One Voice

Saying Happy New Year - Around The World!

Arabic Kul 'am wa antum bikhair
Basque Urte Berri on
Bengali Shuvo noboborsho
Chinese (Cantonese) Sun nien fai lok
Chinese (Mandarin) Xin nian yu kuai
Czech Stastny Novy Rok
Danish Godt NytÅr
Dutch Gelukkig nieuwjaar
Esperanto Bonan Novjaron
Finnish Onnellista uutta vuotta
French Bonne année
German Ein glückliches neues Jahr
Greek Eutychismenos o kainourgios chronos
Hawaiian Hauoli Makahiki hou
Hebrew Shana Tova
Hungarian Boldog uj evet
Indonesian (Bahasa) Selamat Tahun Baru
Italian Felice Anno Nuovo or Buon anno
Japanese Akemashite Omedetou Gozaimasu
Korean Sehe Bokmanee Bateuseyo
Laotian (Hmong) Nyob Zoo Xyoo Tshiab
Latin Felix sit annus novus
Nigerian (Hausa) Barka da sabuwar shekara
Norwegian Godt Nytt År
Philippines (Tagalog) Manigong Bagong Taon
Polish Szczesliwego Nowego Roku
Romanian La Multi Ani si Un An Nou Fericit
Samoan Ia manuia le Tausaga Fou
Spanish Feliz año nuevo
Swahili Heri za Mwaka Mpya
Swedish Gott Nytt År
Vietnamese Chuc mung nam moi
Welsh Blwyddyn Newydd Dda

Looking For gLove In All the Right Places?

Pittsburg, PA has one very cool ... er, warm ... blogsite. And NYC has a sister site. It might work well in Boston - someone needs to go to work on it!

Anonymouse

In Dennis O'Reilly's blog post of December 17, he states 5 ways to protect your privacy online:

#1: Paranoia pays. Don't trust anything or anyone.

#2: Don't use Internet Explorer.

#3: Use a temporary credit card number.

#4: Use an anonymous proxy server like Anonymouse.

#5: Don't use Google.

I wasn't aware there was any way I could surf the web anonymously, leaving no cookies behind. It's a great tip. As we do more and more online, and more and more sophisticated phishing and marketing ploys hit the Web, it's important that we learn some privacy protection.

Spellbound!

Want a way to while away* the time? Try Free Rice. It's fun and it's educational and it's ADDICTIVE! Besides it will improve your vocabulary and spelling.

"The rice is paid for by the advertisers whose names you see on the bottom of your vocabulary screen. This is regular advertising for these companies, but it is also something more. Through their advertising at FreeRice, these companies support both learning (free vocabulary for everyone) and reducing hunger (free rice for the hungry)." Thanks to Kate Haviland for the link.

*And while we are at it, did you know there are forty synonyms for the expression 'while away the time"? Moby Thesaurus has words for "while away the time":
beguile the time, burn daylight, buy time, consume time, dabble,
diddle, doodle, drown care, footle, fribble, fritter away time,
have a ball, have fun, keep time, kill time, laugh it up,
live it up, look for time, loosen up, lose time, measure time,
occupy time, pass the time, pass time, piddle, potter, put in time,
putter, race against time, relax, spend time, summer, take time,
take up time, trifle, use time, waste time, weekend, winter,
work against time

Unique Gifts From Around the World

I have found the National Geographic sponsored site, Novica.com, to be a great source of gifts. Many of the gifts I've purchased come completely or uniquely wrapped - very special packaging touches and personal cards from the artist. The shipping from places like Thailand and Bali seems to be more reasonably priced than within this country and it is very fast and on time. Among other things I've purchased have been the three beaded silk shawls my daughters wore as maids of honor in my wedding this past year.

Check out the necklaces, bags and briefcases, handmade apparel and others and sort by price if you'd like. A great option for gift buying to support aristry around the world.

Why Not Your Library?

As the years go by as a orofessional librarian I keep less books in my home. Oh, yes, they look great and decorating with books is a real art. I've been very proud of my collections in the past, having actual 'libraries', rooms devoted to books and reading, in my own homes. I've even cataloged them using the ReaderCat barcode scanner. However, these days most of my books are long-gone in favor of never moving books again! It just doesn't make that much sense to me to hang on when reciprocal borrowing from Massachusetts libraries is so easy.

Then again ... perhaps I would need that certain book at 3 a.m. on a Sunday morning? Not me. Or perhaps I am just jealous, not having the space in my life that I once had. I don't think so.

However, that said ... if you want to read about a couple who did organize and catalog their home collection, it is an interesting example of

Home Library, Extreme Style!

Fun With Elves

Two of the best sites for this holiday are ElfYourself and ScroogeYourself brought to you by OfficeMax. This fun software can create a great online greeting using photos you have right on your computer. Play with it and create with it. I've ScroogedMyself and you can get right to the task yourself!

Gifts With Panache

Warning: Some political humor involved! Salon.com has published this year's gift guide and the suggestions are loads of fun - even if you aren't buying or giving. For a quick peek at some of the cleverest:
Check out the

Great Revolutionaries finger puppet set or the Sticky Notes or Freudian Slippers at The Unemployed Philosopher's Guild

or a

Double Shot Travel French Press Mug for adventurous coffee lovers from Liquid Planet

or

Go Green with a continual supply of recycled toothbrushes from Recycline

Listening In

"lively and revealing conversations to more readers than our radio signal reaches ... [and] with the generous and visionary support of The Leo S. Guthman Fund of Chicago, [OpenBooks] is able to provide free downloadable Open Books audio files Open Books Radio is home to a substantial archive of author interviews, a collection that will continue to grow as we add new shows each month. Visit our Interviews page for a list of the writers appearing on Open Books."

