in Monterey with a crisp and star-filled New Year's Eve over our community's First Night celebration, followed by great gusts of wind, driving rain and towering white-capped seas by the end of last week.

Our apologies to those who ventured out last Friday afternoon to visit the Library and found it closed. And those who tried to visit online and found our PALS catalog down. Library services were interrupted because of repeated power outages, concerns for customer and safety and the loss of the city's network. We hated to go dark. And were delighted to be back up and running on Saturday.

If you stopped by, you may have noticed a larger crowd than usual in the Community Room. The Friends of the Library were holding their annual BIG booksale; well-attended as usual by book buyers of all ages, interested in all types of books and reading/listening/ viewing "stuff". All the funds raised by the Friends at their booksales (a smaller version is held the first Saturday of the month in front of the Library from 1 pm to 4pm) go to purchase new library "stuff" for our community. Hooray for our Friends!

Still looking for New Year's Resolutions? The US News and World Report online journal of December 20, 2007 highlights "50 Ways to Improve Your Life in 2008". And under "Your Mind: Quick Picks" I was overjoyed to see "Get (and Use) a Library Card" and "Make Your Favorite Blogs Come to You".

So keep that library card well-exercised (or add it to your wallet or key chain if you haven't been library-carded yet) and invite our Library blog into your RSS reader. And Happy New Year's Reading!