I figured out how to edit the Learn & Play Wiki. It took me a minute because I couldn’t find all the blogs links to add mine to. I finally realized I had to scroll down (duh!). Then I was able to easily add my blog url, but I couldn’t figure out how to make it show the title of my blog as opposed to the url. I know how to do it now, but it took me awhile. I also added to the Favorite Album section. Woohoo!
Wikis September 29, 2008
Wikis can be useful to libraries in many ways. For one thing, wikis can be a good reference tool. I know a lot of people are opposed to using Wikipedia, but I find it to be helpful if I need a very brief introduction to a particular topic. I wouldn’t recommend it as a reference, but I do use it myself. I like the idea of a shared “knowledge bank.” Everyone has an area of expertise, so why not put it to good use and spread the knowledge. For folks who complain about the lack of oversight on Wikipedia, there’s always Citizendium- very similar to Wikipedia, but according to their About Us, “…a responsibly governed global community where real-named contributors work under expert guidance and all are accountable.” For a class I took in grad school, we had to post or edit something in a wiki. Here is my contribution on LISWiki. I think I added “customer service desk,” “placing holds and reserves,” and “issuing a new library card.” I think CML might benefit from doing a staff wiki. It could replace a lot of stuff on CMLsi and would be searchable (how I wish CMLsi was searchable). I think a lot of staff members would participate. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was already in the works. Anyone know of this potentially happening?
Librarian stereotypes September 28, 2008
I often think about librarian stereotypes. Everyone knows what I’m talking about- quiet, bookish old woman wearing a sweater and a bun in her hair, lowering her glasses to shush everyone from behind her big desk. Obviously librarians haven’t been like that for decades (or were they ever like that? Sometimes we accept stereotypes as true because we don’t know any different). But lately there’s been a different kind of librarian stereotype- the librarian, still bookish and glasses-wearing, but with a “naughty” side: the Sexy Librarian. Where did this come from? I’ve especially been hearing this term being used recently to describe Sarah Palin, whose sexiness is questionable and who is has never been a librarian. I suppose the sexy librarian stereotype is slightly more flattering the old librarian stereotype, if I had to choose. The whole notion of the sexy/naughty librarian probably came from the fact that we are sometimes bookish, but we do like to have fun. At the gang awareness training I recently attended, the officer talked about how he used to be a page at the library and he couldn’t believe how much the librarians “liked to party.” Don’t be fooled by the image, he said, librarians are fun people.
One of my favorite bands, My Morning Jacket, has a beautiful song on their new album called Librarian. It is basically about hidden beauty and it’s a love poem to a librarian the narrator sees. Some of the lyrics play on the bookish woman who lets her hair down (“simple little bookworm, buried underneath/
is the sexiest librarian, take off those glasses and let down your hair for me”) but not in a disrespectful or distasteful way. It is about seeing someone for who they are, not necessarily for what they try to present. When I saw that there was a song called Librarian on the album, I knew I would love it before I heard it. I would still love it if it wasn’t about a librarian (although that helps!)- substitute anything for a librarian and it’s still a beautiful song.
“Librarian”
Walk across the courtyard, towards the library.
I can hear the insects buzz and the leaves ‘neath my feet…
Ramble up the stairwell, into the hall of books…
Since we got the interweb these hardly get used.
Duck into the men’s room… combing thru my hair…
When god gave us mirrors he had no idea…
Looking for a lesson in the periodicals…
There I spy you listening to the AM radio…
Karen of the carpenters- singing in the rain…
Another lovely victim of the mirror’s evil way.
It’s not like you’re not trying, with a pencil in your har
To defy the beauty the good lord put in there…
Simple little bookworm- buried underneath…
Is the sexiest librarian… take off those glasses and let down your hair for me.
So I watch you thru the bookcase- imaging a scene:
You and I at dinner, spending time, then to sleep.
And what then would I say to you- lying there in bed?
These words, with a kiss, I would plant in your head:
“what is it inside our heads that makes us do the opposite?
Makes us do the opposite of what’s right for us?
Cause everything’d be grrreat… and everything’d be good…
If everybody gave… like everybody could.”
Sweetest little bookworm. hidden underneath…
Is the sexiest librarian…
Take off those glasses and let your hair down for me.
Take off those glasses and let your hair down for me.
Simple little beauty- heaven in your breath.
The simplest of pleasures- the world at it’s best.
Mmmm…delicious September 25, 2008
Yay- it worked! I started a del.icio.us account at home and imported all my bookmarks to it. I just checked it and here it is! I don’t know why I’m so excited about it. I knew it would work- it’s just so cool to see everything I have bookmarked when I’m not at home! (Although it reminded me that I needed to clean up my bookmarks- I still have a lot of school-related bookmarks, and I can get rid of those now.) I’ve heard about delicious for a couple years now, but never thought much about it. This seems to be a theme here with Learn & Play- I’ve heard of something and I know what it is, but I’ve never used it. But this is something I will continue to use. I hardly ever use a computer other than my own for personal use, but occassionally I’ll be at a friend’s house or at work and want to check something or show someone something. Now all I have to do is go to my delicious account, and there it will be!
