The techno-nots of Maura

I've been at home sick for the good part of the last week and half with some sort of nasty cold thing. I am feeling pretty tired most of the time with a linger cough. As I said to my boss today, I don't have my Mauraness, and quite frankly I miss my Mauraness.

So the time at home has allowed me to be productive on some parts: list things on ebay, clean my closest, sort through books, all things good for my impending move, as well as watch The Devil Wears Prada 3 million times and Pride and Prejudice 5 million times. I've been blazing through Scrabulous games with my cousin, and reading blogs. There was a recent series of posts on techno-nots, which got me thinking about my own techno-nots. I am pretty good at most things technology, but I also have my shortcomings.

• My ex boyfriend had about 5 remotes to work the TV, cable, DVD player, and some other things that controlled the sound for all these devices. I never figured them out after many years together. Remotes just baffle me. I once had a job at a cable company where I'd have to help people program their remotes over the phone. I would rather be yelled at for ten minutes than help someone program their remote.
  
• I often don't know why a computer has frozen or a program stopped working, so I just recommend a restart and 99% of the time that seems to do the trick. Like right now, my co-worker said the printer wasn't working. I suggested turning it off and then back on. 99% of the time, it works!
  
• I pretend to be all non interested in gaming, but really I would love a Nintendo Wii, and I had dreams about playing Guitar Hero after that one time at with some friends. Though, I am a bit scornful at other types of games, like World of Warcraft and Runescape.
• I had a lot of trouble when transferring oatmeal by noon to the new server. I had to enlist a friend to help me set up the new space, and it turns out I didn't import the right files to rebuild it. Whoops!
  
• I used to know a lot about networks, ftp, web stuff, html and css. I don't use this on a daily basis so most of it is lying dormant in my brain.
  
• I've been told a million times how to restart the print server, but I just can't figure it out on my own.
  
• I'm not very good at securing home networks or even for that matter my personal computer. It is so bad, but I think because I have a Mac, I am somehow immune to viruses and other yucky things.
  
• I just started backing up 4 months ago.
  

BAM Feb 2008: The Surgeons

Due to a feverish cold last week, I was able to finish my February Selection for the BAM Challenge. I had selected a nonfiction piece, as last month's read was very romantical. In keeping with the theme of hearts, I went for the literal interpretation and selected a book about heart surgeons. I read The Surgeons: Life and Death in a Top Heart Center by Charles R. Morris.

The first half of the book was engaging and interesting. Morris was able to gain behind the scenes access to one of the top heart centers and hospitals in the US. Soon he blended into the wallpaper, and was able to present two in depth case studies of patients at Columbia-Presbyterian, an older gentleman and a young girl who ultimately died. Morris also focused on the lives of the heart surgeons which gave insight into the lives of these extraordinary problem solvers. Morris probed to learn what it takes to be a heart surgeon, including skill development, training and education, character, problem solving skills and salary. He gave us primary information by posting the notes of one surgeons diary, detailing his surgeries and challenges.

The second half of the book was very dry and not as engaging. Morris discussed quite a bit about policy, money and the future of health care: the business side of heart surgery and health care. I found this to be all rather boring, and not as personal as the work of saving lives. I am drawn to the stories about the surgeons and the difficult choices that need to be made, like the explanation of the transplant process and decision making tree. His prose was accessible, with the mechanics of surgery and the heart easily explained, including a helpful appendix. However, when discussing salaries and comparing them to what other New Yorkers make and the different kinds of work they do, was quite compelling and Morris made the argument that based on the kind of work heart surgeons do and the outcomes, they are underpaid.

I might pursue another book for the second half of the month... perhaps something a bit more romantical....

BAM Jan 08: Time Traveler's Wife

I have been wanting to read this book forever, and now I can return it to the person I borrowed it from (in 2004!).

Time travel is an interesting concept, one that always grabs my attention as it requires a keen eye on physics, space and time, and cool things like wormholes, quantum mechanics. Just sounds complicated. Henry has the ability to travel in time, and meets his wife when she is quite young. I found myself to be incredibly jealous of Henry and his ability to time travel, especially to see his parents before he was born. Such a great treasure to see parents before they became parents. I was terribly weepy at the end of the book as Henry was dying and in the letter he wrote to Clare. Though, I found the whole Clare and Henry dynamic a bit tiring, and would have liked some conflict between them. Their love story just seemed to good to be true, too amazing and wonderful.

