John Green, author of the award-winning book Looking for Alaska (which I am in the middle of right now and will definitely blog about later), was recently interviewed on another fabulous blog, Pop Goes the Library. When asked what his area of pop cultural expertise was, he replied "Are conjoined twins part of pop culture? If so, definitely conjoined twins." This got me thinking about my own brief fascination with conjoined twins...

A few summers ago, I read the novel Chang and Eng by Darin Strauss. The book is a work of historical fiction about the famous conjoined twins named Chang and Eng Bunker, who were born in 1811. The twins were joined at the sternum by a flap of skin and although they could have been easily separated in modern times, doctors weren't up to the challenge 200 years ago. They were discovered in their native Siam by a British merchant and were brought to America to tour in freak shows owned by circus entrepeneur P.T. Barnum. As they became more famous, they became known as the "Siamese Twins," given that they were from Siam. This is why this term is still around today.

The twins eventually settled down on a southern plantation and married a pair of sisters, having 22 children between them. The book Chang and Eng is told from the perspective of Chang, and fictionally depicts the lives of the twins and the natural struggles that come from being less than one foot away from somebody for your entire life. Next time you get mad at your sibling, you can at least be thankful that you aren't literally joined at the hip!

For further reading about Chang and Eng, you can check out The Two: A Biography by Irving Wallace or the fictional God's Fool by Mark Slouka. For further reading about conjoined twins in general, check out Joined at Birth : The Lives of Conjoined Twins by Elaine Landau.

Due to popular demand, I have started displaying DVDs and CDs in the Teen area on the main floor of the library. The selection I chose this evening includes copies of the movies Saved!, Zoolander (so you can practice your "Blue Steel"), and Donnie Darko and CDs by Smashing Pumpkins, Alicia Keys, and the British band Keane. I also paid tribute to my goth days as a teenager by putting out albums by The Cure and Depeche Mode. Be sure to stop by and see this lovely example of my display-making ability. That is all.

TNT is showing a movie called The Librarian tonight and of course, I'm going to watch it. Not because I think Noah Wyle is a cool guy (BTW, does anybody else think he doesn't look that great in his IMDB photo?), but because there are so few movies about librarians that I feel obligated. Some library school students (yes, there is such a thing as library school and yes, I went to one myself) compiled a list of movies featuring librarians. My favorite library movie of all time actually inspired me to become a librarian myself: Party Girl starring Parker Posey.

Do you have any favorite movies featuring librarians? Do you have any thoughts on tonight's movie? Leave a comment!