Do you like going to the library?

I used to love going to the library, in the days when you were expected to be quiet while you were there!

That's why I also loved academic libraries, with their little reading nooks, where you could stay tucked away in a corner - almost all night, if you chose, reading any of the thousands of books stored in the many floors of the library "stacks".

Now that libraries have become more multi-functional, though, I'm now one of the grumpy old devils who glares at the people hanging around chatting in loud voices, or typing too noisily on the computers provided at the main library where I live. 

And God help you if your mobile phone rings while you're in the library, and sitting next to me! That offence could earn you a glare capable of turning you to stone.

On a more serious note, my favourite-ever library was the mobile library van which used to visit the remote village where I lived some years ago. It came once every three weeks, throughout the year.

It only had a relatively small selection of books, but these were changed regularly, and you could order any book you liked.

Library van day was such an event in the village that the villagers all used to arrive ages before the van would turn up, and then they'd jostle to get on, and to choose their books.

For me, the best thing about the library van was that there was no limit on the number of books you could borrow at any one time - so I would come home with literally mountains of books, for me and my husband, and for my two children, both of whom were very small at the time.

I'd make both kids walk home afterwards, so that we could cram as many books into the littlest one's pushchair as we possibly could.

Luckily, the children would be so excited by the prospect of having new books to look at (and to have read to them) that neither of them ever complained, even when it was raining and took us ages to get home, because we all had to walk at the snail's pace demanded by a toddler who was still very wobbly on his feet!

If only I'd thought to make them a book playhouse like this, they'd have been even happier!