Too Many Books, Too Little Space

The British Library's collection is growing every year, just as our Library of Congress in Washington, DC. Libraries who are 'copyright houses' are weighed down with that responsibility. Read the article in The Guardian to learn just how much space is needed to house books that no one is currently reading.

Reinventing the Book?

"The book, just turns out to be an incredible device."

says Jeff Bezos, 43, the CEO of Internet commerce giant Amazon.com. Read the article in Newsweek. From Library Link Of the Day Bezos believes the concept of perfection can be improved upon. Do you?

Sci Fi and Fantasy and Cups of Tea

Nancy Pearl and I are on the same page - science fiction and fantasy are not our genre. However, Nancy has picked a half dozen must-reads and you can listen to the NPR podcast, or read the reviews. From the I Love Libraries.org newsletter.

Star Images

The top 100 images from the Hubble Telescope can be found at Space Telescope.org

"The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the sharpest view yet of the most famous of all planetary nebulae: the Ring Nebula (M57). In this October 1998 image, the telescope has looked down a barrel of gas cast off by a dying star thousands of years ago. This photo reveals elongated dark clumps of material embedded in the gas at the edge of the nebula; the dying central star floating in a blue haze of hot gas. The nebula is about a light-year in diameter and is located some 2, 000 light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Lyra."

"Give me the child until he is seven and I will give you the man"

One of the best uses of tube time is viewing the Up Series. By now the original series (Seven-Up) has gone thirty-five years beyond its original filming. In 1964 director Michael Apted filmed fourteen seven-year olds (in England) and provided us with an inside view of their lives. He followed it with 7 Plus Seven in 1971, 21-Up in 1978, 28-Up in 1985, 35-Up in 1992, 42-Up in 1999 and 49-Up in 2006. It is an intriguing series and one that hooked me in 1999. Watch the whole thing - you'll be mesmerized. It runs for many hours - plan the whole week to watch it.

From Amazon.com

Starting in 1964 with Seven Up, The UP Series has explored this Jesuit maxim of "Give me the child until he is seven and I will give you the man." The original concept was to interview 14 children from diverse backgrounds from all over England, asking them about their lives and their dreams for the future. Every seven years, renowned director Michael Apted, a researcher for Seven Up, has been back to talk to them, examining the progression of their lives.
From cab driver Tony to schoolmates Jackie, Lynn and Susan and the heart-breaking Neil, as they turn 49 more life-changing decisions and surprising developments are revealed.

Glasswing

I had to share this photograph of a glasswing butterfly from South America. Simply gorgeous. Click for more photos.


And here: Art in Hand

Missed the Debate?

If you missed the Democratic debate last Tuesday night, you can watch it through the NY Times link here for a time. The buffering is great and you can read the transcript as you watch. Also remember to catch up on all Election 2008 news go to Road to 2008.com or perhaps Comedy Central's Indecision 2008 is more your cup of tea. It's a humorous look at the 2008 Presidential race.

Daylight Moving Time

Two books written about the 'daylight savings' insanity are Seize the Daylight: The Curious and Contentious Story of Daylight Saving Time by David Prerau and Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Timeby Michael Downing.

Happy Halloween

Mini Fenway to Open 2008

For an A to Z glossary of Fenway Park (everything you wanted to know and more!) go the official Red Sox site.

The Mini Fenway Park in Quincy will open as early as 2008. The major components include:

1. Fenway Park Replica, a kid size Fenway Park with a regulation youth baseball and softball field including all of the present day features of the real Fenway Park: the Green Monster, the Fisk and Pesky Poles, dugout, bull pens, red box seats, light towers, Citgo Sign, practice batting and pitching cages, the exact foot print of the historic field and 1912 Façade.
2. Legends Museum, a museum with both stationary and interactive exhibits that will feature baseball legends such as Carl Yastrzemski, the first graduate of the Little League System to make it to the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
3. Major League Baseball Fan Fest Area including interactive exhibits that replicate the actual MLB Fan Fest held annually at the All Star Game.
4. Theater shaped like a baseball diamond that features indoor clinics, lectures, baseball games and movies.
5. Food & Beverage consisting of a full service Restaurant with Function Rooms, Food Court & Concessions.
6. Souvenir and Pro Shop with the latest baseball and softball apparel, equipment and memorabilia.
7. Clubhouse for players and coaches traveling a long distance.

Find a Haunted Library

At I Love Libraries you can search Massachusetts and the country for a haunted library. From this week's American Libraries Direct.

How Sweet It Is!

Today's Killer Sudoku was classified as 'moderate'. I find the sum calculator and check functions to really help me hone my skills at the game.

Reading, No Pressure

Take a literature course for fun from LitLovers.

Be Warned! Addictive Killer Sudoku

Okay, so I'm addicted to Killer Sudoku and Kakuro, two very difficult versions of the Sudoku puzzles. (Sudoku is actually a 'child' of the more difficult Kakuro.) Now please know that I make a lot of mistakes and only complete the 'easy' ones (without cheating.)

Try these online versions for free: Killer Sudoku (with daily and weekly puzzles) and my favorite Kakuro, PuzzleMix and Sudoko sites. You can purchase inexpensive copies for your desktop as well but the online versions work well.

Reuter's Surprise!

Reuters.com reports in the article "Surprise! Internet Actually a Boon for Books!"

Penguin publishers said this week that the explosion in online and second-hand retailing has not caused the damage they were expecting and that the Internet has in many ways been a boon for booksellers as a tool for marketing, experimentation and reaching out to the next generation of readers.

See the Colors Change

Yankee Magazine's Interactive Foliage Map brings you all over New England for peak color. Finally, we are really seeing some beauty out of our windows. If you are stuck in an office with no view it's a pity!

