Bluma Pushing Sixty

Fall 2011 Walk along the Delaware

2011-12-26T11:32:00.001-08:00

Cody - June 2011

2011-06-07T08:06:00.000-07:00

Farewell to 2010

2010-12-28T10:57:00.000-08:00

We say good-bye to 2010 the same way we said hello - with snow!

Very simple photo editing and cropping

2010-08-16T07:20:00.000-07:00

Here we go again - Web Challenge.

I found Picnik is easy to use. My turtle is 80 x 150 so he should be suitable for Engaged Patron. I also edited a picture of the Jackson Friends' sculpture to fit on Engaged Patron. The last picture is a small butterfly bush with butterfly taken with my phone.

Blueberry Farm - More Health & Wellness

2010-06-27T13:45:00.000-07:00

It was a very hot morning at the blueberry farm but the blueberries were delicious. I was slightly annoyed when I stopped at Whole Foods on the way home and saw organic local blueberries for the same price I paid to pick them myself.

Health & Wellness

2010-05-26T06:28:00.000-07:00

Here it is the end of May already. I'm still working on maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

I took this picture yesterday morning when I was out walking before work. The honeysuckle really smelled wonderful, although probably not too good for allergies.

Our CSA farm has opened for the season. This is our 3rd week of picking strawberries. So far it looks like 2010 it will be a good year for the farm crops.

Winter 2009 -2010

2010-03-14T08:24:00.000-07:00

Winter is almost over. Just a few more days and Spring will be here. After all the snow from this winter I can't wait for the warm weather and flowers to appear.

Attached are a couple of pictures of my backyard in February 2010. I'm happy to say all that snow is now melted. The tulpenmanie photo is from the Philadelphia Flower Show.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Nineteen - Service & Spirituality

2009-11-05T12:51:00.000-08:00

I began by reading the Mayo Clinic article Spirituality and Stress Relief: Make the Connection. I thought about all the things it directed me to think about. That's all I have to say about that.

For Service I checked out the website Serve.gov and pulled up a list of places I can volunteer in my area. At work the staff voted (using Outlook voting tabs) on whether to Pay It Forward or do a Secret Santa for the holidays. It was a landslide victory for Pay It Forward. We are bringing in donations for a local animal shelter and also Harbor House.

Challenge #7 - Learning More About Outlook

2009-10-21T07:13:00.000-07:00

1. I took the class on Scheduling Meetings for Outlook 2003. I plan to use it when scheduling monthly meetings with my direct reports and also department heads meetings. I like the fact that you can see whether the attendees are busy at the time of the meeting. The next online class I'm going to take is on Managing Your Mailbox Size. I have an urgent need to slim down my email box.

2. My vote question was "Which technology event are you looking most forward to over the next few months at OCL?" With 24 responses in, the tally shows Good-bye Cybraryn in the lead with 11 votes followed closely by Increased Network Speed with 9 votes. Share point is far behind with 3 votes while Federated Search received only 1 vote.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Eighteen - Service

2009-10-21T06:55:00.000-07:00

I'm not interested in playing games or supplying my email to make a donation, although I am sure that it is great idea for those who do it. I prefer to pick my charities that I want to donate to for the year and send a check. I no longer use plastic or paper bags at the grocery store, choosing instead reusable bags. In fact I may be tending toward obsession in the number of reusable bags that I now have in the trunk of our cars.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Seventeen - Service & Spirituality

2009-10-01T15:39:00.000-07:00

With October being Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and being a survivor, I will be thinking pink for the month.
Since we participate in the Philadelphia walk which is on Mother's Day, we usually do not take part in the October walk at Great Adventure.
However, checking the Race for the Cure website for the Philly affiliate I found that you can do early registration for the May 2010 walk.
It is the 20th year for this particular race and it will be my 19th year as a survivor. So in honor of the 20th year I am going to register early and make a donation.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Sixteen - Last Fun Round-Up

2009-09-22T12:10:00.000-07:00

We had much fun hiking on the Delaware Canal. We saw turtles sunning themselves on a log, blue herons sitting on rocks and an egret coming in for a landing reflected in the water. Cody, the dog, managed to walk nearly 3 1/2 miles on his short little legs. The combination of walking in the wet grass and then on the crushed red stone path turned his short white legs into red ones. What a mess, especially after rolling around in the parking lot. He went directly from the car into the laundry tub for a bath when we got home.
The following day we took Cody with us to Community Pride Day. While he managed to go about 2 1/2 miles with the walk over and the walking around once there, the little guy just could not manage to walk all the way home. We had to take turns carrying him - which could be a good thing since it gave us a better workout.
I checked out The Happiness Project and decided this is something I might want to start thinking about with the goal of being there when I am ready to retire in a few years.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Fifteen - The Fun Continues...

