It seems hard for me to believe that the 23 Things are over already.

Anyway, I think my favorite aspect was reading the blogs of my FRL partners-in-crime. I've really enjoyed that and I'm sad to see it end. One minor note of frustration along those lines, though, is: I can't view older blog entries, because if I try to click the link for 'older posts', I get the 'blocked by the library' speech. This is irritating, because I think I've missed peoples' entries and I want to read them!

My favorite site we've explored is goodreads, and it is definitely one of a number that I've taken away from this entire exercise and will use for a long time to come. Even though I was not a newbie to the land of blogs, YouTube, podcasts and the like, I can honestly say that I've learned many things throughout the past weeks, both from the exercises and from my fellow workmates. I've enjoyed that.

Would I participate again? Sure.

Before I go, in the interest of sharing fun things I've discovered recently, my new favorite is muxtape. It's like mixtape heaven for the online crowd! If you want to listen to my mixtape (or muxtape, whatever) go here.

Thing #22: NetLibrary

Because I'm nothing if not predictable, the first search I did was by author for ... *drum roll* ... Jane Austen. I was very happy to see her big six novels, all unabridged, all able to be downloaded. I think I'll download "Mansfield Park", as it's been a while since I've read it.

I started browsing around under Nonfiction, and was feeling like the selection wasn't the greatest, when I found Bob Dylan's "Chronicles: Volume One" which has been on my to-read list for ages now. Exciting! I added it to my 'favorites'. Speaking of, I like being able to add titles to my favorites to save for later.

I still feel like the selection is on the narrow side, though. Am I just being too picky about free audiobooks? Probably! I found the children's fiction to be especially sparse. On the other hand, there were a fair amount of mystery/suspense titles.

I think patrons would like this site but I really foresee problems with them not knowing how to download, or not knowing how to listen to their selections after downloading, or not knowing how to load them onto their mp3 player, etc.

Okay, so after typing all of the above, I decided to look around the 'help' section. Lo and behold, these books aren't compatible with iPods or Zunes. Oh well, I suppose I won't be listening to "Mansfield Park" or "Chronicles" en route to work after all...

Thing #21: The Pod People

Well, I feel a bit cheaty going into this exercise because I'm already a big fan of podcasts and have been using them for a while now. Right after I got my iPod, my first thought after dreading the tedium of transferring all of my music over to it, was: 'Yay! This American Life podcasts!' Fast forward to now and I'm still very much 'Yay, TAL podcasts!'
Yes, now I can cry in my car to the soothing sounds of Ira Glass' voice at any time I choose!
I don't have to wait until it comes on NPR to get snivelly & weepy!

I think I even added TAL podcasts to my RSS feeds thingy already when we were working on that exercise, so that's done.

I get mine directly from iTunes, personally, but I know that's not the best option for everyone. I'm pretty much a big NPR nerd, but this is especially evident in the podcasts I choose to subscribe to (in addition to TAL), 75% of which are from NPR. Some things don't translate well for me, though, as far as listening to podcasts versus reading books. I downloaded some organic gardening ones but I found that my mind kept drifting and I kept losing my place in what was being said. This is more of an ongoing issue I have with any audiobook, though.

I did peruse podcastalley.com and found some that I might have to try, like some under the 'Food and Drink' category. Instead of weeping in my car to Ira Glass, though, these might make my stomach growl too much...

Thing #20: YouTube

I've been a fan of YouTube for a while now, so it wasn't exactly a hardship to play around on that website!

First of all, a couple of fun things to share:

I love this recording of The Pogues doing one of my favorite, if not my very favorite, songs of theirs: 'Dirty Ol' Town'. This is obviously from back when Shane still had a few teeth left!


While I'm sharing music and music videos, here's one of my favorite videos ever, "Hoppípolla" (Icelandic for "jumping into puddles") by Sigur Rós. I just love the video -- and the song, of course. It's in Icelandic so don't try too hard to make out the lyrics, unless you happen to speak Icelandic, in which case feel free. :)



I found a lot of YouTube videos pertaining to libraries, quite a few of which were tours of various libraries. Most of them were pretty basic and rather dry, but this one made me laugh a little. It's pretty cheesy, but cute.



And now, for something completely different.
Monty Python meets librarians.



A few thoughts on YouTube: one of my biggest pet peeves with the site is the stupid comments left by people. Not all of the comments are asinine, but I'd say a good 90% are, and usually just irritate me. Therefore, I just skip 'em.

I do think there are a lot of fun things on YouTube, but also a lot of drivel and time wasters, of course. It's not a site that I personally spend a lot of time viewing. However, I can see some potential for libraries and FRL in particular -- library tours, upcoming programming, previous programs as advertisement, etc.

What's up, Docs?

Really, my blog is just a place for me to display how full of cringeworthy puns I am...

Thing #18: Google Docs
I think this is a pretty brilliant idea. I'm the queen of emailing myself pertinent documents, and this is cumbersome and leaves much margin for error and confusion. Google Docs my just solve some of my scatterbrained problems. I uploaded a Word document from my files here at work and found it easy to use. My only complaint is that Publisher documents are not supported and 95% of my stuff is in Publisher.

I had to laugh, though, when I was taking the tour and reading some of the ways other people use Docs in their business and personal lives (some great ideas!) when I got to the British fellow who created a shared spreadsheet grocery list with his wife, that they each could access from whatever computer they happened to be at. They also could each edit it, of course. Anyway, he described their grocery list, which was designed to print on one sheet of A4-size paper and with the items categorised in the same order as the layout at the local supermarket. This seemed a far cry from my customary grocery shopping experience: scribbled notes to myself on whatever scrap of paper is available at the time or my hand as notepad, frantically going in circles around the inside of the store forgetting which aisle everything was on, getting distracted by food I was suddenly craving, then noticing fifteen minutes later when I got home that I'd forgotten something crucial, like toilet paper or dark chocolate.
Maybe Google Docs is my shopping list dream come true, too?

How do I think it would be helpful for library and patrons?
Well, for patrons it seems like it would obviously be very appealing to be able to access documents from any computer, any time. No need to cart that pesky flash drive around with you! For staff, I admit it didn't seem quite as must-have to me ... but maybe I'm just overlooking some way it would make our lives easier, in the sense of working together, I mean. For myself, I think it may be a place to store my electronic timesheets, because then I could make changes any time without, again, having to do the juggling act of emailing it to myself because of folder restrictions on the network.

Thing #19
When I looked at the list of Web 2.0 winners, it seemed blindingly obvious what my choice would be. Etsy! I've been a huge Etsy fan for quite a while now -- in fact, the necklace I'm wearing to work today is one I bought from a crafter on that site. It's wonderful, it's fabulous, I can't say enough about the talented craftspeople on Etsy. There's even an option to shop local so you can support your local crafters! My only sadness is that they've removed a feature called 'Suggestions' that I used to love. It would take items or sellers you'd designated as 'Favorites' (great feature, by the way) and would suggest other items based on that. I don't know why it's gone, but gone it is.

Because I can't possibly pick just one, I have to give a brief mention to Pandora. You create personalized radio stations based on the musician(s) of your choice. I've discovered some new music this way, plus it's always interesting to see what artists they compare to ones I love. Sometimes I scratch my head at Pandora's choices, but it's still a site I frequent, usually if I'm at work working on projects and want something to listen to but have no cds with me.