What is a cloud?

The question was asked by Dr. Mary Ann Bell on LM_Net - what do you think of when you hear the phrase 'The Cloud'? She offered a quick survey to the LM_Net community. She gave us a hint- we could look in Wikipedia for The Cloud.

I think of 'It Looked Like Spilt Milk' by Charles G. Shaw when I think of clouds. I cut a white flannel shape for each of the pictures and lay out the 'clouds' on the board as I read. By the time I've finished- it looks like a sky full of clouds.

Back to Dr. Bell's question - which asked about 'The Cloud'. I did check Wikipedia, then I went to GALILEO where I selected Browse by Type and chose Encyclopedias- of course, Encyclopedia Britannica was my first choice. 'The cloud' brought up 1290 entries in EB. Changing the search term to The cloud internet brought up one entry.

I learned something from the Wikipedia article. I'm not sure I understand it- but I learned something!

-kls

Ashes, ashes, we all fall down

In the Christian year, this is the first day of Lent. The beginning of the 40 days before Easter when Christians reflect on their humanity, their fallen and broken nature, the nature that is ultimately redeemed by Jesus. Ash Wednesday is appropriately preceeded by Fat Tuesday (also known as Shrove Tuesday) - the day of excess celebrated most vividly in Latin cultures via Mardi Gras. Northern Europeans celebrate Fat Tuesday with the Pancake Supper!

Where can you find information about Fat Tuesday, Shrove Tuesday, Mardi Gras, Lent, Easter, etc? I did a Google search on each topic and found many a site willing to share. Some sites had a clear 'authority' - the Vatican for example. Yet, I wanted something I could cite without digging through the About Us to find the author.

GALILEO offers cite-able sources- Ebsco's Religion and Philosophy "includes more than 300 full-text journals covering topics such as world religions, major denominations, biblical studies, religious history, epistemology, political philosophy, philosophy of language, moral philosophy, and the history of philosophy."

I'm looking for facts about Lent, etc - Encyclopedia Brittanica or Credo Reference offer access to 'facts'. Yes, yes, I know about Wikipedia but even they note " anyone can edit it". Credo and Britannica offer me credible, vetted information (yes, I've read the Nature article showing Britannica had almost as many errors as Wikipedia and the refutation).

Easy is not always the surest route to the best information.....Lent offers a time to reflect on what 'easy' gets us....get the password to use GALILEO from your Georgia librarian.

-kls

How do I find thee?

Thank you Jeff Mallett, creator of Frazz.


22 Feb 2009

I smiled. Yes, print is one way to find the information.


-kls

Those who don't know

history are destined to repeat it - said Edmund Burke

Carter G. Woodson began Negro History Week in 1926. He wrote 'Observances of Negro History Week,' which appeared in the volume 11, number 2 issue of the 'Journal of Negro History.'

Where could I find that article?

A Google search led me to HighBeam.com which has the article but requires my registering for a free trial (and then charging me a monthly fee).

You know I'm sending you to GALILEO - where our Georgia tax dollars are at work (get the password for home use from your Georgia librarian). There you'll find the History Reference Center an Ebsco product.

GALILEO
...Databases A-Z, select H
.....Scroll to History Reference Center
.......Type in Negro History week
.........Select 'Observances of Negro History Week'(on my search it was the 4th article)notice it is a pdf file- you'll see the article as it was in the journal

Reprints the article 'Observances of Negro History Week,' by Carter G. Woodson, which appeared in the volume 11, number 2 issue of the 'Journal of Negro History.'

You can create an Alert for the Black History Bulletin "A peer-reviewed publication written to provide those who instruct our youth with innovative materials, which teach Black history and conform to national history standards." Ebsco will send you links to the latest articles posted from Black History Bulletin.

Make learning history a year round effort!

Keeping in mind Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it - Edmund Burke

-kls

Answers to Presidential Trivia

Here are the answers to our Presidents' Day Trivia. Let's see how you did.

1. This man was the shortest President to date, standing in at 5'4".

Answer: James Madison, our 4th President.

2. This President was the first to die in office, setting a record for the shortest term of office to date, a whole month.

Answer: William Henry Harrison, our 9th President. Harrison did not wear a coat during his inaugural address, given on a cold, yucky day, and proceeded to give the longest such address in history. He got sick the next day and died soon after.

3. Technically counting as two Presidents, this man was the only President to serve non-consecutive terms of office.

Answer: Grover Cleveland, the 22nd and 24th President. Cleveland was defeated for reelection by Benjamin Harrison in 1888. He then returned in 1892 and was elected again.

4. This President came from a historically prominent American family, had a grandfather who was President before him, and was elected to one term by winning the electoral college but losing the popular vote.

Answer: Benjamin Harrison, the 23rd President. Harrison's grandfather was William Henry Harrison. He defeated Grover Cleveland in the electoral college in 1888, but lost a rematch to Cleveland in 1892.

5. 'Accidental' President who became the longest lived President to date. He outlived the second longest lived President, Ronald Reagan, by 45 days and died at the age of 93 years and 165 days.

Answer: Gerald Ford, the 38th President. Ford remains the only President to have never been elected to either the Presidency or Vice-Presidency. He was appointed to be Vice-President under the terms of the 25th Amendment to the US Constitution following the resignation of Vice-President Spiro Agnew. When President Richard Nixon later resigned, Ford became President. He lost the campaign to win a term as President in his own right in 1976 to former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter.

6. The President who was the youngest age, at 42, when he was first inaugurated President.

Answer: Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President. Roosevelt was the younger man to ever become President. He was sworn in upon the assassination of President William McKinley. John F. Kennedy has the youngest age upon being elected President. Theodore Roosevelt was older than Kennedy's election age when he won a term in his own right in 1904.

7. The only President to date who was born outside of the continental United States.

Answer: Barack Obama, the 44th President. Obama was born in Hawaii, which along with Alaska, is not one of the 48 continental United States.

8. This President had the rotten luck to see the Roaring Twenties come crashing to an end just after taking office, but lived longer after he was President than any man to date.

Answer: Herbert Hoover, the 31st President. Hoover saw the 1929 stock market crash and the onset of the Great Depression shortly after taking office in 1929. He was defeated for reelection in 1932 by Franklin Roosevelt, and many blamed him for the Depression for years after. Hoover lived for thirty one years after leaving office.

9. The only President who is buried in the District of Columbia. His final resting place is in the National Cathedral.

Answer: Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President. Wilson is buried in the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

10. The only President to die in the 18th century.

Answer: George Washington, the 1st President. Washington died December 14th, 1799.

How did you do?

Number Correct:
0-failed run for city council
1-2-made it to the state legislature
3-4-won statewide office
5-6-elected to the House of Representatives
7-8-elected governor
9-US Senate
10-Presidential

JWF

President's Day

In honor of President's Day, here is a bit of Presidential trivia. Answers to be posted on Tuesday, February 17, 2009. See if you can identify the President referred to by each statement/question.

Remember, you may want to use Galileo to try and find the answers. Get the password from your Georgia librarian.


1. This man was the shortest President to date, standing in at 5'4".

2. This President was the first to die in office, setting the record for the shortest term of office to date, a whole month.

3. Technically counting as two Presidents, this man was the only President to serve non-consecutive terms of office.

4. This President came from a historically prominent American family, had a grandfather who was President before him, and was elected to one term by winning the electoral college but losing the popular vote.

5. 'Accidental' President who became the longest lived President to date. He outlived the second longest lived President, Ronald Reagan, by 45 days and died at the age of 93 years and 165 days.

6. The President who was the youngest age, at 42, when he was first inaugurated President.

7. The only President to date who was born outside of the continental United States.

8. This President had the rotten luck to see the Roaring Twenties come crashing to an end just after taking office, but lived longer after he was President than any man to date.

9. The only President who is buried in the District of Columbia. His final resting place is in the National Cathedral.

10. The only President to die in the 18th century.

JWF

Happy Birthday Charlie Darwin!

