ChrisTalbot.com

I got a library card at the main branch of the Ajax Public Library on Saturday. While not really a big deal, as getting a library card is a fairly mundane event, I was kind of excited about it. I haven't had a library card since I was about sixteen years old, so I have, in fact, spent nearly half my life without a library card.

Libraries have changed since I was a teen. The video collections have grown enormously, and there are even a lot of DVDs available. I ended up taking out a couple of documentaries I'd been wanting to see -- Grizzly Man (watched it on Sunday; great documentary) and Canada: A People History, Vol. 1 (which I started watching at lunch).

However, libraries have also added graphic novels and even video games to the items they keep on hand and loan out to those with library cards. I never thought I'd see video games available in a library. While I can understand graphic novels because they're still books, video games strike me as going against the concept of learning and knowledge that a library has always stood for (at least to me). Not that I'm going to complain, of course. I'm sure I'll eventually take advantage of the ability to check out games with my library card.