Genealogy #70: Genealogy 2.0

Here's my experiment with the Look-alike Meter on MyHeritage.com. It's a nice, safe answer, but actually one that I agree with.

MyHeritage.com had some interesting and fun things to try, but I found it pretty poorly organized and not very easy to use. I would opt for a more serious site when I get ready to do online family history.

http://www.myheritage.com/collage

The celebrity look-alike collage is a little stranger. I like the #1 match with Susan B. Anthony, although she looks a little fierce. However, the other matches are guys!! They are handsome, but what's that about??

Footnote is a place where people can post local genealogy sources, tagged photos, etc. It seems pretty "hit or miss" as to finding anything useful there. I got excited when I found Herman Halleen, one of my mother's ancestors, was found in dozens of entries. Checking them out, however, led to many, many old Detroit city directories.

Genealogy #69: Database Researching

Searching in the 1920 census via Heritage Quest led me to this entry for my grandfather, Walter Edmunds, age 32, who lived in Blue Island, Illinois, at that time. Part of the chart I found is copied below. The record shows that he was a railroad engineer, and that his father was from England and his mother was from Wales.

Also shown under his name is my grandmother, Cecil, age 33, whose father was born in Scotland and whose mother was born in Illinois. Then my father, Robert Edmunds, is listed. He was only 10 months old at the time.

A bonus that I had not expected is that my grandmother's parents are also shown on this sheet, just below my grandparents. They must have shared a home or lived next door at that time. Thomas Roberston was 58, and Dora his wife was 56. Thomas was a section foreman for the railroad. His parents were from Scotland, and Dora's parents were both from Germany.


This record also shows my grandmother's 28-year-old sister, Mary Robertson. She worked as a stenographer for a paint company.

It is wonderful how records such as these can be accessed so easily through the Internet now. When I started my family history research in 1978, I had to travel to a large library and spend hours searching through census records on microfilm reels.

Genealogy # 68: Detective Work

Harris County owns some oral history CDs that can be checked out. One is "Texas Wisewomen Speak." In this collection of interviews conducted by author PJ Pierce, twenty-five Texas women ranging in age from 53 to 93 share the wisdom they've acquired through living unconventional lives in the Lonestar state.

In my family, I have become the matriarch as these things naturally happen over the years. That means I need to be making my own oral history audio or video. It would be interesting to get together with my brother and sister and do a joint tape of reminiscences, although I suppose we all would remember things very differently.

I found all three of the cemeteries I searched for in "Find-A-Grave": Evergreen Cemetery in Detroit, Michigan; Cedar Park Cemetery in Calumet Park, Illinois; and First Evangelical Lutheran Cemetery in Alsip, Illinois. However, none of them had the data recorded for the ancestors I know are buried there. They do permit you to register and add names for free so others can find them. You can also post pictures of the cemetery and particular monuments and head stones. I have lots of these, and when I have more time I will come back and add this information.

First Lutheran Cemetery is the graveyard for First Lutheran Church, an old German Lutheran Congregation in Blue island, Illinois. The oldest grave I see listed is 1886. Many of my ancestors on my mother's side are buried here. I own a plot, too, so someday I will join them. Walking through that cemetery is like walking through the aisle at the old church and seeing many folks you know.

Genealogy #67: Genealogy Genesis

I started researching my family history in 1978 after my son was born. I had the twin motivations of wanting to pass on this information to him and future generations, and also needing some intellectual stimulation to pass the time. Becoming a full-time stay-at-home mom after having been in the university teaching and research life was culture shock.

Tracking down the clues to compile a family history brought tremendous pleasure, although I prefer the "Colombo" analogy rather than "Sherlock Holmes" to make it a little more contemporary. I began by reading how-to books (of course), writing lots of letters to relatives, and talking to the older members of the family. If I have one piece of advice for those starting out, I think that is the one I would emphasize most. DON'T WAIT to talk to the elders. Once they pass away or become infirm, a tremendous amount of information is lost. Especially the kind that gives flesh to the skeleton of names and dates that genealogy can become without them.

A second bit of advice is: let everyone in the family know that you are compiling information. They will be glad that you are doing the work for them, and they will bury you with photos and letters so that YOU can store them! Be prepared to put in more shelves or buy more cabinets if you get really serious.

