23 Things, Week 9 #23!!!

Some of my favorite discoveries were blogs, Flickr, Gizmo and You Tube. This exercise reminds me how quick our world changes and we need to keep in touch with the latest advances or be lost to alot of new things and technology. The surprises in this journey are when I tell my kids about technology they know nothing about - the surprised looks on their faces are priceless. I love it! Mom knows something they don't know.

Some things were a little user unfriendly. I got through the work, but for a number of items I don't really have a good understanding of what it was and how it could be used. At least this exercise cracked the door into a world I knew nothing about in many instances. It would have been great to have links, maybe on our intranet home page that could have gotten us to some of the basic sites that we used over and over. The lay-out was somewhat cumbersome - rather than going to 23 things and then finding 3 or 4 items to do under each of the 23 things, it would have been easier to list everything in one spot and calling it 100 things to do. There was alot of going back and forth to sites over and over.

Concerning another discovery program I would have to see what it was about and how much time it involved. I would rather see shorter projects and more mentoring. The younger staff have such a technological knowledge and ease of trying new things that many of the older staff grapple with.

I would call this experience interesting.

Murphy, you have been a very good boy to listen to all these ramblings about 23 Things!

23 Things, Week 9 #22

I went on Project Gutenberg and located "Poems Every Child Should Know" by Mary Burt and found that it was human read and there were many options for downloading. A number of formats were offered including; Ogg Vorbis Audio, AppleItunes, MP3 Audio and Speex Audio.

Now even Murf can "read" a book!

23 Things Week 9 #21

Podcast.net and Yahoo Podcasts are the two podcast directories that I looked at, but I found Yahoo much easier to navigate. I found church and sermon podcasts which were of interest to me since my husband is a Pastor. I also looked at food, fasion and family podcasts, as well as some music ones. I came across one called Firefly and it had nice violin music (I'm a violinist) so I clicked on that while I was reading the directions of how to add an RSS feed for my Bloglines account. Another co-worker helped me with the process when I got stuck. Firefly is now on my Bloglines and I only pray it is a good site, as I never got to listen to the speaking...

Murphy it's not wise to connect with things you are not sure of....

4th of July 2007 - Mount Rushmore Singers

Sing A Long!

Racing baby

Racing Baby

23 Things Week 9 #20

I looked at several You Tube videos and really enjoyed them. I saw a great one of the 4 men of Mt. Rushmore singing on the 4th of July - it really had me applauding! The one I would like to post is of a preborn baby looking like he is racing a car - the sounds effects make it so funny. Since I am the mother of a OB/GYN who delivers lots of babies, this would be a special one for our family.

Music and babies are both favorites of Murphpy!

23 Things Week 8 #19

The tool I selected from the Web 2.0 Awards was the #1 Social Networking site of Facebook. While I recently joined Facebook, I am still a novice and I need to learn all that it can do and how I can best use it. I really could use some instruction for new users....to catch up with my friends and family who have added me to their Facebook.

Murphy would be a cute face on Facebook....

23 Things Week 8 #18

I am feeling out of my element here with spreadsheets, but they must be a wonderful tool to math folks. I did a little "Testing, one, two, three - Testing one, two, three" test document.

Ok, Murf this is a test...

23 Things Week 7 #17

I have created a link on the Favorite Blogs page. It took awhile as I could not find the world/chain icon. I am thinking that others were on at the same time and it prevented me from seeing that link, as all the sudden the tool bar changed and added that link....

I pestered several co-workers trying to find that world/chain link and then...blink... it appears as I'm sitting and looking at the computer.

Now I know how Murphy feels when he pesters me and I have no idea what he wants...

23 Things Week 7 #16

Interesting Wiki Things I found:
~ SJCPL - Under antiques I visited the Studebaker Museum
~ PB Wiki- Make a free wiki as easily as a peanut butter sandwhich
~ Book Lover's Wiki - Great for Book Reviews by staff and/or patrons
~ Lib Success Best Practices Wiki - Puts their info material manual on a wiki
~ Bull Run Wiki - Run by a library patron - found Blurb, where anyone can publish a book

What is a Wiki? A Wiki is basically a website anyone can edit - the most famous being Wikipedia. A Wiki is always changing and is a work in progress.

I already use a Wiki as a Pipeline correspondent and every other month imput my branch's news on our system's staff info and photos, similiar to a newspaper.

Running to play Wiki, I mean frisbee with Murf!

23 Things Week 6 #15

In the Away from the Iceberg's article by Rick Anderson of Universitity of Nevada, Reno Libraries, he wrote of 3 iceberg's libraries need to say away from:

1. The Just-In-Case Collection
2. Reliance on User Education
3. The "Come to Us" Model of Library Science

I can see where at NCC we have already begun to make some of the changes Mr. Anderson is addressing. Interfiling our reference materials and also allowing patrons to check out reference materials is an example of this. Having a "roving librarian" like we started last year is skiriting around another iceberg he mentions.