And I suppose that is the point as well, Henry does time travel and one can't really do that. I appreciated the way Niffenegger let us know who was narrating, and the way she would paint a scene over many years and through the experiences of many people. I wouldn't say that I loved the book, but I am glad that I read it. From a science standout, I appreciated that Henry wasn't allowed to impact the future and change the outcome of things. How sad to carry that burden with him, but allowed the story to have a cohesive narrative as well as be a bit more believable. Though in the beginning I found the narrative a bit hard to follow. I was confused for about the first 50 pages, but was drawn to the characters. Perhaps an index to all the dates would have been helpful.

Overall, I enjoyed the escapism into a fantastic love story, sad and beautiful.

I heart Library 2.0 Tee Shirt: One Size Fits All

One size fits all clothing bothers me. It might fit, but its not always going to look pretty.

Recent activity in the biblio-blogsphere has been discussing the cultural context of Library 2.0, and I have found these discussions to be quite helpful when considering the needs of one of the populations I interact with. As an anthropology undergrad, I appreciate the acknowledgment that we should be aware of the community that uses a particular web 2.0 tool and why. What are they doing there, what are the social norms and accepted behaviors, and what do the users look like, what is the benefit of belonging to this website or social network. In other words, before slapping a MySpace logo onto your library's homepage, take your time to do the fieldwork and learn about that particular information climate.

As one of the tech savvy people at my library, I have a leg up on the emerging technologies. Through our own Learning 2.0 program, I think more of our staff members are up on what exactly tagging is or how a social network works. The program definitely generated interest around creating podcasts of our programs and other tools to use internally. Though as they discovered various tools and applications, I maintained a steady reminder that Library 2.0 is about what our users want, and the ways we learn about what they want is by asking them. But as Kate Sheehan described the "slap a wiki on it and call me in the morning" mentality isn't going to automatically create an outstanding nor innovative service for our patrons unless we fully understand what their needs are, then understand the tools to meet those needs. It is going to look hurried and sloppy, with seams coming undone. Tim Gunn would not approve.

So, through this program I’ve turned on my Library 2.0 thinking cap, and in a way started to understand the culture and users of my library, at least the ones that I interact with on a daily basis. I teach Basic Computer and Basic Internet classes, and find myself developing strategies for double clicking and multi-class series, programming about applying for jobs online, and how to set up an email address. It is the most basic level of technology, something most librarians mastered years ago. And on the surface, developing programming around these skills is not sexy and not hip. Yet, the on-the-job reality is that many of our users have not had the opportunities to develop technology skills and they turn to us to help them when they are in need. Our mission is to address the informational needs to the community, and if I can call reference librarianship fieldwork, overwhelming I would categorically describe those needs as basic computer literacy skills. And perhaps what I am doing isn’t innovative and ground breaking, it is personal and local, it is serving the real needs of a community. It will be a customized piece of programming for a specific community, tailored and beautiful.

requiem for an ipod

The first signs of an imminent death appeared as we sped along the BQE towards Brooklyn. I was with a friend, and her English friend who just had a jelly doughnut from Dunkin' Donuts for the first time. EVER. We were having a sing along to Mika, when the ipod stopped working. After a few attempts to restart it and hold it in positions only a yogi could master, we turned to hot 97 for the duration of the trip. Upon arriving at my friend's apartment, I immediately consulted the Apple Support pages. Repeatedly pressing the menu and select buttons to restore, as if I was on Grey's and trying frantically to get a heart beating again. Oh, she just kept redlining, with the sad ipod face.

The next morning, I attempted to squeeze a bit of life out of her. While navigating my way back to Connecticut, I willed her to work. "Please, some Journey or even the Bangles! How about a This American Life podcast!! JUST PLAY SOMETHING!!!" On my lunch break, I went to the Genius Bar and asked him to call it. He looked at my quizzically, and I handed over my ipod. "Just call it," I said, defeated. He took one look at it and smiled sympathetically at me. He tried a few things, and handed it back saying "It's gone". I looked down at my ipod, the first to have the click wheel and sighed. I walked back to the library, with my new paperweight nestled in my pocket.

Oh, my dear sweet sweet ipod. We certainly had some good times together. You arrived all shiny and new from China in the Fall of 2004 just as I was starting library school. We went everywhere together, and you were a most perfect and agreeable companion. Always there with the perfect song whenever I needed it most. These were the days of the early majority, and we'd have ipod parties. "Have you listened to Thrice? Oh man, you'll love them!" and "These Darkness B-sides are killer!"

