The Driving Insane

Weird drunk-acting guy who had difficulting forming complete thoughts: "Do you control these computers?" (the OPACS)

Me: "What do you mean? are you having a problem with it?"

"Yes I am. Every time I click on something a box comes up that says back forward..."

Me: "Let me take a look at it." He was right clicking. I explained which button to push to select something.

The search screen came up with “keyword” as the default search.

Drunk dude: "Wordkey? what does that mean? wordkey?"

Me: "Keyword…that is just the kind of search. Type in the subject you are looking for."

Drunk dude motioning wildly: "Is there a catalog or something? Something where I can research?"

Me: "This is it. What are you looking for?"

Drunk dude thinks hard: "uh…Medical!"

"Well, you might need to narrow that down a bit. I give examples: cancer, drug effects, etc."

"Oh. thank you."

He seems to want me to leave, even though it is clear he has no idea what to do, so I leave.

Next he comes up to the desk: can you spell “Einstein” for me?

Now he is just standing at the computer looking around the room.

Eventually he came back up and wanted to know if we had instructions on how to use those computers over there. With considerable difficulty I got him to tell me what he wanted and just took him to the shelves where the books on Einstein were located. I was showing him how to look at the call numbers and match what I wrote on the paper when he just sort of ran off in the other direction with the paper. He came back a few seconds later, and explained that he was just checking on his stuff: a large ratty backpack with a sort of bedroll in a black trash bag strapped awkwardly on top.