September 2006 Archives

The Decency Wars: The Campaign to Cleanse American Culture

This book came out last month, I saw a review of it in one of the library catalogs we get and I ordered it immediately. I was so excited to get it that I dropped everything else I was reading just to read this.

I loved it too! From the jacket cover:

In The Decency Wars, First Amendment specialist Frederick S. Lane examines America's changing attitudes toward decency and the politics of decency. He takes a strong and unequivocal position that it is inappropriate and dangerous for the government to try to regulate morality. He accuses religous conservaties of starting "decency wars" for motives no more noble than profict and political gain.

So this book was so up my alley, it was hard to resist. The content ranged from historical to current, I learned so much about the history of these "decency wars" that I did not know, and I was refreshed on the incidents I was well aware of. For instance, I had no clue that the Puritan religious culture of our country can actually be traced back to Henry VIII! And in regards to the religous conservatives, who were a just target in this book, I'm generally pretty open and understanding in regards to people's convictions, but I tend to not tolerate people who force their ideals onto me...for this my respect is low for anybody who tries. I don't sympathize with the relgious conservatives, I don't get political on my blog much anymore, but I think these people are destroying our culture, and thank goodness this book exists to prove it!

When I first started reading this book, my husband noted that the thing he doesn't like about non-fiction books is that they often expose a problem, but not the solution. I read non-fiction a lot, this doesn't bother me, but he is a little bit correct. This is exactly why I was happy that this book devoted the last chapter to a solution for fighting this particular problem. The bullets weren't a stretch to the things I already believe or already do, but what they did do was make me realize that there's more I need to do (without feeling like I wasn't already doing enough).

I grabbed another book catalog from the mail the other day and noticed that attacking the religous right seems to be the new favorite thing with a few of these upcoming books. All I have to say is good, because I'm sick and tired of the way they've constantly attacked other groups on their radio and tv shows, even to the point of threatening the lives of other people who even oppose them just a little bit...if this isn't decent then I don't know what is?! I may read a few of these new books, but I don't know. I like to balance out the amount of political books I read, sometimes all of the yelling and screaming from both sides tends to wear me out and I need to take a break for awhile.

Technorati : book, censorship, decency, first amendment, frederick lane, frederick s lane, the decency wars

I was reading my textbook, of all things, today and I found a quote that I wanted to share.

We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it - and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove lid again - and this is well; but also she will not sit down on a cold one any more.

- Mark Twain

Alex and I spent Saturday evening and yesterday at "The Lake", my mom's place in Indiana. I had a good time but I missed most of the party on Saturday because I had to work 'til 5 and it takes roughly 2 hours to drive there after I got home. My mom had a "Chili Party" and they watched the Ohio State game. Well it was mostly an OSU party, but there are a few Michigan, Wisconsin, and Notre Dame fans around the place so it was really just a football party.

By the time Alex and I got there, most everybody was pretty blitzed, Saturday was a still a blast though. I don't think I've laughed so hard in my life as my mom and Doug were talking about this "true redneck" they met at the bar the night before. Oh my gosh, was that hilarious, especially Doug's impressions...

My mom, despite the fact that she couldn't remember much of the night before, promised to wake up and make us breakfast/brunch, and by golly she did! She was thrilled because not only could Alex and I make it but so did my brother and my sister with her son. It's not too often she can get all of us up at The Lake at once.

What I found the most amusing, though, was the presentation of my belated birthday presents on Sunday morning. My mom usually gets me an item of OSU clothing...this year she went on a shopping spree. My new OSU clothing consisted of a nice long sleeved t-shirt, a sweatshirt, some lounge around pants (which I did desparately need), a hat, and a sweatshirt. My brother then presented me with his gift which was a nice OSU zippered sweatshirt/jacket type thing. Now keeping in mind I live in Ann Arbor, much of my OSU clothing does not get worn in public around here. I usually end up taking it to The Lake when I visit, like this weekend, in addition to the new clothes I got I also brought an OSU sweatshirt of my own, and a long sleeved t-shirt that I got as a previous birthday present.

