Just for Fun

Summer Technology and Relaxation

/ dwakimoto

Hi, all. Well, after a couple of breaks and diversions from the regularly scheduled programming, we are back to library and technology fun with a summer twist. I love summer, don’t you? (And I really love summer in the Bay Area because it isn’t super hot and humid, but instead it is blessed with perfect warm days and usually lovely nights.) So in celebration of summer, I have some resources for relaxation as well as some for improving your use of technology.

If you haven’t seen it yet, check out the Best of 2009-2010 Scout Report. The Scout Report is one of my favorite digests of good stuff on the Internet. I always learn about something new reading the weekly reports and the “Best of” list is fantastic. (Though I might be slightly biased because the first resource listed is Xeno-Canto: Bird Sounds from the Americas.)

Speaking of lists of helpful stuff, check out 7 Things You Should Know About Open Educational Resources. EDUCAUSE creates great, short handouts; they are perfect for sharing with the instructors you know and hopefully you can get more people excited about OER (Open Educational Resources). At my library, we highlight various open educational resources in our presentations to faculty and encourage their use. Plus, lots of OER databases are also social networks where faculty members can come together and share their work, plus pick up new tips to use in the classroom.

Speaking of online resources, all my fellow bloggers out there should check out the Social Media Today article, Bloggers: 7 questions to ask before hitting “Publish”. Most of the advice is common sense, but it is still very worthwhile to give the article a quick review. Then stop putting it off, and update your blog already.

You knew I couldn’t possibly have a post without mentioning Lifehacker, right? Here is a great article on the Top 10 Clever Google Voice Tricks. As anyone can now get a Google Voice account, this article is particularly timely and has the usual great Lifehacker advice and tips.

For all my fellow West Coasters who are interested in technology, you’ll be pleased to note that registration is open for Internet Librarian 2010 to be held October 25-27 in Monterey, California. I’m hoping to make it this year (I missed last year’s conference). I was excited to see an entire track dedicated to mobile services in the advanced program. And come on people, it’s Monterey, in October and that’s as close to perfection on the coast as you’re ever going to get. (But I’m of course hoping to go for the professional development.)

Productivity tips of the day: How to Stay Organized when Life Throws You a Curveball. Great piece on organization that I think everyone will find handy–either now or in the future.

Now on to the summer relaxation fun! I love this article on Low or No Heat Meals Ideas for Easy Summer Cooking. Now in the Bay Area we can’t really complain about cooking in the summer because the weather is pretty mild, but I know for everyone living in the Central Valley, on the East Coast, and just about everywhere else, doesn’t want to cook and these ideas are perfect. (I can say from experience that I hardly touched the oven for cooking in the summer when I lived in Boston.) If you need more ideas and recipes, take a jump over to Joy the Baker who has tons of fabulous recipes (some not requiring an oven, but a lot do because, come on people, she’s a baker) including this recipe for frozen Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Balls. All I can say is “yum!”

I love vacations, don’t you? I love unplugging, unwinding, and generally relaxing (and contrary to popular belief, I don’t feel guilty about taking vacations). If you need some convincing to take your allotted vacation time, read this Psychology Today article on the Importance of Vacations. Seriously, take your vacation and not only will your body and mind thank you, all your colleagues will too.

So go forth and relax! I on the other hand need to get back to work scheduling the fall term’s information literacy classes, writing up some papers for a meeting in August, and finishing a grant proposal. Enjoy the holiday weekend for those of you in the United States, read a lot, relax outside (with sunblock and a nice floppy hat on, naturally), and the Waki Librarian will be back soon with more technology and library fun.

More random stuff for ALA, etc.

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! Oh, my goodness am I ever ready for the weekend. And yes, I know that ALA isn’t for another two weeks or so, but I thought for those of you who like to plan ahead might find some of this week’s random stuff helpful. Plus, I’m leaving on vacation prior to ALA fun and might not post anything next week except lovely photographs from my trip because I am looking forward to being mostly unplugged for a week. So, allons-y! (let’s go) as the good Doctor would say (sorry, had to include that again as I’ve finally managed to persuade one of the interns that his life truly wouldn’t be complete until he’s watched the new Doctor Who).

Before delving into some of the really interesting, and or fun, stuff that may (or may not) be useful for your ALA trip, I had to share this wonderful post Intimidation that Hanna [link is to her awesome blog] sent to me. This is a fantastic post that sums up how I feel when people say I’m “intimidating.” I especially like this bit, “as a shy woman who stands all of 5’3″, I can’t say that I see myself as especially terrifying.” But then again, apparently Hanna and I were considered intimidating once people had a history seminar with us. There is a definite power dynamic in the instructor/student relationship no matter how much we try to smooth out the hierarchy so that we are all learning and teaching together which, along with shyness (that can be perceived as aloofness or intimidation), probably leads to the “scary” instructor effect.