You'd accompany me on road trips to Maine, and those long drives to Boston for Business Reference. You were there when Llama and drove cross country, when the first song we listened to every morning was Siouxie And The Banshees' "Hong Kong Garden". You were there through the relationship woes, as I sat on the rocks at the beach, melancholy listening to "When Doves Cry" and The Cure. After an early spring trip to Europe, I added Joni Mitchell, Amy Winehouse and Arcade Fire and rediscovered that part of me absolutely loved music, and discovering new music. This was a part of me I neglected for so long! You provided all the embarrassing hip hop music I love to listen to while working out, with more than 130 beats per minute, helping me through that final mile, and letting me walk it off the hour run to Queens "We are the Champions."

Ahh, yes, true sweet first ipod. You have been a great friend and companion, and have been with me through good times and bad times. It is with great sadness that I say goodbye. My life has been revolutionized by having the perfect personalized soundtrack with me at all times. Now when I strut down the street, I can strut to KT Tunstall's "Suddenly I See" a la The Devil Wears Prada or Tori Amos' "Siren". And thanks to iTunes and the crazy 80s mixes I was obsessed with making in college, I have all the one hit wonders I could ever want. The perfect song to jump start a party (Baby Got Back anyone?), or listen to in the subdued lighting while drinking a glass of wine (how about a little Belle and Sebastian?).

Dear sweet third generation ipod, you will be missed. I am sorry I took you running so many times, as I think that was the cause of your life sustaining injuries. Oh why did you have a hard drive?! Why wasn't there the foresight for flash memory!!!?? Though, as you are resting in ipod heaven, I think you'd be happy to know that I have two ipods now. I bought a bright hot pink shuffle for running, something to wear on my person. She is great at providing the hip hop and rock jams when I am running, and podcasts while on the train to New York. So tiny and just enough of space. And just this past week, I welcomed the ipod touch into my home. She is sleek and oh so sexy, with an elegant touch screen, room for photographs, and best of all a wifi browser. I know that my ipods and I will be very happy, and I will always remember you, my first.

Space for everyone at the library!

Confession: I am a jealous person.

Over the weekend, the object of my jealousy was the Muhlenberg Branch of NYPL in my favorite neighborhood, Chelsea where my pal Jenny works.

Ahh.. Chelsea, home of Pinkberry, Big Booty Cafe and the worst experience I have ever had at a New York restaurant. That's right Mister Mexican restaurant, just because I am white doesn't mean I didn't understand the nasty things you said about me when I asked for a FORK!!!

But right, my insane jealousy. A teen space. A teen space. I work at a medium sized urban library, at the downtown branch where we have no real teen space, and I would argue till the cows came home that this is a space we need. Teens have different needs, different habits, activities, and teens today are certainly different from when I was a teen. I recall going to my hometown library, and slowing outgrowing the Babysitters Club and Sweet Valley High series. I loved that the YA section was upstairs in the gorgeous adult section of the library. I felt so special and grownup, selecting books to read among the adult books! To me, setting aside precious square footage for a population says, "hey, we are about you and your needs!"

Also: Jenny is at MW ALA as she is an Emerging Leader in ALA! Woo!!

Just doing my part to be a part of the percentage of people who Google themselves on a regular basis.

Confession: I Google myself (and other people I know) on a fairly regular basis.

I Google new people I meet, colleagues, friends, and yes even ex-boyfriends. I Google myself so I know what others would see if they Google me, and in an interest of privacy as well. What kind of information is available about me? The other night, I had a great conversation about the process of Googling yourself and the role of information combed from the internet used in interviews. A friend of mine recently obtained a position at a financial institution. During one of her many interviews, it was brought up that the interviewer had viewed her blog. My friend was taken aback at the forwardness of this question, and inquired as to what her impressions were. One of our companions chimed in that he just interviewed an amazing woman for a position at his firm, and was considering looking her up on social networking sites as well. I inquired as to what he would do with that information, say if she displayed photographs of her in a social setting with alcoholic beverages. The woman is of age, and does it matter to an employer what an employee partakes in between business hours? The conversation quickly moved to the idea of managing one's internet profile, through various sites. The lines between professional and personal are blurring, as I network with librarians on Facebook. Once a space exclusively for friends, it is now in someways an online resume with details of who I know, jobs I have had, educational background, as well as a tool to communicate with family scattered around. There is also the element of what content is missing from the profile, and in today's world among savvy internet users could arguably speak volumes.

