This ResourceShelf announcement about the availability, for free, of a service called Answers.com, is worth noting. I am embarrassed to say that I had never heard of GuruNet (Answers.com’s predecessor). I’ve used this service a little bit and think it is good enough to advertise more widely for users of my library. I’ve also downloaded and installed the 1-Click Answers.com software and like it. With this you can point to any word or phrase in your web browser, do an Alt-Click, and this will query Answer.com for you. Great stuff.
Monthly Archives: January 2005
Ice storm worries justified
Turns out my worries about power outages from last week’s ice storm were well justified. Not long after I posted the entry, our power went out. We all gathered for the night in our bedroom upstairs, thus keeping warm. When the power hadn’t been restored by midday Thursday, Michele and I decided to leave. We felt that the low temperatures were dangerous for the little kids, especially. My mother said we could come over to stay with her and that’s what we did. Thank goodness the van was fixed so that we could make the trip, otherwise, I don’t know what we would have done! The ice storm was the worst I’ve ever seen. Many people are still without power in our area, although the power to our house was restored sometime Saturday. There is a great deal of damage to trees and power lines. One section not far from where we live had twenty — yes, twenty — power lines simultaneously fall in a row.
Excitement over new products
Today’s announcement of several new products from Apple was pretty exciting: upgraded iLife, new iWorks, the Mac mini, the iPod shuffle … I’d like one of each, please!
Firefox extension for Google Scholar
Reply
Some really cool news from the oss4lib discussion list today. Openly Informatics, perhaps best known as the purveyors of the 1CATE OpenURL link resolver, announced the availability of a significant enhancement to Peter Binkley’s Google Scholar Firefox extension. Their more functional version is available for download here. I’ve already developed a Taylor-specific version of this extension and will shortly publicize it on my library’s blog, Z-Blog. And then there was a real sense of convergence when a student came to me late this afternoon, asking me to help him with Google Scholar and finding full text that we might have available in library databases. He had been using Google Scholar since its beta release late last year, but was constantly frustrated by the discovery that many of the articles he was looking for weren’t available to him. You can imagine how pleased and excited he was when I showed him what I had just been working on earlier today!
New C.A.S. program from my alma mater
Yesterday I was excited to read about a new Certificate of Advanced Studies (C.A.S.) program at UIUC GSLIS, that focuses on digital libraries. This special degree program falls in between the master’s and the PhD. One of the things that really caught my attention was that those enrolled in this program can complete it through UIUC GSLIS’s distance education option, called LEEP. I taught a course in LEEP in 2003 and will be teaching another course in LEEP this summer. I checked with my boss about whether this kind of program would count toward Taylor’s tenure requirements and he thought it definitely would, so now I am wondering if this is something I should think about more seriously, rather than a PhD, since I can take it online. If I were to pursue a PhD, it would almost certainly require us to move, something I am reluctant to do right now.
Ice storm worries
We have been hit today with a fairly severe ice storm. Employees were told to go home at 1p and most classes were cancelled. The big worry is a power outage. Everything is coated with a thick layer of ice and some of our trees (e.g. the birches) are bent nearly double under the strain. I hope that there won’t be significant damage to them. As I was cleaning dishes before supper tonight, the power flickered on and off for a bit and I thought, Oh great, here it comes…But so far, it hasn’t cut off completely or for any length of time. Events like this make you remember how much you take certain things, like electricity, for granted. I’m not sure what we’ll do if the power goes out tonight because we don’t have enough wood for the fireplace. I guess if it happens, we’ll all just bundle up and try to get some sleep.
Back to work
Readers of this blog may have noticed how little I have had to say lately about things relating to libraries. I’ve needed a break. Today is my first day back since December 16 and I am grateful for the amount of time I have off as a faculty member at my institution. However, I must admit to some reluctance to go back to work just yet. I worry about my wife being home with the kids most of the day, without my help. Keegan went back to school today, too. I’m feeling unmotivated to pursue librarian tasks yet. Hopefully that mood will change.
One of the tasks before me in this new year is to finally come to a decision, one way or another, about pursuing a PhD in library and information science. (I’ve considered some alternative areas of study but none really seems to catch my interest and passions the way librarianship does.) My boss strongly encourages me to pursue this and in fact, in order to achieve tenure I will have to pursue a second master’s degree, at least. Other factors that are in favor of doing this are that my institution will provide significant financial support, and they also will provide me with time off.