2009-09-03T09:28:00.000-07:00

On the web I found the link for dog people and also Learn Something Every Day to be fun sites.

I am also looking forward to having some"fun" when I have time off next week.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Fourteen - More Fun Activities to Explore

2009-08-21T09:25:00.001-07:00

Ready for more fun I checked out Lifedev and found some great blogs to read. I really liked How to Stop Worrying About Every Little Project which was posted by Karl Staib of Work Happy Now. Any suggestion that could lead to sleeping better is interesting to me. I tried Guess-the-Google but since I'm not fond of guessing games this was not for me. With all the hot steamy weather I am not able to walk during the work day which makes for some stress. I guess I will try reading more of Lifedev instead and hope that some cooler dry weather will return before the end of summer.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Thirteen - Time for Some Fun

2009-08-07T06:56:00.000-07:00

Kathy Freston's suggestion to *Drive in your car and blast your favorite songs* brought a smile to my face. Not because I like to blast my favorite songs, because I do not. The smile is because my husband Fred loves to blast his favorite songs which hurts my ears and results in a less than fun discussion.

We belong to a CSA farm this year. Since Fred is retired he is the one who goes to the farm weekly to pick up our share. The share consists of items that are already picked and ready in the farm stand, and other items that he needs to pick himself from the fields such as herbs, flowers and some vegetables. Since I was home this week on our assigned pick up day I thought it would be fun to go with him (along with our son and his wife). We enjoyed seeing the fun the children were having picking flowers with their families.
This week the pick your own vegetable was okra. The picking of okra led to a funny result. Okra is one vegetable that I have refused to eat for 60 years. Knowing this Fred was happy that he would not have to pick it in the heat. However, my daughter-in-law thought it should be picked because okra is a good vegetable. The result was that we would pick it, but she would take it home with her. However, as they were leaving to go home, she told us that they would be back this weekend with samples of okra prepared three different ways for us to taste - that should be fun!

If you liked the link to Cake Wrecks you should watch Cake Boss on TLC. It follows cake artist Buddy Valastro (the cake boss) and his family of Carlo's Bake Shop in Hoboken. The cakes are amazing, but what goes into creating them is quite entertaining. On a recent show they dropped a completed cake down the stairs and had to recreate it in 90 minutes. On another episode they made a wedding cake that involved getting live doves for the finished product. It is on Mondays at 10 PM.

Challenge #6 - Optical Character Recognition

2009-07-27T10:16:00.000-07:00

I used the scanner component on my All-in-One Printer for this challenge. I chose Scan Document. Once it was scanned I was able to proofread it and make corrections.

When I scanned page 40, the OCL came through as GeL, 2007 appeared as 201, and the page number read page 40 of 412 instead of 42. After I made those corrections I was able to complete the letter in Microsoft Word and send it to the Challenge Gmail account.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Twelve - Moving Right Along

2009-07-27T10:06:00.000-07:00

With Round 12 I continue to exercise daily. This week I am working on increasing the speed of my morning walk. Next week I will then work on adding additional distance to the walk. I will also vary my walking routes to avoid boredom, using Spark People to map out my new routes. I am also starting to do some gardening and count that as part of my exercise.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Eleven - Keep Moving!

2009-07-14T11:55:00.000-07:00

Well, here we are again. Vacation is over and I'm back to work. One thing I noticed on vacation was that I didn't feel like sleeping late in the morning even though I could. On the morning that I did stay in bed later, I actually felt less ready to walk 4 miles than I normally am when I get up at 5 AM. I attribute this to the fact that over the past year I have been getting more exercise, going to bed earlier than in the past so I am able to get 7-8 hours of sleep every night and waking up ready to get my early morning exercise before work. And as noted in the Spark People article one of the benefits of physical activity is better sleep habits.

I also found the "Top 42 Exercise Hacks" blog on Zen Habits very interesting and entertaining. I find that I already do many of the 42 but found a few that I can add.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Ten - VACATION!