Do We Check?

Here's a Dewey Quiz from Carnegie Mellon University Libraries. It's fun and can be difficult if you aren't looking!

Sedona, Arizona

I'm back from the honeymoon and thank goodness for public libraries and free Internet access. It surely made me feel at home in the desert. The Sedona Public Library is actually a privately-run library for members in the Sedona area. Library cards are free and membership is much the same as publicly-funded libraries everywhere.

May 14, 1994 a parade of Sedona citizens carried "Books Across Sedona" to symbolize the move to the new library building at 3250 White Bear Road. This move took place over the next three weeks, and the new building opened its doors to the public June 6, 1994. The Sedona Schnebly statue, located near the entrance of the library, was Sedona's first Art in Public Places project. The Sedona monument was commissioned and donated to the City of Sedona by the Red Rock Arts Council in August 1994. The unveiling of the monument was part of the dedication ceremony of the Sedona Public Library, held on October 1, 1994.

The town was named Sedona after Sedona Schnebly...

By the turn of the century, about 15 homesteading families called the area home. In 1899, Theodore Carlton (Carl or "T.C.") Schnebly, and his wife, Sedona Miller Schnebly, joined T.C.'s brother, Ellsworth (D.E.), in the Oak Creek Area. T. C. Schnebly was an enterprising young man. He had 80 acres with a general store and hotel (in his house), where Tlaquepaque and the Los Abrigados resort are now located. Mr. Schnebly saw the need for regular mail service in the little community and organized its first post office. He first suggested the names "Oak Creek Crossing" and "Schnebly Station" to the Postmaster General in Washington. They were considered too long by the Postmaster, so both were rejected. Ellsworth then suggested to Theodore to submit Sedona's name for the honor. Theodore submitted it, and on June 26, 1902, the Postmaster approved the name 'Sedona'.

Banned Books Week

The "10 Most Challenged Books of 2006" reflect a range of themes, and consist of the following titles:

"And Tango Makes Three," by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, for homosexuality, anti-family, and unsuited to age group;
"Alice" series, by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor for sexual content and offensive language;
"Athletic Shorts," by Chris Crutcher for homosexuality and offensive language;
"Beloved," by Toni Morrison for offensive language, sexual content, and unsuited to age group;
"The Bluest Eye," by Toni Morrison for sexual content, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;
"The Chocolate War," by Robert Cormier for sexual content, offensive language, and violence;
"The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things," by Carolyn Mackler for sexual content, anti-family, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;
"Gossip Girls," series by Cecily Von Ziegesar for homosexuality, sexual content, drugs, unsuited to age group, and offensive language;
"The Perks of Being a Wallflower," by Stephen Chbosky for homosexuality, sexually explicit, offensive language, and unsuited to age group; and
"Scary Stories" series, by Alvin Schwartz for occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence, and insensitivity.

For more information on Banned Books Week, check out the ALA.org web site.

Get the Skinny on the Zip

I'm not sure about the validity of this site and there are some interesting percentages when you really look around and compare zip codes. (South Harwich, MA comes up top in many areas so go figure.) That aside, the information supposedly is from the 2000 Census and it does have some interesting demographics and is worth the visit. Visit ZipSkinny.com

Life's Too Short For The Wrong Job

These and other great ads by a bank in Denmark (Middelfart Sparekasse) can be found on the web site Positive Sharing filed under Happiness at Work

A Novel Idea

Funny entry by IronicSans.com about the trend in recent years, and more often RECENTLY, for the words 'a novel' to be part of the cover or title of published fiction. For a fun game of find-the-book from the 'novel' title, visit the Book Trend: A Novel.

Numbers Up

"Today's libraries are more than just shelves of books. Visitors can get music, movies, audiobooks and instructional videos. There are banks of computers with high-speed connections to the Internet and meeting rooms used by community groups and business mentors. Some libraries have coffee shops and used-book stores."

Read the Denver Post article and be assured that library visitors AND circulation are increasing at the nation's libraries. Bellingham Public Library's visitors and circulation increased once again this year. *The circulation figure for the Bellingham Public Library, from August 2006 through July 2007 or Fiscal Year 2007, was a total of 118,590 items. The same figure for Fiscal Year 2006 was 105143. Therefore, our circulation increased 13%. The Fiscal Year 2005 figure was near 80000 items. You can read the Annual Report Information Statistics filed with the MBLC on September 1, 2007 for other information on your library in Bellingham.

Marriage

"Marriage may be made in heaven, but the maintenance must be done on earth."

Beautiful Libraries

To see sixty-five photos of the most breathtakingly beautiful libraries in the world, including this one of the Boston Copley Public Library, visit The Librophiliac Love Letter. You won't be able to view just one. It is inspirational.

Remember September 11, 2001

Libraries represent freedom
of expression,
preservation of heritage
and equal access to knowledge.
The Bellingham Public Library
offers a fitting tribute on
September 11th doing what we do best –
disseminating information,
facilitating communication,
fostering citizenship,
promoting understanding,
guaranteeing freedom of access to information and encouraging learning and reading.
American public libraries stand with doors open as a remarkable symbol of freedom.

