Ramblings

Added more to my Bloglines RSS feeds. Now I can also keep updated on Alzheimer news. I am in a large research study called the WRAP program (Wisconsin Registry for Alzheimer's Prevention) at the Wisconsin Alzheimer's Institute: http://www.medsch.wisc.edu/wai/wrap/wrap.html As the adult child of a person diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease, I take a battery of tests every four years. It's a challenging test and the collective results are always very interesting.

I'm following three other members of the class, having discovered I can find their postings on my "dashboard" after registering as a follower. It's a convenient feature that I am appreciating.

I thought I had already completed 20 hours at my practicum after last Thursday, but discovered it must have been a senior moment. I'll finish the half-way point after this Thursday (10/22). I am learning a lot at the Meriter Medical Library. The time seems to go by so quickly. I'll add one picture of the library here. At some point, I'd like to add one of Robert's poems here.

I had a lot of fun planning the trip to British Columbia. Wish we could really go. . .

More this weekend -- "Things" 10, 11 and 12 coming up.

RSS Feeds

Well, would you look at that?! I knew about RSS feeds. I manage a biochemistry research lab. The researchers use RSS feeds to be notified of articles that pertain to their research. I didn't know what RSS stood for. How non-inquisitive is that? "Really Simple Syndication" sounds a little like "keep it simple stupid". And really, it is simple. I never really thought of having my own personal RSS feed. I had a great deal of fun setting up the Bloglines newsreader account. I added in news feeds, library feeds, my son and daughter-in-law's blog (wonderful grandchildren pictures), dictionary.com's word of the day (love it!), and a number of the Channel 3000 (Madison) feeds. And you know what-- this is going to help. My schedule is a bit overwhelming just now, and I have missed keeping up to date on some things because of it. It's pretty obvious that this great technology would be very helpful to the busy librarian, who has more than a personal need for keeping up to date on all sorts of things, especially library news. I almost feel like saying Whoo Hooo!

Practicum

Have I said how much I am enjoying my practicum at the Meriter Hospital Medical Library? Robert and Sharon have welcomed me and made me feel like I belong. Both Robert, the library director and Sharon, his assistant are very busy helping with literature searches, filling reference requests and being amazing customer service representatives. Robert has built a rapport with an amazing number of people in the entire hospital community. There are always people in the library and in the short two hours I am there on a day, several people will stop by with requests -- or just to chat for a few moments! The goal of the library is to fill requests as quickly as possible -- rarely does a reply not go out the same day. Meriter is part of free-share group that freely shares articles through Docline. Yesterday as I was finishing, Robert said, "just think, perhaps one of those articles will help save someone's life". I hadn't thought of it that way, but it did remind me that what we do as librarians is important!

#7 -- Something technology related

I'm usually a pretty private individual. I don't think Twitter would be a place for me personally. Because of it's apparent popularity, I do think that it probably would have value for the library. It would be great for the library to have "followers" and for those followers to be able to keep up with events at the library, great reads, etc -- in a cool, fun way. But, I was quite upset by the newspaper article this week detailing a woman's decision to Twitter about extremely personal events in her life. Is this where this type of technology invites us to go? I don't want to go there. I also have a question -- is there a difference between Twitter and Facebook?

That being said, I do feel that it is important for the librarians to know about as many things technology related as possible. I really appreciate this introduction to and exploration of available technologies. However, at the rate that they are being introduced, how will I keep up with them?

Flickr

Help. I can't help it. Reading about all these amazing (to me at least) technologies, I'm suffering from technology overload. I don't even have a digital camera. Once the children grew up, got digital cameras and started taking pictures, I simply let them take the pictures. I was introduced to "Webshots" years ago and used to download random photos for my computer's desktop. I joined Facebook last year and became "friends" with my children so that I could see the pictures of the grandkids they posted -- now my computer desktop picture changes often with new pictures of the grandkids. Someday when I get the chance, I'd like to make a trading card for each of them. I had heard of avatars in LIS 450. I'm afraid it boggled my mind a bit. However, I realized how they could be valuable on a library's website when I visited this site -- http://norfolknavyhomes.com -- highlighted on Sitepal. Good old Salty - helping Navy folks transition to Norfolk. I found this especially interesting since my youngest son graduated from the Naval Academy and then spent an additional six years in the Marines. I also have a daughter (in the picture with me) who is a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy. She's a Pharmacist, serving at Naval Hospital in Beaufort, NC.