2009-06-25T17:33:00.000-07:00

This round is perfect timing for me. I am going to have a week off soon, but still need to make plans for activities. I read all of the articles for this round. Since this will be an "at home vacation" I'm going to look for some new places to hike close to home. Since they have recently finished working on the Delaware Canal in my area, I am going to hike the Canal in several different locations. I also discovered that the outside tables at Lambertville Station are dog friendly, even offering a water bowl for your dog while you enjoy your meal. I guess Cody will be hiking that part of the canal with us.

As you can see from the pictures above, Cody is already an experienced hiker!

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Nine - Exercise at Work

2009-06-11T14:31:00.000-07:00

I have visited the Office Diet blog and checked out desk exercises for office workers. In the future I will be reaching for the sky doing 60 second aerobics. I have a set of little weights to do curls in my office which I will be using soon. However, using the stairs for exercise, taking 2 at a time can be extremely painful if you fall, so I will pass on that tip. I find that one of the best things about my day at work is being able to take a quick walk outside during breaks and lunch. As you can see by the picture the Jackson Branch has some great places to walk just outside the building.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Eight - Exercise

2009-05-30T15:30:00.000-07:00

3. I love Sparkpeople.com. I like adding what I plan to eat for the day, getting my daily nutrition feedback report, and then I know whether I can add additional food during the day. I also find some of the articles have good information that I can save to my page. They recently added trivia questions that you can answer daily. I've been tracking my exercise for several months now. The main exercise I get is walking. I love to walk. However, that leads me to my next number, #5.

5. Just get moving - I was recently on vacation with my family on Bainbridge Island, Washington. We decided that for this trip we would not rent a car and walk everywhere on the Island. Lucky for us, the weather was beautiful. If I hadn't brought my pedometer, I never would have believed how much we walked every day. With all the short trips from the ferry to the hotel, to the condo, to the shopping center, to my Mom's apartment, to the town of Winslow and to Eagle Harbor we averaged 8-9 miles a day. This now leads me back to Sparkpeople.com.

7. Because I have been tracking my nutrition for many months now, I found it much easier to figure out what I could eat on vacation that was healthy and within my calorie limits, but also where I could apply the 90/10 Rule of Good Health.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round Seven - Stress Free Zones

2009-05-15T06:33:00.000-07:00

The link to the virtual bubble wrap is priceless. It is amazing how relaxing it is to pop them on the pc. Popping the bubble wrap and drinking a cup of tea - I'm feeling more relaxed already.

I also enjoyed the link for dog lovers. I emailed it home so the dog could actually hear the sounds.

Challenge #5 - Newspapers Online - Part One

2009-05-06T09:18:00.000-07:00

When I searched for an article about the Reagan Inauguration in January 1981 using the lead paragraph trick, and I put it in quotes I only got one result. When I removed the quotes and searched again I had 87 posts with 62 from the Washington Post.

I searched in America's Newspapers in all text under my father's name and Oklahoma. I discovered that he was in an automobile accident in December 1982 that I never knew about before. When I limited the search to the lead paragraph I had no results.

I also searched for an obituary using Newsbank. I searched first under the name and 2009 in American Obituaries and found it. I then searched in America's Newspapers in the Bucks County Courier Times and also found the obituary; however, I had to go through the entire obituary column for the day to find the correct one. When I searched for my father's obituary in American Obituaries I did not find it.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Rounds Five & Six

2009-04-27T06:23:00.001-07:00

(the pictures above show the new sculpture that has been added to the Friends' gazebo garden)

Round 5 - Workplace Stress

1 & 2. I read the New York Times article and mentioned it at a branch staff meeting. We also took the SELF-TEST on job stress. We then discussed work stress which was centered around Polaris training, coming up with suggestions on how to cope.

We also enjoyed breakfast at the meeting. H&W Challenge participants brought in healthy breakfast items for others to try.

3. Finally our H&W team leader, Ginnie, had us write down 15 small things that give us pleasure. We are going to take time to do one each day. Yesterday I tried a new recipe.

5. I signed up for the free ten-week ecourse on low-stress.

Round 6 - Stress Therapy

1. I had trouble with the sound on the art therapy video. I will try it again tomorrow. I've always loved making mosaic pictures but haven't done it in many years. I never thought of it as stress therapy before, but I'm definitely going to try working with mosaics again.