Yesterday I was decked out in my new clothing most of the day...good thing it was chilly outside because I had on about 7 layers of Ohio State. I spent most of the day outside by the fire...that's probably why my nose is stuffy and my cough is getting worse, but it was worth it :)

I wasn't ready for it to be Fall yet, but now I think I'm ready!

A little diversion...I was just going through some bookmarks, even though there's plenty of other stuff I should be doing right now. Anyway, from Terminally Incoherent, What does your browser reveal about you? I think this may even be updated from when I first saw it too.

What does my browser say about me?

Well, it depends, I was using Firefox Beta 2.0 for awhile, I downgraded because I'm was having problems with it on some sites. Right now I'm using Firefox 1.5.0.7 but I'm still having problems with it...but like the blog posts says, "You really don't care if FF is faster, or safer than IE - you would use it even if it performed 10 times worse." This is quite true.

I used Flock sometimes, currently it's uninstalled. Sometimes I'm compelled to reinstall it, but then I usually uninstall it again. The thing about Flock is that it does have some cool integration in it and I would love to be able to use it exclusively but I just can't...and I hardly want 3 browsers on my computer (I have to keep IE, as much as I hate to.)

Tags: browsers, firefix, flock, ie, internet explorer

I have had a folder of bookmarks that I've wanted to blog about but I have been too busy to blog...until tonight...I just don't feel like doing much of anything else at the moment. Included in this folder was an article that I read a few weeks ago called, Librarians at the Gates. I think it is an appropriate article to share, especially considering that Banned Books Week begins in only a few days.

Courage, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. And in an era of increasing controls on the gathering and dissemination of information, many Americans are unaware of the courageous stands librarians take every day.

The day-to-day challenges librarians face are inherent in the job description: defending access to controversial or banned books, staving off budget cuts, and creating and expanding programs to draw more citizens into one of the few remaining genuinely public commons in American life. While the ethic of secrecy often prevails in the gathering and dissemination of corporate and governmental information, the work of a librarian is imbued with just the opposite. Be it in the capacity of archivist, reference librarian or information technology professional, a common thread is the profession's dogged commitment to safeguarding books, research and information to make knowledge more widespread, not less.

There are actually a lot of reasons why I love doing what I do, but if you were to ask me why librarians are so important to have in our society, it would certainly be for the reason above. I get to read, play with computers, talk to lots of people, and I have fun, but the thing that gives me the most pride in what I do is making sure that nobody is left without access to the information they need or want.

The issues of free speech and privacy have always been important to me, even before I knew I wanted to be a librarian or that it was even important to librarians. Ever since I can remember (which was about 8th grade), I spoke out against censorship in school, on just about every research paper I wrote through high school and college, and I never stopped speaking out against it. Now I'm older, wiser (maybe), and definitely more educated, and I still think it's the most important right we have and it's the most important thing about my job and what I do...that other stuff makes my job fun, but protecting everybody's freedom to information is what gives my job purpose.

Tags: library, libraries, intellectual freedom, banned books week, privacy, free speech, first amendment

Wikipedia has the neatest citation tool. Going first to the main citation page, you can type in the page in the search box that you would like to cite. I typed in one of my encyclopedia reference topics to try it out. First wikipedia gives you a great disclaimer (that most people probably won't read):

IMPORTANT NOTE: Most educators and professionals do not consider it appropriate to use tertiary sources such as encyclopedias as a sole source for any information — citing an encyclopedia as an important reference in footnotes or bibiliographies may result in censure or a failing grade. Wikipedia articles should be used for background information, as a reference for correct terminology and search terms, and as a starting point for further research.

As with any community-built reference, there is a possibility for error in Wikipedia's content — please check your facts against multiple sources and read our disclaimers for more information.

Next you get bibliographic details about the page; page name, author (wikipedia contributors), publisher (wikipedia of course), date of last revision, date retrieved, permalink, a link to view primary contributors to the page, and page version ID.

In addition there are citation examples for just about every different style manual you can image (APA and MLA included of course). I love it!

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

I finally finished this book today. I guess according to my All Consuming account, I started it six weeks ago...that sounds about right. It seems like I have about a million books going on right now and this one got buried on my desk until today. I know this isn't a new book but we got a brand new copy at the library and I decided to finally read it. It was a bit of a life changing book for me, not complete life changing, but I have seen enough progress with the advice in this book to know that it absolutely works.

