Daily Thoughts 03/13/2012

Ein stiller Moment. Signiert. Datiert 1878. Öl auf Leinwand, 40 x 30 cm
Daily Thoughts 03/13/2012

This morning, I checked the Facebook and Twitter accounts for the library.  I also checked the displays and gift books.

I spent some time looking through the Slideshare presentation for Intro to the NYC Startup Community.  I kind of liked Hacker News http://news.ycombinator.com/

There are two programs today, The Biography Book Club from 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m., and the Bimpe Fageyinbo Reading from 6:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Her website is http://www.bimpefageyinbo.com/

At the Biography Book Club we ended up discussing Eugene O'Neill, August Wilson, and Emma Goldman.  It was rather interesting to hear the different opinions.

Bimpe Fageyinbo did a very nice presentation of her memoir and poetry.  I rather enjoyed hearing her read.

Daily Thoughts 11/15/2011

Understanding, mural by Robert Lewis Reid. Second Floor, North Corridor. Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington, D.C. , 1896


Caption underneath reads:
WISDOM IS THE PRINCIPAL THING
THEREFORE GET WISDOM AND WITH ALL
THY GETTING GET VNDERSTANDING.




Daily Thoughts 11/15/2011


This morning, I read some more of The Better Angels of Our Natures.  The author is describing how literacy increases empathy leading to less tolerance for violence.  Reading allows people to reflect on other peoples thoughts.  It also increases civility.  Literacy also helps create an information network.  With ships, letters, and correspondence it was possible to spread ideas across the whole globe in the 18th and 19th century.  With the advent of the internet and telecommunications there is now a global sphere of learning creating the possibility of a "global university."

This morning, I checked the displays, updated the Twitter and Facebook accounts, and spent a little more time looking at programming.  One of my colleagues gave me a copy of the March-April 2011 Calendar of Events.

This afternoon, the library is having the Biography Book Club from 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m., I am looking forward to talking about The Letters of Robert Frost to Louis Untermeyer.  Hopefully, it should be very interesting.  I bought some snacks during lunch time.  People talked about Vachel Lindsay, Claude McKay, Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, and Alexander Pushkin.  It was interesting hearing about the different poets lives.

We are also having the Intermediate Computer Class today from 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. and 6:45 p.m. to 7:45 p.m. in the Computer Lab.

Kabiru Mohammed dropped off flyers for his play The Tragedy of Ethelia which he is showing on January 26, 2012 from 5:30-8:00 p.m. in the community room.

On the way home, I read more of The Better Angels of Our Natures. Steven Pinker is describing the statistical decline of the total amount of wars in the 20th century.


Web Bits


Occupy Wall Street Library

It was interesting that the library was at first thought destroyed, then found to be safely stored away.  This has a very dramatic feel to it.  Sometimes it makes you think  There have has been discussions but still I hear no solutions among the noise of the media.

Occupy Wall Street Library Evicted
http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/occupy-wall-street-library-evicted_b42238
I find the idea of a digital Occupy Wall Street Library interesting.

Occupy Wall Street Library Reportedly Thrown Away by NYPD
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/15/occupy-wall-street-library_n_1094941.html?ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

Occupy Wall Street Library Removed as New York Evicts Protestors
http://www.libraryjournal.com/lj/home/892805-264/occupy_wall_street_library_removed.html.csp

ReOccupy Writers Stand in Solidarity with OWS Tonight at 6:00

http://peopleslibrary.wordpress.com/2011/11/15/occupy-writers-stand-in-solidarity-with-ows-and-the-peoples-library/

Daily Thoughts 11/2/2011

Jean Baptiste-Camille Corot, Poetry



Daily Thoughts 11/2/2011

I finished reading Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength Willpower this morning.  I enjoyed reading it.  It gave me some ideas on how to manage my own weaknesses.  I like food a little too much.  Three ideas seemed very good; precommitting to what I would do in the future, placing a bet on how much weight I might lose, and putting off snacks.  Apparently, procrastinating on whether you want to drink, smoke, or do some other habit is a way to help quitting.

This morning I checked the Twitter and Facebook account.  I have been asked to post a little extra about our Book and Bake Sale on November 4 and November 5.  We are opening on Saturday for the event.

http://www.mountvernonpubliclibrary.org/node/298  We even have a countdown widget on the page which reads 1 day and 16 hours until the sale.

I also checked the donations.  We had the complete Seasons 1, 2, and 3 for the television show Lost which is being added. 

