Elf Yourself

I elfed myself over at ElfYourself by OfficeMax. Link

Animal Occuations

On the Best Week Ever blog, blogger Michelle Collins has a humours piece on 50 animals with day jobs. To the left is "Bunny Ableman, Librarian." Some of the other animals were funnier, but I liked Miss Bunny.

Play a Game - Give Rice to Hungry People

This is an interesting concept. At Free Rice, you play a vocabulary game and for each answer you get right, they give 20 grains of rice to the United Nations to help end world hunger. The game is free and is funded by advertising banners.

The game itself is enjoyable. It's a vocabulary game that raises or lowers the level of words based on if you get the answer correct.

So, you can play a game and boost your brain power and help feed the worlds hungry. How cool is that?

Link: Free Rice

I'm Like Hermione Granger - Who are You?

This doesn't surprise me in the least. I do seem to have an affinity for Hermione.


Harry Potter Personality Quiz by Pirate Monkeys Inc.

Link from Native Reader

Time Interviews Stephen King

Interesting interview with Stephen King in Time magazine. I've been a fan of Stephen King since I was in my late teens. We saw The Mist this weekend, which was good overall, but I found the ending disappointing. In the original story - one of my favorites - the ending is ambiguous, but in the movie they have eliminated that, to the detriment of the story, in my opinion. King writes a regular column for Entertainment Weekly called The Pop of King, in which he discusses pop culture. The Time interview and his weekly column expose a different side of the author.

Link via Library Stuff

Week 10: #23 The End?

It is hard to believe that this is the final exercise. When the idea for doing a 23 Things type project was first suggested (in late 2006 or early 2007) by several different people it was hard to imagine this point. After months of planning and then doing, we are done - at least for now.

What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?

I loved doing avatars - and seeing what other people came up with. I also enjoyed reading people's blogs and discovering some good strong - and sometime unexpected - voices.

How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

It has reinforced the need to always keep learning. When Thomas Jefferson founded the University of Virginia, my alma mater, he didn't believe in using the terms freshman, sophomore, etc. - or even giving degrees. The reason for this is he didn't think people ever stopped learning. While they give degrees now, it's still first year, second year, etc. - because you're never senior in learning. This has always been my philosophy and this program reinforces that.

Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?

For me, it the number of people who participated and the overwhelmingly positive response. While some people started and didn't continue, we've had a good continuation rate. I have been so pleased with how many people have joined in on this journey.

What ideas do you have for using these technologies at Harris County Public Library?

I would like to get more people involved in blogging. We're about to move the web server, which will allow us to upgrade some software, including Moveable Type. I would like to see more staff blogging for the public.

I'd like to make Harriet into a Wiki. I'd also like to see us use Wiki software on the main website, perhaps for the links section.

I think we should do some kind of trading card to hand out to the public.

What if we had everyone at a branch create an avatar and featured that on the branch page?

For the Adult SRP we're looking at using a Wiki. I'd like to see about using LibraryThing or Twitter to feature some content from customers.

Above all else, we need more staff involved on the website and we need to involve our customers.

What else do you want to learn about? What other web 2.0 applications are you interested in?

I have a list started on my del.icio.us account with ideas of sites for the next step in iHCPL.

This has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career - helping with and participating in iHCPL. I hope that we can continue this type of program in the coming year. My thanks to all the participants and iHCPL team members.

Sesame Street - For Adults Only?

If you can't see the video, click here.

A recent article in the New York Times by Virginia Heffernan relates that the first two seasons of Sesame Street are now out on DVD, but come with the following warning:

These early ‘Sesame Street’ episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today’s preschool child.

Being born in 1970, I grew up with Sesame Street. I love(d) Big Bird, Snuffleupagus, Oscar the Grouch, Kermit, and Cookie Monster. Now I find that the early episodes aren't good enough for todays children. I suppose I understand some of it - the article relates that in one episode Cookie Monster has a pipe - but I loved Sesame Street and I don't think it harmed me.