It's easy for me to remember that February 12th is the birthday of Abraham Lincoln. My mother's birthday is also on February 12th. I guess you could say that I think of the day as my mother's birthday, and it also happens to be Lincoln's birthday.

Old Abe Charles Darwin, the naturalist responsible for the theory of evolution by means of natural selection. Darwin has had an indirect influence on my life. My hometown is Dayton, Tennessee. Dayton was the site of one of the several 'trials of the century,' the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial. The trial was a test case to challenge a Tennessee law banning the teaching of evolution. The trial became the biggest event in Dayton's history, and subsequently gave the town the nickname of 'Monkeytown,' as many a huckster and tonic salesman descended upon the town, selling shaved chimps as the missing link. The trial attracted the likes of WGN radio, Clarence Darrow, and William Jennings Bryan. The liberal arts college in Dayton, Bryan College, was named for Bryan.

Note: to view some of the links in this post, you may need to get the current Galileo password. You can get the password from your Georgia librarian.

Happy Birthday Mom!

JWF

As long as we're talking about Lincoln

Lincoln's birthday celebration brings to mind the Civil War, which brings to mind Veterans, which brings me to Ancestry.com adding records (I feel like a Laura Numeroff story "If you give a librarian ....").

Today's Genealogy Insider by Diane Haddad noted the addition of a number of resources to Ancestry. The one that caught my eye pertains to Georgia.

Confederate Pension Applications from Georgia includes more than 60,000 records documenting pension applications Confederate soldiers and their widows filed in Georgia. (Search these free on the Georgia State Archives Web site.)

You may access Heritage Quest at home with your public library GALILEO password - yes the public library offers slightly different resources in GALILEO - ask your public librarian)

-kls

Happy Birthday, Mr. L

I wonder if Abe had any idea the impact he would make on history when he was a boy, a young man, or even as a middle aged President? It seems 'everyone' is running specials, writing articles, and blogging about the 200th birthday of Abraham Lincoln.

Britannica has been blogging about Mr. Lincoln for a few days. They posted a YouTube that someone compiled of 'all' the pictures of Mr. Lincoln! Fascinating.

I went to GALILEO and selected Lexis Nexis Academic to look through the transcripts.

...I typed "Abraham Lincoln" in quotes
......Limited my search to TV and Radio Broadcast transcripts
........Limited my search to the previous week

110 results were displayed. Read all about it - using Lexis Nexis Academic in GALILEO.

-kls
You may get the password to use GALILEO from your Georgia librarian.

Learning new things

Research Strategies : Finding your Way through the information Fog [Z 710 .B23 2008] by William B. Badke has arrived.

The book is at the circulation desk where the librarians are reading and learning. My favorite quote so far is found on page 13 - "Not all information is equal."

Trying to teach anyone that 'good enough' may not be really 'good enough' is hard. Google and Wikipedia are so easy to find - using the library resources that are protected by passwords sometimes 'feels' quite difficult.

I shared with one class the true story- a student called the library last week and said "I've spent hours on Google and can't find an article for my class". Biting my tongue, I asked "Did you look in GALILEO"....OH

I'm hoping Mr. Badke has a hint or tip that we can share to help students remember to use the library databases!



-kls

The Cards Are Shuffled

In a recent post, I noted that the Arizona (by way of St. Louis and Chicago) Cardinals won the NFL title in 1947. A diligent reader posted a reply stating that the Cardinals also won the NFL championship in 1925. This may depend upon who you ask, especially if they live in Pennsylvania. A summary of the situation can be found here.

Apparently, back in 1925, there were no playoffs. The championship was awarded to the team with the best record. That normally would have gone to the Pottsville Maroons of Pennsylvania, who finished with the best record in the league that year (similar to many soccer leagues). The Maroons also won a convincing victory over the Cardinals in Chicago during the season. However, the Maroons then went on to play a Notre Dam All-Star team in a non-league game. As a result, in part because the game was played in Philadelphia and violated the rights of another team in the league, the league stripped the Maroons of the trophy and awarded the championship to the Cardinals. According to some sources, the Cardinals refused to accept the championship.

Attempts have been made by Maroons fans over the years to have the championship restored to Pottsville. Pottsville fans claim that these attempts have been thwarted over the years by the Bidwell family, longtime owners of the Cardinals (although not in 1925), who want to see the Cardinals remain recognized as the 1925 champs.

It should be noted that the website of the Pro Football Hall of Fame notes that the Cardinals are the 1925 champions, without an asterisk next to their name.

JWF

Pollock

January 29th is the birthday of the late American painter Jackson Pollock. Pollock is noted for his unique style of painting, particularly the paint drop method he used primarily in the fifties. Many of his works from this time period are simply noted with a number and a date. Pollock's paintings sell for millions of dollars.

Google adapted its logo today to resemble one of Pollock's paintings to celebrate his birthday. A sample of Pollock's paintings and a biography are available in the Galileo database Oxford Art Online. Simply do a search, or an advanced search for 'pollock' or 'Jackson Pollock.' Remember, you will need a password to use Galileo off-campus. Contact the library to get the current Galileo password, or your local Georgia librarian.

JWF

Haunted Libraries in the South

Hello,

Encyclopedia Britannica recently did a series of Blog entries on 'haunted libraries' in the United States. They broke that same list down by region, including a list of 'haunted' libraries in the south (although one wonders if Texas is still truly a southern state), as well as a list of international haunts.

Interestingly, Britannica was unable to find any haunted Georgia libraries. One library that is supposedly haunted is in Tennessee, the Hoskins Library at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. The Hoskins Library was the main academic library for many years until it was converted to a special collections library in the 1980's.

Encyclopedia Britannica is always doing many fine blog entries on history, society, politics, and health, among other subjects. Remember that North Metro Tech students can access Britannica through Galileo. Please contact the library if you need the current Galileo password.

JWF

And the winners are

For librarians and bibliophiles - the mid-winter meeting of ALA holds a particular pleasure - the announcement of the Newbery and Caldecott winners- along with others of note.

I no longer keep up with the Newbery but I do avidly await the Caldecott announcement to build up the Early Childhood collection. Yes, I've ordered the winner.

This year someone (sorry I can't remember who) noted the 2009 Newbery winner was available online as Neil Gaiman read aloud the The Graveyard Book over a 9 day book tour trip in October 2008. Delightfully the author has an easy voice to listen to and great expression as well.

I admit it starts off a bit gruesome for my taste but as I continued to listen I was drawn into the story. Mr. Gaiman has a very expressive voice (and an expressive face).

In GALILEO , Novelist K-8 has a book talk and several reviews to help one push this book!

Yes, get the password from your Georgia librarian to access Novelist through GALILEO.

-kls

RIP Rabbit writer

Hat tip to Titus One Nine for RIP John Updike.

I started looking for verification. I did a Google search, figuring there might be a news story. First on the results list was Wikipedia and they had the death date listed. I looked for a newsy source, skimmed fan sites which did not yet list the death date. In a box I saw the Bloomberg site. I read their news story on John Updike.

Now I'm curious- how fast will other sources update the information. Was the updated Wikipedia a fluke?

Went to GALILEO and looked in Encyclopedia Britannica for John Updike - not updated yet (3:10 EST). How long will it take? Should I send in an edit comment?

Many times the bloggers are ahead of the curve but we need to verify the information with other sources. There's that carpenters adage - measure twice, cut once- which can be translated to check your sources!

-kls

Happy Australia Day!

Today, January 26th, is celebrated as a holiday called Australia Day in the nation continent of Australia. January 26th, 1788 was the date of the arrival of the First Fleet ,a collection of eleven British ships under the command of Governor Arthur Phillip, at what is Port Jackson/Sydney Cove/Sydney Harbour near the present day site of the Sydney Opera House . This marked the establishment of a permanent British presence on the eastern coast of the Australian continent and also began the series of events that led to the creation of the modern day state of Australia. Of interest is the fact that many of the colonists aboard the First Fleet were convicts.

The national holiday is also used to reveal the awarding of the Australian of the Year Award. The 1988 holiday was significant in that it marked the 200th anniversary of the arrival of the first fleet.


