More Fun Image Generators

I went looking for a card catalog generator and I found one!! Woot! (I wonder if you recognize the LC call number....)

Back-up Images

Tonight I feel pretty cruddy and gross, so I thought I'd catch up on some 23 Things. Here we are, everybody, twerkin' with the image generators of Thing 10. Word.

All right, Image Chef--show me what you've got:

• Visual Poetry (emo style)
  
• Symbols
  
  

I triple dog dare you...

...to read the following book reviews and NOT think about polar bears. Go on, do it. I did.

P.S. For those of you who wonder why I incessantly say that I'm not thinking about polar bears, I would like you to feast your eyes on this. Fortunately, the wonderful Internet Archive realized the worth of the site Dumblists.com before the owners had to sell their domain and captured it in all it's glory. As you can see on the above link, the second thing to do when bored is to not think about polar bears. Since I spent every weekend of the eighth grade patrolling that site and copying the lists down into my own rendition of Ameila's Notebook, it certainly had a rather large man-hand in determining the flavor of my weirdness.

Some other dumblists of note:

• Hotel Soap Story (that isn't actually a list, but quite enjoyable in 1999, and still enjoyable now)
• Fun things to do in an Elevator
• The Dangers of Bread
• All I Needed to Know About Life, I Learned on Melrose Place
• The Secret of Antigravity
  

Wizarding World of Higher Education

Many people scoff at how old the actors for the Potter films are getting. Well, they don't even know the half of it. I have photographic evidence that Harry Potter is not actually a 15 year old boy in Order of the Phoenix, as has been proposed, but in reality, a graduate student.


As you can see in this screenshot, Harry Potter is dressed in a manner that is quite similar to your average male graduate student. His tan blazer is very tightly fitting, with a slight boxy effect to the shoulders. The tee shirt underneath suggests that he is trying to connect with the undergraduates that he TAs for, but it is tight to show off that he is more than a big brain. You can see from the looks on the faces of those around him, he is discussing some important theorem or another with the undergraduates he teaches. Ron is clearly only listening because it may be on the test, Hermione is trying eagerly to sleep with him by engaging him in his witty dialog and Neville is trying to comprehend what is going on, but as a freshman, is at a loss for what his TA, Harry, is saying. I would suggest that Harry is probably only getting his masters degree, because if he was aiming for his Ph d, there would be elbow patches on his jacket.

The Invasion; or, the book that made me want to read below my RL in middle school

I haven't done a throwback review for a while, so I thought I might as well do it right. If you have not heard of Animorphs, you pretty much need to get up, leave whatever building you're in and get to the nearest book seller or library and pick up The Invasion, by K.A. Applegate (though, please be enviro-friendly and turn off the computer first). This book is everything I remembered and more. I've read a buttload of books for kids written in first person that are transparent and definitely feel like adults frontin' and pretending to be kids. With The Invasion, I felt as if Jake was telling me about the Yeerks and Andalites and the whole gang.

For those of you living under a rock for the past twelve years, Animorphs are a group of five kids that walk through an abandoned construction site and receive the gift of morph-technology from a dying Andalite. The Andalite, Elfangor-Sirinial-Shamtul, details the on-going battle taking place secretly inside the skulls of their fellow man all around them, between mortal minds and Yeerks. What is a Yeerk? Why, it's a mind-controlling, parasitic slug, of course! Throughout The Invasion, the five children that dub themselves the Animorphs must figure out if they want to fight the good fight to save humanity or step back and just be regular kids.

As for readability, I'll let you decide after viewing these pictures:



That is certainly a dog-eared copy (which, considering which text this is, is quite amusing in and of itself, but I'm just sayin').



Me in the library: "I think this is the first book in the series, let me check the spine to double check... Oh."




"Hey, is this a new-fangled monocle?"



"Gasp! It's the back cover of the book! I don't remember it being see-through!!?!"

Recap Attack

Instead of writing a bunch of posts, today I'm just gonna fashion myself a bulleted list and pretend that I'm as organized as a librarian should be.

• Reference is getting annoying. First off, I work at a desk in an academic library. And now, while I'm A) crappy at it and B) not everyone in the class has that luxury, I still can figure out basic things on my own, without a ten minute lesson on how to search databases. When Paulette said she was going to go over something we all should know how to use from the site, I was imagining her busting out the reference resources--because those suckers are intense and I tend to stay away from them even though they are ah-mazing. No. Of course that is too advanced. Instead, let's ask questions about how to find articles. Are you kidding me? Are you effing kidding me? Thank god for blogs and laptops, because otherwise I wouldn't know what to do with myself during class.
  