Jane's Picks

Jane Dutton, Director of the Gale Free Library in Holden, MA, amazes me with her voracious reading habit. If only I was this well-read! I do seem to have a great knack for having ordered Jane's taste in books for our library ... and someday hope to have read more of them when she comes out with her quarterly recommended book list, Jane's Picks:

Keeping the House by Ellen Baker
Away by Amy Bloom
Last Summer of You and Me by Ann Brashares
Rope Walk by Carrie Brown
House Lights by Leah Hager cohen
Maytrees by Annie Dillard
The Landing by Emma Donoghue
Bride Island by Alexandra Enders
Envious Moon by Thomas Christopher Greene
North River by Pete Hamill
Stormy Weather by Paulette Jiles
A Peculiar Grace by Jeffrey Lent
On Chesil Beach by ian McEwan
Red Rover by Deirdre McNamer
Patience and Sarah by Isabel Miller
On Kingdom Mountain by Howard Frank Mosher
Rest of Her Life by laura Moriarty
When the World Was Young by Tony Romano
Peony in Love by Linda See
How to Talk to a Widower by Jonathan Tropper

and the mysteries:
Tin Roof Blowdown by James Lee Burke<
Always by Nicola Griffith
War Against Miss Winter by Kathryn Miller Haines
Gray Ghost by William Tapply

Mueck Sculptures at Brooklyn Museum

The unbelievably realistic sculptures of artist Mueck are on display through February 2007 in New York. Watch the film here.

311: Reference Gets It Right In San Francisco

San Francisco has initiated a wonderful reference service that librarians are much to busy to deal with. Sounds like a great idea to me.

From Library Link of the Day

Books Under Fire

The 10 most-challenged books of 2006, according to the American Library Association (complaints sited in parentheses):

1. And Tango Makes Three by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell (homosexuality, anti-family and unsuited to age group)

2. The Gossip Girls series by Cecily Von Ziegesar (homosexuality, sexual content, drugs, unsuited to age group and offensive language)

3. The Alice series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor (sexual content and offensive language)

4. The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things by Carolyn Mackler (sexual content, anti-family, offensive language and unsuited to age group)

5. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison (sexual content, offensive language and unsuited to age group)

6. The Scary Stories series by Alvin Schwartz (occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence and insensitivity)

7. Athletic Shorts by Chris Crutcher (homosexuality and offensive language)

8. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky (homosexuality, sexually explicit, offensive language and unsuited to age group)

9. Beloved by Toni Morrison (offensive language, sexual content and unsuited to age group)

10. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier (sexual content, offensive language and violence)

Read an article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. And remember that September 29th through October 6th is Banned Books Week at America's libraries.

Training Your Brain

An ALA online newsletter sent me to a NY Times article with lots of information regarding how important it is to keep 'mind fit.' Searchig the web, I found that you can go to Luminosity for a 14-day trial. Most of these brain fitness companies charge for their programs. Free programs online such as Sudoku and Kakuro, crosswords and the like may do the same. Try DKM Software's for a free online version. You can also download a version for not much money. There are free versions of loads of mind games on the web to exercise you brain to stay fit.

Class of 2011

BELOIT, Wis. - Most of the students entering college this fall, members of the class of 2011, were born in 1989. For them, Alvin Ailey, Andrei Sakharov, Huey Newton, Emperor Hirohito, Ted Bundy and Abbie Hoffman have always been dead.

Read the whole story at MSNBC

From Library Link of the Day

Whistler's Mother

Visit Jigsaw Zone for great online puzzles with all shapes of pieces and sizes of puzzles.

LibVibe

You can get a weekly subscription ... or RSS feed the LibVibe to your Google homepage.

Born Cinematographers

Bellingham Public Library kids created something special this summer! Read the article in the Milford Daily News.

Jell-O Brick Roads

The Jell-O Gallery Museum is located at the end of the Jell-O Brick Road in Leroy, New York. Read a related book, A Jell-o Biography by Carolyn Wyman.

ZabaSearch

Zabasearch is a controversial search engine that ONLY returns results from what is already publicly accessible on the web. Zabasearch is great for finding names, addresses, and phone numbers (and sometimes birth dates) quickly and easily. It is a bit creepy to find yourself listed with all known addresses, past and present. However, I have been less frustrated trying to find an address or phone number that I've misplaced.

For other good search engines to help find public records, obituaries and the like, check out this Technophilia.

Quirky Books

Dave Borgenicht, the founder of Quirk Books, coauthored of the wildly successful Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook. Quirk Books has some great titles, worthy of checking out, searchable in these and other categories: Food & Drinks, Gifts, How-To, Love & Relationships, Parenting, Pets, Pop Culture and SmartsCo. They also carry some games. Big, Fat Lies Each card in this trivia games contains two statements. One is true, the other is not. Can you spot the Big Fat Lie?

If You Give This Rabbitt a Photograph ...

My soon-to-be daughter-in-law sent us photos of a recent trip up Ruby Peak in Oregon ... which sent me to the Web looking for heights and details. I found this great site, America's Roof.com. From there you can find links to the world's highest peaks, the Northeast's top 4000 footers, etc. Which led me to a search of a movie I remembered, K2, which was a wonderful adventure. Blockbuster had no record of it ... neither did Netflix. Thank goodness for the C/W MARS catalog. K2 was released on video in 1992 and I've requested it from another library.

Boston Globe on Good Circulation

From Library Link of the Day check out the Boston Globe's July 29th article on Northwest Massachusetts libraries' circulation increases. There are two related articles posted with it.

The L-Team

Great fun from Williams College. The video was made by Nick Baker of Williams College Libraries and was the recipient of an InfoTubey Award.

Live Chat with JK Rowling

You can chat live with JK Rowling on Monday, July 30 9-10:AM EST.

No End In Sight July 27th

Rails to Trails

The Minuteman Bikeway passes through the historic area where the American Revolution began in April 1775. It is one of the most popular and successful rail-trails in the United States, enjoyed by thousands of people each day for both healthy recreation and transportation.

You can search all Northeast trails through TrailLink

Publishing Perils

From the Writer's Almanac:

On this day in 1954 the first part of the Lord of the Rings was published. JRR Tolkien spent 17 years working on the trilogy.