One thing I need to do with my del.ici.ous account is create tags. I think I just used ones that other users created, which is fine, but I also want to create my own. This will make things easier when I want to quickly find something. I have several pages of bookmarks, so searching by tags will be a very useful feature.
Library-related blogs September 25, 2008
I’ve been a longtime fan of librarian.net ever since a friend of mine told me about it. He was a friend of Jessamyn’s- this was when the blog was still fairly new. It’s weird to think that something I’ve been reading for so long written by someone I feel like I know has grown in popularity so much. I guess it just goes to show how far a blog can come. You think you’re just writing something that you and a few friends will see and next thing you know it’s one of the most popular blogs on the subject. Some other library-related blogs I like are Free Range Librarian, written by Karen Schnieder who also is a frequent poster to the publib listserv, and Annoyed Librarian, who I know nothing about except that she is hilarious. All these blogs have RSS feed, which is nice.
Two library-related website that I visit from time to time are ALA’s and OPLIN. I used to hate visiting ALA’s site because it was such an eye-sore and very poorly organized. It was really kind of embarassing that that site represented the American Library Association, THE library organization in the country. It is much improved, although I do still have one gripe: no RSS feeds. OPLIN’s site, on the other hand, does have RSS feeds and I probably read it more frequently simply because it is more relevant to local library issues.
Bloglines September 25, 2008
So I just realized the other day that when we track our progress, we are supposed to put in the url for our blog post, not the url for the actual thing. Like I was putting the url to my Bloglines account, for example. There are some things I never made a blog post for. So I’m doing it now. I did create a Bloglines account and I do like Bloglines, but I never use it. I created an account several months ago and I have it bookmarked on my computer at home, but I never look at it. I think I just have to many blogs on there, so everytime I look at it, there are hundreds of posts to be read. Even if I looked at it everyday, there would still be too many posts to read. So while I appreciate Bloglines and I think it’s a great idea, it doesn’t work for me. Although I guess in theory I could just narrow it down to the blogs I want to read the most. That way it won’t be so overwhelming.
Storm September 15, 2008
Yesterday’s storm was crazy. The last hour of work was a nightmare. First EnvisionWare stopped working, which meant no one could make a reservation or log into a compuer if they already had a reservation. Then the power went off at least three times, which meant rebooting computers and self check-outs, only to have the power go off again. And you know what that means- checking books out the old school way. Luckily our customers were good sports about the whole thing. Driving home was scary- my litle car would’ve just gone with the wind if I would’ve let it. There were many fallen trees and even things in the road that had blown out of people’s trucks; the scariest thing was probably a mattress in the middle of 670 that I had to swerve to avoid hitting. I got home to discover that our power was out and that a giant limb had broken off the tree in the backyard (it’s actually our neighbor’s tree, but 75% of the tree is on our property). Luckily we got our power back in less than two hours. (It’s funny how different things are when you don’t have power. Several times I wanted to get online and check weather reports, etc. only to remember that I couldn’t. I’ve become so dependent on my computer.) I understand many people are still without power and schools and area businesses are closed. CML is closed until noon, so I’m assuming I’m still due to come in at 5. I hope that everyone is ok. I haven’t heard any bad news yet- the worst being that people may be without power for days.
Edited to add: Gahanna is closed today, so I guess I will not be going to work.
TMI September 12, 2008
At this point, my biggest struggle is trying to remember user names and passwords. I usually use the same one or two passwords, but I’m changing my user name for L&P. I kind of like to keep my work life seperate from everything else, so I’m trying to keep all this L&P stuff seperate too. So I now have two Flickr accounts, two blogs, two Bloglines account, and I’ll probably soon have another Twitter (what can I say, it’s growing on me). So much to keep track of!
Image generators September 12, 2008
Here are two of the images I created using imagegenerator.org. Some of them are too big to fit on the page and I’m not sure how to play with the size.
This is my favorite. I’m a huge fan of Abe Simpson.
(more…)
Catching up… September 12, 2008
I haven’t written in here in like two weeks! This week I joined Twitter (finally!). I think it’s a neat little thing, although I don’t know that I’ll keep using it. Do people really need to know what I’m doing all the time? Although I guess if you can link it to your blog, that might be a quick way to update when you don’t have a lot of time. Wait, can you link it to your blog? This week I also finally signed up for LibraryThing. I’ve used LibraryThing in the past and even referred customers to it, but I’ve never actually cataloged my books. I have a few on there now and only time will tell if I keep it up. If I end up getting that laptop, I’m definitely going to catalog all my books. I’m also looking into easy ways to catalog my music, although I’m not so sure there is an easy way to do that.