I had a Cookie Monster puppet, which I fed cookies to - my mom had to clean out his "throat" periodically of crumbs. I also had a Sesame Street activity book that gave me ideas like making drums from oatmeal containers. Do kids do this today?

I know educational standards have evolved for children, especially young children, but it disturbs me that something I grew up on - that I loved - is considered inappropriate now. Boy, do I feel old.

What American Accent Do You Have?

This is an interesting quiz. I thought my result was interesting as it points to my relatives in Minnesota, although I'm originally from the DC area.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Midland
The Northeast
Philadelphia
The South
The West
Boston
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Week 9: #22 The Joys of Downloadable Media

Since I am intimately familiar with the HCPL Digital Media Catalog, I decided to look at LibriVox. I though the selection of free recorded books was excellent considering that all of them had to be recorded by someone. While they aren't up to the quality of a professionally recorded book, they aren't bad. I took a brief listen to two different titles, one of which was Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë - one of my favorite books. My two issues with this site are that there were multiple different readers for the book and that each chapter begins with a notation of what the recording is. I'm glad this resource is out there, but I think I will stick to the Digital Media Catalog for my recordings. Right now I'm listening to A Lick of Frost by Laurell K. Hamilton and have been listening to Tamora Pierce's Tortall books - which I adore.

Week 9: #21 Podcasts

I looked at PodcastAlley and found a couple of Podcasts that fit my tastes. First I tried then I tried Splendid Table: Kitchen Questions, then I tried MuggleCast. Frankly, podcasts just don't appeal to me, but then I'm not much on talk radio. I can see the appeal, it's just not for me. I think in part because I'm more of a visual or kinesthetic (need to be doing something) learner. What's funny, is I really do like audiobooks, but I think because it's a story is why I like it.

While they don't personally appeal to me, I think it's something we need to seriously look at for the library. When Linda and I gave a presentation on iHCPL at the UNT All school Day for Houston, one of the presenters said they use podcasts in the schools because they don't have to worry about a child appearing on camera. It's also a bit simpler to deal with. Something to think about.

Week 9: #20 I Tube, YouTube, We All Tube

Can't see the video, click here.

How silly is it, that I LOVE the above commercial. I can sit and watch it again and again. I suppose it's because I have a part dachshund named Scrappy, whom I adore. That's the thing about YouTube and other video services, we can get to video of our favorite TV shows, old commercials, and just about anything you can imagine. I think we have used video very effectively during iHCPL, thanks to Beth's amazing skill. Each week we've had a relevant video to introduce that week's topic - all thanks to YouTube. We've already started embedding video on the HCPL website. Video is going to become more and more integrated into the web and we need to be along for the ride.

What's Your Flavor

And the quizzing continues. Found this on another blog.

What Flower Are You?

I came across this on one of the other iHCPL blogs. What can I say, I'm a sucker for quizzes.

I am a Snapdragon What Flower Are You?

"Mischief is your middle name, but your first is friend. You are quite the prankster that loves to make other people laugh."

I'm not sure if that's an accurate description of me, but I have always loved snapdragons.

Week 8: #19 Zoho

So, I'm trying out Zoho Writer.  At home, I don't have Word - or at least I don't want to pay for it - so this may be a good alternative when I need to write a document.  I also like that it will publish to a blog, although I have to say I'd probably just write directly on a blog. 

Let's see what it will do:

Bold - Underline - Italic - I like that it did that using standard keyboard commands (I'm a keyboard person)
Fonts: Verdana, Palantino Linotype, Small Font,  Comic Sans, - Not a bad selection for documents.

It will do a text box - to the left is a picture of Harlequin AKA Harley, who Patrick has fallen in love with and we are keeping.

Update: Well, to get it to look halfway decent on the blog I had to remove text boxes and the larger type.  That said, I still think this is a cool program and will be using it at home.  I do like that when I click publish - after the innitial time - it updates the post.

Overall, this is a pretty cool program.  It has it's limitations, but it's something I'll be sharing with Patrick since he is a writer and I'm not.  Very cool!

Record a Drawing

Click here if you can't see it.