  
• Last night was the YA author panel in the faculty lounge at SCILS. It was quite snazz-tastic. The featured authors were Bob Krech, Eireann Corrigan and Megan Mccafferty. It was definitely worth the late visit to SCILS and a great learning experience. I was pleasantly surprised that 2 of the panelists worked as teachers in addition to writing books; it gives me hope for the future. One of my biggest fears is that I'll finally get a real job at a school and never have time during the week to do something other than lesson-planning like my friend Dana, let alone write. So, phew, you can be a teacher and a wonderful writer. Excellent. Although, I can't personally say that I've read the books, so I am going on everyone else's words that they are awesome. I guess I will have to shelve my juvenille-fiction-only mentality to read their works. They all were such fun and interesting people that their books can't help but be good, right? Right. Plug time, so you can all read them with me:
• Megan Mccafferty's Fourth Comings(but it would probably be better to read the first three books beforehand)
• Bob Krech's Rebound
• Eireann Corrigan's Ordinary Ghosts
• Bonus: Eireann Corrigan's Splintering (because that just sounds interesting as hell)
  
  
• There is no logical leap for this, so I'll just put this out there. I miss the Secret World of Alex Mack. Badly. I yearn to watch a girl turn into silvery goo while wearing striped shirts from Sears and overalls. What a great premise. Her dad works at a radioactive chemical plant, and Alex, being in the wrong place at the wrong time (which is obviously the best formula for preteen mishap) gets doused in chemicals and BAM she can turn into liquid and squirt herself into all sorts of tiny nooks and crevices. Oh, and her father's plant is lurking and looming, looking all about for her. But oh snap, she just oozes out of all sorts of tight spaces. Sigh. I miss that being on TV all the time. Those were the days. In fact, I was grounded from TV so much that I ended up buying the books, because I need a Mack attack that badly.
  

Grammar + Writing = <3

Thank you, Caroline of the Longstockings, for sharing your recent tribulations with the comma and various other grammar ticks your copyeditor found. I loves me some grammar news.

Yick.

Ew.

(I heard it from bookshelves of doom, who had it from Read Roger, who, as it turns out, says "for reals" for real.)

Cutting the Fat--Thing 9

No more whining about how I've done this crap already. Who the hell wants to read that? Not I. Already, I digress from cutting the fat--what can I say, I'm a lazy diet/exercise kind of person.

Blah, blah, blah, find some school library blogs and play around with blog searchers. Got it.

• Technorati
  So, everyone and their mom is talking about Technorati. Now I get to play around! Word. Basically, you pop in some search terms and BAM! you get some blogs.
  
  Now on to the real thing I discovered using Technorati. I found out that my blog ended up on a blogroll! Eep! Now, you can't use these fancy things to decipher whether or not other people read your blog, but hey--a blogroll is pretty good. Especially since it's Minh Le of Bottom Shelf Books and his book reviews tend to make me laugh obnoxiously loud. Especially this one on Frog and Toad. I think I've sent that post out to at least five people before posting it to all of you invisible readers out there. It is worth being late to work in order to read (unless you read blogs at work--because then you should read it and read it again).
  
  
• Google Blog Search
  As for this bad boy, I'm not too impressed and here's why: I tried to use it to find the above Frog and Toad post and could not find it! No matter what search terms I put it. Frog and Toad and Bottom Shelf only brought up his most recent post about Stick (which, incidentally, is also a rather good one). I had to scour his blog to find it, and fortunately, his tags are quite straightforward and led me straight to it. This service gets minus points--about 6 and a half minus points. On a sidebar, can you talk crap about a Google service on another Google service? Looks like I just did.
  

EDIT: This is actually thing 14 and I'm too stupid to know how to count, apparently. Or read.

Zeugma

Who gives a fuck about the Oxford Comma?

A whole bus of grammarians definitely care about this grammatical separator. Journalists, select writers, and apparently this librarian also fancy this tiny little squiggle. I spend my free time reading blogs like the Lexicographer's Rules, reading the Oxford English Dictionary for fun, and reading about grammar in the Facebook group, "Good Grammar is Hot." I'm beginning to question my choice of graduate programs. Perhaps I would have been better served getting a degree in linguistics. Oh well.