When I first got the book I devoted an entire weekend to going through my crap to start the organization process. Well, six weeks later most of what I started then is still in place! I started an inbox not just for stuff at home, but I've applied the same principles to work and school things. My email situation has improved tremendously. I went from having over 400 messages in my inbox, about half of them unread to currently 23 and only 3 unread. I've also managed to get the amount of junk mail and paper crap hanging around my apartment in various places to reside mostly in one organized mail section of the apartment. This has helped keep the sanity in our home...we can actually eat at our dining table now!!!

I do recommend this book to anybody who needs a little help and motivation in organizing your life, not just paper clutter (if you're like me), but all the little projects you need to get done. It changes the way you think about what you have to do and you end up being surprised at how much time you really do have to get things done (it's probably more than you think!)

Of course I love GTD tools and hacks, here's a few things that have helped me:

GMail of course, but there's a couple of things you can add to GMail to make life and email easier:

GMail + Firefox + Greasemonkey Extension + GMail Saved Searches Script

This awesome Greasemonkey script adds "virtual folders" to the sidebar of your GMail. This script has helped me organize my email so much that if I'm checking my email on a computer where I don't have it installed, my mail will start to pile up because I only read what's important. When I finally do sit down to take care of the email, it only takes me a matter of minutes to get back down to zero unread again.

I also have a very specific way of attending to my GMail through labels, I do take the time to set up filters to auto label most everything that comes in my inbox. I've found that initially taking the time to do this has saved me a lot of hassle down the road...I do have a lot of labels on my GMail though...for me it's worth it.

There is also a GTD script for GMail, I have it installed but I know I haven't used it to its full advantage. I already had a decent system going with the Saved Searches script to it might be a little too much for me, but maybe helpful for other people.

My other new favorite tool is Hiveminder. For a to do list, this one rocks! I've used a lot of pretty decent ones too, but what I love about Hiveminder is the ability to review and hide tasks (it is built on GTD principles). I usually find that when I start having a mental block of what I should be doing next, going through a using Hiveminder in addition to applying some of the strategies in GTD actually puts me back on track again.

I use Google Calendar now, but another great calendar is 30Boxes. It was hard switching from 30Boxes, but Google Calendar is cool and it integrates right with GMail.

Online tools are nice, but the best thing I did for myself was really just create a space more condusive to getting things done. My clutter is actually minized to a few small piles of manageble things. I utlize the file cabinet I have sitting next to my desk (after I cleaned it out and created file folders for projects), and I put everything where it needs to go now...that is once I actually made sure everything I wanted to keep had a home! I even created a To Go System where all of my work and school projects would also stay organized. Six weeks is a long time for me to keep up any system, so it has worked!

Technorati : 30boxes, all consuming, david allen, firefox, getting things done, gmail saved searches, google calendar, greasemonkey, gtd, hiveminder, virtual folders

Alex told me about this whole "Ladies Bible Study" mail storm that was going on at Michigan some time last week. He told me this morning that somebody made a wikipedia page on it. I just checked it out, it's great (and informative for those of us who weren't a part of it). Here's what it's all about though:

"Ladies Bible Study- tonight!" was a 'mail storm' that was created on September 11, 2006 and has still not abated. The original message was sent by a student in Sociology to almost every student organization email list at the University of Michigan.

The original spam message had started several parallel threads: hate mail, comical parody, debate on first amendment rights, science vs. humanities, and even entrepreneurship.

I love the t-shirt somebody created and put on CafePress.

Tags: spam, mail storm, university of michigan, ladies bible study

I had an interesting experience with Plazes the other day while I was at Michigan. I've had the software installed on my computer for some time now, I haven't done much with it either. I was going to integrate the badge in my blog but it's way too big to do anything with right now. I also have one contact on my Plazes, Ed Vielmetti, whom I knew was thrilled about the software based on some of his past blog posts and a few comments.