I came across this on a Librarian in Black blog post talking about the tools presentation from Internet Librarian. This could be a neat tool for trying to visually explain something to people. Try it out at Screencast.com.

Dog Available

We had a very sweet female puppy wander up on our property last night. We have surveyed our neighbors and she doesn't seem to belong to anyone in our area. She is female, is maybe 15-20 pounds and 4-6 months old (maybe younger). She has pretty big paws and our best guess is she'll be 50-60 pounds when full grown. She is multi-colored (white, black, brown, and brindle. She is very people friendly and while a bit timid around our other dogs, seems to be OK with them.

If you're interested, please let me know.

Fun for Halloween

Fun little game for Halloween.

Week 8: #18 The Social Web

Visit my family

Join the Dogster community

I've been checking out some social networking sites recently. I can't say I'm overly enamored of them, but they are interesting. Honestly, I think a lot of it is I'm just out of the age range it really appeals to. What I have found is the niche sites are more appealing to me. I love Dogster & Catster - all of my dogs and cats have their own page and friends.

LinkedIn is interesting as it is business oriented. It looks like it might be a great way to network with people. I've been on it for a couple months - someone invited me to join. I like that you can tie in with current and past work colleagues and other people who might "relate" to you.

Of the big services, I honestly can't stand MySpace. Many of the spaces I've seen are just plain gaudy and it just doesn't appeal to me. Again, I think I'm too old.

Facebook, on the other hand, I've been fiddling with for about a month. I do find it appealing and could see it being potentially useful at work. Groups are still new to me, but it might be useful for some projects. I say this because I wish Ning worked at the library. It's a way to form your own social network, but we have yet to make it work in the library.

I do think Social Networking is something all libraries need to pay attention to. I don't think it's going away any time soon, it's simply too popular and a new way for people to communicate. Using proper safety measures, it can be a safe experience. That's one of the reasons I like trying it out with Dogster or Catster. Your dogs and cats are on stage, rather than you.

Week 7: #17 Looking Back at Technology

Since I'm generally knee deep in technology, I thought I'd talk a little about how I got to where I am in terms of technology. I am not a digital native, I'm just a bit too old (36) to have grown up with computers, although I had access at various times. When I was in elementary school, my best friend Cheryl had an Atari computer. Her mom used to type in programs she found in books and record them to cassette tape. We played games on the computer, but that was about it.

At home we had a TI99-4A, which hooked up to the TV. Again, just played games. When I was about 13, we bought an IBM PC jr. Frankly, it was too difficult to use, so we just didn't do much with it except use it for a word processor.

In high school and then in college, rather than use the computer to type papers, I used a typewriter, because...I was afraid of computers. I know, that may be a bit hard to believe now, but I really was. It took needing to write a resume in my 3rd year of college to get me on a computer in the library's computer lab. I had to have a friend of mine show me how to use WordPerfect (in DOS). After that, I wrote the rest of my papers using a computer, because it was a lot easier.

My point is, that anyone can learn. I am advanced in terms of technology now, but this wasn't always the case.

Week 7: #16 Wiki Space

So I added a couple of favorite books and restaurants. Since I set up the Wiki initially, I figured I could get by with that. I used a Wiki previously for a project I worked on for TLA's ATRT committee. I found that it was a great way to do collaborative work with people spread out around Texas.

We're exploring the use of Wikis in the eBranch. We'd like to see about changing the links section of the website over to a Wiki and also perhaps Harriet. If we do so, it probably won't be quite so open.

Information R/evolution

Michael Wesch, who also did the amazing The Machine is Using Us video, has come out with a new video called Information R/evolution, which I think ties many of the things we have been doing with iHCPL together. It gives a good explanation of how information is now coming to us rather than us seeking out the information that online, information is not limited to shelves but can be "put" in numerous different places. Well worth a look.



Link via the Shifted Librarian.

DIY Fairy Wings

This is a cool video I came across. I have some fairy wings I bought a few years ago for Halloween, but don't really like them. Perhaps I'll try these at some point, although this year I'm going as a witch.