The Sporadic Word of today comes to us from an article that was mentioned on the aforementioned Lexicographer's Rules all about Vampire Weekend and their musically driven debate about the Oxford Comma. I highly recommend the article, because it is exquisitely hilarious. This is my favorite quote, by far:

Peter Devine, Vanity Fair’s copy chief, also cops to giving a “modest-size fuck about the Oxford comma. There are times when it adds a bit of clarity.”

A modest-sized fuck (chuckles). Oh silly grammarians, how I love thee. But I didn't bring all of this up to talk about the Oxford Comma. Nope, I wanted to talk about zeugma (hence the title). I saw this in the article and ::gasp:: discovered an aspect of grammar I was unfamiliar with. Clearly I needed to get the librarian out of hiding and search for this interesting word. Normally the OED would serve me well for a purpose like this, but grammar isn't something I play around with (unless, you know, I'm writing poetry). So instead I traveled to Wikipedia and was delighted to have a vast array of distinct things to learn! To avoid making this post longer than I've already made it, I'd suggest checking out the Wikipedia entry if you are interested. Oh come on, I know you are!

Let the Wild Worship Start!

Why you should fall to your knees and worship a librarian.

Now here's something that should be taught in the 23 Things: How to cite something a friend posted on Facebook. I have no clue. So, that being said, I'm going to do it wrong (woot!) and just say that my classmate Lynnette (who may or may not want her last name out there, so I shan't give it, just in case) put this up.

Pottertastic Poser

Out of all of the people I know, hands down, I win the way-too-obsessed-with-Potter award. I've been hoping and praying to finally meet one of these fanatics that are way more into Harry than I am. I know they're out there and I would love to pick their brain and discuss things with them that I just can't do with anyone else in my current circle of friends.

But after reading this news piece from the Leaky Cauldron, I don't know if I want to meet these people anymore. When does loving a book go too far? Is it when your entire Christmas one year consists of various Potter memorabilia, including the first six titles from Bloomsbury Publishing? Or is it when you buy over five hundred first edition copies of the books in 63 languages....

Thing 8---is it 23 yet?

Man. Bloglines? Shouldn't I have realized that at the age of 22, I'm on the border of being a digital native and shouldn't have to do this course? Well, now I'm slugging through it, there's no stopping me now--but Bloglines? It's thanks to Bloglines' technical difficulties that I have the visual image of Mr. Blog. So, in case you were wondering, when I go crazy and start talking to my blog as if it were some 1950s school girl diary and had an actual personality instead of being a receptacle for my thoughts, this is what Mr. Blog looks like:And back to Chip in the regular section of this post that actually relates to Bloglines...

The people in charge of the Things wanted me to focus on the following bold questions while making this entry. So, for sport, let's pretend I just set up my RSS feed, instead of many moons ago. Great.

• What do you like about RSS and newsreaders?
  Oh man, oh man! RSS sure is swell. You know, minus the fact that the default setting makes it so that you have to open each post individually if you wish to read more than a paragraph or two.
  
• How do you think you might be able to use this technology in your school or personal life?
  Well, I can cut the crap like Vector scissors can cut a penny into a bottle opener (incidentally, if you have never seen this action, it might very well be worth the three hours of your life required to go to a Vector pyramid scam job interview to watch that. I'm not kidding. Do it. NOW!). If I want to get the best of the web and the blogosphere without wasting my effort for nothing and coming up with crappy posts I don't want to read, then I'll stop using Bloglines. But, if I did want to be able to look at the first paragraph of my favorite blogs and decide that today they blogged about crap I don't need, I can utilize Bloglines to the maximum and how.
  
• How can libraries use RSS or take advantage of this new technology?
  The first thing that pops into mind is having the programs and new releases and other public library items circulate in a blog that patrons can easily subscribe to and look at (or not) in their Bloglines.
  
• Optional: If you're up to the challenge, you can provide the URL address to your public bloglines account
  So, Thing 8 lied brutally to me. Either that, or this just goes to show how something involving web 2.0 can be dated within months. Depends on if you want to be nice about it. Whichever description you fancy, the screen shots and directions they listed on this public URL nonsense is not true anymore. If you have been following my 23 Things journey with eager anticipation, doing the lessons alongside me silently (like a stalking butler), then I will tell you what. I'll tell you where it really is. If you scroll down to the very bottom of your feeds, you will see a link that says Share. It's that simple. For real, see look: here's mine.
  