Just goes to show that instructors can be misperceived as often as their students and really, in the end, we are all just people. And this may help you at ALA in all those receptions and mixers–just remember shy doesn’t equal antisocial. So just come over and say hi. Though perhaps, just so people don’t have to guess where you stand on the whole “social interaction thing,” you might want to get this shirt from xkcd.

I love traveling (well, actually I don’t like flying very much but I like how traveling is the means to the end which is seeing new places and meeting people). But sometimes those transatlantic and flights from California to the East Coast get really long and boring. So to the rescue, why don’t you check out one of the Top 10 Difficult Literary Works from your local library to ponder on the flight? Found via ALA Direct, it is lovely for the sheer hilarity of the descriptions of some of works. As soon as I told my office mate about it, he immediately asked if Tolkien’s The Similarion was on the list–it’s not, but I bet some of the books you were required to read in your studies are on the list. So what do you think is the most difficult literary work to slog through?

Here’s another great post from Lifehacker that will help you make the photographs you take at ALA really shine: Top 10 photo fixing and image editing tricks. Come on, you know you’ll take photographs at ALA, so why not take the time to take/make great photographs?

Oh, and while your at ALA, if you need to hook into a meeting happening back at your workplace, check out the Lifehacker guide to the Five best web-based conferencing tools and find something that will work nicely. I’m hoping to try out a couple of the free ones at my library for our meetings because we always have at least one librarian at another physical location during meeting times. Still, I’m just waiting for the holographic projections, or really good virtual reality, to make meetings more fun (and productive, of course).

This is amazing: locals and tourists flickr set helps you avoid tourists on vacation, find local favorites. What a cool use creation and use of data pulled from flickr images. Alas, it appears that just about everywhere in DC where ALA events are happening is tourist-central. It would be nifty to create a similar type map using data from all the photos by librarians attending ALA. Just a thought.

Finally, something fun to end another Friday post, a clip explaining the Friendship Algorithm (thanks to Hanna from the great idea of having Friday posts include videos and to my sister for basically forcing me to watch this show). It’s fantastic, nerdy fun.

Have a lovely weekend, read a lot, and the Waki Librarian will be blogging about the actual ALA Conference very soon.

Some ALA Fun

/ dwakimoto / 2 Comments

Happy Friday! Is it just me, or has it seemed like a really long week? I’m so glad that it is Friday and that the weekend starts very, very soon. But before the day closes, I wanted to share a bit of library fun that really does relate to ALA Annual.

First, I want to share this wonderful post by Mary (who just happens to be a Nerdfighter, future librarian, and daughter of the rockin’ librarian Nancy): Why ALA is going to be awesome. I am super excited that people, like Mary, with this much enthusiasm want to join our profession. Our levels of awesome will only increase with the inclusion of more Nerdfighters in the librarian ranks. (And if that made no sense to you, well, you need to become a Nerdfighter and watch the Vlogbrothers and it will.)

Also, Mary did the “Hi, Hank” introduction at ALA 2008 in Anaheim (note the Nerdfighter t-shirt). So if you just can’t wait for ALA Annual at the end of the month, get your quick fix here:

While we are on the subject of conferences, we might as well talk about how much the excitement and all can wreck havoc with a person’s sleep schedule. In order to get back on track before (or after) the conference, check out the Lifehacker guide on how to reboot your sleep cycle. [Even if you have no issues with your sleep habits, check it out for the adorable photo of the cat.]

While on vacation or being a tourist at a conference this summer, you will probably want to talk photographs of your adventures. And, if you are like me, when you are photographing a monument, you like not having people messing up the shot. But we all know that is difficult to do in high tourist season. (I once spent 15 minutes waiting for people to move out of the way so I could photograph Leeds Castle.) But now with digital photograph and a little Photoshop magic you don’t have to wait for people to move. Check out how from Shutterstock.

Also, on the tech front, check out the Lifehacker Pack 2010 for a downloadable software bundle of the programs Lifehacker has found to be essential for Windows. Never hurts to just check out the article to see if there is some bit of software that you’ve not heard of yet.

And to end, this fun video by one of our local Bay Area bands, Train. What can I say? This Friday simply needed people dancing around in chicken suits to a happy tune.

Have a fantastic weekend! Enjoy the weather, read outside in the sunshine, and I’ll be back next week with more library and technology fun.

Thank you!