2.I found the video relaxation exercise very good. The voice was quite soothing. It appears to be the basic exercise that I have done in workshops previously.

3. I am starting a stress journal to look for patterns of stressors in my life. I hope that I learn something helpful with it. In the meantime I am looking forward to a low stress weekend!

Health & Wellness Challenge ! Round Four - Stress Management

2009-04-06T16:15:00.000-07:00

1. Quiz on stress level - I took the quiz. I have mild stress.

2. I enjoyed the slideshow of stress reducing foods. Since I have been eating many of them over the past few months, I'm wondering if that helped me to have mild stress instead of much stress?

3. Eliminate caffeine - I'm not ready to give up my green tea for a week, not to mention that it is supposed to be very healthy to drink green tea.

4. Sound - I do find that it is more relaxing not to have the television and radio turned on for background noise. It also saves on electricity.

5. News - I love my news. That is what gets me through my morning stint on the treadmill - and what else is on at 5 AM! I will have to be more selective later in the day.

6. I'm still working on relaxation technique. I find that putting on comfortable clothes, getting all snug under a throw and reading a good book works wonders. I am also trying meditation. For now it is a work in progress.

The picture on the top right of this blog is from my relaxing stress-free trip to Cape May last week.

Challenge #4 - Google and the first steps to becoming a Power User (Second Post)

2009-03-23T11:59:00.000-07:00

Everytime I start to write my second post for this challenge I decide to try one more thing. I just found posters for educators, printed one and headed down to Youth Services to share what I found. This led to a discussion of the features that I have been exploring with this challenge.

I dropped in at the Reference Desk earlier to share some of the things I have learned on Google. I'm happy to say that they already know most of the things I pointed out. One new thing that interested Reference was using Google to search just within the NJ state site. What a difference in results!

My final thought - I love the GoogleGuide cheatsheet. I hope I can remember everything I have learned with this challenge.

Health & Wellness Challenge ! Round Three - Final Conscious Eating

2009-03-19T13:53:00.000-07:00

1. It's nice to read that there might be a positive effect from all that tea I drink. However, I don't think that I will be able drink 12 cups of tea per day. I guess I will have to wait for the cream to come out. I wonder if it will be like the effect of caffeine on migraines - it can cause them, but it also can be used to cure them.

2. I checked out the BMI calculator with the aolhealth link given. I also checked it out on Spark People http://www.sparkpeople.com/resource/calculator_bmi.asp In the calculation from the aolhealth it required waist measurement, but it did not require it on the calculator on Spark People - yet the results were the same on both.

I like eating more vegetarian meals. I've decided to eat vegetarian on the night that I work, that way I can add a 3rd night per week. Tonight I tried Kashi Ranchero Beans which was okay, but I wouldn't eat it again unless I was really starving.

Challenge #4 - Google and the first steps to becoming a Power User (First Post)

2009-03-14T12:24:00.000-07:00

Just typing in the title makes me feel more powerful. I just read the article by David Pogue and found it interesting as well as helpful and have forwarded the link to a friend. When I checked About Google I got sidetracked by Google Health and had to enter my medications before moving on to the Google Blog.

My first post for this challenge is about a Google Blog post that I read. I searched for a blog under recipe. I was hungry at the time having just finished tracking some of my food for the day on Sparkpeople.com during my break, so it seemed like a good choice. The post that I chose had a recipe on it for a Triple silken pumpkin pie that had won a bake-off at the office and was advertised as the perfect holiday pie. The recipe did look delicious, however, I imagine that by the time I would substitute soy creamer for the heavy cream and soy sour cream for regular sour cream, it might not taste quite so delicious.

I just added the RSS feed for the Google Blog to BlumaPushingSixty, so I will be checking it periodically and posting again soon.

Update:I did find something interesting that was posted March 31st on local flavor for google suggest. Google Suggest was launched in the US in August giving real time suggestions after typing in just a few letters. The International launch was announced March 31st. The really interesting part is that if you are in the US and searching "liver" you will get more suggestions related to liver disease while in the UK "liver" will get more suggestions related to Liverpool.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round 2 - More Conscious Eating

2009-03-10T17:15:00.000-07:00

This round I am reading Eat More, Weigh Less by Dean Ornish. I had it at home, but never finished reading it.