Quotey Quote Quote

No matter what one does, whether one's deeds serve virtue or vice, nothing lacks importance. All actions bear a kind of fruit.

::Buddha::

Thing Seven--Technology Update

Man, these 23 things are starting to get annoying. I feel as if I should have looked in advance to see if there were a few things I didn't already know about. Alas, I must finish what I start; that's just how I roll. This thing is really an assignment is to take some sort of technological advance and blog about it. Since I've already blogged about flickr a few times, I'm gonna go ahead and ignore that suggestion. How about Danbury Library's catalog? Widgets and tagging and blogging, oh my!

I am totally pumped for this new system--you have no idea. Somehow, since coming to SCILS, I've become all about folksonomies and user-driven tags. I eat, sleep and breathe metadata. In fact, i feel bad for Danielle if she's reading this, since this website was actually brought up in our cataloging class (which I am totally digging). Anyway, she can just stop reading now, if she likes.

As for this new take on the public library catalog, it's simply awesome. I highly recommend going into the catalog and searching for a book. Any book. I looked up Harry Potter, being obsessed with everything about him and his universe, and found all sorts of tags that users applied to open an entirely new way of surfing the library catalog. Instead of dealing only with LC's subject headings (because really, some of them just don't make sense. see also: anime being classified as "Animation (Cinematography) Japan"), users can search for material on their own terms. This is a great usage of new 2.0 technology and a great step for libraries everywhere. I can't wait to use something like this in my school library's automation--you know, when I get a school library and can convince the school board that it's a great idea. So... maybe never, but we'll see.

Thing SIx Reprise

That was so much fun, I had to make more. Now there is a whole set of Emo Trading Cards. I don't know what's worse. The fact that I had an emo photo session a year ago, or that I just turned them into a card "game."

Thing Six

A further experiment with flickr and mashup applications. I like how this entire project just leads me to play around and not do homework. Now that's what I call a great learning experience! Here you will see a trading card created for the dreaded emo version of Magick cards. I posed for this one, back in early 2007 when I was pretending to be emo for a week. I was so convincing that they needed to have me for their cards. See the dedication with the hair and the skull? I'm even doubting that I'm not emo looking at this.

Thing Five--Flickr

Last one for today, I promise! Okay, thing 4 didn't apply to me, so I skipped right into Flickr. I'm surprised I didn't already have an account, but it is what it is. I do now. On to the challenges, noble blog-steed!*

The first challenge was to look around people's accounts for pictures that I would like to blog about. Well, since I'm still pissed they didn't have an option to give yourself a pug dog as a pet on Yahoo!'s Avatar, I clearly searched for pugs. This led to the discovery of my hobby in five years from now when I own pug dogs: having online photo albums dedicated to my pug dog. Anyway, here is my usage of Blogger's image upload ( because I've never done that. Ever. I swear).

The second challenge was to create your very own flickr account and upload some pictures. Strictly speaking, I am being a rebel all over the place, because thing five wanted me to upload some school library shots and use one of their tags so they knew I did it. Well. About not having a school library of my own... yeah... So I uploaded Some Lives that are Aquatic from my trip to the zoo in 06.



*Mr. Blog would like it noted that he does not appreciate being treated like an animal, even if that animal is a noble steed. Silly Mr. Blog. Fine then, live without honor and see how that pays the bills. Hmph.

Also: Thank you to angiemckaig and Evan Agee for having such adorable pug dogs and for sharing them on flickr.

Thing Three--Blogging and Avatars

Again, I think I have "create a blog" down pat. Next thing. "Make an avatar and post it to your blog." They wanted me to include it in the page element section, but frankly, I don't want it there. I do, however, know how to use page elements--so that lesson is learned. As for my avatar, check out the hotness:



Look at me, chilling out at Bust Mecca (Mount Rushmore) wishing I had the bust of Thomas Jefferson with me. Or maybe the rest of my minions from my bust collection. Oh, and observe how, even though there is a polar bear RIGHT THERE under my nose, I am nonchalant and not thinking about polar bears. That's just how I roll.

23 Things

In preparation for February's RASL meeting, I finally read through the free School Library Media Activities Monthly I got back at NJASL in November. The very last article mentioned the School Library Learning 2.0 blog, which seemed very interesting. As it turns out, there is a 9-week challenge of 23 things that you can do to familiarize yourself with Web 2.0 and the impact it can have on your school library.

