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Sunday, June 29
Link Dump - Middle of the Night Version
by
Jason
on Sun 29 Jun 2008 03:52 AM CST
I'm
not sure if I put Pace to sleep tonight or he put me to sleep but at
8pm, we were both in bed, crashed out. So that means I wake up now and
am going to be completely messed up tomorrow. Oh well - the same thing
we always say when he naps at an unusual time - "he's tired - he needs
it" applies to my little nap tonight as well!
Here's some
randomness...apologies if you were the person who sent me one or more
of these links. I've lost track of where I got them.
"The Mother's Milk of Literacy: How Breastfeeding May Improve Literacy"
- to which I say, "no duh!"
The Science of Early Brain Development
- you'll have to click on the first search result to see the PowerPoint presentation
Neat New Stuff on the Internet
- by librarian, Marylaine Block. "The sites I include are usually free sites of
substantial reference value, authoritative, browsable, searchable, and
packed with information, whether educational or aimed at answering
everday questions."
"It Takes A Village of Librarians To Raise A Teen"
"Schools should continue to require library research so kids can learn how old folks used to Google stuff."
"The Times (UK) Makes 200 Years of Newspapers Available Online for Free"
"Reading The Future: Planning To Meet Canada's Future Literacy Challenges"
- a new study has lots of stats and info from the Canadian Council on Learning
"Dealing With Book Clutter"
- includes a list of questions that could be used with slight modification during weeding at your library
PaperbackSwap.com
- a site that
the previous linked article led to which allows you to swap books (and
CD's and DVD's) with others. It appears to only be for US-based people
right now (or people with access to a US mailing address) but still
worth taking note of in case they expand to Canada in the future." Who Says Librarians and Teachers Don't Like Tags?"
And for a big, non-library-related finish, "What skills would be most useful if you could time travel back to 1000 A.D."
(Man, it always feels good to get this accumulated kludge off the books!  )
Saturday, June 28
So You Wanna Write A Memoir? - An Exhaustive Guide
by
Jason
on Sat 28 Jun 2008 11:58 PM CST
Entertainment Weekly magazine is one of my guilty pleasures. In fact, I had a subscription to it in the early 1990's right after it began publication. And I was surprised to see that last week's issue marked its 1000th issue! I still read EW on a fairly regular basis but now it's visits to the local public library for a range of back issues (or when I'm in the area, the one local library branch that permits loans of the most recent issues of their magazines - how cool is that?)A recent issue had an article about the memoir and included a list of every possible permutation of the genre - memoirs by geography, occupation, addiction, disease and even who had to die in the author's life to provoke the writing of the memoir, etc.
Friday, June 27
Friday Fun Link - 50 Best Cult Books (June 27, 2008)
by
Jason
on Fri 27 Jun 2008 10:59 PM CST
"What is a cult book? We tried and failed to arrive at a definition:
books often found in the pockets of murderers; books that you take very
seriously when you are 17; books whose readers can be identified to all
with the formula "<Author Name> whacko"; books our children just
won’t get…"50 best cult books - Telegraph 50 best cult books - Telegraph
Tuesday, June 24
Slow Reading: The Book
by
Jason
on Tue 24 Jun 2008 08:50 PM CST
I was very happy to hear that my FIMS classmate, John Miedema, will be having a book coming out later this year. I'm also proud to say I may have played some small role in making this happen. John has said (I think in a comment on this blog or perhaps in an e-mail to me?) that it was the point made in a list by former CLA President Wendy Newman that I reprinted on this blog ("3. In your first three years, become a ranking practitioner-expert in one great thing that becomes your "brand". ) which inspired him to pursue his interest in the area of "Slow Reading".
Through his writing on the topic, he's gained attention from librarians all over the world, has presented at a conference, gave birth to a Wikipedia page on the topic and now, this book.
Congratulations John - I can't wait to get my copy!
