Yesterday was the annual Library Assistants Away Day at Cardiff University and I helped to organise it for the second year. We normally go off campus but we thought it would be wise to have a free venue and blow our budget on tea, cake and lunch. Sensible. So we chose to have our away day on campus (free) in the beautiful Main Building. We had a variety of talks on things like medical illustration, how the school of Social Science is using Twitter for research and how working with artists is different to working with academics. But mainly the day was about cake, chatting with people from different libraries and  rounding off the academic year with some fun.




A few little facts for you about the Main Building at Cardiff University:

• Main Building today houses a number of Schools and Departments, including the School of Chemistry, the School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, part of the School of Biosciences, and the Vice-Chancellor’s Office.
• Main Building is a Grade II listed building.
• The message carved prominently in the Portland stone over the main entrance reads ‘Nerth gwlad ei gwybodaeth – A nation's strength is in its learning.’
• The Science Library is today home to approximately 37,000 loanable books, more than 1.2km of book shelves, and more than 1.5km of journals shelving.
• In February 1941 during the war, the long corridor above the library in Main Building caught fire from an incendiary device that had lodged in the roof. Off-duty students had to form chains of buckets to help put out the fire.

I wanted to look a little more formal than usual for the big day so I put my favourite fancy shoes on, my official looking bag, a smart dress and a crazed look. The crazy look in my eyes in a mixture of stress and mania. It's hard work organising events, how the hell does Emily Eavis manage to organise Glasto?!






Swoon, isn't she lovely? I like that I have a very traditional bag but I chose a bonkers colour. I can't wait for this to get worn in and have that battered look. I know that I'm going to enjoy using this for a very long time.



Everyone seemed to enjoy the cake, marshmallow challenge and the presentations. It's all over for another year, phew! I really enjoyed being in such beautiful surroundings and need to find another excuse to spend the day in the council chambers.