Today someone said, “You know, the library even smells better these days!” I did not say, “Because the bathroom exhaust fans are working now!” There really is no way in scholarly discourse to announce that certain corners within the Crucible of Higher Learning no longer have a rather distinct and unmistakable odor that gets worse […]
One of my favorite library stories comes from the days when small public libraries in upstate New York were being encouraged to go online. A consultant went to visit a small library–one of those Barbie Dream libraries that are hot in the summer, cold in the winter, and staffed so minimally that the library worker […]
I have this long post drafted about Maslow’s hierarchy and priorities and this and that. I guess it’s ok. But tonight I sat in a circle with students, faculty, and other friends and supporters of Peanut U, and first we celebrated the artistic achievements of a student graduating this spring, whose art now graces the […]
Last week I was asked to submit a written draft of our library’s Vision, like, pronto. This scared me to death, because I’ve done a lot of presenting and talking and so on, but I don’t have a Vision. (I have progressive lenses–quite reasonable at CostCo–but that’s not quite the same thing.) But my boss […]
I spent almost two weeks struggling with the Monster Cold that attacked My Place of Work, and really could only take one day off. This wasn’t about heroics; it was simply that there were too many important, entertwined events that my absence would have affected. And you know, that is not such a bad thing. […]
We just dropped the rent! The Craigslist listing says $1200 but we agreed to $1150. (As I had suggested all along… but I digress.) We are renting out the home we own in Tallahassee. It’s a 3-bedroom, 2-bath midcentury house with a sunroom and loads of lawn around it, making it very private. There’s a […]
I’m in a motel in Oxnard, resting up before a funeral tomorrow. My uncle Bob died. I didn’t know him well — our family has a lot of gaps in its attachments — but he led a good strong life and died with his boots on, felled by a series of strokes that began hours […]
Tomorrow I’m keynoting virtually for the Edgy Librarian conference. I have come back from ALA with my head full of interesting things–augmented reality, mobility, the cloud, and web-scale library management will be high on my list–but what I’m trying to do now is… 1. cluster these thoughts into actual trends (a neat new tool is […]
Top Technology Trends was very well done (I had the sense someone had actually tested the technologies in advance, or at least evaluated previous sessions) and featured a suite of smart, articulate, forward-looking librarians. Recurrent themes among their trends included localization, mobile apps, user experience, augmented reality, and more. Had a sit-down with OCLC folks […]
Today we took residence of our really-good-deal San Francisco rental. This places me back in my home town for the first time since August, 1979, when I took off for New York City to begin my junior year in college, following two years in which I saved up money by working as a records clerk […]