I'm working on a new personal goal. We have been eating a vegetarian meal once a week for several months now. Starting this round I am increasing eating vegetarian to twice a week. I'm not announcing at home that I'm doing this. I going to concentrate on finding some new recipes and hope that I don't encounter any opposition at dinner time.

I joined the OCL Health and Wellness Challenge team on Spark People.

Another useful thing I found on Spark People is that you can print out instructions for new exercises that you want to try. That way I can have it in front of me when I try it.

Health & Wellness Challenge! Round One - Conscious Eating

2009-02-19T11:13:00.001-08:00

Winter view from our window.

Activity 3 - I have found that I sleep much better when I don't eat anything after dinner, not to mention the fact that I eat less. Over the past year I have found that the best way that I can accomplish this is to brush my teeth immediately after finishing dinner. I know that it sounds strange because I could always eat something and then brush my teeth again, but I rarely do. It works for me.

Activity 5 - I could not get onto the Prevention or the aolhealth site when I tried, so I opted for a Wellness Quiz: Test Your Health IQ that I found on abcnews.go.com. It focused on the truth about some common health myths. I pretty well, getting all 8 of the questions correct.

However, I then went to Spark People to take the Fast Food Showdown SparkPeople Nutrition Quiz. I stopped eating fast food about five years ago so I guess it isn't a surprise that I only got 4 of the 12 choices correct. Still, I hate to score a 33 on any quiz. I guess I should have stopped after the first quiz.

Activity 7 - Recently (when I had a lot of very ripe bananas) I read that you can cut them in half and freeze them for smoothies. On Monday when we were off, I decided to try making a smoothie for lunch. I found a recipe for a banana berry smoothie on Spark People that I made using soy milk and soy yogurt along with the frozen banana and berries. The frozen bananas worked really well. My husband had to admit that he enjoyed his smoothie even though it did have milk and yogurt from soy, not a cow.

Challenge #3 - Gale Virtual Reference Library

2009-02-17T17:39:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure why I have been putting off doing this challenge. It really didn't take much time, and what a great resource Gale Virtual Reference Library is.

I was pleased to see that Grzimek's Student Animal Life Resource was one of the 500 plus titles. This was always a favorite of mine when helping children work on animal reports.

It was easy to search, contains great information and has wonderful pictures of the animals. The source citation should be a big help for the children writing reports.

It should be a popular resource for the students who wait until the night before the assignment is due to begin their research.

The next title I want to explore is the Gale Encyclopedia of Surgery and Medical Tests.

I plan to share information on GVRL at a branch staff meeting soon.

Challenge #2 - Digital Projectors

2008-11-12T11:32:00.000-08:00

I know that the challenge isn't officially posted yet, but this seemed like a good day to reexplore the digital projector and laptop, so I'm working from the November 11th email describing the next challenge.

I haven't used the projector and laptop in several months, so a review was needed. We have a nice page of instructions from the branch to work from, but my ultimate goal today was to be able to setup the laptop and projector together without the cheat sheet.

After first setting it up and then taking it apart with the cheat sheet and the help of Bill Ringer, I was now ready to set up the laptop projector combo again, but this time without the directions.

Much to my surprise I was able to set it up without the instructions and do my presentation in the reference area. The presentation was created by Paul Zubritzky for a branch staff meeting last year. It involved a slide show of which doors to use to exit the building depending on where the fire might be on either the first or second floors.

Everything went smoothly and I was able to pack it up after the presentation. I'm going to try setting it up again tomorrow to reinforce what I learned today.

Challenge #1 Steps 1-3: New Challenge, Same Blog

2008-10-13T17:16:00.000-07:00

Since I used Yahoo mail for the Web 2.0 Challenge, I started this Technology for OCL Branch Managers Challenge by setting up a gmail account. I decided to use the same blog from the previous challenge. As for ListenNJ, I checked out two books, downloaded them to my laptop and then transfered them to my Sansa Clip. Since I followed Elilzabeth's instructions and read the directions before downloading to an MP3 player, it was easy.I will be listening to one of the books when I walk at lunchtime tomorrow.

