Mad

#1 -Last night I hunted around the house for the kids' library books that I wanted to return today.  The books are supposed to stay in the basket downstairs…

#2 -I found a few books in Owen’s room, and when I went into Jack’s room, I found several books including a book that looked like this…

After dropping the boys off with their grandma this morning, I ran into the library to return the books and check out a book on CD that I could listen to while I cleaned. (If you haven’t tried this, I highly recommend it; you get much more done.)

Trying to be a good citizen, I brought the ripped book to the librarian and asked if they used special tape or if I should just use regular tape to fix the page.  She responded with furrowed eyebrows saying that the book was ruined and that they don’t fix “that kind of damage.”  Now I have definitely checked out books from the library with pages that have been taped back together.  I reminisced about this experience with the librarian who proceeded to give me a dirty look and tell me that they can’t “check up” on every returned book.  (Apparently you have to turn yourself in, like I did).

#3 - I had to pay $17 for the darned thing!  (The book wasn’t really even that good either!)

#4 – I began to think if I could claim that I didn’t know for sure if my child even tore it…I didn’t see Jack do it… It could be for any reason that he looked hugely guilty when he saw me pick the book up, right?  And his dropped eyes and lame response of “Oh” to my (probably unheard) lecture on treating books with respect surely was akin to him denying that it was him, right??  His generally destructive nature and the fact that he often ends coloring activities or gifts of drawings from others by ripping up the paper, probably doesn’t apply here, right? I wasn’t convincing myself. I moved on to pay for the book.

#5 – After adding the fee to my account, the sweet librarian handed the book back to me and said, “It’s all yours now.  You can tape it up however you want.”  (huh?!)  Right.  Like I am going to take the book home and tell Jack that he ripped it, so I had to buy it, and now we get to keep a library book.  I am pretty sure that would pose a problem the next time we went to the library or Target…

#6 – When I went to check out the book on CD, my account was over $10 due, so I couldn’t check anything else out.