Daily Thoughts 4/27/2010

Rotunda Reading Room, University of Pennsylvania Library, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, circa 1900.

Daily Thoughts 4/27/2010

The system has provided us with a content management system called Book Letters http://bookletters.com/ , that allows us to create newsletters, add widgets, and add material recommendations to our website. I am hoping that it will be interesting and useful. We also have been working on revamping our website which should be a big improvement.

I am reading an E-ARC from Baen Publishers called What Distant Deeps by David Drake. It is part of the Lieutenant Leary Commanding series. It is also the second ebook which I have ever purchased. It is not the completely edited text, but I like the series enough to read it early.

Daily Thoughts 5/24/2009

Richard Wright photographed by Carl von Vechten. Richard Wright wrote a book of Haiku called Haiku This Other World. As the restrictions on this collection expired in 1986, the Library of Congress believes this image is in the public domain However, the Carl Van Vechten estate has asked that use of Van Vechten's photographs "preserve the integrity" of his work, i.e, that photographs not be colorized or cropped, and that proper credit is given to the photographer.

Daily Thoughts 5/24/2009

I have been reading more of Fool's Gold by Mark Y. Herring. It is an entertaining book. I rather like some of his arguments. You pick up some of the common arguments against using the internet as a pure research tool. He reminds us that Google has a separate search engine for more scholarly articles http://www.google.scholar.com/ . Most pages with databases or deep repositories of knowledge are hidden from standard search engines. They reside in a place called the deep or invisible web. Complete Planet has a search engine specifically designed to find pages with databases built into them http://www.completeplanet.com/ Incy Wincy is another search engine which can reach into the invisible web http://www.incywincy.com/ .

As I read this book I am learning many arguments that will be useful in why we should keep a library and not just have everything put on the internet. There are many secondary uses that are not just about resisting change. Libraries are in an environment of budget cuts and have to be able to justify their existence.

Right now, I am reading the section on Google and digitization. Mark Y. Herring correctly states that the main benefit of digitization is increased access. The moment an item is put on a website in digital format it instantly becomes available to anyone who has a web connection. This will become a tremendous boon for all the classics of literature and all the works in the public domain. Suddenly they will become available all over the world. This is the real advantage of scanning, much more so than preservation. Because the information is public domain it also is public property to manipulate and build on. I look forward to seeing the creative use of this material.

I took a short break from reading serious material and tried out one of the previews on the Baen previews, In The Stormy Red Sky by David Drake. It is military space opera, part of the RCN (Royal Cinnabar Navy) series featuring Captain Leary and Adele Mundy. The story reminds me a little bit of the Master and Commander series of naval fiction written by Patrick O' Brian. There are seven free chapters. http://www.webscription.net/chapters/1416591591/1416591591.htm?blurb

Web Bits

If you go to Stanza the most popular free ereader produced by Lexcycle with over a million downloads for the Iphone, one of the main highlights is places to get ebooks. Many of these books are public domain or free. http://www.lexcycle.com/faq/where_to_get_books

This is also interesting. It is in its early stages. You should be able to get many public domain books available as print on demand. http://www.publicdomainreprints.org/

There is a corollary idea that goes with giving away free books on ereaders. This cannot be proven yet. If you give away an ebook by an author, you are likely to increase demand for their books that are in print. I might even say that if you give away a free ebook, the reader is going to look for more print books for free. Libraries are places with a lot of free material. I think the increase in the availability of free material in the public domain through the internet will increase library use.

Daily Thoughts 2/26/09

Rembrandt (1606-1669) "Rembrandt Drawing at a Window" Etching Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Daily Thoughts 2/26/2009

This is a really interesting article. http://kotaku.com/5160610/librarians-investigated-for-playing-rock-band . I am rather surprised that the librarians in Nebraska got in trouble for this. I think the Benny Hill theme song might have done it more than the Rock Band video game. A lot of libraries have video games as part of their collections these days. Rock Band, Guitar Hero, and Dance Dance Revolution are some of the most popular video games to use in teenage programs. It gets teenagers to come into the library. We want them to come in and read and use books. Music video games are a lot better than most violent videogames. We have a video game machine, a Nintendo Wii which we use in some of our teenage programming. It looks like the librarians are testing the machinery to see if it works.

Right now, I have a day off. I am reading the Caryatids by Bruce Sterling. The writing is very dense for science fiction. It is saying a lot more than most science fiction novels which I read. The story is in a near future setting in a world torn apart by global warming and pollution. Much of what is being described is very relevant to some of the things which are happening today.

Today has been a quiet peaceful day. I had a chance to walk up to my library and drop off a few books, as well as do my exercises in the morning. I spent some time relaxing, reading on the computer. I read some more of David Drake's Starliner on the Baen free library. I am on chapter 3 of Starliner now. So right now, I am reading an ebook and a regular book at the same time.

