And using the cliché, a picture paints a thousand words. In this case, this picture is worth 301,100 words.
Two years ago, Tata recommended this book, Professor and the Madman. This is not a book review because I don’t really know how to make one. Anyway, just a little background, the book is about W.C. Minor who supposedly collaborated with Professor James Murray in creating the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). According to Wikipedia, the Oxford English Dictionary is a comprehensive dictionary of the English language. So the OED lists W. C. Minor as one of its contributors. So Tata and I wanted to see for ourselves W. C. Minor’s name on the dictionary.
On October 14 2006, We had the perfect opportunity to look for a copy of the OED in the UP Main Library. It was a Saturday so the library was only open until 5pm. Since we were not students anymore, we cannot go inside the main library. We had to get a UP Alumni ID. Ala 24 the TV Series….I’m going to put time stamps from hereon.
3:30 pm
So at around 3pm, we ran from Beach House (home of the best barbecue in the campus) to the Bahay ng Alumni where the Alumni office is. The lady in the office just asked our name and course. She located our names in her amazing database of all graduates. Then, she gave us our Alumni IDs.
4:15 pm
We sprinted from the Bahay ng Alumni to the UP Main Library General Reference Section. We tried to go through the Engineering building shortcut, but the exit nearest the library was closed. So we had to go back to our initial point of ingress (just feel like using this word). We lost precious moments here.
4:25 pm
We finally got to the main library. We checked the OPAC, the library’s online database (yup no more card catalogs), and we found out that the OED copy was in the general reference section.
4:35 pm
We searched for the OED. And after about 10 minutes of searching, we found it. I forgot who found it first, Tata or me. Anyway, there were about ten volumes of the dictionary. I think we started with the last volume or was it the first?
On October 14 2006, We had the perfect opportunity to look for a copy of the OED in the UP Main Library. It was a Saturday so the library was only open until 5pm. Since we were not students anymore, we cannot go inside the main library. We had to get a UP Alumni ID. Ala 24 the TV Series….I’m going to put time stamps from hereon.
3:30 pm
So at around 3pm, we ran from Beach House (home of the best barbecue in the campus) to the Bahay ng Alumni where the Alumni office is. The lady in the office just asked our name and course. She located our names in her amazing database of all graduates. Then, she gave us our Alumni IDs.
4:15 pm
We sprinted from the Bahay ng Alumni to the UP Main Library General Reference Section. We tried to go through the Engineering building shortcut, but the exit nearest the library was closed. So we had to go back to our initial point of ingress (just feel like using this word). We lost precious moments here.
4:25 pm
We finally got to the main library. We checked the OPAC, the library’s online database (yup no more card catalogs), and we found out that the OED copy was in the general reference section.
4:35 pm
We searched for the OED. And after about 10 minutes of searching, we found it. I forgot who found it first, Tata or me. Anyway, there were about ten volumes of the dictionary. I think we started with the last volume or was it the first?
Basta, we started flipping through the dusty pages of the OED. We heard the bell rang to signify that the library is about to close. For a moment, I felt like this was an Amazing Race task. And just in the nick of time, Voila! W. C. Minor's name....
1 comment:
Nikki,
Thanks for sharing your blog. I have that book, "The professor and the Madman." I got if from a book sale.
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