Reflecting

Creating this blog was a great learning experience for me. As always, the greatest fear is fear of the unknown. NOW I KNOW! Never quit learning, experimenting and, above all, traveling.



Ireland was my last adventure. Newfoundland will be next.

In addition to a great learning experience, this has been a lot of fun. Ms. Dewey is a kick. She has attitude and humor like my daughter, a great combination. Maps and geotagging was probably my favorite exercise. Favorite class in high school: geography. Pandora was great. No song too obscure for her.

I would definitely join in again should we be asked to a similar learning exercise.

Gaming

I confess I LOVE Suduko, Mahjong, Spider Solitaire and the list goes on. So this was fun and a guilty pleasure to know I'm being paid to find a new game to add to my list!

Google Earth

I could spend a lot of time here! I looked at pictures of Cesky Krumlov, a village in the Czech Republic that I visited many years ago. It is still beautiful and hasn't changed much.
Surprising feature: looking up an address in Juneau, AK showed me nearby B&B's. Could be very useful in planning my next trip.

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Online Tools

Google Docs has possibilities. Once again I prefer to keep it simple and not have accounts and passwords for too many various things out there for me to remember. Enjoying the ride however, even if I won't be coming back.

Search Engines

Thanks, Jim, for jogging my memory about a search engine I used to use before GOOGLE kind of took over......it was Metacrawler and it searched the search engines much like Dogpile and Mama. I did the searches for Dublin art galleries in those three and find I still prefer Metacrawler. I will use it again instead of always relying on Google.

Podcasting

http://www.grpl.org/yourlibrary/pods/storytimes.xml

I had trouble with this one--at least with getting the feeds to incorporate into my Google reader. I tried Irish music from "Learn Outloud" and that would not transfer. So then I listened to this children's librarian read a story called "Festival of the Bones" in English and Spanish. Very nice and this will do for my podcasting experience.

Overdrive

I like it! Listening from my computer is not for me but to download a book to listen to from my I-Pod would be great. I was very surprised at the current titles. I looked at biography, one of my favorite reads, and found the new Barbara Walters book was on there already. (Not one I would listen to, just illustrates a very current title.) Bye-bye Books on Tape!

del.icio.us

Perhaps I don't have wide enough interests to use this tool. I'll give it a go though, and use it in addition to my "favorites".

Wiki Wiki Fun

This Wiki business looks like something I could spend a lot of time on. But, I have work to do so will continue this from my home computer. I especially liked the Book Lovers wiki from Princeton University. There were a lot of non-fiction reviews and I would like to add some of my favorite titles to that, such as: "The Rabbi's Daughter" by Reva Mann, "My Father's Secret War" by Lucinda Franks and "American Boy" by Wade Rouse.

Week 9

I'm familiar with YouTube. Hula was interesting. Where else could you find clips from Saturday Night Live 1975 version?

MySpace

I now have a MySpace account and can communicate with Kim who sits right next to me at work! Nevermind, it could be fun. I might connect others who are trying to become more tech savvy.

http://www.flickr.com/tour/maps/

Completed my Flickr assignment. I think I will use Flickr from my home computer. I am bookmarking the "maps" section to verify my exploration. I have always been interested in geography--where people were born, where they now live, where they've visited. So I like this map feature of Flickr. Thanks, SIL, for letting me take the time to learn these new communication websites.

Pandora

Now this is fun! I haven't heard the music of the "Crash Test Dummies" for years! And it is so easy to set up. I wonder if there is any song or artist that Pandora couldn't find......

RSS Feeds

It took awhile to complete the RSS feed step but now I have it and can enter it in my log!

Awards Breakfast

I just wanted to say how much my husband and I enjoyed the SIL Awards Breakfast yesterday. The food was great, the short speeches were too. It has been a pleasure to work in this library system for twenty plus years.

Wondering

If you are wondering who the cute little guy making a mess could be, it's my 9 month old grandson. There is nothing more special than becoming a first time grandparent. He loves his books and teething bisquits.

First Time Blogger

I've enjoyed setting this up more than I imagined. Because it is basically a project mandated by my job in a very busy library, I was hesitant to try this. I have enough to do at work, or so I thought. But here I am and this is fun! More later......

Driving in Ireland

In May, my sister-in-law and I will be driving in Ireland. We have a nine day trip mapped out with a B&B or castle hotel awaiting us each night. I'd love to get some tips for driving on the "wrong" side of the highway as neither one of us has ever had the experience. I am a bit concerned.....