Daily Thoughts 2/22/2009

William Michael Harnett (1848-1892)
Still Life Writing Table
Oil on canvas, 1877
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia

Daily Thoughts

Good morning, I am drinking my morning coffee right now. I am thinking about the post I made yesterday about magazines. I especially like The Indie Next List which is a list of bestsellers from Independent Bookstores. http://www.bookweb.org/indiebound/nextlist.html . I often think that librarians don't look outside their field enough for recommendations of books to buy or read.

Right now, I am reading The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski. I decided to put it down after the first 100 pages. While I liked some pieces of it; I found it to be very dark and often gratuitously violent. It also seemed to have a bit too much of the gamer audience in mind.

I am reading Starliner by David Drake. It is part of the Baen Free Library.
http://www.webscription.net/10.1125/Baen/0671721216/0671721216.htm . David Drake is one of my favorite authors of military science fiction. He is a reliably good author with plenty of entertaining writing.

When The Tide Rises-- David Drake-- Review

When The Tide Rises by David Drake is military space opera. The book is part of a larger series, The Republic of Cinnabar Navy series. The main character, Lieutenant Leary is patriotic, astute, politically savvy, and willing to take risks. He is a gentleman adventurer much in the style of the historical Lord Cochrane who the character is based on. The book is an ode to the sailing ships of old. The space ships even use sails and rigging to travel through the matrix (hyperspace).

The setting is rather interesting. It is in a distant future. The Republic of Cinnabar, an imperial elitist republic, and the Alliance, a totalitarian government are at war. Both control many different worlds. The Cinnabar characters are jingoistic, patriotic, and class conscious. The naval men and women act like sailors, they fight, brawl, drink, and carry on with the native populations. The main character, Lieutenant Leary has a loyal servant, Hogg, and his freind, the spy, Adele Mundy, has a servant Tovera.

This is one of the few science fiction novels that describes the freindship between a male and female lead character well. Adele Mundy, spy for Cinnabar is a close freind of Lieutenant Leary, commander of the corvette Princess Cecile.

In this novel, Lieutenant Leary is sent to Bagaria to help the rebel government remain free from being taken over by the Alliance. The Bagarians are plagued by inept and corrupt leaders. By todays standard, they would be called a "banana republic."

Lieutenant Leary promptly starts a series of commerce raids, capturing prizes for the Republic of Cinnabar. He also attacks an Alliance base. One of the nice things about this book, is that it is not in the slightest bit politically correct. A spacer is a spacer, and Leary recruits naval troops from his captured ships, as well as calls some of the natives "wogs."

A lot of the action is based on deceiving the enemy. Leary uses the tactics of surprise, espionage, subterfuge, and first strike. On a few occassions, he poses as the enemy using captured ships.

The fights are fast and furious, but often unreal. This is of course a story. However, I find not enough people die or are wounded in the story. Leary loses a few of his allied ships, and one of his crew members Woetjans is injured. This is explained away by Adele Mundy's ability to penetrate the enemies communication networks and collect critical intelligence to turn the tide. She after all was a librarian and is a communications specialist and spy.

There is a political element to the story. Leary's father is a senator in the Cinnabar republic. Also, Admiral Vocaine views Leary as a potential enemy. Because of this, Leary is sent into the hot situations where he will have to be savvy or end up rotting in prison or dead.

Adele Mundy and Daniel Leary also help refine the environment of the science fiction worlds they visit. Daniel Leary is interested in the "natural history" of alien worlds. He observes the odd plants and animals. For example at one point in the novel he is watching a small tentacled flying creature the size of his thumb. Adele Mundy is interested in archaeology, literature, and librarianship. At the end of the book, she visits the megaliths of Diamondia.

I am looking forward to reading more of this excellent series. At the end of the book, Lieutenant Leary is to become Captain Leary. David Drake, the author is an interesting writer. He is best known for his series, Hammer's Slammers about a mercenary tank company in the far future. David Drake also served as an interrogation officer during Vietnam. He is described as often making very exacting descriptions of combat. The books in this series are With The Lightnings, Lieutent Leary Commanding, The Far Side of the Stars, The Way to Glory, Some Golden Harbor, and When The Tide Rises. With the Lightings is available for free from the Baen free library if you want to see what the series is about. http://www.baen.com/library/defaultTitles.htm

Morning Thoughts, Poetry Handbook

This morning is once again very quiet. I put some new inserts into the law books, checked books to weed for reference and made sure the reference room was in order. Not a whole lot is going on right now. I also gave a few catalogs from New York Comic Con to the young adult librarian.

I reread pieces of A Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver. I think I can read this book repeatedly. It is quite good.

Here is another short poem.

Book

Oh look, oh look I have a book
My book is fine for it is mine
I paid for its page with my wages
Now I read with slow slow speed
Taking in what lies within
The pages turn so I can learn
What is taught for my thoughts
This book so fine that is mine

I had a Seussian moment on the train. Dr. Seuss happens to be one of my literary heros. I think he is fantastic. In addition to being a writer, he also edited children's books like the Berenstain Bears.

I think this book is worth having.



Right now, I am thinking of a few things. On June 7, and June 8, MOCCA-- The Museum of Cartoon and Comic Art hosts the MOCCA art festival in New York. It has been a lot of fun to attend. There are a lot of alternative and comics literature presses there as well as a very interesting guest list.