The photo to the right is of my Dad and his brother and sister in the late 1920's.

The third piece of advice would be to investigate carefully what software you want to use to manage your data. Entering everything is very time-consuming, and you don't want to have to work twice. "Free" is fine and readily available, but make sure the program has everything you need before you start: ease of entry, standardized formats to encourage sharing with others, flexibility to create charts, ability to incorporate photos and narratives, etc.

When I started my work, home computers weren't around yet. I had lots of notebooks full of photocopies and handwritten datasheets. A retirement project for me will be transferring lots of this original data online. That is a great (and cheap) way to share information with lots of relatives, and to keep it from being lost in the future.

Our Ceramics Tell Our Stories

Crafts & Hobbies #63: Digital Scrapbooking

1) I watched the video on Scrapblog and was successful in using the program on my first try. My postcard on My Favorite Pets includes my own dog Holley (a lab/chow mix) with my brother's two bichons; my two grand-dogs (Ginger and Clover, both chihuahua mixes), and my cat Tiger (Siamese/ shorthair mix). {Only my cat signed a photo release, so the rest of the animals are pictured from the back.}

2) I do a lot of genealogy research, and have made many physical scrapbooks from the pictures. I think that doing a scrapbook digitally might be an inexpensive and easy way to share these pictures with the wider family. I will enjoy learning more about this.

I was NOT successful in posting my scrapbook page to this blog as a picture. Not sure why, as I did not get any error messages. I WAS successful in adding it to my Facebook photos.

3) Here is my post from Scrapblog as a link.

Crafts & Hobbies #61: Craftspiration!

I enjoyed browsing through the craft sites, looking at pictures and instruction lists and videos. I have to say, though, that I am not a very crafty person and I was not inspired to go off and make something. The best I can say is that I was "almost" inspired to go off and buy something. I loved some of the earrings on Etsy. This pair was shown at madebysam's shop. The only thing that stopped me was a current aversion to extra "stuff", and our recent IHCPLNextGen posts on recession money management.



I was surprised to find a pleasant diversion down memory lane on the Craftszine site. When my son was a preschooler, he and I used to make our own play dough that looked just like what was shown here. The only downside was that it was very oily, so you had to be careful where you laid it or you would end up with unwanted greasy spots. We actually resurrected this technique later in junior high school, as the play dough was a perfect medium for making a model "ant" for an assigment.


http://blog.craftzine.com/archive/2009/06/_making_playdough_is_almost.html



I don't think I could learn a craft from just a video, especially one with no sound. I tried watching someone crochet a ball on Craftzine, to see how the crocheted eyeballs were made, but I would not have a clue how to do it.

You can see what I mean by watching this segment at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YM3rBmtJi0&feature=player_embedded

One thing that I did learn from browsing these posts was the many creative ways used to instruct people how to do things, from lists, to series of pictures, to simple videos. I think HCPL could make use of some of these techniques to teach people how to place holds, search databases, etc.

Maybe we could have a contest using a Flickr site (pictures, sheesh!) where customers could load pictures of themselves in our library, or enjoying one of our books outside the library, or showing a project they accomplished using a DIY book or a cookbook or a craft book from the library.

#60: Recession Busters

1. Watch one of Clara’s videos or search online for one recession recipe and post the recipe or video onto your blog.

My Mom was a child of the Great Depression and never outgrew her love for "spaghetti" made with boiled macaroni shells with a sauce of canned tomatoes. She was also big on onion sandwiches. I had to laugh when I saw some of the "recession" recipes listed on the websites noted. Take the "Chilaquiles al Guajillo." Supposedly it is a recession buster because the chilaquiles (a kind of Mexican chile pepper) cost only $1.79 a serving. However, reading the recipe, you find that you also need tomatoes, cilantro, eggs, chicken broth, tortilla chips, Mexican crema, garlic, red onions, and sugar. Doesn't sound like a time or money-saver to me.

I wasn't very impress with the $5.00 martinis or the $49.01 per person "stimulus package dining offers" either. Where do these restaurants get their customers if they think this is a bargain?

2. Share a few recession busters that you have heard or seen about in the media over the last few weeks, either on the local or national level.

The Pearl Fincher Museum of Fine Arts, housed in the building that was once the old Cypress Creek Library, offers free admission at all times. The exhibits are always high quality, and anyone who visited the dark and dingy old library will be impressed by the transformation of the space.

