Been Awhile

Jeesh, I didn't realize how long it's been since I posted! I'm now in the process of creating a lesson plan for giving a Get Your Own Blog Class as we speak. I am also setting up one for my Sunday School class of 9-12th grade to work on perhaps as a group and post our church happenings. Been busy attending my daughter's crosscountry runs and son's soccer games. My oldest wrecked on a cycle and was injured badly, but is now back in college. He has to get some stitches out, chipped a tooth, broke a bone in his hand and he will have scars for awhile - but thank God - no ongoing problems that we know of. God is good.

Jodi Picoult

#23 Final Thoughts

Wow, the final swan song. I've learned a great deal, some of which I will definitely use again & again. Some will be perfect offered as computer classes to the public. I already have two lined up for upcoming classes. I think the public will love Flickr. There were a couple of frustrating problems, but a biggie was the slow or internet-down days and #22 gave me some hissy fits! Staying open to learning new things keeps us in the know.

#22 Downloadable Audiobooks

I looked around in OverDrive for audiobooks on Technology and was surprised how many there were offered. I also checked out Maryland's Digital eLibrary Consortium thru Enoch Pratt. I also downloaded the software from a link on the Enoch Pratt site, very easy, but I was not happy that they would not lend a e-book to Allegany Co. So I checked out Wash Co. library & they would not lend to Allegany Co! Something is wrong here - they are e-books for heavens sake! I also set up an account thru NetLibrary but couldn't figure out where to go. Apparently I was selecting audiobooks to buy!! Whoops! I would like to download audiobooks but it has to be easier than this.

#21 Podcasting

Podcasting is fun; I recorded one down at MLA with Jennifer and John Venditta. Wearing a headset makes you feel like a recording star - does anyone want to hear me sing? Ha, ha, not!! I have Audacity downloaded to my laptop and use it, and also use Itunes and WMP to listen to them. I created an account with Ourmedia in case I need to upload pods in the future.

#20 YouTube

I've always wanted to add a video to YouTube and wished I had my digital camera that takes movies when the kids were small. They did such funny, goofy things. I still have my old VHS camcorder that uses the small tapes, but I like using the digital and downloading my short movies to the computer. I've watched a lot of videos on YouTube, but some are of such poor quality, that they need deleted. I do like Weird Al's "White & Nerdy" and "Amish Paradise." He is a hoot! It was easy to embed the code in my post.

#19 Award Winners

I really want to check out these award winners in great detail later - especially the Social Networking sites especially. It's good to know what is out there. Personally, I kinda like Meebo. You don't even need to download anything from Hotmail to use it. This might be a great way to meet our teens halfway. They are IMing anyway when we are not looking!

Teen MySpace Debut!!!

Yay, our Teen MySpace page has debuted. We are hoping to meet teens on their on their own turf (that phrase probably dates me!) and provide a positive influence on MySpace as well. It will be a work in progress and my daughter, Sadie, has been a huge help with this project. I can't wait to see where this takes us!

www.myspace.com/the_teen_lair

#17 - Zoho

Wow, what a easy account to set up, create a document, like below, and publish to your blog. I'm impressed again. This is too easy. It found my blogs immediately. Definitely can use both of these programs.

#18 Zoho - too easy!

Creating a Zoho Writer account was extremely easy.  It certainly has a lot of buttons to customize your documents. Nice.

#17 Web Based Apps - Google Docs

The goofy, simple post below was created in September of '06 when I was thinking of offering Writely in my computer classes. Now that Google has taken Writely over, imagine my surprise that my doc was still in there. Apparently, since I was already signed into Google somewhere - my account popped right up. It was extremey easy to update my Blog settings and send my doc over. Cool beans! I haven't tried Zoho yet.

Hello, I am trying Writely out.

#17 PB Wikis

I think that there is a little bit more to wikis than what we did in the Sandbox, although it was fun. I believe there's more to the learning curve than say, creating a post in your blog. Knowing a bit about HTML would help. I did create a log-in and a new entry and then linked to my blog. I can see how things could get lost very easily, like the front page, if a new page wasn't created first.

Person of the Year - Nate the Great!

Wikis

Wiki, wiki, wiki, what a fun word to say! Wanna wiki? Back when I went to MLA, I checked the official MLA wiki site, which was neat. I could listen to my podcast - I was the first to do it after listening to Chris Anderson speak on "The Longtail" and check out other podcasts. I thought the wiki worked great for the conference.

I think the ability to edit and collectively work on a project is again, empowering to everyday people - and the project, article, etc. is policed by the online community. Where else can you find some of the latest info on stuff going on in the world - certainly not in a encyclopedia.