His publisher nor his public gave him the same pressure that JK Rowling had for Harry Potter!

ReadWriteThink

ReadWriteThink, established in April of 2002, is a partnership between the International Reading Association (IRA), the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), and the Verizon Foundation.

NCTE and IRA are working together to provide educators and students with access to the highest quality practices and resources in reading and language arts instruction through free, Internet-based content.

It's A Phase

Barbie Clothes

For an interesting look at unusual careers, read Conde Nast's Portfolio.com read All Dolled Up:

Like most fashion designers, Kim Culmone spends her days analyzing fabric swatches, sitting through focus groups, editing design sketches, and scouring stores for trends. But unlike her fashion-world colleagues, Culmone has just one client: the 11½-inch tall, anatomically incorrect Barbie.

Happy Birthday Henry!

From Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac we learn that not only Henry David Thoreau but George Eastman, Oscar Hammerstein, Pablo Neruda and Julius Caesar were also born on this day, June 12th.

Henry David Thoreau who was born David Henry Thoreau in Concord, Massachusetts (1817). We know him as the author of Walden, and the essay "Civil Disobedience." He became the first member of his family to go to college. He went to Harvard, but didn't much care for the place. He didn't much care for school teaching either. He went to live with Ralph Waldo Emerson in Concord and did odd jobs around the house and took care of the children. It was Emerson who encouraged Thoreau to write poetry and suggested that Thoreau keep a journal, both of which Thoreau continued to do for the rest of his life. He was 27 years old when he built that little cabin on the edge of Walden Pond and moved in, in an attempt, he said, to "Simplify, simplify, simplify ... to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach."

George Eastman, the man who gave us the Kodak camera, was born in Waterville, New York. He was working at a bank when he got interested in photography around 1877. He took his first dry plate photograph the next year with the camera that he invented—a view of the building across the street from his window. He developed this little handheld camera, and he called it the Kodak because it was easy to remember, difficult to misspell, and it meant nothing, so it could only be associated with his product.

Oscar Hammerstein II, the very prolific and productive lyricist, born in New York City (1895). He wrote lyrics for Sigmund Romberg. He wrote "Old Man River" and "Can't Help Loving That Man" for Jerome Kern's Showboat in 1927, and then all of the hits that he wrote with Richard Rogers, Oklahoma, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music.

The poet Pablo Neruda was born in Parral, Chile (1904). He was born Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto, but since his father didn't approve of him writing poetry, so he took the pen name Pablo Neruda.

Julius Caesar was born in Rome around 100 B.C.

ALA Picks a Winner to Sign Kids Up for Cards

Ben Roethlisberger, quarterback of the 2006 Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers, official spokesperson for ALA's Library Card Sign-up Month in September 2007.

Mad About Chess

There's a social network online just for those chess lovers.

Features include friends, profiles, blogging, a “yourname@chess.com” email address, events, forums, video sharing and a directory of clubs and coaches. There’s also a series of articles and other content to help users learn chess. Player vs player games, product and book reviews, too. Mashable

Kids Make a Difference: A New Library

Learn how kids can make a difference. Kids' Real Life Civic Lesson from the NY Daily News.

Best For the Buck

This is a Forbes Magazine report, Best and Worst School Districts For the Buck, listing Norfolk County Public School District as the 4th best deal in the country, behind Marin County (#1) in California, Collin County (#2) in Texas and Hamilton County (#3) in Indiana. Middlesex (#23) and Barnstable (#54) are two other Massachusetts counties included in the 97 reported best schools disticts on the list.

#4 Norfolk County, MA
Per Pupil Spending 1 : $8,845
College Entrance Exam Score 2,3: 1,090
College Entrance Exam Participation Rate 3: 87.80%
Graduation Rate 3: 89.20%

1Based on Fiscal Year 2004, adjusted for the cost of living in the county's associated Metropolitan Statistical Area. 2Mean score of exam more common in the state (SAT score out of 1600, ACT out of 36). 3For the high school class of 2005 4Combines SAT and ACT (converted to SAT scale) results. 5State average. Sources: Tax Foundation, Economy.com, counties, school district officials, and high school administrators. Forbes Magazine, July 5, 2007

Norfolk County's 31 school districts include: *From EPODUNK.com Avon, Bellingham, Braintree, Brookline, Canton, Cohasset, Dedham, Dover, Dover-Sherborn, Foxborough, Franklin, Holbrook, KingPhilip, Medfield, Medway, Millis, Milton, Needham, Norfolk, Norwood, Plainville, Quincy, Randolph, Sharon, Stoughton, TriCounty, Walpole, Wellesley, Westwood, Weymouth and Wrentham

Deathly Hallows

Nearly 1.6m copies of the final Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, have been pre-ordered online ahead of its release on 21 July. BBC News

World Clock

Created by Poodwaddle.com

Hollywood Librarian: A Trailer

To watch the trailer on YouTube just double-click on the button in the center of the screen.


Premiered at the American Library Association Annual Conference in Washington, DC last week, the full-length documentary Hollywood Librarian will be available this fall at your local library. The Washington Post covered the event. If the link breaks, the Post's article expires in 14 days and will then be archived.

Break The Chain

Ever wonder if the email you've been forwarded has any credence? Want to check it out BEFORE you send it on to a colleague or a relative? Google one phrase and you'll undoubtedly be directed to HoaxBusters or BreaktheChain.org. You can also check these sites out directly. Another to try is Snopes. Save yourself any embarrassment and look at these sites first.

BreakTheChain.org promises this:

There are all sorts of junk e-mails floating around the Internet, but perhaps the most offensive is the junk we send each other: bogus virus warnings, urban legends, offers of easy cash, letters that promise to help sick kids... the list goes on.