Anyway, it was Ed who contacted me when I was sitting in the graduate library at Michigan on Thursday. At about 11:30 he sent me an IM (noticing I was in the grad library from my Plazes account) and mentioned that he usually meets a group of people regularly for lunch on Thursday and invited me to join them. I knew I was at Michigan for the long haul that day so I told him that sounded like fun! Plus I was already planning on going to AADL which is a few blocks away from the restaurant.

The lunch was fun, I met some interesting people, and more importantly, I didn't spend the whole day with my nose stuck in encyclopedias...

I was really interested in the planned spontaneity of the whole thing though. The fact that I was in the right place at the right time, and with the right tools I was able to have the experience. It is another testimonial to how technology doesn't just shape our online lives anymore, it is also giving us richer experiences offline too.

Since I only have one Plazes contact I do invite anybody who reads this blog to add me as a contact if they want. You can visit my profile to see where I've already been.

Tags: plazes, ann arbor, michigan, umich, university of michigan

I went to work/school with Alex today. I want to spend the day at the library working on my assignment but I thought it might be easier for me to just go with Alex...save on parking, save a tree, whatever. So right now I'm sitting in the graduate library reference room at the University of Michigan and let me tell you this room is enough to make any reference student needing to do an encyclopedia project salivate. The walls of the entire room are reference books and encyclopedias on just about every subject there is...

I have to choose one encyclopedia on each topic geared to children so I may take a walk down to the AADL main branch sometime today to see what's available in the children's room over there.

Tags: library, libraries, reference, resources, encyclopedia

Out of nowhere the sound started working again...I haven't got a sound from this thing in months and now it starts working?! Weird. Oh well, I have no faith that it will continue to work...

I realized today that I haven't been posting much in my blog...not unusual for me, but I have been pretty busy these last few weeks. I think once school settles in for me then I'll be back to business as usual.

So this is what I'm up to these days:

1. Work...when I'm not there I'm thinking about it. I just had my performance evaluation and I'm all hyped up on that. I got some great feedback on projects that we were considering doing or want to do and I've really been letting those things settle in my brain.

2. School...I have class today, my first class was last week. I'm taking Access to Information this semester which is really just the intro reference class. I had a small library visit project last week which will eventually lead up to a more major project at the end of the semester. This last project will require me to spend a lot of time observing the reference desk at two libraries...this will consume a lot of my precious free time. Today I'm meeting with my advisor to square away the rest of my classes at WSU...I'm pretty excited because I think I'm going to enjoy most of these classes. Next class project though is the encyclopedia assignment...which requires me to compare a variety of online and print encyclopedias. I think I'll be going to UMich's library on Thursday to complete this one.

3. Orchestra...the work I'm doing with the orchestra right now is actually frustrating me some and I wish not to speak about it at this time.

4. My Computer...I took it in on Thursday to see what was up. After they ran the diagnostics they found that the sound card is shot. By the way, the people at the computer place I went to were super nice! I like these guys a lot. Anyway, my computer is still not fixed, I decided on getting an external sound card (cost of replacement reasons mostly) and when they went to order it they said that it was on back order at all the major vendors they use...even the internet places had them on back order. I suggested that maybe everybody who owns my computer needs new sound cards about now :) Anyway, I have my computer back and they'll let me know when a new sound cars comes in...in the meantime I have to use Alex's computer if I need to watch any videos for school or anything like that. The guy at the computer place did fix some 600 registry errors on my computer though and he also mentioned that there is a power management issue with it but everything else is working excellently. The registry and power management errors don't surprise me much though. I try to take care of my computer the best I can but I have to admit it's mostly because I know I'm rough on it. My good friend jokes about my computer because it's huge...he calls it my "space heater" (can't complain it keeps my coffee warm in the morning), but the reason I went with this computer was because I tend to run a lot of memory intensive programs all at once. It's a good computer though, minus a few software issues I have with HP, I'm not dissatisfied with it. If I were to get a new computer I wouldn't mind a smaller, more portable one, but to be honest with you I think it would be hard for me to trade in the power of the one I have now.

That's all for now I suppose. I've been keeping a list of things I wanted to post about but I don't know when I'll be able to get to these. I haven't been reading my feeds much these days either, there's too much in my head and I don't really want to put any more in there right now.