Category Archives: brinley
A recording of loons calling
This link is to a recording I made on my iPhone when at Honey Rock. A pair of loons was calling across Long Lake and I was glad I was able to capture their distinctive calls. You can also hear Brin and Cohen asking questions on this recording.
Happy Birthday Russel
When visiting family last weekend, we were able to attend my great-nephew Russel’s 2nd birthday party. Here’s a video of us singing Happy Birthday to him.
Kids Dancing
Speedy Brinley
My sweet kids
Brinley and the big “seagulls”
When we were up in Three Lakes, Wisconsin a few weeks ago, I took each of the younger kids on a short canoe trip. When taking Brinley for her special trip, she told me to look at the big “seagulls.” Turns out they were a pair of bald eagles and I was able to video one of them catching a fish. It’s rather hard to see because it was far away. The video linked above requires the Quicktime viewer and may take a while to load.
Extreme focus on user experience in the context of the web
A recent post from the Publishing 2.0 blog really got me thinking. Somewhat provocatively titled, “If Your Users Fail, Your Website Fails, Regardless Of Intent Or Design,” the author shares his views on the extreme importance of user experience in the context of the web. He holds up Google as the gold standard and frankly, I think he has a great point. He says that Google succeeds, and deservedly so, because of its intense focus on the user experience. One statement of his captures this view:
“Google is obsessed with making sure its users never fail, no matter how “stupid” they are. Google makes users feel smart. That’s why they keep coming back.”
Wow. All I can say is, read this post and think it through very carefully and you will gain some insight into the problems we who work in libraries face when it comes to user experience. This model or viewpoint — making users “feel” smart — is so radically different from what many libraries have tried to do in the past. I’m encouraged by the noticeable proliferation of job announcements or library initiatives that contain tasks relating to user interface design. See here and here for examples.
Punk haircuts
Fun and games
This weekend we’ve had our share of fun and games. Yesterday the weather was cool and rainy but today it was perfect: sunny and in the high 60s.
In addition to getting another van, which was exciting enough on its own, we made a trip to the Chicago Botanic Garden along with 10 million other people (or so it appeared) to see the Spring blooms.
Cohen was a real stinker the whole time, running away when he was told to stay put, climbing on things he wasn’t supposed to, stepping in the flower beds, and on and on. Not sure what was wrong with him; maybe he was just more excited than usual. Brinley, on the other hand, was pretty quiet and meek the whole time. She has been unwell for a few days now with fever and sore throat so it’s no wonder. She slept on the way to the gardens and then sort of kept behind everyone else as we walked everywhere. Even though the place was crawling with people, more than we had ever seen before, it was worth the trip. The Spring flowers were gorgeous, especially the tulips.
We went on some walkways that led out into the lagoon a little bit and were amused to discover a great big ‘ol carp looking for us to feed it, surrounded by a large school of bluegills. (I wish I had had my fishing pole to catch those bluegills!)
Overall it was a nice way to spend a Sunday afternoon. On our way home we stopped and ate a nice meal at Chipotle’s. Click here to see the full set of photos from the trip.