BreakTheChain.org tries to educate the world that e-mail is an unreliable medium for sharing information.

Other great sites to check out urban legends and hoax emails are:
KnowledgeHound.com and HoaxBusters. For computer virus hoaxes or myths, try VMyths.com.

Spidey Goes to LegoLand

This week the Internet Archive became an official library. The library is full of free music, videos and books.

If you love animation AND Spidey, check out this Lego animation film from BrickFilms.com. With a Spiderman addict in the family, this site was a find!

Writer's Almanac

Garrison Keillor broadcasts a daily five-minute almanac. You can subscribe to the email to listen to the podcast ... or just read the daily post. From Saturday, June 30th:

It was on this day in 1936 that the novel Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell was first published. When she handed the manuscript over to editors, it was in terrible shape, with more than 1,000 pages of faded and dog-eared paper, poorly typed and with penciled changes. But they loved the story. They asked Mitchell to change the original title "Tomorrow Is Another Day" because at the time there were already thirteen books in print with the word "Tomorrow" in the title. They also asked her to change the main character's name from Pansy to Scarlett.

Gone with the Wind sold 50,000 copies sold in one day, a million copies six months, and two million by the end of the year. The sales of the book were even more impressive because it was in the middle of the Great Depression. The year it came out, employees at the Macmillan publishing company received Christmas bonuses for the first time in nearly a decade.

Freecycle

If you hate to throw things out and yet hate to go through the process of Craig'sList or a yard sale ... then join Freecyle.org. I've joined several groups in New England over the past five years and have gotten rid of those great and useful items that someone else can use but that I just don't need to store anymore. It's recycling at its best. Join a group with lots of members but make sure it is local. There's nothing worse than finding an item over fifty miles away when it's not worth the gas to go get it. There are over 75 groups in Massachusetts and eight in Rhode Island. Subscribe and then sign up for the daily digest so your mailbox isn't full of email. If you're looking for good stuff, however, you'll need to sign up for the individual emails or someone else might find that case of antique Mason jars hours before YOU will.

The Freecycle Network™ is made up of many individual groups across the globe. It's a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (& getting) stuff for free in their own towns. Each local group is moderated by a local volunteer (them's good people). Membership is free. Number of Freecycle™ Communities: 4,041
Number of Freecycle™ Members: 3,540,995

You've Heard the Hype ...

all the reasons why you should buy the iPhone from Apple ... from Forbes here are five reasons why not to:

1. You Must Have an iTunes Account. Not the hugest deal considering that most people use iTunes anyway, but it would be nice to have some other options for purchasing and managing your music.

2. No Direct-to-Phone Downloads. There's nothing like hearing a song you like (or thinking of a song you want) and downloading it right then and there, directly into your phone (or audio player). Sure, you can't do this with your iPod, either, but the feature is increasingly the norm on music-capable phones from Verizon and Sprint. Now, given that Apple has said that the iPhone will feature a full version of iTunes, it's perfectly possible that, come Friday, over-the-air downloads via Wi-Fi could well be a reality on the iPhone.

3. No built-in GPS. Like over-the-air downloads, built-in GPS is increasingly the norm on many lower cost phones from Sprint and Verizon. Sure, the iPhone has built-in Google Maps that give you directions from point A to point B, but good luck if you deviate from the route or get lost, since the lack of real-time GPS won't recalculate routes automatically based on your actual location (which you probably won't know anyway, since you'll be lost). To be fair, many of the other smart phones competing with the iPhone don't have GPS built-in either – case in point, the otherwise very satisfying BlackBerry Curve – but the feature is increasingly commonplace on many new phones from Verizon and Sprint.

4. Even 8-gigabytes (GB) of memory is not enough . If you watch a lot of TV, or are going on a long trip that involves even just one ten-hour-or-more flight, you'll quickly run out of video entertainment with just an iPhone. And since it has no expandable memory option, the iPhone can only hold a Nano's worth of media and that's it. Now, each movie takes up about 1-gigabyte of space or approximately 250 songs. This means that if you have, say, three movies and 1,000 or so songs, you've pretty much tapped out the larger iPhone's memory.

5. It won't play nice with your work e-mail. If you wanted to use the iPhone as your work phone, you'll most likely be out of luck, since the it won't play nice with Microsoft Exchange, which is one of the most widespread work e-mail systems. Yes, it'll connect with your Outlook and transfer emails that have already been retrieved on your desktop, but don't expect real-time push work e-mail a la BlackBerry.

Okay, okay. So here are the ten reasons to buy, from Sally Walker Davies.

Miles To Go Before I Sleep

After driving what seemed like thousands of miles yesterday (and killing my poor VW in the process) I discovered Mapquest's new destination tool currently in Beta testing. Enter your departure address and add up to an infinite amount of sidetrips. Not only will you map the whole adventure but it adds up the total miles for you. A handy tool for figuring out how much fossil-fuel you've burned in one day. It wasn't a thousand miles ... but it felt like in this heat with a zonked out air conditioning system.

Streets of San Francisco

Will wonders never cease? Google now has both 'street' and 'traffic' views to add to their three other map views (road, satellite and hybrid.) In San Francisco and New York, and a few other cities, (not Boston) the street view will being up four angles of actual photographs of the location. It is a bit tricky to use - you have to use your 'human' icon and 'walk' to your location to bring up the street view. Not all streets are available in those cities, either.

More useful is the new traffic view. Is this new or have I never noticed? Wherever there is a traffic light (Springfield, Boston, Providence, etc.) the map will offer you current traffic conditions in red, yellow or green. I refreshed my screen and watched Westboro's traffic on the Pike change from a large red jam to moving green traffic. Pretty cool.

I recommend the Google Maps User's Guide as a place to start.

