love MeL

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Lots of bloggers make a point of posting things they are happy about at the moment.

Here is something that is making me happy -- the Michigan eLibrary system that lets me check out books that belong to other libraries.

I had tried the inter-library loan thing, a long time ago, when it was a pain to use. Then, more recently, I looked for a book I wanted, and none of the libraries I had access to, through mine, seemed to have it.

A few weeks ago, one of my colleagues at work told me he uses MeL all the time. He used to live in Ann Arbor, and now lives in one of the smaller near-by towns. He still has access to the Ann Arbor library's collection, but he has to use MeL and wait until the materials are delivered to his current library.

I decided to try using MeL the next time I wanted something Ann Arbor doesn't have.

Which is a lot of stuff.

Ann Arbor used to have a rather good selection of craft books, but in the last several years, they have decided it's more important to have an enormous selection of books in foreign languages. The selection of craft books is now much sparser than ere it was. Alas.

It also used to be the case that they were very responsive to requests that they add titles to their collection. That, too, is no longer true. (Do you detect a pattern of fading warm-n-fuzzy feelings toward my erstwhile beloved library? Sigh!)

In any case, I had a sizable list of books in my Amazon cart, so I asked MeL about them. Only one book on my list was not in MeL's lists, and only one more was there but unavailable. (I suspect people in the town whose library has a given book have priority for that book, which seems meet and right to me.)

Apparently lots of other libraries around Michigan are still buying craft books rather than foreign-language novels. Huzzah!

I can't figure how it's cheaper to ship books hither, thither, and yon around the state than to buy more books. But hey. They don't pay me the big bucks to make library decisions............

Google says Iron Mountain is 471 miles (8.5 hours!) from Ann Arbor.

Nevertheless, I have their copy of Danny Gregory's Illustrated Life.

This book is constructed of the contributions of many artists who draw all the time.

I was familiar with several of them (including Danny Gregory) before seeing this book.

France Belleville, whose work I revere but have no thought of emulating.

Mattias Adolfsson, who makes me laugh -- check out this drawing.

Jane LaFazio, whose work I would love to emulate (and who is one of the pros doing the sketchbook challenge).

Christian Slade -- I own one of his original drawings! He donated a copy of Korgi to an auction in service of CorgiAid, and I won the book.

There are many other artists in the book whose work I love as well as the five above.

It is very interesting to see the range of subjects, techniques, etc.

Very encouraging -- I'm pretty sure every one of these artists would say "If you want to draw, draw!"  I know it's what Danny says.

Me, too.

If you want to draw, do!  You don't have to show anyone.  You don't have to tell anyone.  Just ... draw.  And keep drawing................

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