But am I really capable of doing this? I’m filled with doubt. Am I smart enough, motivated enough, good enough? We’re talking about the world’s worst procrastinator, and one of the worst students around. Plus, how can I devote the necessary focus and energy when I have a young family? I have no desire to sacrifice their needs for this career move. What if I fail? (I’ve failed in so many other areas, professionally.) Ok, ok, I know, I’m supposed to stay POSITIVE this year…
It’s 2005 and I resolve to be more positive
OK, so it is now 2005. Ho hum. One of my unspoken resolutions of the new year is to be more positive 
In that spirit, here are some nice, happy, positive things to write about:
One of the positive things that’s happened lately comes out of a big negative. We were told a few weeks ago that our van, a Honda Odyssey, needed a new catalytic converter. The price to fix it? A cool $1,200! (Why so expensive? We were told that it is because Honda’s catalytic converter contains precious metals like platinum.) We don’t have $120 extra to spend on anything, let alone $1,200, so this was a very big setback for us. The dealer told us that although the catalytic converter wasn’t clogged, it was very close to being clogged and we shouldn’t travel anywhere. We had to cancel our plans to visit family during the holidays because of this. At the dealer’s suggestion, we contacted American Honda to ask if they could help us out at all with the cost. I was very skeptical about this possibility, frankly. I called Honda last week and they promised to investigate the situation and give us a call back with their decision early this week. Lo and behold, we got a call on Tuesday from them, saying that they had decided to waive the entire cost of the catalytic converter!!! All we would have to pay would be the labor cost of installing it. I couldn’t believe it. Would an American car manufacturer do a thing like that? I wish I could say, YES, but I greatly doubt it. I have been a huge Honda fan for years since buying my first Honda in the mid 90s, an Accord, and I am more “sold” on Honda than ever before because of this. Anyway, I took the van in to the dealer yesterday and they installed the new part and all I had to pay was $76 for the labor. Good deal!
What other positive things can I start the new year with? Well, let’s see…I finally managed to clean out our garage. If you had ever seen how messy it was, you would be amazed at this incredible feat We can now park our van in the garage, which makes things much easier for everyone, especially in inclement weather.
Another positive thing is that after cleaning out the garage, we finally got around to unpacking a lot of our decorative items like family photos, knickknacks, paintings, and such. This, almost three years after we moved to Indiana. It was like having Christmas all over again as we rediscovered so many of the things that we hadn’t seen in years, many of the things that hold special meaning like framed photos from our wedding, as well as many of the wedding gifts that we received. The downside is that we have to figure out where on earth we are going to find space for some of the knickknacks in this house. Maybe Michele and I will finally feel at home here when we find places for all of these personal belongings and see them displayed around us.
One of the many nice presents I received for Christmas was something I had wanted for a long time: an AirPort Express base station with AirTunes. Talk about cool! I’m using it to extend the range of our AirPort Extreme base station, and I also set it up to play music on our stereo system in the living room via iTunes. I copied all of our CDs onto the PowerBook — about 1,200 songs in total — and we can now listen to all of our music or whatever combination of songs that we want, from the equivalent of a gigantic jukebox. How cool is that?
Another Christmas gift was the extended edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. I have already watched it and am generally pleased with the extra stuff in there. Now I have to figure out what I am going to say about it for my invited presentation at the upcoming C.S. Lewis Society meeting!
Finally, the most positive thing I can write about is that I am blessed in so many ways, with a wonderful wife, and four great children. Yes, there are some sacrifices and some trials here and there, but I still find it amazing that God has given me so many good things. Over and over again, He does what I think is impossible. In the midst of this world’s troubles — especially thinking about and grieving over the terrible devastation in Southeast Asia right now — I am so thankful that Jesus Christ took my sins upon Him and bore them on the cross, paying my debt for sin. I struggle all the time with accepting and enjoying what I do not deserve, and God knows I surely don’t deserve such an incredible gift. But this is exactly what He loves to do: to rescue and bless and be in relationship with those who don’t deserve it. Amazing grace!