Grammar Snobs

For those of you who are punctuation snobs, there are a few sites to suit your fancy:
Apostrophe Abuse is one of them; Quotation Mark Abuse is another. Want a whole Flickr site of photos of abuse? They've got 'em. And if you want to read the book on grammar etiquette check out on audio Grammar Snobs: A Guide to Language For Fun and Spite by June Casagrande.

Book Movements

Bookmovement.com is a great site for organizing book club meetings. All members are invited and options are automatic reminders and RSVP requests. It's easy to use once you've gathered your email addresses. One person deemed the organizer can easily upload future book discussion information including venues and cover graphics of the book you've chosen. Members can add commentary of their own.

BookMovement has online book discussion guides, lists and reviews.

For the past 3 years, BookMovement has been collecting, sorting and ranking the book selections of thousands of book clubs. From this information, [they] are able to bring you the first-ever Book Club Bestseller List.

Another great site for book group guidelines and suggestions is NancyPearl.com, home of the inspiration for the first librarian action-figure doll.

Groaners

From Newswriting.org comes 'Groaners!'

You know ‘em. You love ‘em. But can’t we live without ‘em? Groaners are those horrible, overused, hackneyed phrases that turn news copy into boring, “same old, same old” stuff.

Some of those overused words and expressions include amidst, center stage, death toll, rank and file, and torrential rain. Want to avoid sounding like a cliche? Bookmark this site. Additional good information on the site are articles and writing tools from a veteran news writer.

Building Your Home Library

The American Library Association has some wonderful booklists for those of you compulsive enough to build a comprehensive home library. (Then again, there's the PUBLIC library at your disposal, as well.)

The good news is that the lists are short and are available in PDF format by age group.

Road to 2008

If you want the daily news, politics and opinions on the 2008 Election, this will feed that hunger.

Word Imperfect

If you like Balderdash and other forms of word play, the Word Imperfect blog is pretty cool.

The blog owner, a writer from New Zealand explains how to play:

"I choose an obscure dictionary word [nearly every day]. You invent a wacky meaning. I put 3 invented meanings on the voting poll below and list the true meaning."

Words so far in June: Limbate, squacco, abbacy, tierce, wivern, pilose, splenius, kymograph, jobation, nonage, mattoid, horopter, asperity bleb, quaquaversal, orlop, francolin, reliquary, graminaceous.

I would think even Scrabble players would learn something new. And speaking of words, the book American Bee: The National Spelling Bee and the Culture Of Word Nerds : The Lives Of Five Top Ppellers As They Compete For Glory and Fame by James Maguire is a great read and includes several introductory chapters about the history of the American Bee and the English language. Wordnerd heaven.

How a Bluetooth Works

I don't know about you but I am constantly boggled about electronics in general and just use them, hoping for the best. To find out just exactly HOW a Bluetooth works you'll be compelled to work backwards to the basics they call Building Blocks. Ever wondered how a lithium battery works or how avalanches work or how bees work? How Stuff Works is a great site.

Book Review: Flower Confidential

Flower Confidential: The Good, the Bad and the Beautiful in the Business of Flowers by Amy Stewart. Did you think that we really received our flowers from a greenhouse in Western Massachusetts ... or perhaps from Atlanta or Nashville? Think again.

From the Washington Post review: "Our blooms are more likely to have been raised in high-altitude flower factories in Ecuador or Colombia, dunked in chemicals, flown to Miami and distributed to wholesale markets around the country. A rose cut on a Monday morning in the shadow of a snow-capped volcano might find its way to a Manhattan florist the following Friday, and then be good for a week or more with a little care. In your local supermarket, you will find roses completely devoid of fragrance -- pretty in a stiff and uniform sort of way, but not the earthy roses of the garden."

And Americans are not the largest consumers of cut flowers but are 17th behind consumers in many other countries around the world.

If you are a lover of flowers ... or if you love to give them ... OR if you hate the whole romantic idea of flowers at all ... then this book will interest you.

Juneteenth Day

"Juneteenth day celebrates and symbolizes the end of slavery in the United States. President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862. But, it was not until June 19, 1865 that all slaves were finally freed. That concluding event was when General Gordon Granger rode into Galveston, Texas with his troops and issued Order Number 3 which finally freed the last of the slaves. The formal end of slavery was marked by the passing of the 13th amendment of the constitution."

This tidbit and MANY others from Holiday Insights. Did you know that June 22 is National Chocolate Eclair Day? Plenty to celebrate if you check out the Bizarre and Unique Days.

We have the new DVD, The Holiday, starring Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Even though I can't seem to leave Windows, I found a great Mozilla web page listing keyboard shortcuts for Firefox, Windows and Opera operating systems. A firm believer in 'sink or swim'learning, I haven't had the time over the years to fully train myself in keyboarding, Word and other applications and I'm always amazed at tricks I should have known about.

From this site I learned how to instantly clear my cache (Control F5) so that my blogging updates come through immediately using my AOL browser. It's bugged me for years and I've bookmarked this site for future use. For those of you brave and savvy enough to use a Firefox or Opera, you might like this site. There's a mouse shortcuts page, as well.

You're Not Just in High School Anymore: College Summer Reading

More colleges and universities across the country are requiring summer reading of their incoming freshmen class. The book is sometimes called The Common Read and includes a book discussion during orientation week and into the fall semester. Some colleges have required this for a decade or more. (I know my oldest daughter was required to read Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond before she began her freshman year at Dartmouth College in 2000 but I don't see them listed in the article.)

Michael Arnush—director of first-year experience at Skidmore College, which started its summer reading requirement a decade ago—says the goal is to engage students early with a "proactive discussion of challenging reading."

