Check It Out: Student Edition

Can you believe the year's nearly over, Mountaineers? It's been a minute since our last newsletter, so we'll check the chatter and cut straight to the bone:

Crank the soundtrack embedded in the video below, catch that library vibe, and see what's happening in the happiest place at West Orange High School!

Everybody knows LMC visitors never sweat, but always drip, and we're well aware that books are the ultimate accessory. Indeed, these bound, printed artifacts serve as costume keystones, bridging the gap between drab duds and fire attire.

As such, your humble librarians are always searching for dank new spatial paradigms and designing magnificently ornamented institutional avenues. We aspire to engineer book browsing experiences that not only ignite Mach-10 literary journeys, but assure the borrower boosted confidence as they beat those feet on their preferred boulevard.

Oh, we're just shining on as usual, much to the chagrin of rival celestial bodies adorning Earth's atmosphere.

Our latest fantastical feat? Nothing much, HBU? We've only reconfigured our shelving to create a new bookstore-inspired browsing area adjacent to the lounge.

These shelves, like those at your favorite indie bookseller, are organized not according to surname or subject, but genre. It's never been easier to find a book that will complete your look, expand your lore, and generally improve your one wild and precious life!

Too often, Mrs. Binns and Mr. Thompson find their ceaseless labors and industrious spirit interrupted by wayward souls adrift in the hall, their eyes glossy with tears, their hearts sunken in lament.

While we sit, contemplating life's great mysteries, separating informational wheat from chaff, and developing swagalicious lesson plans, a plaintive wail will ring out, shattering our professional panorama and returning us to this mortal plane.

What words so strike at us? Which mere utterance constitutes this chthonic horror, reverberating amongst our eons of erudition and threatening to stifle our swag? Dearest Mountaineers, it's a short but staggering sentence that haunts us:

Fear not, stalwart students! for we heed your cries and stand prepared to answer!

Send your neighbors in West Orange your best wishes this holiday season by creating festive cards in the LMC!

Everything you need is available in the Makerspace. All you need to supply is a bit of time and a whole lot of creativity!

(Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash)

We're breaking out our Oculus Quest 2 headsets in our newly cleared Bookstore/VR alley!

Stop by during lunch to spend some time with a virtual pet, float above the planet on the International Space Station, or refine your bow and arrow skills!

(Photo by Vinicius "amnx" Amano on Unsplash)

Want to see your console on the LMC's big-screen TV during lunch? Stop by and ask either of your librarians to add you to the sign-up sheet!

Not one for volunteering? We're confident our usual gamers would be more than happy to share their equipment with you!

Well, it is an ode, a poem of praise and adoration, a capsule-sized celebration of something truly sublime. We can't help but smile!

Moreover, it's quite humorous! Indeed, your imperturbable librarians found themselves tickled pink by this vivacious, vaunting verse, rife as it is with formal fireworks and wonderous wordplay.

But there's something else, isn't there? Whatever can it be?

Maybe it's that magnificent center split, that marvelous swishing gap, that Naomi Campbell pop in the middle of each line, swinging left and right without a care in the world, relishing its joy and jubilation, just savoring the d@rn moment while it lasts.

Maybe it's the way we're shown how fashion choices serve as a mirror not for the person wearing an outfit, but the people reacting to their fabulous finery. What is it that you see in the garb I'm rocking? How do your perceptions of my outfit reflect not on me, but on you?

Maybe it's the speaker's outright refusal to defend his right to exist as he please in public space. This poem is at once intellectually mature and physically playful, simultaneously functional and frivolous, well-aware of what's going on but undaunted by the circumstances.

This poem serves as a reminder that we are free to embody ourselves however we please at any given moment.

This poem knows only one opinion matters when it comes to your sartorial considerations.

This poem not only accepts its own choices, but invites everybody—even its detractors— to join in on the fun.

And what is poetry if not a raging party, an offered embrace, an open invitation to leave old perceptions behind in favor of a new and liberating point of view?

Last 'sletter, we presented you with an opportunity to solve the following puzzle:

The images below were created by five different text-to-image generators using the same prompt: "a library in the style of (insert famous Latinx artist's name here)."

We're asking you to take a close look at these AI artworks in order to guess the name of the artist we used in our prompt. Need a hint? The artist in question was known mainly as a muralist, and their work is featured on this webpage! Successful guesses will be rewarded with a 3-D print of their choice!

We're pleased to announce that two people successfully identified the artist: Diego Rivera! Congratulations to this industrious duo!

This time around, our 'sletter challenge is pretty lowkey.

The next time you finish a fantabulous library book, swing by Destiny Discover, our most visually intensive catalog interface, and leave an honest review of what you've read!

We've appended a straightforward tutorial below. We'll select three of our favorite reviews at the end of December, contact the reviewers, and reward their diligence with some health food (say, a bag of Cheetos or Doritos or what have you).

Start scribbling! We look forward to seeing your thoughts.

Do you love reading? Are you interested in books? The Mountaineer Book Club is going strong, and we want to see you at their December meetings!

The next two are scheduled for December 7th and December 21st in the LMC Computer Lab. See Mrs. Binns for more details!

As you may have heard, new library books are now on display in our recently reconfigured book store! These titles are arranged by genre, imbuing them with enhanced browsability.

Before you enter the fray, limber up with this pair of suggestions from your librarians!

Moth, who lost her family in an accident, and Sani, who is battling ongoing depression, take a road trip that has them chasing ghosts and searching for ancestors, which helps them move forward in surprising, powerful and unforgettable ways.

Leah is changed. Months earlier, she left for a routine expedition, only this time her submarine sank to the sea floor. When she finally surfaces and returns home, her wife Miri knows that something is wrong. Barely eating and lost in her thoughts, Leah rotates between rooms in their apartment, running the taps morning and night. As Miri searches for answers, desperate to understand what happened below the water, she must face the possibility that the woman she loves is slipping from her grasp.