Frustration! Success!

So, here I am at thing 21, and I’m trying to do the exercises in order. But, of course, I can’t exactly keep in order, just in the same way I can’t exactly follow a recipe. So, I explore things that interest me, and find a great little clip of a ewe giving birth to her second lamb. Since that’s all I think about these days, I try to add it to my blog. Wrong blog. Lost the blog. I can do it again later. Go to the clips about libraries. Find a GREAT one, I think, about cookie monster in the library - one I don’t remember. (We used to be faithful watchers of the Muppet Show.) It keeps hanging up in the middle. I WANT TO SEE THE END.

Let’s see what happens here. That doesn’t look right

I can’t believe it worked. I chose this to share because It’s very much what happens in my barn. Only difference - my sheep are sheared. I hope I can be sharing some pictures from my barn soon. As a visitor said recently - she looks like a double-wide.

Here’s a weird thing - I have the sound from that video clip coming while I’m typing this blentry- or is it blontry- or maybe it should be blogentry. No that’s not right. Got to go down and check on the girls.

Nothing yet.

Looking at all these videos. I would love to make a little video of what happened at the library last week. It was spring vacation and we had a three workshop program of signs of spring. ONE We listened for bird songs and made nests. TWO We found bugs in the stream. THREE We went out to draw from nature. Can I do something from a bunch of stills?

And, thank you, Brattleboro Reformer, for that great photo essay. Well, I tried to connect to it, but it’s not anywhere to be found. The Reformer did a full-page spread of our DRAWING FROM NATURE workshop, and even put in a little blurb about the other workshops in the series — and where the funding came from. (Imagine. Having to use words. HUMPHHH.)

Thank you, Winnie Belle Learned Fund.

Here’s the best part. The photographer gave me his card and said ‘Give me a call when you’re doing something like this again.’ Well, we’re ALWAYS doing ’something like this’. I have his card very handy.

So, now I have a few photos on FLIKKR, now all I have to do is arrange for them to be more like a slide show.

Here’s what I’m getting scared about - I’m using these photos I take and I think they’re going out to THE WORLD and I’m just looking and saying ‘what a nice picture.’ and not thinking a whole lot about privacy.

Well, it’s late, and I’m too tired to solve all the problems of the world.

Maybe we’ll have lambs tomorrow.

Flunking Thing 20

Oh dear, I’m not doing very well here at Thing 20. I’ve been searching through all the possibilities –and I must admit there are a lot–but not many of them seem interesting - or something I want to spend my time on. Doesn’t that sound elitist?

I keep coming back to the same old things : things that Mara introduced us to in Thing 19 (If I capitalize it, does that make it better?) Wanting to do collaborative writing and planning. Google.doc seems the better choice. How unimaginative.

Here’s what I want. An annual calendar. Does someone out there have that to offer?

I say that because I asked a question about another concern (not putting pictures of kids in our program out to EVERYONE) and someone from slideshare answered me back. Why would someone, besides one of us, be reading my blog?

I put our bylaws on google.doc and asked trustees to make changes. So far, the change suggestions have come by email-not changing the original document. No real experience in my major concern–that people would make changes and I wouldn’t even know what they were.

I think I’ll just keep working on the future I had mapped out for Thing 19, and not try to spread myself too thinly.

Oh, we had a great program today! River Exploration. OK, Stream. Everyone was looking under rocks and finding things. Gotta go now, so I can make a slide show about today. Tomorrow- Drawing From Nature.

Well, since I made my blog entry befo…

Well, since I made my blog entry before I read the next step - a pattern I’ve always followed- let’s see if I can post this mini to my major.

Google Docs

Only created one google.doc. Our trustees need to review the bylaws for our next meeting, and last night I said I’d send the latest revision out. I was wondering if this would be a good use of google.doc, so I did it that way.

First Thing. (pardon me, maman) When I went to upload, Google told me that it couldn’t tell what kind of document I was sending. I’ve become very accustomed to Mac naming, but someone warned me that I’d need to use the suffix for advanced procedures. This is the FIRST time I’ve run into that.

Second Thing. I was wondering if public documents, or even limited audience documents are moderated.
By that, I mean, do I get to look at them before they are changed?  Once I put that thing (pardon me again) up there, I wondered if I’d be able to FIND all the changes people are making? This is truly a great experiment.

Third Thing. I’m going to try to figure out 30 Boxes. I’ve been doing the yearly calendar for the board very untechnologically. Let’s see if I can adapt this. (I wasn’t able to do it with iCal.)

Fourth Thing. Can slideshare be the way I can share pictures of events without making them public?

I’ve got a lot more to explore here.

I’m going to have to keep referring to my blog to find out what I plan to do. I have so many plans, so little time. Getting some knowledge, though.

I’m trying to rush through, because lambs are due to start coming on Sunday, so I might be away for a while - again.

I was just looking at the categories. Learning, playing. That’s what I used to say to parents - playing is learning - learning is playing.

My Favorite Frog

As I was working on thing 18, and diligently adding my favorites to vacation spots, plants, and wondering about restaurants and books, I came upon frogs.

At storytime we sing about 5 green and speckled frogs, with little frog puppets.
How could I resist taking a photo and adding it to the list?