Wrapping Up - Thing 23

2008-05-04T12:31:00.000-07:00

Here are some Favorite things I learned about and will share with others. I couldn't just choose one. I liked being introduced to Flickr, will continue to use it and share it with my family and friends. I think I will use WebApps both at home and with family. World Cat is a wonderful tool that I will want to use in the future. Library Thing was a find that I will continue to use with my home library and have already started sharing with family. And RSS feeds are a great convenience and time saver and possibly my favorite - I love adding them to the home page on my laptop.
I think wikis were my least favorite and not something that I will seek out to use.
I surprised myself with blogging. I really enjoyed this challenge and learning about Web 2.0. It even helped me learn how to use features on my new smart phone. It became a frequent topic of conversation in the branch. Staff members helped each other with the 23 Things and enjoyed sharing their blogs with each other. While I think the library should be doing most of the things that we learned about, I think podcasting and adding content to YouTube are 2 things that the library should focus on. I think an important feature that the library should provide to customers as far as Web 2.0 is training. Classes should be offered for customers for many of the 23 things that we explored in this challenge. While much of Web 2.0 is already being used by teens, there are alot of adults who would take advantage of it with a little training. After all, look at what we have done over the past 10 weeks.

ListenNJ - Thing 22

2008-05-04T11:06:00.000-07:00

I just started listening to Catch Me If You Can that I downloaded to my laptop from ListenNJ. I like the fact that for this title I also have the option of putting it on my pda or burning a CD since I can't put it on my ipod. I have seen the movie but never read the book. Now that I've tried it, I think that I will be using ListenNJ in the future. There are quite a few titles that I have already read, but would like to reread. It is easy to browse and then checkout the books. The software was easy to download and install.

Podcasting - Thing 21

2008-05-03T18:49:00.000-07:00

http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast.php?id=510165 I tried setting up an account on podcast.com but got myself rather confused on how to use it. I just tried this link, but it doesn't work so I will go back to podcast and try and figure out what I am doing wrong. Okay, the problem is solved and this link should take you to the The Blues File podcast from WXPN - nice music.

YouTube - Thing 20

2008-05-03T16:08:00.001-07:00

I have known about YouTube for awhile, but had never used it before Thing 20. I searched under talking dogs and found some very entertaining videos. In fact, while I was watching them, my dog was sitting on the top of the couch behind me. He actually leaned over my shoulder to look and listen to the videos. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCYaw5tGYAs This is the link to video that featured dogs Cody was most interested in watching and talking to. After I imbedded the video in the blog, I played it and Cody came over to take another look.

Web 2.0 Awards - Thing 19

2008-04-27T17:35:00.002-07:00

The award winner that I use the most at this point is maps.google.com. While I have used it before like most people, because of this challenge I have explored it more closely. The best result is that I am now using it in my phone - a feature I have had for a couple of months but only started using as a result of thing 19. I also liked using the trip planner on realtravel.com.

Web Apps - Thing 18

2008-04-27T17:35:00.001-07:00

Web Apps is an application that I can see myself using. For instance when I was working on a project last year putting together a new employee orientation guide, I often gathered information while at work then saved it on a flash drive. Then at home I would use the flash drive and continue working on the project on my laptop. With Web Apps I could have eliminated the need for the flash drive. In the future I might use it for genealogy reports, that then family members in other locations could review and edit. What could be better than colored folder names which are a new feature on Web Apps? Another new feature I want to use is access to Google Docs on my cell phone.
I also looked at Zoho and played around with the Zoho Notebook. I liked that the list of the features that you can add on was conveniently located on the left. However, I need to spend time exploring Zoho. I would like to check out the To-Do-List feature on Zoho Planner also.

Play in the Sandbox - Thing 17

2008-04-22T12:14:00.000-07:00

Playing in the sandbox was okay. Adding the link went well with the directions. My feelings are still the same about not really loving the whole concept of wikis. I guess it might have application in working on a team project from different locations.

Learn About Wikis - Thing 16

2008-04-22T10:36:00.000-07:00

On the Library Success: A Best Practices Wiki I checked under the heading Training and Development for Librarians and found interesting information under Online Training Resources for librarians. I checked out the Ocean County Library article on Wikipedia making note of the tabs and looking at them. I thought the video from Common Craft showed an interesting use for a wiki with planning a camping trip. I'm not sure that I will make use of wikis. Somehow it doesn't seem right to go in and change information someone else has added.

Jackson Branch at Closing

2008-04-18T05:49:00.001-07:00

JAnighttree
Originally uploaded by rothleinb

I had to stop and take a picture of this flowering tree last night when we closed. It was striking in the glow of the street lamp.

