I’ve been working a lot lately . . . even more than usual. I’m being trained on a new computer program at my second job (Lean Logistics, Inc.) and at Barnes & Noble we’re gearing up for the great Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows unveiling, 12:01:01am on 21 July. Festivities start at 6pm and I’ve been recruited (well, strictly speaking, I volunteered) to paint lightening bolts on people’s foreheads. Since we have hundreds of reservations, I am hoping I have a whole crew of house elves to help or my wrist will be totally useless by the end of the night.

Yesterday, when I was at Lean Logistics, my supervisor said her eleven-year-old son had been in with her the day before, and asked about me. When he heard I was going to grad school, he wondered if I was going to become and engineer and build robots like his uncle (who also went to graduate school). She said no, that I was going for something else, and then tried to think how to explain what I was going to do in a way that would make sense to him. “Then I remembered that his favorite movie in the world,” she told me, “is National Treasure . . . you know? . . . with Nicholas Cage?” I thought about this, and remembered, vaguely, trailers that included lots of exciting chase sequences and something about the Declaration of Independence . . .”Yeah, I think I remember.” “Well,” she continued, “there’s this character in the movie, Dr. Chase, and she’s got a degree in library science and in history and she works as an archivist. So I said, ‘Anna’s going to be Dr. Chase!’ “

Who knew that being an archivist was soooooo sexy?