The program this year looks really fantastic. I'll probably take a day to go to this. The guest of honor this year is Bill Plympton.

http://www.moccany.org/artfest-programming-08.html

I still haven't had a chance to visit their museum yet. I have been meaning to for a long time. I just have never had a chance to really do it yet.

I just put Michael Chabon's book Maps And Legends: Essays On Reading And Writing Along the Borderlands . This book is by the author of The Yiddish Policemen's Union.

I finished reading David Drake When The Tide Rises. I am working on the review of the book. I really enjoy reading his books.

I am reading, Robert Grave's and Alan Hodges, The Reader Over Your Shoulder right now. It seems to be a fairly complicated book on the english language. It is not that easy to follow, despite being well written. It is the kind of book which should be read slowly to understand it. There is a very interesting section on reading and writing things quickly. It very much reflects on what I am doing right now.

A Little Poetry, Thoughts for Today

I have the fire in me this morning to write a little poetry. I finished reading the books of poetry last night and did a few exercises. Now it is in me. There is often no way to know where it will take you. With instruction book, the only way of knowing the quality of the instruction books is the results they give you.

I have a poetry open microphone to do on Thursday, and I would rather read some of my own poetry than be a professor and read from a book. I think if I read some of my own work even if it is uneven, it will make the program go better. These are being worked on.

This first poem is about a bar that scared me enough to never go there again.

Red Room
Red light plays in a red room
Cocktail dresses with warm bodies
Red lights with red wallpapers
Smiling faces with plump lips
Red light screams sex darkness
Hollow eyes with red red rims
Red light carries me upstairs
Where a bed awaits empty soft
Red light warns me why are you here?
I wait lost, hollow, full of sex
Blood, sex, death heart of red
The red light pierces my heart
As I wait for a lady or a man in red.

Boatman (It just came to me)

The pen rolls across the paper
like waves in a deep blue sea
The ink rolls out of the pen
like water in a smooth river
I can feel the pens grip heft
Solid comforting like a boat
I am the boatman of words
The steerer of the word ship
The holder of this fine pen

Lost Mists (A Little Dream)

Forgotten mists roll through the hills
Crying who am I? Who am I?
They are the lost forever wandering
They cry where am I? Where am I?
Is this a a waking dream like you and I

A Clerihew of T.H. White

T.H. White
Was always right
He'd always write
From left to right

Deli (I am still working on this).

I order an egg sandwich
I pick some fresh berries
I pour myself fresh coffee
I drink water from s stream
I stand behind a tall rack
The tall trees surround me
I get milk from the freezer
A stream fills my waterskin
The paperbag has my breakfast
My satchel and waterskin are full
I head home

Green

Green is the ocean
Green is the sea
Green is the grass

I ride on a bullet train
From New York to San Francisco

Green are the fields
Green are the trees
Green are the moss

Fields of switchgrass roll by
Stacks of algae oil refineries

Green is the earth
Green is the frog
Green is the snake

Cities are in bright bloom
With flowers and brown trees

Green was the desert
Green was the dump
Green was the sand

Every community has a park
Every community has gardens

Green grows the pepper
Green grows the grape
Green grows the apple

I watch the clear rivers flow
Clear, pure, clean, sweet water

Green is my thumb
Green is my mind
Green is my spirit

There are no huge landfills
There are no massive dumps

Green is a color
Green is a feeling
Green is a thought

Windmills spin like flowers
Solar towers shine brightly

I wear bright green
I touch green plants
I smell green earth

Biodiesel and electric trucks
Roll by on smooth highways

I ride green transport
I buy green products
I invest in green stocks

Tree farms grow fresh timber
Greenhouses dot the land

I can hear green
I can see green
I can feel green

The train moves by the ocean
Wave farms float quietly by

Green is not plastic
Green is not pollution
Green is not refuse

The skyscraper farms of San Francisco
Are in the distance, tall vertical

The city is quiet, peaceful, clean
America reindustrialized clean and green







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This morning my machine was a little slow. I had to use a little program called
Spybot, Search & Destroy. This program cleans out spyware, tracking programs hijacking, keyboard hacking, malware, cookies, and trojans from your machine. It is very easy to get this stuff when you are searching through blogs a lot. These are not viruses but tracking program from companies like doubleclick, 24/7 Media, and other companies that want to sell things to you. I had over 194 such programs on my computer. I also cleaned my internet files, history, and cache to make my machine run better. Then I ran the defragmenter for extra measure. You need to do this even if you have a good firewall once in a while.

Right now, I am reading When The Tide Rises by David Drake. The main character, Lieutenant Leary is loosely based on the life of Lord Cochrane, a historical ship commander who served the revolutionary government of Brazil and Chile. The genesis of the Lieutenant Leary series is based on Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey Maturin series of historical novels. The difference is that this is military science fiction with flourishes of space opera. It is quite enjoyable. I am glad that David Drake included an acknowledgement.