Answer: 76,998

Question: How many telephone calls did Central Librarians handle between July 1, 2007 and July 1, 2008?

It has been many years since we had the ability to accurately count calls to the Telephone Reference Desk. The new telephone system installed last spring has been counting for a year, now, and here's what we learned:
- Total talk time: 2,539.7 hours.
- Busiest month: January (7,542)
- Slowest month: November (5,349)
- Busiest time: 10-12 a.m.
- Slowest time: 7-8 p.m.
- Average wait to speak to a librarian: 1.5 minutes.
- (Red face, here) Longest wait in the hold queue: 28.5 minutes.

These were among the questions that crossed our desk recently:

Q. What are the health care benefits of federal public officials?

A. Slate reports that the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program is administered by the United States Office of Personnel Management. OPM reports it covers over 4 million federal employees, retirees and their families, and the government pays about 75% of the average premium. Benefits are listed on the Program's web site, and there is an interactive map to discover local coverage by state.

Q. What are the Postal Service rules/specifications for the format of business reply envelopes?

A. For this, we went straight to the horse's mouth. The United States Postal Service web site has a downloadable "Quick Service Guide 507a" that answered the question exactly.

What do YOU want to know? Call 916-264-2920 and we'll do our best to find the answer to your question.

What Would You Like to Know?

One of the more interesting things librarians do is answer questions. In Sacramento, questions that come in by phone to any of our branches are routed automatically to the Telephone Information Service (TELIS) at the Central Library, where librarians use a collection of books, online subscriptions, and the Internet to answer them - usually in less than 5 minutes.

So, what kind of questions do callers ask? Everything from "What day is it today?" to "How many hairs are there on a cat?" (answer)

Here are a few questions we've received over the last few years:

Q: How did Roseville get its name?
A: It was chosen by the residents at a picnic for the most popular girl present (Sacramento Bee, Oct. 10, 1931).

Q: When weather reports give wind direction, does that indicate 1) direction the wind is blowing to, or 2) direction from which the wind is blowing?
A: From Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary: "the direction from which the wind is blowing."

Q: Does OPEC have a standard size for their oil drums?
A: According to the OPEC Web site: "Oil is measured in barrels. . .One barrel equals 52 US gallons, or 159 litres."

What would YOU like to know? Call 916-264-2920 after 10 a.m.