Mr. Jefferson on LibraryThing

How cool is this? Thomas Jefferson is on LibraryThing, or at least his library is. I have long admired Mr. Jefferson since he founded the University of Virginia, my Alma Mater.

Grace Notes in Neon

Found this through the Generator blog. It's actually a company that makes neon signs, and you can preview your text in a variety of sign formats. I thought the snorting bull was appropriate for Texas.

Librarian Hell

One of my favorite online comics is Savage Chickens. I subscribe to it through Bloglines. The guy who writes it does one comic a day on a Post-it-Note featuring chickens. He has done a couple of library oriented strips. The strip for Thursday 10/18

Week 6: #15 The Future of Libraries & the Web

I have read a lot about Web 2.0 & Library 2.0 prior to iHCPL and fell that I have fully embraced both concepts. I really liked the iceberg article. I think Anderson makes some good points. One of the things that we're doing with iHCPL is training our customers as well as our staff, which I think is what we need to do more of. While we need to learn these tools, our customers do as well. We also need to go to them. In a Web 2.0 sense this is using social tools such as Flickr, YouTube, IM, etc. rather than making them use library geared services.

I also really like the Librarian 2.0 Manifesto. I think we should adopt something like this within HPCL. iHCPL is a great beginning to this type of thinking and what I've seen on other blogs, this is beginning to happen, we just need it to continue.

Leader Test

I came across this interesting test while I was playing around on the Internet this weekend trying to find some information on personality tests. An interesting take on leadership in a not-so-serious manner. I took a couple versions of the test. In one, it said I was like Gandhi (morals matter to you; you like to lead by example; perfection is important to you). Two others both pegged me as like Abe Lincoln.

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Week 6: #14 Technorati

This is a tool that I should like - a lot. But, it just doesn't do much for me. I had even forgotten that I had claimed my blog a while back until I was about to register. I can see where this could be useful, I guess I just find enough information in other places at the moment.

While I'm no prude, Where's the Fire made me want to get an extinguisher. This is not what I want to spend my time reading. I did create a watchlist with iHCPL. There's a few items on it right now, and we'll see what else comes up.

I realized as I was doing the exercise that the since most of us are using Blogger, Technorati no longer seems to require special code to capture tags. Interesting.

Week 6: #13 Yummy!

I adore del.icio.us. I've had an account for several years now and use it for most of my bookmarks at work and at home. The only thing I don't put on del.icio.us are administrative accounts that I use every day on the job. Since I set up the iHCPL del.icio.us I didn't go back to explore it this time. I would like to see about putting in the sites for the rest of the program at some point, as well as additional sites.

One of the ways I use del.icio.us is when I'm searching for sites on a topic, I'll see what I have and then look at some of the other sites listed, especially those linked to by a lot of people. Our communal use of del.icio.us is still beginning, but I'd like to see where we as a system can go with it.

I've heard that a lot of people are having problems viewing the tutorial, which is too bad. I did like the video that someone sent me that was put in the comments of the post and which is below.

View @ Yahoo Video

Week 5: #12 Helpful Elf

I signed up for Library Elf several years ago before the library started sending out reminder notices. I am still signed up and like getting reminders of holds and books due. One of the more recent features they added is recommendations based on your items out and/or holds.

While we have a wonderful service for reminders through the library, one of the benefits of Library Elf for our customers is that they can opt to get reminders via text message. An interesting service.

Week 5: #11 Library Thing

LibraryThing is nothing new to me. I have been a member since September 8, 2005 and have been keeping track of books I read even longer than that - since around 1998/1999. I moved online to using AllConsuming in 2003 or 2004. I decided to switch to LibraryThing because I like the book management better than AllConsuming; I also don't have an interest in tracking movies, music or food. I also like that you can friend people and see what you have in common with other users.

I only added two more books today - Woman Who Rides Like a Man & Cave of the Dark Wind - since I already have 499 and only add books when I've finished them. I also have had a LibraryThing widget on my blog - see sidebar - pretty much since I started the blog.

My Profile
My Library

Week 5: #10 I'm a Meez!