Read the whole article, June 16, 2007 - "Incoming Freshmen Get Summer Reading Assignments" by Jackie Mantey in
US News and World Report

For the younger set, go to the PBS Parents Site to their Bookfinder to find just the right books for your child. Give Bookfinder the age of the child, the theme that interests her or him and whether it's book to be read aloud or read alone.

Retail Me NOT

A light-hearted link for the weekend: RetailMeNot.com. My staff, family and friends know me as someone who hates to pay retail ... I'm a shameless coupon-user from my early marriage-on-a-shoestring days of the 70's. One of the staff suggested I offer a workshop at the library on finding coupons and discounts on the Web that can be used either online or in the retail stores. I found this site just the other day and bookmarked it along with the others I've found over the last few years.

A not-so-light-hearted link for the weekend to remind us to count our blessings. From Library Link of the Day.

A Papercut That Won't Sting

Paper Cuts, a blog about books and is written by Dwight Garner, senior editor of The NY Times Book Review. I've added this link to the right and encourage you to bookmark it.

The very first Papercuts.Blog was posted just last week on June 11th with this comment:

Paper Cuts will be a daily round-up of news and opinion about books and other printed matter. Make that an almost daily round-up. There won’t be posts on weekends. Or holidays. Or on the mornings after the Book Review’s bimonthly drinks nights at Jimmy’s Corner, a bar in midtown Manhattan.

Great blogger's think alike!

Keeping Magazines Real Simple

Real Simple is the one magazine I get at home, a gift from a wonderful friend who just keeps it coming. From Real Simple's July issue come more gems that I can include here, among them AmericanFlags.com and why Old Glory gets folded 13 times. The blurb from the magazine tells us that we can get a free three-by-five-foot polyester flag. I checked it out and it is true ... just $5.99 in shipping and handling charges although it's too late to arrive for Flag Day tomorrow, June 14th.

Librarians who 'love books ... and lists' all know about LibraryThing.com but you may not. Real Simple tells us it's free for 200 volumes, and 'you don't have to whisper.' Well, it is free to usjust like we are but we don't exactly shusshhhh you anymore at the library either. Interstingly, LibraryThing.com seems to be down due to the fact that they lost the main "read slave." Bookmark the site anyway.

Real Simple tells us that we can buy a Sun Calculator from LeeValley.com to figure out those partial shade/full shade/sun/full sun issues that novice gardeners get confused about. I checked it out and the item is a bit hard to find on their site. Look under 'weather/time' and then let them know you are using US dollars - $29.95. Sounds good to me because I can't be home to plot the sun's rays.

Do you hate the feel of bug spray or ointment on your body? From DontBugMePatch.com you can buy over-the-counter natural, transdermal insect patches. I checked this one out and they seemed reasonably priced per box.

The best tip from Real Simple in July is the site Drive-ins.com where you can search by zipcode for a drive-in near you! (Mendon perhaps.) The most interesting information on this website? The names of all the drive-ins near you that have closed. You might remember them from childhood. And the GoogleEarth map in the Drive-in Museum. Check out this site for some nostalgia and fun.

You can subscribe to a daily Real Simple Thought like I do and receive it via email ... or you can view it online each day at the daily view. Yesterday's thought:

When the character of a man is not clear to you, look at his friends

was a good one. You can even select a thoughtful wallpaper background for your computer and be inspired to keep it clean and neat. Yes, it's 'real simple.'

Libraries Shelve Old Image

Libraries across the country are becoming active community centers. At the Bellingham Public Library the number of visitors, Internet users, website hits, and materials checked out, renewed and requested have risen each year since 2005. We have an average of 9000 visitors per month, 1000 Internet users per month, 4000 website hits PER DAY and we circulate over 10,000 items per month. Read our recently published 2006 Annual Report of the Library Director in PDF format at our website.

The Charlotte Observer in North Carolina reports:

• "The number of visits per year to U.S. public libraries increased 61 percent between 1994 and 2004, according to federal data.
• Circulation (items checked out) increased 28 percent over the decade.
• 99 percent of U.S. public libraries provide free public access to the Internet, compared with 25 percent 10 years ago."

Read the whole article >"Quiet? Libraries Shelve Old Image" (sent through >Library Link of the Day, June 12, 2007.)

Tired of Amazon for your reading information?

Try Booklist, a 100-year-old journal published by the American Library Association. Booklist has also become a valuable tool that helps librarians make reading recommendations. The best part is that >Booklist Online is both a free Web site with a subscription database. The free site offers a generous selection of Booklist content—plus some Web-only features—and is updated daily or weekly, depending on the portion of the site. (The subscription database contains archived reviews.) The site has loads of lists, reviews and other great stuff for readers and librarians. While you can't read the past reviews without a subscription, you can browse the award lists and read articles and more.

Op Ed For Libraries

Glenn Ickler, a former newspaper editor who lives in Hopedale writes this in the Milford Daily News on June 9, 2007. To see the entire article, read >Milford Daily News Online June 9, 2007.
Convincing voters that libraries are a vital part of their community is also a tough sell in an era of ever-rising real estate taxes. Proposition 2 1/2 overrides are becoming increasingly unpopular and public officials are finding it easier to chop library funding than to lay off police officers and fire fighters.
Prop 2 1/2 was designed to limit local tax increases in conjunction with adequate aid from the state. It's not working that way, and the communities are facing higher costs of providing services without the means of meeting them. So there go the libraries, along with numerous school programs and activities.
According to a report done by the Urban Institute and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, libraries are an unappreciated economic engine as a core of a community's literacy and connection with technology and job opportunities.
"Rather than succumbing to obsolescence with the advent of new information technologies, the basic business of public libraries is being recast," the report said. "Public libraries are positioned to fuel not only new, but next economies."