/ dwakimoto

Hi, all. Just a quick post to share a few fun things and say thank you.

Dragon Kite

Photograph of Dragon Kite

First, the above photograph from the Art & Wind Festival held in San Ramon over the weekend. [If you are interested, the above image is actually a mash-up of three photos I took; editing done in Photoshop, naturally.] It was a great festival, lots of wonderful kites, crafts, art, and great Taiko drumming. I hope your weekend was filled with at least that much fun.

On to the main reason for this post, a thank you to the person who nominated my blog for a Salem Library Press Blog Award. I still don’t know who you are, but thank you! The winners were just announced; you can see the list of winners here: Salem Library Press Blog Award Winners. There are a lot of wonderful blogs out there in the bibliosphere. While The Waki Librarian did not win, it did receive a gold star for being “of significant quality that [it] stood above the norm.” You can see a full list of academic library starred blogs here: Academic Library Blogs. I was very happy to get recognized and felt a little like a happy kid in grade school getting a gold star. It is very nice to be recognized so thanks again to whoever nominated this blog and thanks to everyone who reads it.

Finally, until Friday, I leave you with this absolutely wonderful comic from xkcd:
Geeks and Nerds Comic

Back Friday with more library and technology fun.

Friday Round-up of Tips, Help, and Advice

/ dwakimoto

Today is a round-up of tips to browse through while you try to find motivation to make it through the Friday work day. I can’t believe we are coming into the last week in May, that it is still raining regularly where I live, and that ALA Annual is going to be happening in about a month. Where does the time go? In the interest of saving time, let’s get right to the productivity tips.

I think Lifehacker has some of the best summaries of productivity tips and hacks. Check out the Top 10 motivation boosters and procrastination killers. Great stuff, especially when it is Friday and all you can think about is the weekend.

Also, in the interest of productivity, check out the Top 10 ways to upgrade your morning routine. Personally, I’m a morning person (it has a lot to do with once working for a bakery and (unrelated) doing bird counts when you have to be up before the dawn chorus), but I know a lot of people aren’t and need a little motivation in the morning. Check out the tips and I’m sure you can have productive mornings, even if you don’t love them. I need a list of the “top ten ways to upgrade the middle of the afternoon when any sane person is taking a siesta”, but I digress.

Librarians, and savvy library users, already know that public libraries are great places to check for free passes to museums and events. However, a lot of people, probably the vast majority of people, don’t know about this great service. I was very excited to see this short piece on Lifehacker, no less, Check your local library for free museum, concert, and event tickets. I loved Boston Public Library had a great program, though I wonder about its viability given the massive budget issues it is now facing.

Finally, on the tip front, it is getting to be vacation time up here in the Northern Hemisphere so check out a savvy traveler’s guide to vacationing abroad. It completely makes me want to travel abroad this summer.

Oh, and some shameless self-promotion. For those of you dear readers who are going to ALA Annual, I will be speaking on Sunday, June 27th along with Megan Oakleaf from 1:30-3:30 in Room 146B at the Washington Convention Center. Our talk is titled, “Question, Find, Evaluate, Apply: Translating Evidence-Based Practice to Information Literacy Instruction.” Come by and say hi. We’d love a full house for our talk. Okay, shameless self-promotion is over, back to the Friday fun stuff.

And because, once again, xkcd did not fail to delight, we (almost) end with today’s comic strip:
Infrastructures comic strip by xkcd

My very good friend, Hanna, who writes the amazing …fly over me, evil angel… (extra bonus points if you know what song that’s from) has a custom/tradition/thing to have Friday blog posts sharing awesome YouTube videos. I think it’s lovely, and so completely riffing off of her (and giving you a nice, short break from all that productive work you are doing), we’ll end with this amazing video–seriously how do people do that with cards?

Have a lovely weekend (whatever the weather brings), read a lot (I happen to be enjoying Terry Pratchett’s Witches Abroad at the moment), and there will be more tips next week on The Waki Librarian.

Love/Hate Relationship with Technology

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! How amazing is it that we all survived another week?! This week has been insanely busy, yet productive, here at the library. I think it is finally sinking in with the campus population that we are coming up on the end of the spring term and it might be a good idea to actually start final projects.