JWF

EB clarifies itself

Encyclopedia Britannica has a blog that covers a variety of topics. They must be hearing that folks aren't thrilled with the idea of EB turning into Wikipedia.

Britannica.com : new features

A “Suggest Edit” button allows a user to edit any section of an article and submit the changes to Britannica’s editors. Edits submitted by readers are suggestions to our editors that must be reviewed and approved by them before they’re posted. We’re eager for editorial suggestions from our readers, and we’ll review and act on them as quickly as we can, but no one can actually change a Britannica article except our editors.

That's good to hear!

-kls

Math on Sunday

The comics on Sunday, January 25, had a math pattern -
First there is Luann by Greg Evans


Then Foxtrot by Bill Arnend.

Math has never been my favorite subject. It is so rigid, so black and white, so right and wrong- so precise. It's easier to mush around in the Social Sciences. Yet, I ,along with LuAnn and Paige, - use math daily. I'm grateful that I was 'forced' to memorize the multiplication tables as I figure out how much several items will cost. I value being made to practice adding and subtracting in my head, quickly - as I look at a restaurant bill to see if it's correct. I appreciate being able to quickly figure percentages when faced with how much tip to leave.

We have several books in the Q's to help our students brush up on their math skills as they prepare for various standardized tests.

GALILEO has a search link for math. You may search Academic Search Complete - National Science Digital Library -
Research Library (at ProQuest) - and Science and Technology Collection - plus adding other databases.

Math is for everyday use!

-kls

Britannica to Look Like Wikipedia

Greetings,

A librarian at Chattahoochee Technical College set us the following link about Britannica attempting to model itself after Wikipedia by allowing users some ability to edit and add content.

Note: To access Britannica off-campus, you may need to get the current Galileo password from your local Georgia public and/or college librarian.

Britannica to Allow User Edits Like Wikipedia

Britannica is making a mistake with this one.

Britannica is attempting, whether they admit it or not, to become another Wikipedia. They should rather focus on what makes them unique from Wikipedia, which is existing as an authoritative, academic , online encyclopedia. Rather than try to copy Wikipedia, Britannica needs to strengthen what I feel are its weaknesses as compared to Wikipedia. These would include what I feel are poorer interfaces, layouts, and graphics when compared to Wikipedia.

Also, I don’t see how their new user-added feature will entice patrons away from Wikipedia. First, Britannica has it articles written by experts in a field. I find it hard to digest that Britannica will have a Classics expert on call 24/7 to vet a user submitted entry on the Alexander the Great article. Also, one appeal of the user edit feature in Wikipedia is that you can see your edits instantly, not twenty minutes later.

Wikipedia, because of its nature, is much more exhaustive than Britannica. You can find articles in Wikipedia on the novel adaptations of the different Star Trek television series. You won’t find that on Britannica. And you shouldn’t find that on Britannica , if Britannica continues to promote itself as an academic source.

Despite its level of acceptance by many of our younger patrons, Wikipedia is best viewed as a pop culture/quick reference resource, that has to be taken with a grain of salt. Britannica should recognize this and not try to copy them, but rather should play to its own strengths and increase its viability as an academic and referenced alternative.

I liken this situation to the current state of affairs at General Motors. One of their few bright spots the last decade has been Cadillac. They made the decision to make the line unique from Buick and other GM lines, and play to Cadillac’s strengths as a high end luxury line with lots of features. One area GM failed was its half-hearted attempts to copy Japanese/Korean successes in smaller cars without giving the same level of quality and fuel efficiency that the imports offered.

This is akin to Pepsi changing it can color to red and white because Coke is selling more product.


JWF

From way up high

A bit of news posted in the Atlanta Journal Constitution on 14 Jan 2009. Google Earth and the Museo Nacional del Prado in Spain have joined to put art into Google Earth.

Open up Google Earth (you may need to install it on your computer but it didn't take me long to do that). When you search for Museo del Prado, click on the museum, 14 pictures appear, click on a picture and read about the painting. Fascinating!

I noticed in my glance at a Google Earth page, a mention of Shakespeare. When I went back after loading Google Earth, I couldn't find the entry. I was able to find the Google Earth Blog reference for Shakespeare. Many places mentioned by Shakespeare are noted on Google Earth. Click on a picture of Shakespeare and zoom in to see what the location looks like today.

Fascinating! It does remind me of my foray into Second Life - flying over the land- setting down to visit.

I've added the Google Earth Blog story to delicious and tagged it for ENG 193 and Humanities 191.


-kls

Feeding the info tiger

Really Simple Syndication is one way to get the news and commentary delivered to your desktop.

This morning I read on Titus One Nine the news about the WhiteHouse.gov site. The Obama team had their first blog posting at 12:01. Fast, very fast. I've created a feed to my Bloglines because I find it easier to check Bloglines than to go from site to site checking for a new post.

Various vendors in GALILEO offer RSS feeds for searches and publications. I like getting the latest publication delivered to my desktop (quicker than theUS Mail, cheaper than a print subscription. RSS really is simple.

Yes, the password to access GALILEO is available from your Georgia librarian.

-kls

Card-Pitt

Greetings,

This past Sunday, the last four remaining NFL teams competed for a chance to represent their respective conference in Super Bowl XLIII. The Pittsburgh Steelers eliminated the Baltimore Ravens to win the American Conference and the Lamar Hunt trophy, while the Arizona Cardinals defeated the Philadelphia Eagles to win the National Conferenc. Thus, the Cardinals and the Steelers will face off in neutral Tampa to see which team will hoist the Vince Lombardi Trophy as the champions of the National Football League fo the 2008 season.

The Super Bowl matchup is quite interesting, for a number of reasons. The Arizona Cardinals are, according to their own website, the oldest pro football team in the country that has been in continous operation since their founding. The Cardinals were founded in 1898, predating the NFL itself, serving as one of the charter members of the league. Since the NFL began, the Cardinals have played in Chicago, serving as the city's south-side team, in St. Louis, and mostly recently in the Phoenix area. However, in their long history, the Cardinals have won exactly one NFL championship (the name of the league title prior to the Super Bowl), and were the last NFC team to make the conference championship game since 'modern' NFL history began in 1970 with the AFL/NFL merger. Now that the Cardinals have made both the conference championship and the Super Bowl, they leave only the New Orleans Saints, the Detroit Lions, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Cleveland Browns, and the Houston Texans as the teams that have never made it to the Super Bowl. Of those, only the Texans have never made their respective conference game.

The Pittsburgh Steelers are considered one of the NFL's premier franchises. According to the Steelers' official website, they are the fifth oldest NFL franchise, forming in 1933. The Steelers were one of the lowliest franchises in the league until the hiring of Coach Chuck Noll in 1969, who led the team to four Super Bowl titles in the 1970's. The Steelers have been to the Super Bowl six times prior to this appearance, winning five times.

The Steelers have been owned by the Rooney family since their inception. The Cardinals have been owned by the Bidwill family for most of their existence. During the World War II affected 1944 season, both teams combined to form the Card-Pitt team, which lost every game it played that year.

If you are interested in news and information about these two teams, try Galileo . Go to the 'search' page. Try using the 'Pittsburgh Steelers' and 'Arizona Cardinals' as your search terms. You might want to limit your search to full-text. You will get results from publications including Sports Illustrated. (Note: you may need to get the current Galileo password from your local Georgia librarian.)

JWF

What did that mean?

The English language evolves with use. What a word means today is not what it meant 96 to 181 years ago. On LM_NET Sybil Finemel of Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913 + 1828)supported by The ARTFL Project. Fun to type in a word and see what it used to mean!

GALILEO offers access to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (in Encyclopædia Britannica Online). It too is easy to search and includes the older meanings.

The grandaddy of dictionaries is the Oxford English Dictionary (also available through GALILEO)

The Oxford English Dictionary is the "accepted authority on the evolution of the English language over the last millennium." The OED gives definitions, etymological analysis, and quotations to demonstrate the use of words in the English language over time.

The fun part of the OED is the timeline of use with dated quotes.