I really liked the Book Lovers Wiki thru (they even gave away prizes to patrons) Princeton Public Library. (maybe something like this for our MySpace teen page to link to) It uses the PBWiki platform.

Best conference bling

Best conference bling
Originally uploaded by hblowers

Great Bling, bling. What do you think?

(from the metropolitan group)

Great Cartoon

Eli & the Scouts at the GC Library

#15 Web 2.0, Library 2.0

Pay close attention to this clip on youtube because it is fast - "The Machine is Us/ing Us" - With Library 2.0, I believe it is a little easier for me to accept the coming changes within the library. I'm coming to my library career later in my life, after being a graphic artist for a magazine with a circ around the world and then being a stay-at-home mom for many years - so I'm not resistant to the changes in the air. Already loving technology for what it can do for me, our system needs to keep up. Our digital natives around us will be beyond us if we don't. Don't get me wrong, I love to read, read, read! But, we need to embrace and work with technology that can work for us.

I really enjoyed - Away from the “icebergs” by Rick Anderson. I agree; I'm glad we are already paddling.

From Michael Stephens: Librarian 2.0 also listens to staff and users when planning, tells the stories of successes and failures, learns from both, celebrates those successes, allows staff time to play and learn, and never stops dreaming about the best library services. Amen.

I also like what Dr. Wendy Schultz says: Libraries are not merely in communities, they are communities: they preserve and promote community memories; they provide mentors not only for the exploration of stored memory, but also for the creation of new artifacts of memory. I love our little G.C.library; it's like a community center for adults & kids. Library 4.0 made me snigger. He, he.

In a ripple effect - Self-checkout for books, kinda like WalMart, my daughter loves it. She doesn't hesitate to scan a huge order of food, clothes, and supplies. Again, self-empowerment. Ovid-Elsie Schools - they really got it going on. Wow! Talk about ahead of the pack.

Thank God, finally it worked

After several attempts, my mutterings increased, but I finally succeeded in tagging to Technorati. Apparently I had too many of these: < or these: > or somethings or others. Give me the high five, yeah baby!

#14 Technorati

Wow! Technorati, the holy mother of blogs everywhere! I think it's amazing that blogging #s are doubling every 6 months. Everyone wants to have their say. Remember the movie where the guy yells out the window, "I'm mad and I don't want to take it anymore!"

I watched the new screencast (Technorati Tour)showing the new updates to Technorati, and it covered alot, but it covered it way too fast! I feel like I'd have to watch it several times before some of it sunk in. There is so much to look at on Technorati that it is overwhelming!

I found 25,050 posts about Learning 2.0 from the main Search box. When I did a tag search I followed the tag to a blog called Happy Trails - from a CLSA middle school teacher on a learning 2.0 team. In the Blog Directory search, which I found from the Advanced search link, it only coughed up 494 blogs about Learning 2.o. Interesting. It's neat how there is a little pink box that gives the # of adoring fans that follow that blog. (it doesn't take much to tickle me) I did find Helene Blowers blog this way.

I like how I can keep track of my favorite blogs.

I'm wrestling to associate a post with a Technorati tag, so here I go:

mdlearn2">

I had already claimed by blog awhile back on Technorati and I don't remember it being too difficult. (Alas,of course, I can't remember yesterday, let alone 2 months ago.

I've also manually pinged (sounds naughty, doesn't it)my blog, but I want to set it up to do that automatically with Technorati. (I hope)

#13 Del.icio.us

Wow, this looks pretty handy. I've been checking some of the other libraries uses for Del.icio.us and found a couple site I can use. Yahoo Bookmarks look handy too

http://allconsuming.net seems like a good site too. I wish I had more time to explore these sites, but today has been a crazy one. Not too much time to work on 23 Things and really check out the links like I want to.

I love to tag! It's like putting my personal stamp on everything. (We have to leave our mark - ha, ha - like a cat!) No wonder it's so popular.

http://www.beelerspace.com/index.php?p=890 Us.ef.ul - A beginner's guide to The Next Big Thing - was funny and useful.

I have created an account in Del.icio.us and imported my favorites from my work PC. Very easy to do from the directions. Now, I'd like to follow through on my laptop. Good lord, I hope I never forget my username & passwords.

#12 Rollyo

I've created my account and have went into Searchrolls of Note. I did notice "Very Hardy Perennials" and "StarWars Everything"

More on My Library Thing

Oh, my Gosh! I finally figured out how to put that Library Thing Widget on my blog. I had been pasting the code in the wrong box. It, of course, goes in the HTML element box. (if that makes sense!) Now, as my old sweeties at the Nursing Home used to say - I'm cooking with gas!

My Library Thang!!!