Today I thought I’d post a few links and talk about our love/hate relationship with technology. I definitely have a love/hate relationship with computers, especially the ones at the library, with fax machines (nothing in the realm of clerical duties annoys me as much as using a fax machine–mainly because I almost always manage to load the document the wrong way), and photocopiers (the ones at the library time people out so quickly that double-sided photocopying is nigh impossible). I’m usually perfectly content and at easy with computers and online work, obviously since I’m a blogger and the online literacy librarian at my library. But some days I completely sympathize with people who want nothing to do with any of it. For example, last week I was ready to throw my computer out the window (provided I could find a window that actually opened) because I was trying to work with some videos from the archives that consistently crashed my video software and sometimes my entire computer. Other times, like when I’m making cool graphics for friends or finding out something new and shiny to use for class, I love computers. So without any more rambling on my part, on to the resources for this (hopefully) lovely Friday.

This is a wonderful read: I hate computers: Confessions of a sysadmin. Not only is it funny, but it also completely sums up how I feel about computers, and technology in general. They are tools; they are means to an end; they shouldn’t make me, or anyone else, feel stupid when they self-destruct.

If you’ve been keeping up with the hot technology news this week, you know that Facebook has been all over the news. If you didn’t know about the hullabaloo, check out Facebook’s gone rogue and a review of Facebook news and commentary to get up to speed. Then share the information with your friends, colleagues, and family and help them become informed about the privacy issues with using Facebook. Everyone should be able to make informed, uncomplicated decisions about what they want to share and what they don’t online and in first life (if you know jokes about Second Life, you’ll have gotten that joke. If not, don’t worry about it). In full disclosure, I was on Facebook for a few months and then killed my account because it just didn’t work for me. But to each, her own.

On things that are not a secret: it is no secret that I adore the Vlogbrothers. Their videos are funny, sweet, inspiring, and educational (sometimes not all at the same time). They, and Common Craft, explain concepts in ways that are understandable and entertaining to my students.

As this post is dedicated to love/hate relationships with technology, I thought that Hank Green’s video on Net Neutrality would be fantastic to share:

And finally, because I just think this Vlogbrothers’ video is so awesome (and I wish there had been a Nerdfighter community when I was in junior high/high school), we end with John Green’s advice video on dumb boyfriends, going to college, and more:

Have a wonderful rest of your day and fantastic weekend (filled with reading).

Productivity for Mother's Day

/ dwakimoto

Happy Friday! This is (once again) a quick break from focusing specifically on libraries and technology because it is Mother’s Day on Sunday. This probably means you have more important things to do than read a blog post (hopefully it involves making your mother something lovely for brunch). So without further ado, here is your abbreviated post that will leave you plenty of time to do all that last minute shopping or cooking.

Morning people have a lot going for them. They get up before most of the world therefore they get to start being productive earlier with less distractions. If you want to get more done in the mornings, check out Lifehacker’s post: ditch the morning drag by creating a new routine.

With all your new-found time, you can also check out this article from Lifehacker on HearNames.com. Anything to help me with pronouncing people’s names correctly is a good thing in my book.

Now that you are organized and have a couple of new tools in your pocket, check out Joy the Baker’s Mama’s Day Brunch Menu. Joy has one of the most fabulous baking blogs–I love the recipes and her writing. Seriously, check it out and surprise and delight your mother. (And if your mother happens to like chocolate, check out the recipe for old school fudge brownies with walnuts. Trust me, they are fantastic and you will not be disappointed.

So stop reading this post and go get ready for Mother’s Day, or enjoy the sunshine outside, or enjoy the sunshine while reading a book. Just have a lovely weekend and the Waki Librarian will be back next week with more technology and library fun.

John Green & David Levithan Book Event

/ dwakimoto / 1 Comment

I have this lovely post I am working on about learning foreign languages, creating better profile photographs and just having fun with technology and libraries. But we are going to have to put that on hold right now because I want to talk about last night’s book even with John Green and David Levithan, if I don’t I will spend the rest of the day annoying people at work with tales of the nerdfighter-tastic fun that was to be had at Books Inc. last night.

First a little background, John Green and David Levithan are both young adult authors. Not only our they young adult authors, but the happen to be New York Times best selling authors (trust me, go read their work if you haven’t already) and simply awesome people to boot. David wrote a book, you may have heard of it or the movie, Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist. John also happens to be one-half of the Vlogbrothers (the other half is his brother, Hank) and de facto leader of the world’s Nerdfighters. If you need a definition of Nerdfighters, please see the video below:

My very good friend, Monika, got me hooked on the Vlogbrothers’ videos (I even use them when I teach, but more on that later). I even have one of the rare John Green bobbleheads in my office. Like I’ve said before, I think it is great that young adults who feel nerdy and like no one else understands them now have a community to come to online and in person (not to mention help decrease world suck). [As an aside, Monika works at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and trained the birds for the new Hot Pink Flamingos exhibit (click the link to see a web cam of the exhibit). So if you go to see the exhibit and run into her, say hi and be nice; she might tell you some cool stuff about the birds.]

