LM_NET: Library Media Networking
Shortly after I moved from a junior high to a high school
library a decade ago, a student from Iran asked me for a copy of
*Mouses and People.* He said he'd read it in Farsi and now wanted
to try the English version. As he described the plot, I realized
that the author was Steinbeck. Since the Northridge earthquake,
I've thought of mouses and people many times:).
We began repairing the family-room, kitchen, dining-room side
of our house right after the quake. By the end of April, we were
done except for a block wall between one neighbor's house and ours.
He's never heard *Good fences make good neighbors* or even of
Robert Frost. We're building it now.
At the end of July the T-shirt salesman (I survived 6.8)
left our corner and moved on to Brentwood where he must fight for
space with the Maps to Stars' Homes salesmen.
We spent a weekend in Las Vegas and came home to find that
the water pressure gauge had become defective. That had caused a
small pipe in the house to break and all rooms were flooded! We
crunched through the house after the quake; this time we squished.
We had to start all over again boxing up crystal, china,
cassettes, CDs, and books. My inexpensive floor-to-ceiling book-
cases, made of particle board, melted like the Wicked Witch of the
West. Things dried fast, though, because the temperature reached
107 degrees daily for four weeks.
We've replaced the new carpeting with newer carpeting. A
color scheme of mid 1970s earthtones has been changed to stress-
reduction blue. We have calming wallpaper except in the computer
room where the busy pattern looks like a screen saver.
There are still gold appliances in the kitchen, but my
sister says the blue and gold are patriotic, representing our alma
mater, UCLA.
Happy new school year to all!
Optimistically yours,
Lois Feldman
ab189@lafn.org Birmingham High School
Former home of the Valley girl 17000 Haynes St.
Fer sure, fer sure Van Nuys, CA 91406
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