Category: Uncategorized

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Priorities

Life amuses me.

For about the past 4 months I have agonized over my lack of time to do a few things:

    Clean the entire house at once. It is now done in batches.
    Read my RSS feeds on library news or any news for that matter.
    Check my email everyday.
    Write in this space or any space.
    Take naps.

I worry that you are all wasting away for lack of posts here, in this space, though I know the world goes on without me and that is hard as well. (Ironically, as I type this, the reason for my compressed schedule has awoken with an expressed need for me and so I will continue this later.)

(days later, it turns out) When I used to talk about technology in libraries, people would often ask where they were supposed to find the time for these new things. Time for the learning curve. Time in the daily routine. Simple Time. My reply was always the same. If it is important, you make time. You trim the things that have become less important. It was true then and it will always be true.

You spend time on the things you value. Where you spend your time, there your heart is also. (paraphrased Luke 12:34)

I have decided to stop beating myself up about my lack of posts here. I will post when I can and feel good about it when I do. I will stop being sad about not writing more and simply be happy when I do find time and have something to say. Rest assured this space will not go away, I just will not be as prolific as I have been in the past. I hope you will keep this in your feed readers so that every other week or so you can still get a dose of Jane.

I think as the Wee Bairn gets a little older my time will free up in different ways.

In this season of my life, my family is more important than anything else. The Wee Bairn only gets one Mom and I only get one shot at this Mom thing for him. I want to enjoy it and be free in that choice.

I will still be around in other ways. I am mentoring an Emerging Leaders group and I am working on a sweet unconference shindig with Meredith Farkas as part of Jim Rettig’s Presidential Initiatives. ALA Annual 2009 will be my first conference after a long hiatus.

–Jane, happy to have this written, finally

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A Window With a View




flooding

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre

This was the sight that greeted us, along with the rain, Saturday morning after the winds had passed. There were a lot of trees down in the Heights and the streets were flooded. The water subsided after the rain stopped, but the trees required some effort on the resident’s part.

In this picture, you can see the large oak at the end of the driveway, that fell across the road. This was a situation that was repeated at least once on every block in this neighborhood. A few blocks over, two houses burned down the night of the storm because a transformer fell on one of them and the fire trucks were unable to get to the houses. The roads were too full of debris.

–Jane, glad she was safe

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First Beer of the Season




First Beer of the Season

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre

It is one of my favorite times of year… Oktoberfest time. We have a local brewery in Houston called St. Arnold and they make many delicious seasonal brews. They only brew a finite amount, so often you have to know when the brews are due out and then stalk the local liquor stores. They can disappear pretty quickly.

Last year at this time, I was with child and unable to partake of the seasonal offerings. This year, there are no such restrictions.

Mr. Rochester and I bought the last two six packs at our local store and we gleefully danced out with them. We did spare a second or two for the schmoes who missed the goodness, but our triumph won and we giggled like children in the cookie jar. Only this is much better than cookies.

–Jane, prost!

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If Dogs Had D&D Characters




Sleeping

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre

Warning: Geeky Entry follows, no library content

In our spare time, Mr. R and I have conversations that are amusing to us, but others might find baffling. In some cases, it is because we are married and that is what happens when you spend too much time with another person. In other cases, it is the meeting of two geeks which creates conversations only other geeks would appreciate.

This past weekend, we discussed what D&D stats our mastiff would have if he was a D&D character. This is what we decided:

Race: Dog
Class: Warrior Mastiff
Armor Class: 2 (because he is a huge baby)
Wisdom: 3 (he just does not understand a lot of things)
Intelligence: 8 (now if he would just listen, that would be something)
Charisma: 10 (I mean look at that cute face!)
Strength: 18
Dexterity: 7
Constitution: 17 (solid as a rock)

He would need some fancy armor to make up for having such a low armor class.

–Jane, wonders what people who are not such geeks talk about for fun

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Seeking School and Public Librarians

Want to see your name in print? Think it might make your day a little brighter? Your step a little lighter?

Wonderful. All you have to do is have a short anecdote you are willing to share for an article I am writing. I know some school librarians but I would love to hear some new stories. Plus, one gets tired of the same old people yammering. (Why you continue to read this rag, I will never know…)

If you are a school or public librarian and have overcome a challenge or obstacle dealing with social software, please contact me. I would love to share your story. I will, of course, give credit for your triumph or leave you anonymous as you prefer.

–Jane, her article will be so much nicer if it included some adventures by librarians in the field

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A day filled with Flan fun

I finally got my hands on the Angel: After the Fall: First Night graphic novel. It is a beautiful hardcover from IDW. I can not wait to devour it.

They were out of Serenity #2 and 3 of Better Days. The guy said they keep selling out so I had to put my name on a list for the next shipment.

This was the Wee Bairn’s first trip to the comic book store. He wore an appropriate outfit for the occasion and looked like a geek’s offspring. Now he just needs some library or literary related outfits.

–Jane, is writing instead of reading

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On Growing a Thick Skin and Other Early Lessons

After you have been blogging for awhile, or spent a good bit of time online sharing oneself, you grow a thicker skin than less internet savvy humans. You still get annoyed, angry, and occasionally flame inducing, but the internet teaches you fast that there are a lot of people willing to be ugly to you online. People willing to think and say the worst of you. There will always be those people. In real life, they exist too, but they are usually less vocal or in your face.

Mr. Rochester recently got a lesson in this, not that he is unaware that people are ridiculous regarding things you write online, but he has not, until recently, expressed himself online. Being an internet junkie who lived online was previously my job in this family.

Mr. R’s recent experience (and do not go looking for it online because it happened through a family grapevine with old fashioned telephones, no less) reminded me of something that us old hats sometimes forget.

There are still a large number of people for whom this internet, blogging, social networking, information sharing world is new and foreign. New in the way that they may have heard of it (crap, even my Grammy knows what MySpace is and she can not even type) but they have no idea how to deal with it.

With that in mind, here are some things we should remember ourselves and take time to share, politely, with people for whom living on the internet is still new.

If you have something to say, say it to my face… online. Conversations in which you take umbrage with something behind closed doors is rude. Unless of course, you are going to be very rude and start a flame war (A conversation in which you are hateful to the person, not the idea. Frequently invokes Nazi’s, see Goodwin’s Law) In that case, please take it outside so that no one else has to read your drivel.

Online, people often feel free to be bluntly honest. If you have trouble with blunt honesty please go play in someone else’s internet. You know, the one with only unicorns, bunnies, and rainbows.

Sarcasm and satire can come off badly online and in writing. If you read something you find offensive. Step back and ask, “Might this be sarcasm or satire? Perchance this person is not actually suggesting we eat babies.”

You may find my willingness to share the details of my life online to be crude and dangerous, but that is my choice. You may wish not to share so much when you venture online and that is your choice. We all have different limits and as long as we are all consenting adults in squandering our privacy, so be it.

We internet authors are not Brontes, Faulkners, Ffordes, Irivings, or Austens. Our turn of phrases are not as well crafted at times (most of it) and it is possible we may use a word with slightly the wrong connotation. Give that person the benefit of the doubt, but be sure to ask them about it to clarify if you have a problem. See first lesson.

–Jane, wishes all lessons were as easy to share as this