RSS

RSS: another new term to learn!

New Tools! New Terminology! Social Networks! How are libraries going to stay ahead of the curve? Reference by text messaging or chatting! Reference customers in cyberspace instead of on the other side of the desk. Reader's Advisory by email. We'll have our presence on MySpace or YouTube.

I remember the first library where I worked in 1955. Way back in the middle of the twentieth century! There was a sign over the information desk that said "Reader's Advisory." I started out as a shelver (pages we were called then.) I also worked on the circulation desk where we checked out books manually by writing the patron's card number on the book card. We've come a long way, baby!!

All this to say I've set up my Google Reader and subscribed to six RSS feeds concerning libraries.

Persons You Do No Want to be Mad at You!

A customer came the library yesterday on crutches. When I asked what happened, she told me she had torn a ligament in her knee. "How did you do that?" I asked. "Cheer leading," she replied. "I thought that was a non-contact sport," I quipped.

That interaction made me think of the people in your life you don't want to be mad at you:

1. A restaurant employee or relative who is going to be alone with your food.
2. A health care professional who is participating in your care.
3. The person who is supporting you in a cheer leading pyramid.
4. Any sibling younger or older who is bigger than you.
5. A spouse or significant other who is devious.
6. A cop is writing you a ticket.

If anyone can think of any others, feel free to add to the list!

Stuart Macbride

One of my favorite things on the Internet is to visit author websites to see what their up to. One my favorites is Stuart Macbride.

http://www.stuartmacbride.com/en/ He is a Scot who writes police procedurals set in Aberdeen, Scotland (picture to the left). (Maybe I'm partial to him because he sets his books in my home town!) Anyway, he lives there with his wife (She who must be....) and their cat, Grendel. If you haven't seen the movie "Beowulf" or forgotten your English lit course, Grendel is the monster that Beowulf has to fight to save his people. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grendel So that you something about his kitty. He loves blog about Grendel and her prey. If you're cat lover you'll love his musing about his feline's behavior.

Other subjects dear to Macbride's heart are his wife's foibles, his writing, and his appearances as an author or people who irrate him.

If are a mystery fan and you haven't tried his books, Cold Granite is his first novel.

Learning Habits

Using technology has always been easy for me. I started using computers with a Mac in 1983. The library I worked for started using personal computers in the mid-eighties before the Internet was quite so ubiquitous. I was one two staff members exempted from training on word processing when supervisors were assigned personal computers. I later taught myself to program on DBase II+ to make my job serials librarian easier.

Viewing problems as challenges is the hardest for me to do. As I get older I would much rather find someone with the skills to solve the problem quickly than to take the time to do it myself, particularly if I don't have the skills myself. Maybe I'm getting lazier I get older. (Don't say anything, Faye!)