So many ways to find out what a word means yesterday and today!

You get the current password to access GALILEO at home from your Georgia librarian.

-kls

We have a new name

North Metro Tech, Appalachian Tech and Chattahoochee Tech have been in the process of combining to create a new school since September. It has taken awhile to work out the new name. Dr. Sanford Chandler, president of Chattahoochee Tech, sent an e-mail announcing the new school would be known as Chattahoochee Technical College.

Read all about it in the various papers - Cartersville Daily Tribune and the Marietta Daily Journal.

-kls

Flickr Commons

Greetings,

Many of you may be familiar with the online photo sharing resource called Flickr . Flickr allows you to post and share photos online, while tagging them so that they can be searched more easily.

Flickr has created a new service that allows you to tag and describe older photos, many of which are from archived collections such as the Library of Congress. The stated mission of the project is to allow users (the public) to contribute information about these photos, and hopefully make them easier to find, and to increase the awareness of the existence of these collections.

Pay a visit to the Commons and explore what you find.

JWF

New 7 Wonders

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ran a story on January 7th, 2009 about online voting for the 'new' 7 wonders of the natural world . This voting is being organized by a group that conducted voting last year for the 'new' 7 manmade wonders of the world. This time, voting is being limited to wonders that are natural.

The current phase of the voting is involves scaling down the nominees from over 200 to 77 for the next phase of the voting. The process seems to be well thought out, as each nominee must have an official sponsorship committee to be eligible to move into the next round.

A list of the winners of the 7 manmade wonders is available here . Note that the closest the USA came to getting an entry was the Statue of Liberty, which made the semifinal round.

Glancing at the nominees for the natural 7 wonders, I was interested to see how many I had not heard of, and that some things I had expected to be on the list were not, such as Arches National Park in Utah . (Although another arches park in Libya is present.) US located nominees include Lake Superior , the Grand Canyon , Niagara Falls , and Buck Island Reef in the Virgin Islands . Note that Lake Superior and Niagara Falls are shared with Canada.

It does appear that you have to provide your email in order to vote.

JWF

Making a comeback

Thanks to Sarah Hey at Stand Firm for highlighting this opinion declaration by Peggy Noonan in the Wall Street Journal. Ms. Noonan happily shares her conviction that reading books will come back in style! She refers to several titles she's read this year. I was touched by the last sentence in her declaration:

that all can change, that a life—and a world—can be made better all of a sudden, out of the blue, unexpectedly. But you have to be listening. You have to be able to hear.

Ms. Noonan was referring to "Mother Teresa's Secret Fire" by Joseph Langford. This is a title I was not familiar with.

I went to GALILEO and selected Book Index with Reviews . Here I read the reviews, clicked on the link to World Cat and the link to EBSCO (which has access to digitized articles from thousands of magazines). WorldCat let me know the closest library that holds this title. The EBSCO link brought me an interesting article about this title.

Book Index with Reviews in GALILEO is the place to go for information about a book someone mentions - to use this source at home get the current password for GALILEO from your Georgia librarian.


-kls

Not so much the green maverick on Main Street

Associated Press writer, Jeff Karoub, penned an article referring to the annual list of words compiled by the faculty at Lake Superior State University. What fun to read the list and think about the popularity (or over popularity) of words in common use.

The Oxford English Dictionary ,which is available to Georgia residents through GALILEO, has examples of the changes in meaning that words go through over time.

Here's what the OED offers on maverick

2. An unorthodox or independent-minded person; a person who refuses to conform to the views of a particular group or party; an individualist. Also in extended use.

1880 Galveston (Texas) Daily News 19 Aug. 4/5 We..will crush radicals, greenbackers and all other foes of democracy, especially those independent gentlemen, those political mavericks. 1892 R. KIPLING Life's Handicap 195 A very muzzy Maverick smote his sergeant on the nose. 1948 Chicago Daily News 11 June 16/7 One Republican Senator, and not by any means a conspicuous maverick, pointed out that the Senate might have acted. 1957 Oxf. Mag. 17 Oct. 22/2 The story is not just of local boy making good, but also, and more significantly, of maverick making friends. 1989 Money & Family Wealth Mar. 25/2 Although the Abbey National is one of the oldest building societies, in recent years it has cultivated an image as a maverick and a mould-breaker. 1994 Hypno 3 69/2 James is a maverick of disturbingly beautiful techno.

Yes, maverick has several meanings and a history to our understanding of what a maverick is!
What I noticed is the RSS feed that the OED offers to those who might like to add a word to their vocabulary. So here's to New Years resolutions- subscribe to the OED RSS feed and use that word twice before the next word appears in your feed reader. Amaze your acquaintances with the expansion of your vocabulary.

You may get the current password to access GALILEO at home from your Georgia librarian.

-kls

0-16

Part of being a librarian is having a familiarity with statistics. Knowledge of where and how to find statistics is part of the job description. Statistics are also a part of our everday lives, from the price of gas to stock prices.

One statistic that you have probably heard a lot about in the last week has been 0-16. This figure has been widely reported in all avenues of the news media, including on venues that are not sports related. 0-16 refers to the the record of the Detroit Lions football team of the National Football League. Losing Sunday, the Lions became the first team in league history to lose all 16 regular season games.

Several teams have had perfect losing seasons in the history of the league. Perhaps the best known is the 1976 Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The Bucs went 0-14 that year. However, the Bucs had a bit of an excuse. That year the Bucs were an expansion team, not expected to compete. (Note that the NFL expanded its regular season to 16 games in the late 1970's.) The last pure 'defeated' season before the Bucs was during World War II.

Several teams have gone winless but have managed to get a tie over the course of a season. The Dallas Cowboys, in their first year, went 0-11-1. More common is the dreaded 1-15 season, a mark achieved by several franchises, including the Patriots, Colts, Dolphins, and Jets, all of whom currently or once played in the AFC East Division. The Miami Dolphins spoiled some fans idea of the ultimate season when they won their singular victory late last year, ending the notion of having one team go undefeated in the regular season, the Patriots, with another going undefeated. The Panthers once went 1-15, winning their first game and losing the rest. The 1989 Cowboys were perhaps the most famous of the 1-15 teams, winning the Super Bowl just three years later.

One great website for football statistics is Pro-Football-Reference.com. This website contains a plethora of information on coaching records, draft picks, and player stats. And most statistics are better than the dreaded 0-16.

JWF

Boxing Day

The last week of the year . . . A time for winding down, putting away all the Christmas decor, and figuring out where you put the free 2009 calendar that you got in the mail.

Speaking of calendars, you may have noticed on yours a little known and understood holiday on December 26th known as Boxing Day. But what in the world is Boxing Day?

Boxing Day is a holiday associated with the United Kingdom, Canada, and other countries of the British Commonwealth. Boxing Day is celebrated on the 26th of December, unless that day falls on a weekend, in which case Boxing Day is often moved back to the next Monday.

There are several possible explanations for the origins of Boxing Day. The entry on Encyclopedia Britannica (available through Galileo , get the password from your Georgia Librarian) notes that Boxing Day may have started out of two possible traditions. The first was the giving of alms or donations to the poor, often collected in small boxes, at Christmas. The second was the later tradition of servants having the day after Christmas off. Servants were often given the day off and were given boxes of goodies (similar to care packages).

There are other origins of the holiday. The urban legends website Snopes.com notes that in all the origin explanations, the main theme is that of the poor being given something by the wealthy.

Boxing Day in Canada has evolved into something similar to the huge post-Christmas shopping day in the United States. Sales and returns at big box stores are often the theme of the day. Britannica also notes that, for whatever reason, English colonists in America did not carry the holiday over from England, perhaps explaining why Boxing Day is not an official holiday in the United States.

Now you can stare at December 26th on your calendar in 2009 and not be confused.

JWF

1000 posts

When I logged in, I noticed we had 1000 posts on this blog...who would have thought I had so much to say?

Sharing the online resources (and the print resources) available to North Metro Technical College students is enjoyable. Noticing the 1000th post notation reinforces the adage- "time flies when you're having fun".