Friday, June 6
Friday Fun Link - Read at Work (and an unrelated story of why Shea is a computer genius) (June 6, 2008)
by
Jason
on Fri 06 Jun 2008 10:10 PM CST
Read at Work
is a site from the New Zealand Book Council that allows you to read classic books, poetry, samples from selected New Zealand authors and more, online and formatted to look like either the Windows XP interface and Powerpoint presentations. Very fun and cool (though I do not, of course, advocate performing non-work activities such as this while at work! Of course, if you work in libraries, this *is* work related...sort of.) (via Reddit though I don't have the original link handy - you can search if you really need it)As for Shea being a computer genius, I'm sitting in a hotel room in Swift Current right now. We made sure the room had an Internet connection as I've brought my laptop with me. I plugged it in when we got here, checked e-mail then trundled off to the pool with Pace and Shea. When we got back, Shea went to the computer and asked, "How come it won't turn on?" I pushed the power button, sure I'd left it running when we left. Nothing. Again, holding it a few seconds. Nothing. "Oh fuck" is the non-paraphrased thought that came to mind. I ran through the checklist...did the screen give out? The motherboard? The hard drive? Hopefully the motherboard - that's the least bothersome major error. The hard drive has a full back-up but would be PAINFUL to redo everything. We're in a poolside room...maybe the humidity just temporarily short-circuited it or something? Wishful thinking but maybe it'll work tomorrow if I crank the air and say a prayer to the techno-gods before I fall asleep. So I'm laying in bed with Shea and Pace and Shea goes, "How long were we at the pool? Do you know if the plug in you used was working? Maybe it wasn't and the battery died?" My battery life is down quite a bit from when it was new (now I get maybe an hour whereas back then, I got 3-4 hours) but w weren't at the pool that long...were we? I plug the laptop into a different outlet and...voila...it boots no problem. So I must say my wife is a brilliant computer-engineer level of intelligence that I am daily in awe of. (Also, I was up and out of the house by 5am today to go do weeding in a distant community. So I drove 3 hours round-trip, did six hours of weeding, then drove another three hours to get here. So hopefully that's an excuse for being such a moron at why my computer "died" tonight.) God, I need sleep... (Oh yeah, I didn't plan to get up at 5am but I had a dream about being at the library weeding and the branch librarian had got her whole board of 10+ people there to help - but in exchange, they wanted me to help them move their entire library...which is in reality a big part of the reason why I was going out - to do a major weeding to help them prepare for an impending move. But yeah...I dreamt about weeding. I think I've reached the next level on the Librarian Nerd Scale!  )
Wednesday, May 14
100 Must-Read Books For Men
by
Jason
on Wed 14 May 2008 10:01 PM CST
Whenever one of those "100 Books You Must Read" lists come out, I'm always a bit ashamed that, even as a former English major, I find that I've barely read any of them.But now, finally, a list where I have read, well, about the same proportion as any other "Top 100 Books" list. 100 Must-Read Books: The Essential Man’s LibraryThe MetaFilter thread links to an earlier thread about the reading choice differences between men and women.(via MetaFilter)
Thursday, May 8
Wikipedia Goes To...Print?
by
Jason
on Thu 08 May 2008 10:23 PM CST
Thursday, May 1
Orson Scott Card Rips JK Rowling A New One
by
Jason
on Thu 01 May 2008 10:58 PM CST
Friday, April 25
Friday Fun Link - Book-Beer Pairings (April 25, 2008)
by
Jason
on Fri 25 Apr 2008 11:42 PM CST
Book beer pairings sees authors suggesting brews that are best enjoyed with their work. What brews go with your favourite books - a very important question for the ages.In semi-related news, the next "Books to Beers and Stacks to Snacks" social gathering will happen following the final day of the SLA conference, Saturday May 3 at 5pm at the Cathedral Village Free House in Regina. Endnote speaker, Jessamyn West, is planning to attend so why not drop by if you're already taking in the conference and/or a MetaFilter member?
Thursday, March 27
Read A Book For Your Health
by
Jason
on Thu 27 Mar 2008 11:56 PM CST
The Globe and Mail recently had an article on the benefits of reading and good literacy to your health (PDF). This is probably not a huge surprise but lines like "While we obsess about our weight, blood pressure and cholesterol levels, the single best predictor of good health and longevity is probably literacy." are pretty big statements to make. (I'd have guessed that the single best predictor of longevity might have to do with healthy eating and exercise.)(via one of our branch librarians who in turn, got it from a librarian at RPL)
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