Shut the fuck up already.

Ever since I started my summer college class, I realized just how noisy some places can be. That is; I realized how noisy some places are supposed to be that are supposed to be quiet. So I can concentrate, I would go to the Urbana Free Library. Much to my dismay, and annoyance, that library is loud.

I can concentrate with normal noises and normal noise levels; I learned to cope when I was in the Marine Corps. If I don't feel like leaving the house, I'll study while Kevin is working on a house project. It is no big deal. However, the level of distraction in a library is astounding. Hmm...there are ringing cell phones, screaming children, coffee grinders grinding, ringing cell phones, screaming children, homeless people eating loudly and having conversations with themselves, ringing cell phones, screaming children, adults with no volume control, screaming children, ringing cell phones, cell phones vibrating noisily on tables, screaming children, and ringing cell phones!

When did public libraries become the repositories of socially-inept, bored, obnoxious people? When did libraries stop being places of quiet and study, and start being places of free entertainment? This library, and I would assume others as well, have slowly become, basically, free movie rental establishments and internet cafés. With that evolution, along came with it people who normally wouldn't be seen in a library - the very people who don't know how to act in these places. Oh look, another mother allowing her little toddler to constantly scream at the top of her lungs. Oh look, another asshole having a loud conversation on his cell phone. Oh look, another teenager taking up space using a public terminal for Farmville. *groan*

If I need to study, and I need to leave the house, I won't go to a library. I'll instead go to...a coffee shop! They are quieter! Automatically, there aren't any screaming kids. That is probably because most of the parents with obnoxious children are at the library browsing the free DVDs. Automatically, most cell phones are turned to vibrate, or even off. This is probably because the people who patron these establishments know the "etiquette" of coffee shops. Automatically, the environment is quieter because most of the clientele are *gasp* college students who are studying, just like me! I never would have thought coffee shops could quieter than public libraries. I must be living in some kind of Bizarro World.

Of course it doesn't have to be this way. I remember when I was little and I was going out in public with my family, my parents and relatives used to look me square in the eye and say, "You will behave yourself - or else." And I did!

Today I was in the library, and it wasn't as bad as it could have been. But there were times I wanted to yell at the lazy parents (who were allowing their kids to yell), cell phone abusers (who forgot to disable the ring of the phone), and loud people (who have no volume control) and tell them to be quiet because they are in a fucking library.

Be quiet. I'm trying to study.

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