OK, so this is one of the "things" I've been waiting for. I LOVE image generators. I just think they are too cool. A while back, I fooled around with Meez, but this gave me a chance to customize it more. So, I made myself a vampire, warrior librarian.

Blog Posts

I am not a fan of writing. That is one of the reasons that I have never kept up a blog before now - I never knew what to write about. I like that iHCPL gives us things to think about and post. Well, on the topic of what to write, I came across a list of 18 Different Kinds of Blog Posts on iLibrarian. It's an interesting exploration of a variety of different blog post styles, with examples.

One of the styles listed was an Aggregate List/Guide, which linked to an example post about Twitter. Now I'll have to do another post - at some point - about Twitter and how we're using it to capture quotes from iHCPL participants. How cool, I have a topic.

Link via Stephen's Lighthouse

Week 4: #9 Too Many Feeds Already

Since I already enough feeds to keep up with, I decided to check out Feedster's widget tool. It's pretty nifty. I did a search on iHCPL, then clicked Create Widget, added my information, and got HTML code to add to my blog. I now have a widget on my sidebar that will show me new posts made that mention iHCPL. How cool is that. I can see using this in a variety of ways for myself and for the library.

Week 4: #8 Bloglines, How I Do Love Thee

This is a particularly easy exercise for me. I have been using Bloglines for several years now to keep up with library news, general news, and topics of general interest to me. I try to read my Bloglines feeds every day, which I sometimes achieve, but more realistically I read them 2-3 times a week. I have also been an advocate for the use of Bloglines to keep up with what's going on in libraries and the world with staff. I hope everyone takes this opportunity to try out Bloglines or another feed reader (both Google and Yahoo have feed readers) to keep up with things.

I've subscribe to a few of the participants blogs, but since I'm tracking a bunch for iHCPL, I'm not going to subscribe to very many. If you want to see the feeds I subscribe to, check out my Blogroll.

Trading Card Redux

Grace & iHCPL
Originally uploaded by hoosgracie

I decided to try doing another trading card - I wasn't overly thrilled with the first one. I'm much happier with this one.

Week 3: #7 Photo Editing

scraps
Originally uploaded by hoosgracie

This is one of my dogs - Scrappy. He's a dachshund mixed with something - maybe Beagle. His personality is a lot bigger than his body and he loves big toys.

I tried out Picnik and really liked it. I love that it ties in with my Flickr account and found it very easy to use. It has good basic editing tools and will even let you do some advanced color correction. It also has some nice extras like the frames and text.

Cool Slide Show

I came across this on one of the other participant's blogs and thought it was way cool. I'm wondering if we could use this on the website as it looks like it would do what we want in a good size.

Week 3: Post #6

trading card
Originally uploaded by hoosgracie

How cool is this, I have my own trading card. Mashups are way cool as they let you go beyond a basic tool and combine it with other online tools. When I have time I'll look at some of the other mashup tools.

iHCPL into Week 3

I am so pleased that everyone participating in iHCPL seems to be having a good time. The posts that I've seen on participant's blogs have shown enthusiasm and excitement for the program. We continue to get new registrations and are up to 209 registrations as of late this afternoon. This afternoon, we packaged bling to send out to 207 people - a lot of work, but rewarding. Looking forward to the next two exercises this week.

Week 3: Post #5

At the Monticello Fish Pond
Originally uploaded by hoosgracie

This is from my trip to Virginia in June and is a picture of me at the Monticello fish pond.. Patrick and I went to Monticello - Thomas Jefferson's home - when we visited Charlottesville, home of the University of Virginia, my alma mater.

I've had a Flickr account for over a year and really enjoy it as a way to share photos with my friends and family who are pretty far away. I took this opportunity to set up posting direction from Flickr to my blog. If anyone is reading this and wondering how, just click "blog this" on a picture, on your account, and walk through the steps.

Wow

I spent a good portion of my day working on registrations for iHCPL. 115 staff members have set up their blogs, and some of the initial posts have been great. While there has been some frustration - based on the posts I've seen - it looks like a lot of people are working together to figure it out. So far so good!