I like this site! Even patrons who want to keep a list of books they have already read would love it, especially cover art is available. I like how you can rate each book and then share. I love the Suggester & UnSunggestor, what a HOOT! Having trouble using the widget to create a link to my Library Thang. Running out of patience with that bugger, will just link to my catalog.

http://www.librarything.com/catalog/Spibrarian

Avatar Fun

Wow, had a terrible time creating an avatar. The creation was fun, but the site kept going crazy - thought I'd never get finished. Finally, I added my avatar to my profile. Check out the crazy, bouncing dog.

#10 Playing with Online Image Generators

This was alot of fun - hope it works. I want to try out some of the other generators (I can waste alot of time here tho!)

Technorati

I just claimed my blog on Technorati - was surprisingly easy to do. It's amazing how some sites provide straight-forward easy to follow step-by-step instructions and others don't! I want to show my patrons who come to my computer classes on blogging next week - how to find my blog on Technorati.

#8 Finding Feeds

Today I've been exploring some of the search tools for feeds - like Feedster, Topix.net, Syndice.com, and Technorati. I had used Technorati before, but not the others. Bloglines now offers a search for feeds and I hadn't known that before reading it in 23 things. Good to know. It is very hard to stop at just a few feeds when there are so many interesting ones out there!!!

Here is a cute video I found while searching for posts and feeds on Shih-Tzus (because we have an adorable one) on the Blogline search:
http://video.sanriotown.com/engine/flaon/player?idcode=4330

My bloglines account has been set up set last year -
http://www.bloglines.com/blog/The-Spibrarian

Does anyone feel this way?

John Burroughs, "I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see."

23 Things #7 - Mash-ups

People are seizing far more control of what they do online. (Power to the people)

"The Web was originally designed to be mashed up," says Google Web developer Aaron Boodman, the 27-year-old creator of a program called Greasemonkey that makes it easy to create and use mash-ups. "The technology is finally growing up and making it possible."

see:
http://www.mashupfeed.com/

and: http://www.businessweek.com/@@76IH*ocQ34AvyQMA/magazine/content/05_30/b3944108_mz063.htm

calico cat

calico cat
Originally uploaded by 3_little_birds.

I wanted to download something funny from Flickr, as part of my 23 things, & I thought this was a hoot! I love calico kitties; my family had a calico named Peanut Butter for over 10 years. It was very easy setting up a Flickr account - (I did need to register through Yahoo), adding my blogs, and then blogging a photo. I need to try adding my digitals to Flickr now.

23 Things

I've just listened to a podcast on the 7 1/2 habits of Lifelong Learners and I'm mulling over which of the 7 1/2 is easiest and/or hardest for me. Teaching/mentoring is definitely the easiest habit to maintain for me; I teach computer classes for the library and teach Sunday School. The hardest is a toss-up between: viewing problems as challenges {I did better with this when I was younger & ready to take on the world!} and playing {my 11 year old tries to help me with this one.}

An Interview with Jan Karon

An interview with Jan Karon, author of the famous, homey Mitford series:

http://www.bookbrowse.com/author_interviews/full/index.cfm?author_number=370

Michelle Gorman & I at MLA in Ocean City, MD

Michelle Gorman is a visionary when it comes to teens. Find Michelle at : http://www.myspace.com/elijahboomadang or

http://www.comixlibrarian.com/

MLA

I've been in Ocean City since Tues, 5 hr. trip and am having a wonderful time. Librarians are the neatest people! Been to Teens & Technology with Michele Gorman. Loved it! This a woman very passionate about serving our teens. I have discovered new ways of reaching our youth and learned more about Virtual Worlds and the value of Gaming. Who knew that today's gamer could be tomorrow's laser surgeon! It is good to network with other librarians and step out of the box when it comes to new ideas. Also, visited with Dr. Agosto on Teens in the Library. Why do they come to the library? Information need, social/entertainment networking, and as a beneficial physical environment. Again, not only seen physical numbers in a survey by Dr. Agosto, but brainstormed with librarians across the state of MD for fresh ideas on young adults. All in all, my first MLA has been a very good learning environment.

MY DEBUT!

Here I am in small town, USA, working in a gorgeous library. Love it here; we have great patrons - young & once young - who love to read. I am really looking forward to the MLA Conference in OC. I have only been to OC once in 1993 for a short weekend. My husband & I went with some family members and young children and it was the first time I had heard the ocean roar! I had been warned how loud it would be - but to hear it for myself was amazing. It was my first experience of getting knocked down by a very large, salty wave. Thank goodness, I had taken my glasses off! Anyway, serious things to consider like - what to pack? Oh, by the way, the speakers sound pretty interesting too!