I'm on break till January 5th but as I see or hear something I'll share. Which brings me to the Early Word blog- "steal this for your next speech". It made me laugh out loud.

I used to be a part of a giant public library system that would mail books to your home.....so when Brian Williams got to the.... well- you'll see- just watch and listen...and think of me laughing.

-kls

It's not just inked anymore

What do you think of when you hear the word encyclopedia? Several shelves of dark colored thick volumes with gold lettering on the spines and big numbers or letters at the bottom of the spine...the traditional 22 volumes of print....with an index that you might consider using if you're really into cross referencing?

Yes, that was the style encyclopedia I used for many years. In my earliest library days there were CD's that could be loaded on a computer. Then encyclopedias became available through a subscription service online. Wiki-pedia, the people's encyclopedia, became the free way online to find pop culture information (and quick facts). So what was a self respecting encyclopedia publisher to do?

Encyclopedia Britannica has moved well into the 21st century. I attended one of their webinars and came away thinking - this isn't the encyclopedia anymore!

It's a portal of information- full text articles from EB, magazine and journal articles from ProQuest and Ebsco, web sites vetted by humans, images, video-clips, and time lines. There are enough links within each page to make the most ardent web surfer happy.

Best of all you can create Workspaces and collect all those links into your personal library on a topic. We're going to use the workspace option for our History classes and English classes. We have collected web sites on delicious but this will add another dimension- best of all the link to the workspace can be e-mailed (or saved on delicious)!

What a wonderful well rounded resource the encyclopedia has become. It's available through GALILEO. You may get the password to use GALILEO at home from your Georgia librarian!


-kls

Serendipity

Yesterday I mentioned the phase of the moon in my entry. Shortly afterwards I read what Mary Ludwick on LM_NET posted from the NASA Science News for December 9, 2008 -Not all full Moons are the same. This Friday's is the biggest and brightest full Moon of the year.
The full story may be found at NASA's page!

Isn't serendipity fun!

From Encyclopedia Britannica via GALILEO:
Main Entry: ser·en·dip·i·ty
Pronunciation: -'di-p&-tE
Function: noun
Etymology: from its possession by the heroes of the Persian fairy tale The Three Princes of Serendip
: the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for

You get the current password to access GALILEO at home from your Georgia librarian

-kls

What phase is the moon in>

A cartoon co-incidence today -Rhymes with Orange refers to T. Oedipus Rex in paleo-psychiatry while One Big Happy plays on the word Rex as wrecks.

I started thinking about Oedipus Rex and realized - my brain is turning to jello and I couldn't remember anything- was it Shakespeare or Greeks? Who wrote it?

To get a quick answer I could have done a Google search but I thought better of it- and went to our OPAC and searched. We have four titles - two print and two electronic books. All looked like more information than I really wanted.

We purchase the full Credo Reference and have a search box on the library page. A search in Credo brought me 171 results. I chose The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Houghton Mifflin (yes, it was first on the list). I was reminded of the Greek myth and the play by Sophocless with a reference to Freud.

All in a paragraph in a reputable source- just as easy as Google without the angst of worrying if this is a credible resource!


-kls

The perfect gift

Can you guess what this item is?

• No assembly required
• No batteries needed
• Does not become obsolete
• Can be taken anywhere
• Does not cause carpel tunnel syndrome
• No small parts to lose
• No annoying sound effects
• No updates or upgrades needed
• Never needs ironing
• Easy to wrap
• Good for hours of entertainment
• Easy to store
• Always fits
• Will not cause strife at airport security
• User friendly
• Easy to share files with friends
• Doesn't need extension cord
• Bookmarks easy to manage
• Great topics of conversation
• Never comes in the wrong color or size
• Doesn't need to be serviced by a dealer
• Doesn't need spare parts
• Easier to wrap than footballs
• Looks good with any decor
• Doesn't need watering or fertilizing
• Won't irritate your allergies
• Doesn't go out of style
• Doesn't get aphids or draw ants
• Doesn't bark or need to be walked in the middle of the night
• Won't stretch, shrink or fade
• Won't scratch the coffee table
• Won't get stale
• Doesn't have zippers that break
• Can be used over and over by many people
• Not empty when finished
• You can open this again and again

Thanks to Cindy Kilpatrick for sharing this list on LM_NET


----it's a book!

I smiled as I went through the list. My youngest has asked for a complete set of the Ian Fleming, James Bond books. Nice- very nice- no batteries....

-kls

the House of Lords

Greetings,

Most Sunday evenings I tune in to watch the delayed broadcast of the Prime Minister's Question Time on C-SPAN. Question Time occurs live on Wednesdays from the British House of Commons in London. The House of Commons is the lower house of the British Parliament, and serves as the equivalent of our legislative branch and most of our executive branch of government. During Question Time, any Member of Parliament, or MP, can ask the current Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, a question, to which the Prime Minister replies. The 30 minute show is a jostling affair, with the members of the three main political parties hollering and cheering as their respective leaders get in various jabs and jarbs with questions and responses. The Speaker of the House tries to referee it all.

This Sunday the Question Time did not air. Instead, C-SPAN aired delayed footage of the ceremonial opening of the parliamentary session. This opening involves the monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, and the upper house of the Parliament, the House of Lords.

The House of Lords was once the domain of the titled nobility. Nobles were given membership based upon their birth into a titled house. Over time, the power of the House of Lords, like that of the monarch, declined and became rather ceremonial in nature, with most power resting in the hands of the House of Commons. Her Majesty's Government is controlled by the party that wins the most seats in the Commons, although there are members of the Government's cabinet who come from the House of Lords.

Today the Lords serves as a bit of a reviewing body on laws passed by Her Majesty's Government. Interestingly, the Lords is also the highest judiciary body in Great Britain, with a small group of 12 members of the House of Lords fulfilling this duty.

Members of the House of Lords are called 'peers.' As mentioned above, membership was once dominated by 'hereditary peers,' those peers who inherited title by birth from their families. A dark time for the House of Lords was the Commonwealth period following the English Civil War. During this time both the monarchy and the Lords were abolished, and England was ruled by general and Parliamentarian Oliver Cromwell. The Lords was restored after Cromwell's death, when the monarchy was restored.

During the mid-twentieth century, legislation was passsed which enabled the creation of Life Peerages. Life Peers are those who are given title for service to Britain. These titles are not passed down to their children but expire when they die. Many former Prime Ministers and other notable members of the House of Commons, such as former PM Margaret Thatcher, have been made life peers. (Interestingly, the last Hereditary Peerage, which can be passed on to children, given to a non-member of the royal family, went to Thatcher's husband Dennis.)

Some peers are referred to as the Lords Spiritual. These members sit because of their office within the Church of England, which is the official state church. Unlike the other peers, Lords Spiritual may not show a preference for or identify with a particular political party. Other peers may choose to identify as Labour, Conservative, or Liberal Democrat. A few peers do not identify with any of the three major political parties.

The Labour Party has been more outspoken on the issue of reforming the nature of the House of Lords when compared to the Conservative Party. At one time, the Labour Party called for the abolition of the House of Lords. One of the platforms of Tony Blair's 'New Labour' election campaign in 1997 was reform of the House of Lords. This succeed in limiting the number of hereditary peers to 92 members, a minority of the members in the House of Lords. Votes on further reform showed support for making the House either 80% elected or 100% elected. However, these votes were not binding. The current government position is to move the House into a body of which 1/3 is up for election every general election, with an elected composition of either 80% or 100%.

Regardless, of future reforms, the House of Lords is a fascinating example of an upper house of government as compared to our own US Senate here in the United States.

BBC Guide to the House of Lords

JWF

Planning ahead

It's quite chilly outside. Several staff saw snow flurries yesterday. When I went to GALILEO to look for a database, I noticed In the Spotlight (on the right hand side of the home page) the All About Birds web site (yes, Virginia, there are web sites in GALILEO).