A Great Start to iHCPL

Registration for iHCPL opened today. As of when I left, we already had 53 staff members registered from a wide variety of positions and branches. It looks like a few people were very challenged by creating a blog, while others had one or had done a blog before. Overall, the comments have been great. I'm definately looking forward to the rest of the program.

Week 2: #4 Online Safety

This is a topic I feel very familiar with at this point. I've been actively involved in the group preparing Internet safety programming for the library. As part of that, we developed a page - linked in the exercise - for the main website on Internet Safety. Being online opens you up to the wide world. On this blog, it should be pretty obvious to just about anyone from HCPL, who I am. I have used my first name and listed my position. That said, I don't show an email address or other personal information to protect myself.

I am currently exploring a couple of social networking sites. On those sites I am listed by first and last name, but again, my contact information is private. When exploring the wonders of the web, you need to decide how much to share of yourself.

Week 2: #3 Learning Styles

While by nature I am a really organized person, finding time to do iHCPL is difficult. I have meant to do the program while we were preparing for it, but never found the time. I am enjoying following along with the program we've been planning for 5 months. Even so, I find that I'm blogging at home, but I don't really mind that, especially since I'm making posts outside of iHCPL topics as well.

So what's my learning style. While the slide show doesn't really talk about it, I am a doer. I need to do something or write it down to have it sink in. I am a big note taker, but I rarely refer back to my notes. I also prefer to try something on my own rather than take a class - at least in most things.

Week 2: #3 Grab a Blog

So in this exercise we grab a blog. We'll have had this particular blog for a few years now, I just haven't done anything with it - I did for awhile, but then dropped off. So, iHCPL is a great incentive to start blogging again. Since I had a blog already, I've been tweaking the template, which I'm finally happy with, for a few weeks now and adding some extras. I will probably still add a few more things, but I'm happy with it for now.

A Book Is Not a Child

Interesting post on Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Books about authors who mess with their characters and the fans who become angry. I know the author this made me think of first was Laurell K. Hamilton, which the post mentions. I started reading the Anita Blake series a couple of years ago, after a number of the books were already out. I fell in love with Anita and her quirkiness, the zombie raisings, the vampire hunting, and the great supporting cast of characters. The books were an amazing mashup of mystery, fantasy, science fiction, and romance.

Then it all changed. Anita was no longer the fun, quirky character. Instead it was all about SEX. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind sex in books, but sheesh, this was ridiculous. In one of the most recent books, there was really no plot, it was just about Anita having sex.

In Candy's post, she has several things to think about:

• What was the last book you got angry about?
• Why were you angry?
• Were you mad at the book, or at the author--or both?
• Who do you think the characters truly belong to: the author? The readers? Both? Neither?

I don't know that I can say I'm mad, I'm more disappointed and maybe feel betrayed. It kind of feels like the author has taken a character who was awesome and done a 180 on the character's personality. I've read Laurell K. Hamilton's blog where at times she has defended the change in Anita and while I can understand that this is her character and as the author it has to come from her, I still think author's have a responsibility to their readers.

The Golden Compass

One of my favorite series of books is Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials. The first book, The Golden Compass, has been made into a movie, which will come out in December. I'll be curious to see how the book transfers to film. On the movie website, they have a Meet Your Daemon quiz. Daemons are physical representations of the soul in the His Dark Materials Universe.

10 Questions

There was an interesting post on the Sites and Soundbytes blog the other day about 10 questions to ask new administrators, which came from David Lee King's blog. I actually think based on the questions that we should go beyond just using this for administrators, what about other positions? Technology is simply too important today to ignore whether people use it or not. I can answer yes to most of these and hopefully most HCPL staff will be able to answer yes to at least some of them after iHCPL.

1. Do you read blogs. YES Which ones? Blogroll
   
2. Do you have a personal blog? YES. What’s it about? Right now I'm figuring that out, but it's a bit of a mish mash. I'll certainly be doing posts relating to iHCPL.
   