Library 2.0 - Thing 15 - My Perspective

2008-04-13T17:06:00.000-07:00

Away from icebergs, Into a new world of librarianship and to more powerful ways to cooperate were the three opinions that I read. I liked what Rick Anderson wrote in the Away from Icebergs opinion when it concluded with a call for us to shift the direction of our profession and provide library services to our customers in the medium of their choosing. I also like the Michael Stephen's idea of a library that allows its users access from many points outside of the physical building as well as from within as expressed in Into the new world of librarianship. When I have more time I am going to read all of the opinions. I think when it comes to Library 2.0 we will need a combination of the ideas voiced in the various opinions listed.

SuperCody

2008-04-13T16:40:00.001-07:00

SuperCody
Originally uploaded by rothleinb

On his morning walk Cody helped a woman find her lost dog, Stanley. Pulling tight on his leash Cody tromped through wet grass in many backyards, until lost Stanley finally appeared and ran over to meet Cody. After walking the rest of the way home, exhausted and wet, Cody waits on top of the couch for a treat. Great job Cody!

Technorati - Thing 14

2008-04-12T11:41:00.000-07:00

I have looked around Technorati and searched Library 2.0. I found a video of Molly Raphael on Learning 2.0. When I searched under the blog tab for Libray 2.0 I found http://davidwarlick.com/2cents/ which I think I might use again.

I then checked out the popular feature. I checked under movies to see when a DVD of a movie I want to see is coming out - April 29th. It linked me to imdb for the information. I looked under Top Searches #9 to see who Samantha Ronson is. It turns out that she is the on-again off-again "best friend" of Lindsay Lohan. I won't be adding that to my links anywhere. I checked out Boing Boing listed as #1 for top 100 blogs by fans and #5 for top 100 blogs by authority. I found Free Range Kids, blog for raising kids without being freaked out about safety all the time which was interesting but not for me since my children are already grown.

I'm beginning to feel like I am in overload with all the information that is available on Technorati and as usual have to ask the question when will I find the time. Actually that is the good thing about this challenge. While we are introduced to a great number of sources of information we don't have to continue to use all of them, but can sort through them and decide which ones work best for us.

Del.icio.us - Thing 13

2008-04-11T16:25:00.001-07:00

I listened to the tutorial that made social bookmarking with del.icio.us sound extremely useful for research. My thought is that this will require a considerable amount of practice to learn how to use it effectively. I'm not sure if I will have the time to devote to this, but I did set up an account and added 11 bookmarks. I'm not comfortable with sharing them yet, so they are set to not shared for now. I do like the fact that I can have the same bookmarks no matter which computer I am using.

WorldCat - Thing 12, part 2

2008-04-05T13:33:00.000-07:00

I really like using WorldCat. It provides a wealth of information about a title that would definitely be helpful in filling out our ILL form. I liked looking at the tabs, but didn't find any reviews of the books I searched - I like to read reviews. I also like using the advanced search option to narrow the search. It was interesting looking at the different libraries that carry a title. Making a list is easy to do. I liked the fact that when I added the title of a book to my list and then searched under one of the subject headings to that title, the resulting list of titles was not limited to books, but also brought up articles that I could add. The fact that the list can be either private or public can be helpful in a library setting.

NetLibrary - Thing 12, part 1

2008-04-05T12:46:00.000-07:00

I have helped customers use NetLibrary before.The hardest thing for them to find is the link to open an account. Otherwise I have found it easy to navigate. I had to set up a new account today because I couldn't remember my sign in information from several years ago. I do remember using it once from home to read part of a book. It is not my preferred method of reading and I doubt that I will use it for my reading after the Challenge (of course I will be happy to help a customer set up an account and use it).

LibraryThing - Thing 11

2008-04-05T12:16:00.000-07:00

I found LibraryThing easy to use and plan to continue using it after the Web Things Challenge is over. I like the ability to tag books that I want to read or must purchase as soon as they are published. When I clicked on the social data icon for one title I got a list of LibraryThing suggestions. I added one of the suggested titles to my library which then led me to another title I wanted to read. I really like LibraryThing.