All About Birds is a website from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that includes information about watching birds, learning their nesting behaviors, attracting birds, indentifying them, recording observations, and getting involved in bird conservation. The site includes guides, images, maps, sounds, videos, and much more. There is also a link to the Macaulay Library, an archive of animal sounds and videos.

I thought- winter (see the first two sentences) would be a great time to prepare for Spring- study the birds, listen to their songs. Think warm thoughts!

kls

Who invented that?

Yesterday I talked about gathering stories about your family- what if you hear that Uncle Bill invented something? How do you find out if that's 'true'? Dear Myrtle (a genealogy blogger) shares the experience of one of her readers with Google Patent. Myrt notes how one can search by name or by invention.

Thinking of simple Christmas gifts from my youth, I searched for 'hula hoop'. Amazing how many patents there are for the wide variety of hoops.

Which lead me to GALILEO to search for 'hula hoop'. From the home page I selected the Company and Industry information link, then Company information, I left the 4 suggested databases and searched for 'hula hoop'. Interesting current articles about this long lived toy!

From stories about family to stories about companies - tie them together by using authoritative resources.

kls

And we talked

Thanksgiving is a delightfully American holiday when we celebrate our blessings which range from a variety of food stuffs to friends and family. Some travel to visit kin over the long weekend. A family reunion may take place - where cousins see each other for the first time in years. The conversations around the table vary from reminiscing about long gone relatives to catching up on life's current little details. If someone in your family has started collecting the stories about the extended family, where are they keeping those tales? My family has a wiki that is accessible by invitation and password. The stories collect, get edited and enjoyed. Here's another way to preserve those stories.

Story Corps is extending the National Day of Listening through the holiday season.
This holiday season, ask the people around you about their lives — it could be your grandmother, a teacher, or someone from the neighborhood. By listening to their stories, you will be telling them that they matter and they won’t ever be forgotten. It may be the most meaningful time you spend this year.

Go listen, record, and share the stories of our lives!

kls

the Pro Football Hall of Fame

Greetings,

Ah, Thanksgiving . . . A time for turkey, family, fun, fall, and football. The National Football League is closely associated with the holiday, as for many years the Detroit Lions and the Dallas Cowboys have played respective games against rotating opponents on America's turkey day. Given the dismal state of the Lions over the last decade, there has been talk of taking the games away from Detroit and Dallas and rotating all four spots among the 32 teams. However, much of this talk has died down now that the NFL Network has started to air a night/third Thanksgiving game that features two rotating teams each year.

Today, Thanksgiving Eve, the Pro Football Hall of Fame announced its twenty five seminfinalists for induction to its hallowed halls. This number will soon be paired down to fifteen and also includes two senior nominees (guys who played a long time ago). Among the semifinalists are some perpetual semifinalists, including Ray Guy, Lester Hayes (Go Raiders!), and those eligible for the first time, including Shannon Sharpe. A player must have been retired for five years to be eligible, and a coach must have been retired for one year to eligible.

Despite its name, the Pro Football Hall of Fame focuses on the NFL/National Football League. However, some of the enshrinees spent portions of their career in other leagues, such as Minnesota Coach Bud Grant in the Canadian Football League and 49ers quarterback Steve Young in the 1980's United States Football League.

The Hall is a museum that is shaped like a vertical football. Some have compared the shape to an old orange juice squeezer. The Hall is located in Canton, Ohio. Why Canton? Canton was home to the Canton Bulldogs, one of the original professional teams in the sport, and is also home to some of the most competitive high school games you will find. The area around Canton is also considered one of the birthplaces of football.

The inductees will be voted on and announced the day before the 2009 Super Bowl. Some get in their first year of eligibility, such as Steelers quarterback Terry Bradshaw, while others wait for many years to be inducted, such as Steelers wideouts Lynn Swann and John Stallworth. Other greats rise up out of the seniors pool to be inducted. Each inductee receives a distinctive yellow blazer, a ring, and has their bust cast in bronze for display in the museum.

The museum also houses famous memorabilia from past games. My personal favorites from my two visits are the white cleets Cowboys running back Tony Dorsett wore when he ran the 99 yard run from scrimmage against the Vikings and a pair of Rams running back Eric Dickerson's goggles. They also have Oilers coach Bum Phillip's belt buckle, which was the size of a small helicopter pad.

If you are ever in Canton/Stark County, give the Hall of Fame a visit.

JWF

Bidding for what

Over the weekend various channels were running stories about the assassination of JFK 45 years ago.

Mike Huckabee interviewed Dan Rather for Saturdays show on Fox. Mr. Rather shared the story about the bidding for the film taken by Abraham Zapruder.



Who would bid today - with the ubiquitous news crews and the everyday person with a camera phone who may post to their blog, YouTube, MySpace, Flickr - providing immediate, unfiltered access to the event.

-kls

The Power of Art at the Library

Greetings,

Need a bit of art in your life to spice up the drab days of late fall and early winter? Look no further than the North Metro Tech Library.

We have just acquired the DVD edition of the BBC/PBS series 'the Power of Art' by Simon Schama. The series focuses on eight great works of art. Each episode takes the viewer back in time to the creation of the piece and examines the cultural and social context in which it was created. The episodes also look at the life of the artist and how that shaped the creation and style of the work. The episodes span several different periods in time and art.

We also have the companion book to the series, for those of you seeking further information. Both the dvd and book are reserve materials, which means that they are available for use within the library.

Schama is a writer well known for his works on the French Revolution and slavery, among other topics. You may recognize him from his tv series 'A History of Britain,' which aired on the History Channel several years ago. Schama is known for his distinctive delivery and narrative prose.

JWF

Get in Shape Georgia

The President's Challenge is a government program designed to get Americans into better physical shape. The website for the program is very interactive and has programs and activities geared toward children, teens, adults, and seniors.

You can create an account on the website and use your account to log your activity. At the adult age level, there are bronze, silver, and gold award levels. You achieve these awards by logging your activity in your account. The website tabulates up the amount of points you earn for each activity based upon time, distance, degree of intensity. The website keeps track of your points and will display the progress that you have made toward your goal. Once you have reached an award level, you are eligible for a certificate from the office of the President.

There are many great features on this website. It also saves you the time of having to keep track of your activity on paper. I am personally using the website. I have a goal of completing the bronze level before President Bush leaves office and getting a certificate from him, then getting a certificate from President Obama for the silver level. At present I am over 50% complete with the bronze level.

JWF

Cornhusks and the Electoral College

Greetings,

The eyes of the electoral world were upon the state of Nebraska for a brief moment on Friday. It was announced that Barack Obama had won one of the state's five electoral votes. This is due to a system of awarding some of the state's electoral votes based upon who wins in a particular Congressional district, not on who wins the popular vote statewide.

All fifty states have electoral votes. Each state has two for its US Senators, and at least one for the number of members it has in the House of Representatives. Example, California: 2+53=55, Wyoming: 2+1=3, Tennessee: 2+9=11. Remember, it is not the candidate who wins the national popular vote who becomes President, but rather the candidate who wins the most electoral votes. As a result, candidates fight to win individual 'swing' states to gain the most electors rather than run a campaing to pile up the biggest amount of votes nationwide. (Note: It is possible to come in 2nd in the popular vote but win the electoral vote and become President. Ex. Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876 and George W. Bush in 2000).

Forty-eight of the fifty states currently award all of their electoral votes to the candidate who wins the popular vote within the state. Some have argued the fairness of this system, as a candidate might win California by one vote (theoretically), but not pick up any of its 53 electoral votes. Colorado voters in 2004 defeated a statewide referendum that would have awarded their electoral votes on a proportional basis.

Nebraska and Maine are the two exceptions. These states award their electoral votes in a unique way. The two electoral votes for the two US Senators in each state are awarded to the winner of the statewide popular vote. As a result, McCain picked up two in Nebraska and Obama two in Maine.