Carl Sagan said, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" (and which a Google search reveals that Rumsfeld co-opted this in regards to Iraq's WMD.) As a student of anthropology and astronomy, I would often mull this over in my head. So how much can we know about someone through a Google search? Part of what I like about having a web presense is that it can give a personal aspect to oneself, outside of professional duties, experiences and accomplishments. Part of who I am outside the reference desk. But, I am increasingly becoming aware of the need to mediate that and establish a bit of authority control on what is out there. Registering a domain, having a central location for writing and blogging, about libraries, about running, about my hobbies and interests and professional activities which bleed into each other.

And so, another year wraps up

I love end of the year goodness. Like top ten lists, summarizing the year into small moments and events, and all sorts of cheeriness. And I like looking forward, to the new year, to making lists and having new goals.

I attended a WebJunction webinar today, The Personal Learning Experience for Library Staff and other Busy Professionals. (Archive should be up soon.) It was a great little reminder on organizing myself and having a learning program. Which I feel like I have through twitter, bloglines, facebook and all the assorted other tools in my life. I think I am a bit of a absentminded creative type, ideas bursting at the seams but sometimes lacking in the follow through. I will open a tab to go to site XYZ and by the time I enter in the url I can not recall where I wanted to go. I follow blogs and read about things that I want to learn and do, and sometimes they get lost in the shuffle. And I want to write more, professionally and personally. So in short, I decided to start my 2008 resolutions a month early?

Why you ask?
Well, because I believe that resolutions are about changing patterns and behaviors, two things that don't happen overnight or in a 7.5 hour workday. Behaviors and patterns that are a result of life experiences. I also believe in success and the ability to overcome obstacles, so by starting a month early, I will have some groundwork for my resolutions to stick, thereby not setting myself up for failure. I will also be more measurable in my goals, to ensure there are outcomes and products. So one of these is to write more, blog more. About library stuff, about nonlibrary stuff. I'll leave the fabulous blog entries about library philosophy and service to the folks who do that best, and figure out what works best for me. I know that I want to write about my family and mental illness. I want to write about my experiences in retail therapy. I want to write about the little moments of library joy.

Oh, and I totally want one of these.

Playing Librarian

In the past 8 weeks, I have spent many hours reading through the blogs of my colleagues involved in Learning 2.0. The other week, one of our Things was LibraryThing. One of the participants blog entries about LibraryThing struck a childhood memory of playing library. I would organize my Baby-sitter's Club and Sweet Valley High books in numbered order and the rest in some order that made sense. Alphabetical by title, organized into height groups, colors. I would make little catalog records and due date cards for the title verso. It was quite the operation with a notebook detailing who borrowed what book and when it was due.

LibraryThing allowed me to organize my personal library, with the bonus of adding tags, emotional keywords. I found 15 other people who also have this book in their library. Play is the locus of Learning 2.0, encouraging staff to experiment, explore, discover the new web tools. It has been a challenge to shift the focus to play and explore, away from protocol and procedure. Play is fun, creative and one of the great benefits of play is the development of ideas, solutions; it fosters an informal setting and changes our way of thinking.

So, in thinking about play and libraries, I wonder what 'playing librarian' would look like today. Our catalogs are digital. Instead of stamping the inside of the cover, we print a receipt with the due dates. In retrospect, librarianship was probably always in my cards and as I developed intellectually my interests were aligned with the missions and goals of libraries. When asked what I might be doing if I wasn't in libraries, I am hard pressed to answer. Perhaps something in museums or art, developing training modules and staff development, teaching or tucked away in the ivory tower for the love of anthropology, of perhaps something IT related; work that complimentary to the work of libraries.

Kate mused about the word library in Bloglines, iTunes, and for every bibliophile on your holiday list, the personal library kit. Understanding what a ten year old playing library means in 2007 requires a different historical context. A child born in 1997 entered into a world when the internet was reaching toddler years. At the end of 1999, parents would be concerned about Y2K and backing up data. The child is probably playing educational video games and has mastered the mouse before kindergarten. At age ten in 2007, we would have a fifth grader on our hands, perhaps with a computer at home, maybe even one in their room. Maybe our ten year old would have a portable gaming system or mp3 player, familiar with accessing digital content online. There might not be a concern for authenticity or authorship, but rather an immediate need. Instead of the home encyclopedia collection, Google would serve as a research tool directing most search queries to Wikipedia. (Perhaps the parents are savvy and aware of iConn!) So, playing library... would the child who loves books and/or technology seek this out? Perhaps the playing would be orientated around the customer experience, like playing store , and focusing on the customer service exchange rather than the objects. Sample scenarios could be looking for the latest magna title or assistance in looking for Grand Theft Auto cheat codes.