I put together a display of biography books on a variety of poets including Allen Ginsberg, Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, Alice Walker and others.  We are reading a biography of a poet for the Biography Book Club on November 15, 2011 from 3:00-4:00 p.m..  I like tying the collection with programming.

In the afternoon, I was in the computer lab for two hours helping people.  I helped people look for jobs and helped someone with basic word processing he was learning as part of the Beginning Computer Class on Tuesday from 6:00-7:00 p.m.  I have also been looking at the Popular Software Tutorial package that is currently on Learning Express and is available to all of our patrons.  http://www.learningexpressllc.com/datasheets/Popular_Software_Tutorials_Product_Sheet.pdf

On the way home, I read some of The Letters of Robert Frost to Louis Untermeyer.  The book was written in 1963.  I got it from our mezzanine area.  It is very old fashioned. 

Daily Thoughts 10/18/2011

An ex libris poem by Abraham Gall.  From Wikimedia.

Daily Thoughts 10/18/2011

This morning I checked the displays and updated the Twitter account.  I also took some time to call people who signed up for the Mount Vernon Writers Network on Thursday.

We are having the Biography Book Club this afternoon.   It should be interesting.  We had a few more people this time.  We discussed people from New York.  A few of the people we talked about were Paul Robeson, Damon Runyon, Fierello LaGuardia, and Langston Hughes.

The book In Other Worlds SF and the Human Imagination by Margaret Atwood came in for me to read. I put the book Now you see it : how the brain science of attention will transform the way we live, work and learn by Cathy N. Davidson on hold.

I spent a few minutes making sure that the computer lab was set up for the Intermediate Computer class in the evening.  People are starting to ask about more advanced classes.

I spent a few minutes looking at the advertisement for the Sony Reader PRS-T1 which is a Sony Reader with Wi-Fi access. The PRS-350 which we have does not have WiFi access.

I read a bit of In Other Worlds.  It is a collection of essays about writing and speculative fiction. One of the wonderful things about Margaret Atwood is her ability to take very geeky ideas and make them intellectual.  She can write about superheros and compare them to Gilgamesh or Odysseuss in a seamless manner.  One moment she can go from talking about her childhood superhero superbunny and the next she can talk about the literary origins of Batman, Superman, and Captain Marvel. 

At the same time, her writing has some very literary qualities.  The Handmaids Tale, Oryx and Crake, and The Robber Bride are superb writing.  She even comes up with a new word for fantastic stories "Wonder Tales" to pull together science fiction, speculative fiction, slipstream fiction (an entirely new term), and fantasy.

I took a break from Lynda.com today.

Web Bits

Big Crowds More Digital Delivery at New York Comic Con
http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/book-news/comics/article/49136-big-crowds-more-digital-delivery-at-new-york-comic-con.html

Daily Thoughts 9/20/2011

Edmund Blair Leighton, Sweet Solitude, 1919


Daily Thoughts 9/20/2011

This morning I bought some refreshments for the Biography Book Club which is happening at 4:00 p.m. today.  We are reading about Abraham Lincoln.  There were some fliers handed out at the Friends of the Mount Vernon Public Library meeting last night.

I checked the displays, udpated the Twitter and Facebook accounts. I spent some time going through the gift books.  I also spent some more time on Lynda.com watching videos on InDesign.

I also am working on an order list for test books.  I spent some time reading through the Chief Leader which is the civil service newspaper for New York city.  They list jobs in the five boroughs of Manhattan as well as the MTA (Metropolitan Transit Authority.)  They also report on open positions as well.

This afternoon from 3:00 to 4:00 p.m. we had our first Biography Book Club.  We talked about different biographies on Abraham Lincoln.  For the next Biography Book Club, each person will read a different biography of a famous person from New York.

This evening, the Mount Vernon Public Library had an Intermediate Computer Class from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m.

The book, A Pleasure to Burn Fahrenheit 451 Stories by Ray Bradbury came in for me to read.  I read some of it on the train home.  There are some interesting themes in the short stories.  For example, a theme in the writing is how modernity rejects horror authors like H:P. Lovecraft, Bram Stoker, Arthur Machen, and   Edgar Allen Poe as superstitious.

Another theme in the book A Pleasure to Burn Fahrenheit 451 Stories is the censorship of reading aimed at creating a mass culture.  It is interesting that Ray Bradbury also criticizes the preference of driving over walking and watching television over reading as part of mass culture..