Here's where it gets a bit trickier. The remaining votes are awarded based upon the candidate who wins the most votes in each of the Congressional districts in the state. Until 2008, there was nothing unusual about this as in both Maine and Nebraska the statewide winner also won in each state's Congressional districts. However, that changed in 2008. After the counting of mail-in ballots, it was determined that Barack Obama had won more votes than John McCain in the Nebraska 2nd Congressional district (the smallest district in the state, which includes the city of Omaha). As a result, one of the Nebraska electoral votes was awarded to Obama for a 4 to 1 McCain to Obama split in the state's electoral votes. (Maine awarded all votes to Obama). Also, the Republican candidate in the 2nd district won the Congressional election, which would seem to indicate that many voters in the Nebraska second congressional district voted a split ticket.

And in a further peace of trivia, Nebraska is the only state government to not have an upper and lower house in its legislature. It operates on a unicameral system, one where there is only one house in the legislature and one in which the members are officially non-partisan.

JWF

A swift goodbye

The Official Michael Crichton site notes his passing. Blogs and news outlets have shared the information. Wiki Pedia has a complete list of his work with links.

At NMTC, we don't have many pleasure reading books - but in our netLibrary collection there is the 1996 edition of Michael Crichton : a critical companion by Elizabeth A. Trembley.

The summary notes: Until now, Michael Crichton's many readers have had nowhere to turn for more information on one of America's most popular novelists. This companion features clear analyses of Crichton's life and literary influences, as well as chapters on each of his 13 novels to date. It will help Crichton's readers to learn more about how significant events in his life affected the development of his fiction and literary style and how the heritage of popular fiction, including mystery, gothic, adventure, and science fiction, influenced his writing. This study provides close textual analysis of each of his novels in turn, focusing on plot, character development, theme, and critical interpretation.

You can check World Cat in GALILEO for the nearest library that owns a Michael Chrichton title. You may also do an Interlibrary Loan request through World Cat. We'll borrow the book for you from another library! Save on gas - let your computer do the searching.

-kls

Through the air with the greatest of ease

Just reading the news - and this story grabbed me - Pilot completes jetpack challenge ....Known as "Fusionman," he was aiming to follow the route taken by French airman Louis Blériot 99 years ago when he became the first person to fly across the English Channel in a plane.

Which reminded me of the Caldecott winner in our collection, The Glorious Flight: Across the Channel with Louis Bleriot July 25, 1909 by Alice Provensen [TL 721.B5 P76 1987]

The pictures are gorgeous - which one would expect from a Caldecott winner. The story is inspiring as well. It wouldn't take long to read either.

New Native American Related Resources at the Library

Excelsior!

Greetings. Here at the NMTC Library we would like to inform you of two books we have recently received, both of which relate to Native American studies.

The first is a 2008 biography of noted Lakota chief Sitting Bull. This book is by Bill Yenne. The cover is interesing because it features a very stoic portrait of the man himself. Also, at the bottom center of the cover, you can see the autograph of the English version of his name that Sitting Bull learned to write. Just beyond the title page, the book quotes the Dictionary of Canadian Biography as follows: "the greatest Indian engima of his time, perhaps of all time."

A review of this work is available in Galileo . Go to Databases A-Z, then go to 'B,' then go to Book Index with Reviews. Search by title and limit the publication dates to 2008. Then you will find a review of this work.

We also have the book 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. The book deals with how the Native Americans lived prior to the arrival of the Europeans in 1492. (Although the Vikings got to North America before that and some say that English fisherman had contact with First Nations tribes off the coast of Newfoundland in the mid-1400's.) One area the book focuses on is the large cities that Native Americans constructed, such as Tenochtitlan in Mexico and Cahokia in Illinois.

A review is available of this work as well in Book Index with Reviews. Do a title search for 1491.

We are very pleased to have both of these resources available at the North Metro Technical College Library for your use. The 1491 book is considered one of the definitive popular books on Native American studies of the last few years.

JWF

To be or not to be

...that is the question posed in Hamlet. We're building our Shakespeare collection to support the growing number (and depth) of our English literature classes.

I'm fond of the No Fear Shakespeare series. It has 'regular' English on one side and 'Shakespearean' English on the other. The cover notes"the play plus a translation anyone can understand".

Quite handy. Check it out - you'll find our No Fear collection amidst the Shakespeare titles PR 2807 etc.

-kls

Election Day and the Fab Five

As Americans go to the polls tomorrow, our thoughts turn to New Wave.

Confused? You shouldn't be if you are a fan of New Wave/New Romance. New Wave was a genre that emerged as both a response to and an extension of punk rock in the early 1980's. Heavy on the synth, New Wave is remembered for its flashy fashions and its lyrics that contrasted from light to brooding and angst ridden.

One of the artists that defined the New Romance expression was a group from Birmingham, England not Alabama, called Duran Duran. (Named for a character in the Jane Fonda camp classic Barbarella.) Made up of singer Simon Le Bon, keyboardist Nick Rhodes, bass player John Taylor, drummer Roger Taylor, and guitarist Andy Taylor, Duran Duran approached a Beatlesque level of popularity for a few years, leading to their nickname of the 'Fab Five.' Girls swooned at the sight of the band, and fans bought up their record in drove. Note that none of the Taylors were related.

The look of Duran propelled the band to stardom as much as their music. Duran was able to form a synergy between the two elements using the newly popular genre of the music video. Duran seized on the young medium of MTV to display what were then some of the most creative and innovative music videos on the airwaves. Duran videos captured the look and feel of 1980's New Romance as much as any other entry into the field. The videos were especially known for their exotic third world shooting locales. The band even cut the title track for the last Roger Moore James Bond film 'A View to a Kill.'

All things must come to an end, and Duran Duran's last performance in their original incarnation was at the Live Aid superconcert until they reunited in 2001. Just prior to Andy Taylor and Roger Taylor leaving the band in the late 1980's, the band formed two side projects. John and Andy helped form the Power Station, a group that had some commerical success with Robert Palmer as the lead singer. Nick, Roger, and Simon formed a group called Arcadia, which cut a studio album but never toured.

Arcadia's one hit from their one album was entitled 'Election Day.' The song features a spoken word moment by Grace Jones, who played an evil Bond girl in the film 'A View to a Kill.' So for true believers in Duran, the term 'election day' conjures up thoughts of music as much as votes.

Duran has a special meaning for me as well. My best friend and his father share names with two of the Taylors in Duran, and yes the two Taylors that I know are related. My friend was married back in the spring, with yours truly as best man, near the city of Gainesville, Georgia. During the drive down and back, I listened to the music of Duran, forming an association of Duran with that wedding weekend.

Andy Taylor, who left the band in the 1980's for a solo career, has left the reunited Duran Duran. He has recently released a book on his experiences in rock and roll. You can read a review of it in Galileo. Go from the Galileo homepage to 'databases a-z' then select 'b.' Then go to Book Index with Reviews. Type 'Andy Taylor' in the search bar and the fourth result will be for his book 'Wild Boy: My Life in Duran Duran.' Click on the result link to read a review of the book (the book has received mixed reviews).

Now isn't all that just as interesting as ballot boxes, dimpled chads, swing states, and red to blue/blue to red?

JWF

Another chance to vote

The old saying about Chicago is the party bosses want you to vote early and vote often....

Now that you're in the mood to vote - try out the GALILEO survey:

When you open the GALILEO website today, you will see an invitation to participate in the annual user survey. Don't miss this chance to provide your feedback on your experience with GALILEO and to enter the drawing to win an iPod Nano. The annual surveys, conducted since 1997, have provided valuable firsthand feedback from users about what they think about the GALILEO web site, as well as experiential feedback from library staff on how their patrons are navigating the site and finding the content they need. Be sure to encourage your users to complete the survey to be entered into the drawing. The survey will be conducted November 3-9, 2008. Just click on the GALILEO User Survey link on the GALILEO home page to participate....info from Karen Minton

The staff at GALILEO take this survey as seriously as a Presidential election. They really do want to hear from their users! So go vote.

-kls

Ooooooooo

Gregory McNamee on the Britannica Blog offers a link to The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving. Very appropriate for today!

Thinking about Washington Irving led me to look in Credo Reference. When was he born, where did he live? Portraits, facts, information about Washington Irving are noted in reference works like the Cambridge Guide to Children's Books in English.

