Daily Thoughts 5/8/2010

Chicago Public Library, Illinois, 1900 (From New York Public Library Digital Gallery)

Daily Thoughts 5/8/2010

I am planning on taking Readers Advisory 101, an online course from the American Library Association. It is a brush up, plus an opportunity to work on my skills with book clubs and other things like that. http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/rusa/development/readersadvisory101/index.cfm There is a textbook that goes with the course as well, Readers Advisory Service In the Public Library, Third Edition, Joyce G. Saricks.

Today has been relatively quiet. We had a professor come in and do an introduction to the law session this morning for about two hours. She talked a bit about the New York Jurisprudence set of law books as well as New York Digest.

I also spent a bit of time updating the current events display with books on subjects in the news. I usually read Yahoo! News to pick out quick topics like oil, Pakistan, India, Obama, Sarah Palin, health care, Google, Apple, and other subjects which make the headlines.

Daily Thoughts 2/27/2009

Portrait of Jonathan Swift, Author of Gulliver's Travels.

Daily Thoughts 2/27/2009

Today has started slowly. I wrote my monthly report of the activities which I have done. I also checked on the movies for the Sunday film series. I did a bit of tidying up and updated my current events display. It is quiet here this morning.

I have been designing some rough drafts for flyers for the upcoming programs. I have sent a few of them over to the community relations person. Mostly, today has been a day to tidy things up a little bit. Cut extra scrap paper squares for the desk, make sure the reference room is in order, and keep my phone numbers and calendar updated.

I think I am ready to go to the Whiteplains Supreme Court Law Library on Monday.

One of my colleagues is leaving for the City College of New York. He is going to be a college librarian working in interlibrary loan. We had a nice discussion about the process of getting published. He is very interested in family literacy. One of his ideas is adapting different learning styles to family literacy.

We have a new librarian starting on Monday. She has worked with law material before. Hopefully, this will help us a bit with answering law questions.

On the train home, I finished reading the Caryatids. It was an excellent read. Tomorrow, I will work on writing a short review.

Daily Thoughts 2/24/2009

Rembrandt, Alte Frau Lesen, 1655

Daily Thoughts 2/24/2009

I spent some time looking through the local papers for recent philanthropic activity. I made a pile of photocopies to give to the director. I am hoping that it will be useful. It is not that easy to know with these things. I read through a lot of local newspapers to find associations like the African American Men of Westchester County, some fraternities and sororities, the local rotary club, and various wealthy people who gave a significant enough amount of money to a nonprofit to appear in the local paper.

We are talking with Westlaw, a major legal publisher about some of our print and online subscriptions. I am making sure all of our old cd rom subscriptions are not active. We are being offered some discounts. You have to be excruciatingly careful when negotiating with Westlaw. The sales people at Westlaw are lawyers and the people who write the contracts are also lawyers. Their agreements tend to be very complex and well done.

I am looking at Every Nonprofit's Guide to Publishing Creating Newsletters, Magazines, & Websites People Will Read by Cheryl Woodard and Lucia Wang. I am rather disappointed with this book. I thought it was a do it yourself kind of book. How to design your own newsletters, websites, and magazines. It is not. It is how to choose other people to make your newsletter, or how to hire a person who will do it for you. There is only a small amount on how to do it yourself. I think I am going to try another book on how to do these things. It is not what I expected.

Now for a little technological euphoria before I even get a new smart phone.

The revolution will not be televised

It has already happened.

Turn off your television and wake up.

Pick up your telephone.

Listen carefully within the decade.

Your phone will change.

The revolution will not be televised

Information should be free.

Your cell phone will be as powerful as

The desktop you are reading.

Smart phones will become cheaply cloned

In China, In India, all over.

Anyone, anywhere who had a cell phone

Will hold their own computer.

The revolution has already happened

In every single place on earth.

One billion people are free of poverty

A pool for information revolution.

More knowledge will be created on phones.

Than in previous human history.

The revolution has already happened.

You hold it in your hand.

Daily Thoughts

Mr. Charles Dickens’s Last Reading. Source:
Leighton, George C.: “Illustrated London News Vol 56” (1870)

Daily Thoughts

I filed looseleafs in the Guide to Employment Law and Regulations this afternoon. I plan on replacing several missing copies of McKinney's Consolidated Laws of New York Annotated as well as a volume of the New York Code of Rules and Regulations. These two sets are some of the most used books in our law collection. We keep several different volumes of the set behind the reference desk and hold identification while they are being used. This is to prevent theft. McKinney's is quite expensive at $135 per volume currently.

This month is African American History Month. There was a reading this last Saturday for the Big Read. People took turns reading from Ernest J. Gaines A Lesson Before Dying. We also just put up a display for the Negro Leagues Baseball. It is in front of our desk. This coming Saturday we are doing a An African American Read In Chain for Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin In The Sun

Tomorrow, I am putting together a display for Lincoln's Birthday on February 12. A patron is donating a mystery about the assassination of Lincoln for the display.

We have fourteen people in our community room who are attending the first part of a series of four part series on starting a business.