Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for August 13, 2014

You’re not just having a book, you’re having a book with all the people that had that book before you.

Always practice safe reading, kids, or you might catch a case of social studies.

I wonder if my local library has gone back to people’s names on the card. Can remember when they started using your library card number and you’d see that in the book. Been years since I’ve checked out a book, ironically I now own most of the books I enjoyed checking out from them, and I can also blame the net for my lack of visiting. Most of the subjects I’d be checking out books from the library for I can look up online. Maybe even find a copy on Project Guttenberg for free download if it’s an old enough book. But it’s been almost twenty years since I last saw a person’s name on that little slip.

My library books have had a lot of dates, but never committed to anyone.

I’ve seen the card pocket system, but never saw names on the cards, just dates.

I don’t mean to be snarky, but I wonder when Pastis last used a library. In my 65 years I have used a lot of different libraries, in at least two different countries, and I don’t think I have EVER seen a system where the borrower wrote his/her name on a card that was left in the book. Usually when the borrower’s name is written on a card, that card is then left with the library until the book is returned.

Our library books have funny bars. Strange borrowers indeed.

Why don’t y’all just enjoy the strip? And btw, my childhood library in a small town DID use names. Granted, we’re going back some…

#1: some libraries did use real names on the cards.#2: sometimes the card stays in by mistake.#3: however, I haven’t seen a card in a library book in at least 20 years, most libraries have computerized checkout systems.

It also means that the book has been in the library system for at least 10 years. Maybe 20.

I’ve had quite a few of dem books, most were pretty good, even the third and forth time.

i thought The Little Tramp was a Charlie Chaplin movie…………….

They are pulling the books out of libraries around here to put more computers in………………………..

Was at my library 2 months ago when the power went out, and since the card catalog no longer exists, could not look up books. When I found some books I wanted, they would not let me take them because the computers were down. That is progress…

The question is, was it good for the book?

The card from other readers was left behind? Is it now considered pregnant?

Pig is associating with a book of ill repute?!

That brings me back to when I was at school and kids from a year or two ahead of us wrote all over the textbooks and drew inappropriate pictures.

Some people!xxx

Is there some reason Paris doesn’t have a navel?!?

The card with the names / user number should stay with at the library when the book is checked out. Another card with the date due is placed in the pocket (or the date is stamped on the pocket. Looks like he stole that book — ARREST that PIG.

They only used dates on the card? How’d they know who checked it out and if they hadn’t brought it back. I always saw the card in a little envelope on the inside of the front of the book, they’d put your name and due date on the card and the due date on the envelope. They kept the card and it was your responsibility to look at the due date on the envelope. You didn’t return the book, they knew it was overdue, the longer it went overdue the more likely they were to either call or send a letter telling you how much you owed.

Are we going to see Pig wearing a Chairman Mao cap some time soon?

I never figured Pig as a library book thief…(the card with the names on it stays with the librarian – that way, she (and it was always a she, wasn’t it?) would know who had an overdue book checked out)

The card is still in the pocket because Pig took the book without checking it out.

I’m confused…

Yeah, and that little book even has a tramp stamp; did you see that tattoo of the name of the Library? The nerve of that book to go out with others when it pretends to belong to the Library!