Why the hell not? It sure beats doing my actual online class. The first week is kind of boring, with an introduction to the concept of 2.0. I think I've got this concept down pat. So instead of paying attention to the lady on the 14 minute powerpoint presentation of the 7.5 Habits of Lifelong Learners, I kept wondering if proper diction should be required for podcasting. Every time her southern drawl spat out some word ending in -ing, I could barely contain myself. Learnen and offen and all those other fun words that should have consonants in them were the only reason I kept listening. Er.. listenen.

As for the 23 things, I'm probably going to skip some things (such as create a blog. I think I can manage that one. Would you like me to revert back to my livejournal/xanga days or keep going with my "professional" blogger account?). But to show my serious dedication (despite being sarcastic about podcasting ladies), I shall pledge my "lifelong learning contract" to better exhibit the 7.5 Habits of Lifelong Learners...or something.

1. Begin with the end in mind
2. Accept responsibility for your own learnen
3. View problems as challenges
4. Have confidence in yourself as a competent, effective learner
5. Create your own learnen toolbox
6. Use technology to your advantage
   
7. Teach and mentor others
   
   And don't forget that there habit 7.5, Playen.
   
   
   
   
   

Stop the Presses!

Thanks to Mugglenet's Deathly Hallows news section, I have been given yet another reason to love Jo Rowling (and to think I couldn't fit another ounce of love). While this news story is almost a month old, practically geriatric for Internet news, I am very glad to hear that a lady with as much power and influence as JKR cares so much about the planet enough to halt Finnish presses. So, I shall share this tidbit with you. Long story short, the Finnish translations of Deathly Hallows will not see the light of day if the publishers do not import paper from sustainable forests.

Six Word Memoir

This seemed like a really neat concept. Create a novel in six words (I won't get into the debate that the difference between novel, novella and short story is determined by amount of words; that's just me picking apart everything).

I received an email with this link, which proves a highly interesting read!

As for my own attempts at a six word novel, the following are my rough drafts:

• Help! I'm permanently seven years old!
• Go with flow, then you'll know
• Forever and ever, circling 'round again...
  

Stumped No More!!

Does anyone recall the episode of Pete and Pete when little Pete is late to class because he hears his favorite song ever? Only to find the band disappeared once and for all and no one was left to hear his favorite song? The sadness of little Pete was so great that he took to the electric guitar to scour his brain for the cords.

Well, I know this plight well. I heard a song on 103.3, WPRB over winter-break and was left with only a few bars to hum, not even lyrics to Google. To my delight, this song came on the radio this morning, months after first hearing it. We reconnected and bonded and it was glorious. I even wrote down lyrics so I could find it. And find it, I did! So, without further ado, I bring you my current favorite song, Young Folks, by Peter Bjorn and John (featuring Victoria Bergsman):

Birthing at the Library

"The library is not a shrine for the worship of books. It is not a temple where literary incense must be burned or where one's devotion to the bound book is expressed in ritual. A library, to modify the famous metaphor of Socrates, should be the delivery room for the birth of ideas - a place where history comes to life."

::Norman Cousins::

Bio-fuels, Schmio-fuels

I was just sent this NY times article that can pretty much be summed up with the ever-popular phrase "we're damned if we do and we're damned if we don't." To be brief, this tidbit of news suggests that, while the intention of bio-fuels are a great step in the right direction, it is falling short of it's aim in reducing green house gases by, in fact, creating more. Apparently, someone forgot to factor the type of land being cleared to grow these crops and the emissions lost while converting them into fuels in the whole greenhouse-gas-reduction theory. Sigh.

Not satisfied with my summary? Good, I wouldn't be either. Read it for yourself and see what you think!

Introducing: Sporadic Word of the Day!

To perpetuate my love affair with the Oxford English Dictionary I have decided to have a sporadic word of the day feature. Translation: Whenever I find an interesting word, I will define it. Some days will be a vast plain filled with nothing but tumbleweeds and a lack of good words.

On with the show, McGillicuddy!

tiswas slang::
a state of nervous agitation or confusion; occas. a state of physical disorder or chaos.

Source: Horribly Expensive Online Version of the OED
Word originally seen at: Tales from Homeward

The Off-beats, Aliens and Caveman Galore!