Thing about wikis is that they’re not static. As I was reading though the favorite blogs, I was guessing that the Librarian’s Guide to Etiquette was not the blog of one of us. Funny though.

PLLoggerR had a good idea, that I think I’d like to play with…..”what about a wiki-podcast for a book discussion? You know, where everyone could add to the podcast, so that you have a shared, non-real time book discussion? Or is that too much like a chain letter where you hope that something valuable comes back to you? “

And I did figure out how to get photos in there.

Trying

I’m trying to add photos to the wiki for favorite vacations (just having returned), but when I insert the pictures they’re too big and distort the whole page. Then I tried the insert photo plug, but it’s blank when I go to preview. So, for now, it’s just words. But, tomorrow. I just tried to put them here, but I have to convert them again, and who remembers how? Guess I haven’t finished with thing whatever. 18? Big trouble here is that no way works the same for every program. As much as I dislike Microsoft, I must say I appreciate the fact that the command for copy works in whatever program I’m using. That has advantages.

Kill Powerpoint

If I hear or see one more powerpoint by Vermont Yankee about how safe it is, I’m going to be a hysterical ranting spinster.

I’m not so sure about Wikis. I’m never even quite sure about when google comes up with a wikipedia entry. In one of them (where?) Middlebury has ruled that Wikipedia cannot be cited as a reference. I’m always a little shy when there are simple spelling errors.

But, I watched (somewhere in some wiki) Joyce Valenza’s Powerpoint of the Gettysburg Address, and her previous rants about Powerpoint, and I was suitably impressed. My husband always scolds me when I say I’m going to make a powerpoint for Town Meeting or something. He’s right, if you do the bullets and the rules, but I just do the “easy” part, and I don’t think many people have fallen asleep at my slide shows yet. But, after looking at Joyce’s stuff, I can find a better way to talk about circulation or variety. That was REALLY good. For a powerpoint.

So, what else about wikis? Somewhere I saw a list of genres and thought it would be comments about books, or reviews, or something. I was so disappointed by Nancy Pearl. Or at least, I can’t figure out how to read what others (and she) have written about some books. So, I think, what people who have something knowledgeable to say doesn’t count anymore. I have to read the misspelled rantings of Joe who wants a quikreed (I swear I read that somewhere). So, so far, that’s my rant about wikis.

On the other hand, I saw some neat possibilities. Lots of people can talk about books - or ideas- or things-and share. I am involved in an attempt to do fundraising that has needs of lots of people. By email it’s kind of funky, but I can see where a wiki would work. (the camping trip example). Maybe I can try that the next time the library trustees have something that’s involving and kinetic.

Now, if I can just find the links.

Can I be finished with Thing 17? The trouble is that it’s spring, and lambing season and gardening season and farmers’ market, and it’s so hard to stay inside and attached to a computer.

Library 2.0

both physical and mindset changes that are occurring within libraries to make our spaces and services more user-centric and inviting. Others within the profession have asserted that libraries have always been 2.0: collaborative, customer friendly and welcoming

The “just in case” collection

if our services can’t be used without training, then it’s the services that need to be fixed—not our patrons.

build connections online where their users live.

knowledge spa

As I read through various descriptions of Library 2.0, I copied a few of the remarks that caught my attention, and that I need to keep in mind. The “just in case collection” is something I’m always struggling with as I think about weeding, especially the ‘classics’. I don’t think I weeded Little Women (even thought it hadn’t been read in about 10 years), but last week when Wynona asked for it, it was nowhere to be found. We got it from ILL, and maybe that has to be what happens in many cases. We’ll buy a new copy if she tells some of her friends to read it.

I love the concept of a library as a “knowledge spa”, and I think that’s what we try to do- well maybe not the single malt.

And I’m certainly trying to build connections online where our users are by taking this course.

Take It Back

I woke up in the middle of the night, thinking that I hadn’t given Technorati a fair chance. Instead, said I, what would I want to read blogs about? Well, given my current state of mind, lambing.

So, I searched for lambing, and came across a site called Daily Dose of Cute - they look just like HazelLambs. But the best thing, for my anxiety right now, was this video of Lambing a Ewe at Furlands. If you’re of the squeamish type, don’t look. I’ve only had to do this a few times in 13 years, reading my book the whole time, but it worked. Mostly, our lambs just pop out. But, I always have to anticipate. And learn a little bit more from watching how others do it.

Now, let’s see if any of this works. And if it does, I will be more respectful of Technorati. Because sometimes, reading blogs has real value.

Technorati

This is a hard one. What do I think about technorati and how does it compare to google and google blog search.? I happened to be looking for lobster recipes, so that’s the first search term I entered. By far, google had the most returns, but they all seemed to return the same sort of stuff.

Another search, May poems, sayings, got zillions at Google, 329 at Technorati, and 238 at Google Blog Search. Blog search was disappointing. It gave me blogs about poems and sayings, while google gave me poems and sayings about May. I don’t quite get Technorati. I think it’s all blogs. The thing is, I’m not really thrilled about reading the argy-bargy of people babbling stream-of consciousness about whatever. That said, I did read quite a bit while I was exploring in Technorati. But thinking about that, was much of what I read going back to the original news story?

Mostly I like Google because it’s so empty. Technorati is too busy.