And to take an incredibly sappy and nostalgic turn, I hope that play isn't something of the 20th centruy. And by play I mean using ones imagination and assorted objects to create a reality, outside of technology. I adore The Dangerous Book for Boys and now The Daring Book for Girls. It is a way of acting out experiences, practicing behaviors and responses, taking on a new personality and building interpersonal skills. Playing is learning.

Population

Census data. Yum. Excel spreadsheets, the most one can have before noon.

Information request was for the Caribbean or Haitian population of Fairfield, CT. One of my favorite information sources that is census.gov, and I was particularly excited to use it this morning to look for data. This post is more of a post-it reminder to myself on accessing the resources. (Or if my patron calls back.) I stumbled a bit on where to go and ran a few different searches until I found an accurate match.

Using American Fact Finder, I can create a custom search that yielded me the specific data, with the ability to narrow down to specific ethnic groups and areas within a city. I used the QuickTables to access information about ancestry, and click-click-show! Population data downloadable to a spreadsheet!

A glorious way to start the week!

I'm on my air cell phone

A little known fact about Maura: I like to air guitar. I like to air sitar. I like to play air stringed instruments. Always have, and hopefully always will. Air guitar is a part of who I am.

We have hosted a few Dance Dance Revolution Programs at the library, and I have looked on with envy as teenagers bopped around, their feet reaching for the right pads. I would be awkward and self-conscious without proper liquid libations. Libraries are picking up Guitar Hero as well and I hope having air guitar programs, with teenagers shredding like they are at Madison Square in '82. (However, most of them probably weren't born in '82...)

I recently attended an air guitar event and it was nothing short of amazing. May I suggest a few titles for your collection?

I recommend Air Guitar Nation, a witty documentary about one man's path to airness. The same man also published a hilarious memoir, a quick satisfying read with diagrams to develop technique.

sticks to stacks.

I am from Massachusetts. I say wicked, love the Red Sox, fall is my favorite season, and I've been told I am a bad driver.

I've worked in libraries in Western Mass, at the tony library of Mount Holyoke and the quaint library of Northampton. I have always been dazzled and in love with cities, from the grittiness to the glamour, and all the little communities in between. My younger sister came down to spend a bit of time in the city with me. Our adventure started in Port Authority and quickly went to the Upper West Side, down to Brooklyn, up to Harlem, back down to Chelsea, SoHo via Chinatown, and then back to Port Authority. We even had Pinkberry.

I was catching up on my blogs this morning, and the always fabulous Jenny posted a shout out to us western mass girls. I laughed out loud, as the reference was timely. Yesterday, I watched my sister's face turn to sheer horror over the screeching subway, her nose crawl into a little acorn at the olfactory subway experience, and her wide eyes as a woman got into a shouting match with a perfect stranger in the subway for being "too old to be so rude". I got a kick out of watching her facial expressions and her face taking in the sites, sounds and smells of the city. We got to see Jenny today and meet her coworkers! (One of which told me she reads my blog, which made me realize maybe I should be more regular about updating this business...) And kudos to Jenny and her coworkers for their fantastic costumes!

From there, Maggie and I strolled down to Chinatown, so she could pick up an I Heart NY tee shirt. I haven't been down there in years, and since then the faux handbag market has grown. The marketing/harassment seems so much more intense. Small women would stand at the street corners, with small pieces of paper showing handbags whispering, fendi gucci coach chanel handbags miss. SO AGGRESSIVE. And this kept happening over and over again for a few blocks. And one woman practically had me cornered after I said no to her twice. I mused to my sister about being that aggressive for promoting new books. I would follow commuters whispering our latest new books and dvds, james patterson the new alice sebold steven colbert, handing out little informational flyers, enticing them to come back to our information lair to look at our books. I digress, I am much too literal. I need to work on this. (And because old habits die hard, I spent some time discussing the knock off industry and legislation surrounding counter fitting. Really, I just needed to lecture about something...)

Outsourcing: Yay or Nay.

Picture this scene:

Just past 3pm, on a warm Indian summer September our heroine, sits at a red light, with NPR quietly playing in the background. Her mobile ear piece is attached to her right here, her planner open on her lap. She punches through her contacts list and makes a call.