3. Do you participate in at least one social network? YES Which one? Facebook, LibraryThing
   
4. Have you ever uploaded a video online? YES What did you use to do it? YouTube
   
5. What’s your favorite search engine. Google Why? I've used it for years. I like that I can do a lot with it including image and news searches. I am very comfortable with it. I will use other search engines as needed.
   
6. Have you ever used an online classified service like craigslist? Yes, we've bought (Table Saw) and sold (riding mower) using Craigslist.
   
7. Besides making phone calls—how else do you use your mobile phone? I actually only use it to make phone calls.
   
8. Have you ever registered a domain name? Yes, I've registered several.
   
9. Do you use social bookmarks or tagging? Yes, I have a del.icio.us account.
   
10. Do you use a feed reader of some sort? Yes Which one? Bloglines Why? I like that it is online and can therefore use it anywhere. I email posts extensively from Bloglines to myself and other people. I was just trying out Bloglines Beta today and was happy to see they had added an email feature, although there are still several bugs to work out.

Booked by 3 Meme for September

Came across this and thought it was kind of cool, especially since I love LibraryThing.

I. Do you have a permanent record of your books?

1. Yes, I keep a manual listing or Excel file or something similar on paper or my computer.
2. Yes, I keep it online on a site like Library Thing or Shelfari.
3. No, who has the time?!

II. If you keep track of your books on a website, do you...

1. Have a free or paid account?
2. Use it to track books to be read as well as books owned, or do you use the site just for your To Be Read list or something else I can't think of? - I use it to keep track of books I have read, whether I own them or not.
   
3. Enter the data manually or did you get a barcode scanner so I can add books faster?

III. Miscellaneous questions.

1. If you use the online sites, do you just catalog your books or do you participate in forums, check other libraries, and otherwise network with other users?
2. If you don't use an online site, do you want to but don't have the time? N/A
   
3. If you use one of the sites, which one and what's your user name so the rest of us can check out your library? Hoosgracie @ LibraryThing - http://www.librarything.com/profile/hoosgracie
   

Link

Well, We're Off

After a great kick-off Friday & yesterday with Michelle Boule, iHCPL has finally begun. 170+ people have viewed the slide show on SlideShare, which is a good sign. Since I have been lazy and haven't actually done my blog posts, I will be following along with the program, even though I feel like I know most of it inside and out.

Which Sesame Street Character Are You?

I love these types of quizzes...

	You are Big Bird. You are something of an eccentric, and not everyone always gives you credit for your inventiveness and intelligence. You may not always know everything, but people turn to you for your sound, unique logic. Plus, you have a big heart. Really big.
Find Your Character @ BrainFall.com

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March of the Librarians Video

Came across this on Stephen's Lighthouse. I don't even want to think about Librarians mating at ALA Midwinter.

Words from Flickr - Ransom Style Writing

Link via Boing Boing

The Book Meme

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?
I would be Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte or The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. These are two of my favorite books. Probably Jane Eyre since it's a classic.

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
Yes. See the above two books. Mr. Rochester is dark and brooding. I especially got a kick out of Jasper Fforde's take on him in The Eyre Affair. When I was 13/14 years old, I also had a crush on Johnny and Soda Pop in The Outsiders.

What are you currently reading?
Greywalker by Kat Richardson & listening to The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

The last book you bought is:
Can't remember at the moment - mostly check books out from the library!

The last book you read:
Valley of Silence by Nora Roberts; Listened to Prince Caspian by C.S. Lewis

Five books you would take to a deserted island:
Tough one. For now, I'll say:
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by CS Lewis - One of the few books (series) I've read multiple times
The Bible (I'd finally have the time and reason to read the whole thing)
A book on survival cooking and first aid (practical)
The Outsiders by SE Hinton - What can I say, I still love the book, it reminds me of the 13/14 year old self.
Either the Complete Far Side or Complete Calvin and Hobbes - this would offer endless entertainment.

This reminds me of a traditional question for potential reference librarians - what books could you not live without in doing reference. For that, I'd say:
A local phone book
A dictionary
The World Almanac
A concise encyclopedia
Other than the encyclopedia (which we have available online) I still have copies of the other three available in my office.

Via LIS News