So anyway, there is this little book (totally joking, it debuted at number 3 on the NYT Best sellers list) that Green and Levithan wrote called Will Grayson, Will Grayson and they were in San Francisco last night to promote the book. It was a blast. There were a lot of Nerdfighters at the event:

Nerdfighter Crowd

Nerdfighter Crowd

Then came the screaming and photo snapping before the “dramatic reading” (which was amazing; there is already footage up on YouTube) and Q & A (yes, I know the photos are not the best quality, but in my defense, neither is my digital camera):

David and John

David and John

Then there was the book signing. I have to give massive props to the people working at Books Inc. because they were pros at moving the line along at a reasonable pace. John and David were lovely about signing as many of their books as people wanted. I managed to tell John that I am a librarian and use Vlogbrothers videos when I teach without tripping all over myself (aka becoming way too much of a fangirl), to which he replied that I was awesome and showing videos was the best evangelism for Nerdfighteria. 🙂 Photograph of the signed page below (because well, yes, I am a nerdy fangirl):

Signed Title Page

Signed Title Page

Now I really must go and get some more tea before teaching my first class of the day. As the Vlogbrothers would say, DFTBA (Don’t Forget To Be Awesome).

Libraries, Tech, and DIY

/ dwakimoto

Back to our regularly scheduled programming of libraries, technology and a bit of do-it-yourself fun. Apparently some people consider Spring Cleaning to be an antiquated ritual, but I find that there is something about spring that makes going on a cleaning spree seem like the greatest idea since we turned scrolls into codices.

Before delving into the DIY and technology, we must talk about conference season. Conference season is upon us and that means purchasing airfare (unless you have a teleporter, in which case we must talk). Before purchasing your tickets, check out Lifehacker’s Frequent Fliers Guide to Finding Cheap Airfare for some hints on saving money. Remember money saved on flights equals more money to buy books!

If spring cleaning isn’t your thing in the physical world but you are up to spring cleaning in the digital world, check out Lifehacker’s Top 10 Ways to Declutter your Digital Life 2010 Edition. Don’t procrastinate, declutter your digital life today. Great tips, many of which I am going to implement this spring.

Multiple people have alerted me to the latest developments with the Library of Congress and Twitter. If you’ve not heard, the Library of Congress will archive all public tweets which is an amazing feat and awesome dataset. I look forward to seeing what research comes from using the tweets.

I think this looks like a fun project: Digital Copier & DIY Book Scanning, but I’m with the people in comments who wouldn’t use it to scan an entire book (and we won’t even begin to talk about all the possible copyright issues). Still this might be a good device in a pinch, especially if you don’t have money for a scanner.

And, of course, to end we have this wonderful xkcd cartoon which relates beautiful to the first link about airplane flights.
cartoon of selecting airplane seat

Have a wonderful weekend, have some fun reading and enjoy the last days of National Library Week.

Clutter

/ dwakimoto

Do you accumulate clutter in your life? What about at your library? Just like we need to weed the collection at the library, sometimes we need to take a mindful, conscious look at the clutter in our lives and do some weeding too. We need to weed not only material clutter, but also mental clutter I think in order to be most effective in our work and have the space to think creatively. I find this especially important when I’m trying to create lesson plans, articles, or lectures. Today’s list of tips will help you decrease your clutter, find alternatives to Google (should you want them) and give you a fun video break.

How can you not like a blog called Unclutterer? This is a nice article: How much is enough. Some good tips about organizing and sorting through your stuff (and junk). The only caveat I have is that I don’t think one could ever have too many books. Of course one copy of each title may be more than enough.

Lifehacker never ceases to amaze me and if you are limiting the number of items in your house (see previous link) you may be interested in how to make your stuff last longer. This is a nice compendium of helpful articles and resources for getting the longest life possible out of everything from your clothes to your mp3 player. Helpful at home and good to share with the students in your library trying to stretch the life of their laptop batteries while cramming for final exams.

After you get done with all that organizing, you might want to take a break and check out Zenhabits’ article on Becoming Google free. Now I happen to be a fan of Google; I adore Chrome (best browser in my opinion) and Gmail (I was so excited when my university switched over to Gmail), but I can understand not wanting to have all your information stored with one company. I am waiting to hear an update on how it is working out for Leo before dropping Google’s applications.

Finally, when you need to take a break from organizing, watch this fantastic video; really, watch it to the end and enjoy.

Have a fantastic weekend. I hope your life becomes or continues to be uncluttered, that you take the time to read some books, relax, and come back next week for more tips and tech to apply in the library and in life.