for 24 MAY 05: THE "LEFT BEHIND" SERIES
KANSAS CITY, KS -- True confession: I've been a "library rat" for a long time. If I traveled through an area, I'd stop at a public or college library to read or study -- and this was long before the Internet came along, making library computers a cheap alternative to renting a laptop.
I've checked e-mail and other things at several libraries, during our BLOG SPECIAL EVENT. But on the way to Kansas City, I made a mistake. I visited a library in Missouri, and left a diskette with all sorts of information in a computer. There could have been a risk of identity theft -- assuming someone wasn't distracted by the photos of a good-looking female golfer on it.
Only after I reached Kansas City and sorted out my bags did I realize what I'd done. The lack of that diskette meant two things. First, making blog entries look the way they usually do would be tougher. Second, I'd have to confess to a family filled with loyal University of Kansas fans that I'd visited -- gulp -- the arch-rival University of Missouri.
The good news is that the University of Missouri is between semesters, so the library computers weren't getting much use. So I went online and e-mailed an urgent plea over the weekend -- could the staff find my diskette and mail it back to Columbus for me? Before some of you get ideas: I DID stop my mail for this trip....
I broke the news as gently as I could to my relatives about visiting Big Bad M.U. Thankfully, they didn't seem too upset about it -- and my sister-in-law admitted the family once went to that campus for a daughter's special event. I should have asked if they spat on the ground as they left.
Weekend checks of the e-mail InBox brought no response from the University of Missouri. Perhaps they were closed on weekends between semesters. Or perhaps someone noticed a photo of the Kansas mascot on the diskette, and wanted to hold it for ransom.
But Monday morning I checked the InBox again, this time at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. The Columbia campus at last replied to my urgent question with a HUGE message. Did the staff decide to send me every Kansas joke they ever knew -- and throw in that German spam worm to boot?
I'm thrilled to report the reply from the University of Missouri was very different:
Good morning,
I found your diskette a few minutes ago and compressed the files into a .zip file, which I will attach. Let me know if you have any problems extracting the files. Do you still wish for us to mail the diskette back to you?
By the by, I often leave my pen drives in computers - absentmindedness seems to be part of the human condition.
L. H. Kevil
Collection Development Librarian
The staff went above and beyond to help me! It truly pays to visit college libraries between semesters -- when the employees have little to do, and few college students are around to pull online pranks.
I asked the M.U. library team to go ahead and mail the diskette back to Columbus. And I promised to write well about them here. Their wonderful courtesy could be a breakthrough in the so-called "border war," between the Universities of Missouri and Kansas. But then again, my older brother only seemed impressed for about five seconds when I told him what happened.
The e-mail comment about the "human condition" seems very true -- because that diskette is not the first thing I've left behind on long trips:
+ Lamar, Colorado -- I visited my late grandmother years ago, and left a nice new white tie hanging on a motel closet hanger. I don't recall even having time to spill soda or ketchup on it.
+ Bournemouth, England -- I thought I emptied all the hotel drawers, but flew home to find a pair of dark green slacks was missing. Amazingly, the hotel staff FOUND that pair and mailed it back! After all, it might be 15 more years before forest green became stylish again.
+ Toronto -- Blame this one on the hotel cleaners. They returned a bundle of clothes, but forgot a few pairs of underwear. Might someone have passed those along to Saddam Hussein?!
The hardest thing to leave behind on a family road trip should be your relatives, when it's over. Monday my older brother and I traveled to Topeka, Kansas, where a younger brother is in an institute for the mentally handicapped. Amazingly, we saw no Westboro Baptist Church picketers anywhere in town....
As we watched our youngest brother and tried to get him out of a half-awake state, a television in the room was showing "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" on the PBS station in Topeka. Fred Rogers was talking about the importance of being kind to others. Suddenly I felt guilty for all the times on this trip I razzed one of my niece's husbands, for being a Kansas State graduate.
Now other odds and ends we've spotted in the self-proclaimed "Heart of America:"
+ The U.S. Senate reached a compromise, so former Alabama Attorney General Bill Pryor will receive an "up or down vote" on becoming a federal appeals judge. If he's confirmed, lawyers will remember this for years -- when they stand up and sit down for Judge Pryor entering court.
+ A gasoline leak poured fuel into the Missouri River, and forced a shutdown of a Kansas City, Kansas electric plant. I don't know if the story made the news back in Columbus. I doubt it did, because the river didn't catch on fire.
+ Which Kansas City sports-talk radio station featured a host saying, "It's true that there's a rumor"?! Doesn't this account for about one-third of all sports talk radio?
+ Instant Message to a young woman I'll call M.: The first meeting was wonderful. You're attractive, fun and interesting. We MUST do it again sometime -- only outside your office conference room.
More Blog Special Event updates as conditions warrant....
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