Category: edinburgh

Hmmm: should I join my public library now?

So I can borrow an energy meter!

I’ve said before that I’m not a member of my local public library, because as a working adult with good computer skills and a computer / internet access at home, no need to read specific books for pleasure (I buy what catches my eye from charity shops, then give them back to resell when I’ve read them) or research (I’m not studying anything at the moment) , I don’t see what they can really offer me just now.
And I don’t know whether, for their statistics, it’s better to have an adult registered that doesn’t use them, or not be registered and therefore not appear on their radar at all….anyone know?
Anyhoo, regardless of the lack of my lovely presence (!), Edinburgh City Libraries are definitely doing well – catching the headlines, in a time when their budget is also under the same pressure as everyone elses finances! And of course, they have a presence on pretty much anywhere online you can think of looking: Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Bebo…if you’re there, they are too, under their “Tales of One City” brand and blog. I don’t know how they find the time!

Fancy a change of career?

Fed up with lending books (librarians), interpreting the law in them (lawyers), or just feeling a burning desire to get more fun out of working with books?


This could be the job for you:

The Job:

The Children’s Bookshop in Edinburgh is expanding and opening a new bookshop for grown-up fiction and non-fiction. The manager will need to develop core stock, as well as undertake daily stock replenishment and new stock ordering. She or he will also be responsible for event organisation, cashing up, maintaining the customer mailing list, customer orders and managing any additional staff. The manager will contribute to overall business development. Work days will be Tuesday-Saturday.


The person:

The candidate will have a proven track record in bookselling as well as experience of managing staff and budgets. Good IT skills and excellent interpersonal skills are a must. She or he must be self-motivated, but also work well in a team with other staff and with The Children’s Bookshop. Reliability is vital.


Those nice people at Fidra books are expanding into the world of grown-up books, and need a manager for this new venture. Wouldn’t it be nice to actually work with books you’d like to read, and recommend to others to read? (I would strongly advise against reading law books for pleasure, unless your definition of pleasure also includes pulling out your own fingernails, and watching the growth of mould in damp areas). The bookshop will open on the 5th September 2009, and I’m hoing to take a trip over.


Prior to the opening of the bookshop for grown-ups (apparently, calling it an “adult bookshop” might attract the wrong type of customers 😉 ), they’re using the space as a gallery for illustrations by some wonderful childrens book artists.during a period which also encompasses the Edinburgh International Book Festival. The Fidra Gallery will be open from the 11th July – 29th August…think I might make it over to that side of town to have a look. And if I’m feeling too lazy, it’s got a website too.


They’re also on Twitter as @FidraBooks


It’s so nice to have such a friendly, fun and communicative independant bookshop in town, instead of just the Big Beasts of Waterstone’s and the supermarket ‘reading for the lowest common denominator’ options! Through their blog and their Twitter posts, I feel like I know the staff already, without ever having met them!

Capital Collections

From the Edinburgh City Libraries website comes news of Capital Collections, “an exciting website giving online access to some of the amazing and unique prints including photographs, engravings and drawings held by Edinburgh City Libraries.”

As a resident of Leith, which has been undergoing insane roadworks to install an unwanted tram network for 2 years now, and facing another 3 years of them before completion in 2011, this photo is pretty topical right now. It certainly feels like they’ve been messing with the roads non-stop since this photo was taken in 1904!

The problems of Edinburgh living

From a link on Improbable Research, this demonstrates the dilemma of locating Edinburgh streets…I would say it would explain why my useless sofa company continues to have to phone me for each incompetent attempt at delivery of yet another broken sofa, but nah, that’s just them being utterly useless!!!
By dropping the word “Street” from my address, they’ve made me un-locateable!

An extract –

Buckstone is a particularly promiscuous forename. Street atlases list All of these:

Buckstone Avenue Buckstone Bank Buckstone Circle Buckstone Close
Buckstone Court Buckstone Crescent Buckstone Crook Buckstone Dell
Buckstone Drive Buckstone Gardens Buckstone Gate Buckstone Green
Buckstone Grove Buckstone Hill Buckstone Lea Buckstone Loan
Buckstone Loan East Buckstone Neuk Buckstone Place Buckstone Rise
Buckstone Road Buckstone Row Buckstone Shaw Buckstone Terrace
Buckstone View Buckstone Way Buckstone Wood Buckstone Wynd

That’s 28 different Buckstone streets. And for good measure there is also one that has no classname, just an attributive premodifier of the forename: High Buckstone.

There are actually way over fifty ways to lose your lover in this city’s streets. We get the first fifty from the fact that a cursory glance through a street index reveals that all of the following words to be quite common as street classnames in Edinburgh:

Approach Crescent Green Parade Square
Arcade Crest Hill Park Street
Avenue Dean Lane Passage Terrace
Bank Dell Lea Path View
Boulevard Drive Loan Place Villas
Circle End Mains Promenade Walk
Circus Entry Market Quadrant Way
Close Gait Mews Rise Wood
Cottages Gardens Mount Road Wynd
Court Glebe Neuk Row Yard

But in fact, for any chosen forename, we can make many more than fifty well-formed street names.