A woman with a slight accent answers, "Dr. Doctor's answering service. How can I help you?" Our heroine inwardly groans, her second attempt to make an appointment is thwarted yet again by the answering service. The lady advises our girl the office will not be open again until Monday and she politely responds that she would like to receive a call back when the office is open. The customer service representative seems slightly annoyed, going over the hours again, expressing she will have to wait until Monday. Our heroine acknowledges this, thinking that the callback will serve as a reminder to make the appointment even if she misses the call, and if she has waited this long to make the appointment, how long will she have to wait to see the Doctor. Sheesh, she thinks.

Our heroine ends the call after giving her name and phone number, and closes her address book. She decides not to call Dr. Her Other Doctor , as this was just exhausting. She arrives home and lists a few things on ebay and craigslist, thereby crossing a few things off on her to-do list. After those tasks are completed, she lounges in bed nursing a small bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream and watching Izzie perform surgery with a hand drill while McDreamy searches for Meredith. There is no time for the nap she was hoping to take before returning to work.

The to-do list is filled with simple tasks that sometimes take much longer to complete than they should. Scheduling appointments, inquiring about rates, checking the weather, listing items for sale, answering emails, finding recipes. All this sort of busy work that gets in the way of daily life. Gosh, wouldn't it be great to hire someone for five hours a week to take care of these tasks for me, freeing up my time to focus on work or leisure. I found myself thinking of the The 4-Hour Workweek (which I have placed on hold at my library), and how we can hire personal assistants to take care of tasks in our lives.

Lifehacker posted about the case for personal outsourcing, and invited users to comment about the practice of outsourcing tasks in their lives. While clicking through and wondering how I might locate a personal assistant company, I came across GetFriday, a firm in Banglore India that I can hire for as little as $120 a month for 12 hours. There are pay-as-you-go plans as well as a task based plan. What do they do you may be wondering:

• Online research for updating blogs
• Reading bedtime stories to a young child on phone
• Get an authenticated weather forecast and weather report for a particular time in a particular place on a particular day, five years ago. This was to be used as supportive evidence for a law suit
• Posting job vacancies on the web
• Educational research for 8-year-old (on behalf of his father)

Wow. Sounds like they do it all and more. Sounds like they could potentially be doing the work of librarians. So much of what we do is the personal touch, the face to face interaction, reading the body and face for clues, asking questions. Libraries are democratic institutions open to the people. I have researched stock prices from years ago, helped children research touch screen technologies, looked up phone numbers and provided directions at no cost to my patrons. Oh, and there are days when I feel like a patron's assistant. I often think about the value add in library services and the cost of the services we provide. I like this estimated cost calculator from Central Massachusetts Regional Library System. I can enter in my use of library services for a month and see what the value of services is. Perhaps we could end every reference with a friendly reminder of how much we are saving our patrons, "Alright, so here is the most recent review of desktop computers from Consumer Reports printed from a database, and your savings is $10.50." Because really, we are not giving our customers something for nothing.

I was having a similar discussion this morning with a friend, regarding fee 411 services. Google offers a free 411 service, as well as Free 411. I haven't tried Google's yet, but Free 411 has a 30 second or so advertisement before your information is provided. 411 costs $1.49, plus airtime with Verizon Wireless. Outsourcing, free vs. fee all come down to a matter of "how much is my time worth?" which is a very personal question that has many different answers. I also feel somewhat suspect that when you add a cost to a service, the value is almost automatic. I paid for this so I must be getting value out of it. Would library services and reference work be more valued if there was an invoice attached to each interaction? Are library services taken for granted because they are "free"?

Oh, and our heroine? Her doctor's office called back the next day for an appointment, at the end of October. And she participates in some outsourcing, on a local level. She still makes her own appointments and does her own research.

Manolo loves us!!

One of my favorite blog is Manolo's Shoe Blog which is related to all things shoe. Manolo writes for a column for the Express of the Washington Post, and recently ran one from a librarian!
Manolo gives props to the librarians,

Now, the librarians compete with each other to be the hippest young “information specialist” in the main branch, the one with the dreadlocks, the radical politics, and the uncanny ability to access arcane databases on remote servers in Tajikistan.

Truly, this is the noblest of professions!

AHH!! Manolo loves us!!

And in a nutshell...

Excuse the f-bomb in the cartoon, but this sums up my attitude on life. Having adventures, seizing the moment, doing the unexpected, taking risks and chances.























image from: xkcd.com