Which led me to wonder about the number of Washington Irving titles available for children. I went to GALILEO to look in NoveList.

NoveList noted 40 titles in an author search for Washington Irving. There are many variations of the Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle stories, plus collections of ghost stories. I learned Mr. Irving wrote Bracebridge Hall, tales of a traveller, the Alhambra. That didn't sound otherworldly.

Clicking on the WorldCat link showed libraries that owned the print title. NMTC didn't show up.

I wondered if NMTC had any Washington Irving titles that were not listed in WorldCat. Searching the NMTC catalog turned up Bracebridge Hall as well as A Tour on the Prairies , both in our netLibrary collection. I started reading A Tour on the Prairies and was drawn in to his description of the west in 1832.

All this wondering and wandering around started with a scary story. Where does a story lead you? Don't be afraid - wander down that crooked path to a new adventure.

Get the password to use GALILEO at home from your Georgia librarian. Pick up the password to use Credo from the NMTC librarian.

-kls

Flying with the greatest of ease

Our Visual Communication department is hosting a Second Life presentation this afternoon. They want to show instructors, students and administrators what educational (and commercial) value might be found in Second Life.

I have created a newbie avatar. I'll be attending and learning. Flying is harder than it sounds. I keep bumping into the roof. I've got to learn to fly outside and not inside!

We've purchased several books to support the program. The first one that arrived, 'Second Life : A Guide to Your Visual World' by Brian White is chock full of interesting tips and hints for both the newbie and experienced SL resident. I have had the book at my side as I try to learn a bit about living in Second Life.

When the hard copies are checked out, we do have two titles in netLibrary on Second Life. I did a search in netLibrary itself limiting my search to the title and the phrase Second Life. 6 titles were retrieved. Two actually have to do with the virtual world. You'll notice they have current copyright dates.

- Second Life Herald: The Virtual Tabloid That Witnessed the Dawn of the Metaverse
by Ludlow, Peter.; Wallace, M. Publication: Cambridge, Mass MIT Press, 2007.

- How to Make Real Money in Second Life: Boost Your Business, Market Your Services, and Sell Your Products in the World's Hottest Virtual Community
McGraw Hill Professional by Freedman, Robert.Publication: New York McGraw-Hill Professional, 2008.

We have a good collection in netLibrary. You may access our electronic books three ways: from our catalog, from GALILEO, and from netLibrary itself! You do need to create your free account (Library Card) on campus to use netLibrary off campus. A hint- you may create your account off campus by going the GALILEO. netLibrary will recognize you as a NMTC patron when you go through GALILEO.

Your Geogria librarian can give you the current password to access GALILEO at home.


Read - and learn to fly without hitting the roof.

-kls

Boo!

Just in time The Haunted Library series is back on the Encyclopedia Britannica blog:

...Each entry has been completely updated and about a dozen new libraries added. George has also included links to the websites of most of the libraries mentioned (as requested by a reader last year), as well as references to relevant entries in Britannica and other sources that have extra information.

I went to GALILEO and looked in NoveList for haunted library. Over 100 titles were found with haunted but the library part wasn't as clear. When I did a search with "haunted library" linked by the quotes only two titles were retrieved. Yet, these two titles seemed quite appropriate. The quotes made all the difference in narrowing my search.

You may get the password to use GALILEO at home from your Georgia librarian!


-kls

If it weren't for blogs

The blogs I subscribe to keep me up to date - Give 'em what they want : News for Collection Development and Readers Advisory Librarians noted today that Tony Hillerman has died. Nora Rawlinson offers links to USA Today and the NY Times for the obituaries.

I checked our catalog, being a tech school we don't have much fiction for fun. However in our e-book collection we have Tony Hillerman : a critical companion by John M. Reilly. The summary notes:

Edgar Award-winning writer Tony Hillerman has earned a reputation as a Grand Master of the popular mystery. This is the first full-length examination of his work. One of the most successful contemporary American writers, Hillerman has made his stories of Native American detectives instrumental in understanding modern American life. Through the creation of his Navajo detective characters, Hillerman has given new vigor to the popular genre of mystery with his treatment of the problems of order and identity in modern society. This study examines each of his 13 novels in turn and includes a biographical chapter and a chapter on his innovations in the genre of detective fiction.

The fun thing about the netLibrary books - one can read them from your desk, a few pages at a time. Create your free account (get your netLibrary card) on campus. Explore the wide variety of titles available through our catalog.

-kls

"Our subject is not death or evil .....

our Subject is the law. "

And that is how “Bound by Law? Tales from the Public Domain” begins. The print version has arrived and is on the shelf- maybe not for long since Jeff told the faculty about its existence.

The Afterword, which is subtitled "Why Three Stodgy Academics Wrote a Comic Book", has a sentence that made me smile broadly:

"For some strange reason, none of our intended audiences seem eager to read scholarly law review articles."

In fact, I laughed as I finished reading the afterword - the law is serious but this book makes copyright understandable and even enjoyable. I might even enjoy these academics law classes if they teach the way they share copyright information.


-kls

Boy and dogs = great story

The latest Oprah's Book Club book arrived this week- The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski.

The summary from our catalog : “A tale reminiscent of "Hamlet" that also celebrates the alliance between humans and dogs follows speech-disabled Wisconsin youth Edgar, who bonds with three yearling canines and struggles to prove that his sinister uncle is responsible for his father's death.”

I will confess – I borrowed this book the day it was processed and read very late- the tale does catch you and grab you….

We have 25 titles from Oprah’s list-
Look in our catalog
On the left side (blue column)
Look for Browse
Select Recommendations
You’ll see lists we’ve compiled for Award winners, the Doran Fuller Horticulture Collection, and Oprah!

-kls

What is the answer?

Libraries are using Instant Messaging, e-mail, Ask A Librarian links, phone reference, MySpace, Facebook, blogs, wikis and text messaging as life lines for the sinking researcher- the person who is overwhelmed by resources and just wants an answer.

netconnect, the supplement to Library Journal, has an interesting article titled "Mobile Delivery :Information Anywhere". (neither Ebsco nor Proquest have posted the Fall 2008 Net Connect issue - but they will - so you will be able to read this article in GALILEO - you can set up an RSS feed in both databases that will alert you when the new issue is posted).

Back to my point - throwing out the lifeline, getting the answers - the other librarian shared this with our faculty:

Kate and I came across an article pointing out that reference information services are now often available for cell phones. Cell users can text a question to one of several services and have the question answered within a few minutes.

The two services I used in a test run were Google and ChaCha (google.com/sms) and (chacha.com). I asked both services ‘what is the capital of Canada?’ The google service responded very quickly with the correct answer, as did the chacha service. Chacha uses live humans to answer their questions while google’s service is automated to some degree.

Google-466453 and ChaCha-242242. Please note that if you have to pay for texts or other cell fees then the cost of that will show up on your cell bill. Otherwise the services are free.

This should come in handy for when you are broken down on the side of the road and need to know the name of the British Prime Minister (Gordon Brown).

Now there's another way to get the answers.....

-kls/JWF

to get the password to use GALILEO at home, ask your Georgia librarian

Using Galileo for Book Reviews

One useful feature of Galileo that you might not be aware of is finding book reviews. You can find reviews of fiction books through a database entitled NoveList. If there is a particular title that you are interested in, you can look up the book in NoveList. The listing for the book in this database will give you publication information, as well as a few books reviews from various sources. This will help you in making selections when reading for pleasure.

What to do if North Metro Tech does not have the book you are interested in? Simply use another Galileo database, entitled WorldCat, to find libraries worldwide that own the book. If you are interested, contact the library and we will request the book for you from a library that owns it through a process called interlibrary loan.

I used NoveList to find a review on a book I just read entitled Three Day Road. The listing in NoveList contained several reviews on the book. The novel tells the story of two Cree/First Nation Canadian snipers during World War II as well as the experience of their aunt, one of the last Cree to live according to very traditional values. A good story if you are into Canada, First Nations, World War I, and/or snipers.

JWF