at a time, so as soon as I turn in a book I check out another. Gotta keep that pipeline full.
Besides all that, libraries have all kinds of activities for kids, places for the poor to get online and quiet places for homeless people to sleep.
Hey, do you like movies? The library has those, and if you thought RedBox was cheap, there ain’t no cheap as the cheap of FREE!
I will leave you with this quote and hopefully the urge to rekindle your love of libraries:
“Libraries will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no libraries.”
― Anne Herbert
Action Steps
- Get yourself to the library.
LOL!! 400+ books!!?? 9 libraries?! This sounds wild and crazy. Love the graphic pictures too 😂
When you are addicted to reading you do what it takes!