Like Murphy, Librarians must keep moving.

23 Things Week 6 #14

Technorati has an amazing amount of information and it is overwhelming, but I did find it easier to use than Del.icio.us.The top favorited blog was Boing, Boing (2,323), the top search was You Tube and the top blog was Engadget (30,364). It was interesting how these lists varied.

Murf, I should video you and put you on You Tube - your meeting with a much larger dog on Fri night would have been very funny.

23 Things Week 6 #13

ERROR: www.library2.0.ottergroup.com is temporarily unavailable or does not exist. Please check the address and try again.

I have tried several times over the last few hours to view the 12 minute Del.icio.us tutorial and keep getting the red message above. I'm going to move on.

I looked at the PLCMCL2 account and appreciated the presentation of the Charlotte Mecklenburg County entitled "My Space for Parents", which was a library program about the dangers and proper use of My Space. You may want to check it out: http://youthtech.wordpress.com/20006/10/15/myspace-for-parents-pt-21

I looked on bookmarks and also saw the comments others had added about the bookmarks. It was interesting to read the comments. I see there is potential for this research tool, but for myself I think that bookmarks you can access from anywhere are easier.

For short time I had a Del.icio.us account to explore and experience, but then I deleted it for now.

Yes, Murf you are not the only one who makes "errors"...

23 Things Week 5 #12

I enjoy news, so Rollo gives me a way to get to a number of News Sources. Here is my search roll: http://rollyo.com/mwenzel/. For librarians, having a list of their favorite websites could be very helpful. No Murf, Rollyo is not is not a new kind of Frisbee!

23 Things Week 5 #11

I cataloged some of my favorite books in Library Things. A year and a half ago I meet author Karen Kingsbury and had breakfast with her while visiting in Alabama. I cataloged one of her recent books and that book was mentioned this week in Publisher's Weekly below:

Kingsbury Takes Top Honors in Christian Publishing
By Lynn Garrett -- Publishers Weekly, 7/11/2007 7:34:00 AM
Bestselling novelist Karen Kingsbury took top honors from two key associations at the International Christian Retail Show this week in Atlanta. The Evangelical Christian Publishers Association (ECPA) presented its 2007 Christian Book of the Year award to Kingsbury’s Ever After (Zondervan)—the first woman and the first novel ever to receive this honor. Kingsbury, who accepted the award in person on Monday night, has more than six million books in print, selling two million in the last year alone. Kingsbury was also named Author of the Year by the Association of Logos Bookstores at its awards banquet on Sunday.

Karen would love Murf!

23 Things Week 5 #10

I made this on an online image generator called LOLCat builder. Murphy is a ball of fluff and can easily pass for a suffed toy in many pictures.

23 Things Week 4 #9

I subscribed to Merlin and I explored some search tools. I did not enjoy some of the sites I came upon and the pictures and text that were displayed. I appreciate the good things, but I am glad Murphy can't see the bad. If it's not good for Murf, then it's really not good for me. It reminds me of a Sunday School song I learned as a child - "Be Careful Little Eyes What You See" - a wise idea for "big eyes" too...

23 Things Week 4 #8

Murphy will be expecting food, when he hears me talking about RSS feeds. He will come running thinking he is getting something new to eat. He will be disappointed to learn that RSS is Really Simple Syndication and has nothing to do with eating. I will tell him that I have lots of feeds on my new blogline, but he will still be very forlorn. He comes racing if he even hears the crackling of the wrapper on a slice of cheese. He won't care how pretty Lynn's pictures are if there is nothing to eat! Sorry Murf! Others can check out my feeds..... http://www.bloglines.com/myblogs

23 Things Week 3 #7

A co-worker introduced me to gizmoz.com and I made a funny card for my new son-in-law who had to go to ER for a terrible migrane. Murphy is still adjusting to loosing the love of his life to "Snugglebunny".

gizmoz

Express Yourself with Gizmoz Video Clips

23 Things Week 3 #6

My creation,
originally uploaded by mrmurfsmom.

Check out the Murphy's Trading Card

23 Things Week 3 #5

murphy,
originally uploaded by mrmurfsmom.

Here's a picture of Murphy as a new puppy. It was fun looking at flickr and seeing that I could make a stamp, movie poster or calendar out of pictures of Murf.

Week 2, Set Up Your Blog

The hardest part of setting up the Blog was choosing the names!

I hope we get through this Murf!

Week 1, Thing 2: Pointers from Lifelong Learners

Of the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits:
- My hardest would be #3 - "View problems as challenges"
- My easiest would be #7 - "Teach and mentor others"


Thanks Murphy!

Week 1, Thing 1: About This Program

May 15, 2007 In the Beginning of 23 Things...

My opinion of #1 of the 23 things:
- Neat!
- I think I will really enjoy learning these new things
- Excited to help my patrons (and catch-up with my kids!)

Murf would be proud!