Technology blogging - Thing 10

2008-04-05T09:11:00.000-07:00

First I need to remind you of my original test blog where I said the hardest of the 7 1/2 Habits of Life Long Learning had to do with technology. Lately I made a huge step when I got a smart phone that has all the information from my pda, plus a phone, email and the web. Yes, it is convenient to have it all in one small package. However, in my initial excitement over the purchase, I would access email and the web on it when my laptop with a much larger screen was available. I do like being able to have web access with me all the time. I still need to work on texting. The keys are so little and my fingers aren't, but I guess it just takes practice. Before I got the smart phone I tried reading an ebook from my pda. It is okay if you are waiting somewhere with nothing to read, but I found it more difficult on my eyes to read because of the small size of the pda screen.
I also added comments on a couple of blogs.

Happy smiling dog

2008-04-02T14:27:00.001-07:00

Happy smiling dog
Originally uploaded by LivornoQueen

Just what does a happy dog look like? This morning while walking my dog, a man picking up his newspaper commented that I had a very happy dog. I get this comment quite often from neighbors and strangers including the UPS driver. How do they determine that he is happy? Could it be the fact that he is usually bouncing up and down when he sees someone, or that he has the ability to hop on his hind legs across the street to greet you, or is it a look on his face? Searching on flickr under the tags dogs smile, I found this great picture (top left) of a dog named Romie originally uploaded by getthebubbles. He definitely looks happy. I also found this wonderful picture on the right of Happy Smiling dog originally uploaded by LivornoQueen. Judging from the number of pictures I found on flickr, dogs do smile.

I'm still loving RSS feeds - Thing 9

2008-03-30T18:35:00.000-07:00

In addition to adding feeds to my Bloglines page, I started adding them to my yahoo page. It's really easy to do and more convenient having all RSS feeds there since I use it as my home page. I found that Blogline's search tool was the easiest to use. I also had success using Syndic8.com.

This is a picture of a cherry tree in my backyard. I remember going to DC years ago to see the cherry blossoms about this time of year. I searched on Bloglines for cherry blossoms and found a blog with cherry blossoms and the Washington Monument.

2008flowershow - Thing 8

2008-03-28T19:49:00.001-07:00

2008flowershow
Originally uploaded by rothleinb

Bloglines. I loved this exercise and am wondering how I managed without using it before. There were so many feeds that I wanted to include. I'm not sure how I will find the time to keep up with all of them.

Wondering what this picture has to do with bloglines? Nothing. I just felt like this post could use some color and a touch of spring.

Scanned Image - Thing 7

2008-03-28T18:43:00.000-07:00

Scanning an image for Thing seven was a good opportunity to use the copier/printer/scanner that I purchased a few months ago. I had used the printer and copier, but still had not tried the scanner component. I love the pose of the dancer and the composition of this postcard with the music in the background. Image Miro Dance Theatre, pictured Jil Stifel, photo by Steve Velkowitz http://www.mirodancetheatre.org/

Jackson Branch Reference - Thing 6

2008-03-26T13:08:00.001-07:00

Jackson Branch Reference
Originally uploaded by rothleinb

I finally did it. I tried taking a picture with my camera phone and then emailing it to flickr to a specific email address through mobile flickr. For some reason it did not reach the destination. I emailed the picture to my yahoo email, saved it and then was able to upload it to flickr. I think I need to do a little more learning about how to use my new phone.

Seattle - Thing 5

2008-03-26T11:31:00.001-07:00

Originally uploaded by tiergarden

I found the photo on the right on Flickr. The Pike Place Market is one of my favorite places to visit when in Seattle. It always reminds me of the Fish Philosophy and Fish Camp at OCL. The picture on the left is another view of the Market taken from the roof of the Inn at the Market.

Too cute - Flickr - Thing 5

2008-03-26T07:47:00.000-07:00

I tried adding the picture on the left that I had uploaded to flickr but all that showed up in the post was an empty box with a tiny x in it. I was able to upload the picture on the right from my computer. Update: I tried this again this afternoon and was able to upload this image from my Flickr account.

7 and 1/2 - Thing 3 Test

2008-03-26T06:30:00.000-07:00

Judging from how long it took me to get started on this challenge because of my concerns about technology, the hardest habit of the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits would probably be using technology to my advantage. A habit that I have been working for the past year is to view problems as a challenge. While it was difficult at first, it is becoming easier as time continues. I figure that since I am now pushing sixty, putting a positive spin on problems is the way to go.