Images - Part 2

I've been using Pinterest for a while now, both for work and for personal use. I find it most useful for:

• craft/activity ideas for kids
• recipes that suit my select eating habits
• inspirational or funny quotations

Looking at the travel pins is tortuous since I want to go to every place. Immediately.

I have quite a few boards that are library-related, take a look! http://www.pinterest.com/librarypins/

Images - Part 1

Creative Commons
Since I've been in SRC mode for the past week, I went looking for a picture of a lighthouse in Wikimedia Commons. Found a really neat illustration from Finland:



Wikimedia commons has a lovely feature where you can just click "Use this file on the web" and it'll give you a handy link to add to your blog. In this case: By http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Janke [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Wordle
I've used Wordle in annual reports and newsletters as it gives a nice visual representation of key words that you want to stand out. I like taking big chunks of text and pasting them into Wordle to see what words will stand out. Some image generators don't allow you to use the images you create without paying for them, so look out for that! (Wordle is safe though).

Memes
A gentle thought from the gentle reptile, Philosoraptor.

Puzzle

Social Reading

As a librarian who works in an office environment, I'm no longer much of a shelf browser. So online browsing options are key to finding books I want to read. I'm a big fan of the "50 Must-Read Books Before the End of the World" type of lists that are often shared on social media. Lately I've been reading a) classic sci-fi/fantasy b) modernist classics available in audio format. I find classics are more palatable in audio format as they often have fantastic narrators. The audiobooks of The Fountainhead / Ayn Rand and Brave New World / Aldous Huxley are quite nice. I love a good radio voice!

I use my For Later list in the library catalogue to keep track of everything I want to read. That way it's easy to switch them over to my Completed list! I did once start a GoodReads account and it was fun selecting all the books I've read, but I can't maintain two such accounts and the library catalogue won out with its convenience. I like to add read-alikes/Similar Titles to books I've read because they're so handy for reader's advisory and I think that it's interesting to see what books other people think are similar (I don't always agree).

Ever thought of a Twitter book club? I've tried it out with some colleagues and it works quite well! You can share little insights in real-time instead of waiting until you're finished the book. Find a hashtag and your whole book club conversation is listed in one tidy stream. (Tip: try not to pick a hashtag that could be a popular soccer player's nickname.)

Twitter

What I love about Twitter is a) that it's concise, and b) that it's fluid. You can send out a tweet and it eventually fades away into the endless stream of information.

It took me a while to get used to Twitter lingo when I first started using my account, but now Twitter is my preferred social network. Here are some accounts that I enjoy on Twitter (tip - many celebrities use their official accounts solely for promotion, so check out their last few tweets before following):

@Stats_Canada
@FakeLibStats
@NightValeRadio
@AbandonedPics
@HalfPics
@J_Goldstein
@Maisie_Williams
@JoshGroban

I find it's easy to get overwhelmed by tweets if I'm following too many accounts, so I often go through and "Unfollow" accounts that I haven't found interesting. Anyone have a better idea for avoiding newsfeed info overload?

Storytime Books

Here's something fun--what are your favourite storytime books from the past 10 years? I'm not a storytimer but I do love picture books and finding good read-alouds is an extra bonus.

23 Things NB

The best thing about starting a new blog is customization. What will my background be? What fonts will I use? What catchy title can I come up with? What witty URL will be available? All of this fun comes within the first couple days of a new blog. The hard part comes later with actually sitting down and formulating something to write about.

In the past, I kept a blog as a type of travel diary for my family to read while I was away. Not always the easiest thing to do if you're somewhere where free wi-fi is about as common as a free public washroom (ahem...London...). Another nice thing about a blog as a travel diary is that you can read your old posts and remember some long forgotten details that make you fondly remember events that at the time were disastrous.

I recently created a Wordpress blog and let me tell you--Blogger is certainly more user friendly! The customization options are fewer (refer to my first paragraph), but for the purposes of this NB 23 program, Blogger is working quite nicely so far.

I'm seeing the NB 23 community growing day by day and look forward to reading about everyone's experiences and sharing my own. A great way to learn a bit more about the people we work with, whether near or far!