My earlier post about Mo Willems led me to be a proper librarian and search for the Off-beats. Not only did I get some Off-Beats, but segments from Kablam! (aka the best show ever). I just wish I could have found the Off-beats clip about tying shoes.

The Off-Beats:


The Prometheus and Bob Tapes:

Ah-Mazing.

This is why someone should invent a stay-alive-forever-to-ensure-geniusdom-in-the-future pill and give it to Mo Willems. This is just a thank you doodle, too. This says nothing of his animations and books and what-have-you. Then again, he did pretty much shape my childhood with the Off-beats. Those few moments of Nickelodeon airwaves completely made commercial breaks worth their beans.

I'm a tad late ('bout a month or so) in catching up on Mo's Doodles, but I'm so glad I didn't let the overwhelming number on my bloglines feed (::gasp:: 43!!) put me off, because my life wouldn't have been complete without looking at this picture. I'm serious. Who knows what kind of crazy shenanigans would have befallen me. I'd probably have ended up living in a refrigerator box in Miami. Though, considering I used to play homeless when I was little instead of house....

Sneaky Author Alert

What's a super cool way to teach kids a word they may not know, but appears in your story a bunch of times, so they probably should know it? Have your characters debate the meaning of it. Philip Pullman, you sly old dog, you.

"What do you mean, a paleo-archaeologist? Archaeologists already study what's old; why do you need to put another word meaning 'old' in front of it?"

Why indeed.

::HIS DARK MATERIALS::The Subtle Knife::Lighted Fliers::

Two for Tuesday!

Special edition of Pottertastic Tuesday with two (count 'em--TWO) YouTube videos! Today was pretty much a waste of a day, so I need to pretend to be productive somehow. The first is a sneak peak into the production of the newest movie complete with interviews and teeny glimpses of costumes and footage. The second is a Lego Harry Potter skit that is not that amusing until about two minutes into it when Dumbledore arrives. Lesson? Put Dumbledore in everything and he will make it better. No really. Write that down.

Naked Men

And just so you don't think I'm hatin' on all old books, here is a delightful picture of Mister Ranger from an old Yogi book illustrated by Mel Crawford that I found on Fun All Around. Enjoy!

Tired... so tired

Since I feel groggy and tired, my throwback shall be about a tired, old story. Many (a very many) will disagree with me about this, but I think the Chronicles of Narnia is terribly outdated. I decided to reread the Narnia series, in light of the popularity of the newer film versions and think that I was much better being off leaving the books in the foggy haze of forgotten memories. At this point, The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is so embedded in popular culture that to recite the meat of the story here would be silly. In this review, I just want to discuss the feasibility of book-talking this book to a kid.

The main problem that I have with this text is gender roles. The girls are dainty and help out with setting tables, and washing dishes and aren't meant to fight. With hundreds of women in the armed service, it is an insult to the women fighting and risking their lives to suggest that women aren't meant to fight. Peter is given a rather phallic sword and shield and is expected to lead the battle. In the first book, The Magician's Nephew, Andrew must go after Polly because she is a girl and would not be able to get back herself.

Yes, these books are historical classics of children's and Christian literature. Yes, the gender roles depicted in these tales reflect the time period in which they were written. But, no, that does not mean I have to recommend them. I have an extreme aversion to sending the wrong idea about gender to young children still forming their concepts of boy and girl behaviors. They get enough of that on the playground and at potentially in their own homes. The last place they should get that thought is the local library (i.e., the warehouse of open ideas and information sharing). I would recommend other books (whose titles have decided to abandon me at this crucial juncture in my argument) that also place women into stereotypical "girl" behaviors over Lewis's books because they don't explicitly state that "women aren't meant to do" XY and Z the way Narnia books do. The fact that he repeatedly states what behaviors are and are not acceptable when exhibited by one gender is what holds me back.

If someone comes in asking about Narnia, I'll point to the DVD section unless they ask me otherwise. Honestly, I'd be hard-pressed to find a situation where I see myself even pausing on the spine of the book, let alone pulling it off the shelves without prompting.

SCILS and the hotness

Well, thank you, University of South Carolina for answering the age old question, "Where are all the mildly attractive men in Library Science?" And thank you, Fuse 8, for helping me find the answer.

I wonder if there are enough even remotely attractive men currently attending our program to get a full twelve months for a calendar. Any thoughts?

News these days

"I am unable to understand how a man of honor can take a newspaper in his hands without a shudder of disgust."

::Charles Baudelaire::