Watch this video clip to learn about the free boat trips at the Port of Houston. You might see someone you recognize. http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/video?id=6449537

I went on the Port of Houston trip with the Academy of Lifelong Learning based at the North Harris campus of Lonestar College. You join ALL for a $20 annual fee, and then get to take free classes and trips throughout the year. http://www.lonestar.edu/all-nharris.htm

Some "senior" discounts are known only by word-of-mouth. For example, at McDonald's you can ask for the "sausage biscuit and hash brown special" with a "senior" coffee, and pay less than $1.50 for breakfast.

I watched a great show about places to visit locally for a stay-at-home vacation, and I was excited until I realized I was watching WGN out of Chicago, one of my favorite stations.

Reviving the habit of getting together with friends to play cards or board games is a great way to save and a wonderful social outlet, especially if everyone brings a "recession" dish to share. Do they still sell wine in big cardboard boxes?

Take a look back at my post of 9/6/08 on the book "The Happy Minimalist." It lists many good reasons for saving money and "going green" by using your public library.

3.List any tips you may have recently discovered or have been using for some time regarding saving money during difficult economic times.

Carry a little packet of tea bags into your purse or wallet, and ask for a cup of hot water at a restaurant.

Marry someone -- male or female -- who can change the oil in your vehicle, do minor plumbing and electrical repairs, etc., or learn to do them yourself.

Do comparison shopping on the Internet.

With friends, do a "progressive dinner": wine at one home; dinner at a restaurant with salads for everyone and a couple of shared entrees; dessert at a third home.

#59: Money & Finance:Credit, Money Management, and Saving

1. Credit

I read the article on how credit scores work, and watched some of the videos. One surprising thing for me was the recommendation that you don't cancel old accounts. I have been angry at one of my cards for their greedy policies, and wanted to write to close it. I have had it a very long time, though, so I guess I will just cut up my card and let the account sit there and age. I took the Credit Quiz and missed one question, related to this issue of cancelling old accounts.

I recently was alerted by Kelsey-Seybold clinics that an employee laptop had been stolen, and that my personal information could have been compromised. I was advised to place a fraud alert with one of the credit monitoring services, so I filed with Experian by phone. It was a very easy process, and the alert was also passed on to the two other main credit bureaus. The alert will be kept in place for 90 days from the day I filed it.

When Experian notified me by mail that they had placed the alert, they recommended that I check my full credit report, which I just did online. That also was an easy process, and I got my report instantly online for free. There were no surprises or obvious errors in the report.

Since I had never seen my credit score, I did decide to purchase it for $5.95. While my score was good ("Prime Plus"), it was not as high as I thought it would be since I have had many accounts over the years and always paid promptly. The reasons for the lower score are kind of bizarre in my opinion. For one, I seem to be penalized because the report "does not show any recently opened credit accounts." My score is also lowered because my report "does not show any real estate loans, such as a mortgage..." It seems weird that having faithfully paid off a long-term mortgage doesn't count for anything in this wonderful world of credit!!


2. Money Management

I use Microsoft Money to manage my finances. I enter what I have spent, and categorize each expenditure, and a "budget" of sorts is prepared to let me know where my money goes. It is helpful to know what my monthly expenses are, but I don't obsess about staying within prescribed limits. Many people resist working with budgets because they see them as "rules" rather than as useful mental "guidelines."

Microsoft Money also has modules for handling credit cards, tracking investments, and planning for future purchases. If you wish, it can translate your data into charts and graphs that give an alternative way to view your finances.

3. Savings and Retirement

The Harris County retirement package is certainly one of the excellent fringe benefits of working for the library system. It is one of the reasons often cited in job interviews about why people want to work for Harris County.

I had opened an online account with TCDRS in the past, as I am tantalizingly close to making use of it for retirement. The numbers are looking good -- too good to retire!!

I have been to the retirement seminar to get information for planning, so I knew quite a bit about TCDRS, but looking at the site was a good review. Most helpful is the page of forms, such as estimates of benefits, change of address, beneficiary designations, etc.

#58 Money & Finance:Banking, Budgeting, Spending

1) Banking

My bank does offer online banking for free. I have used it to go in and look at my balance, and to see if a particular check or deposit has cleared, and that has been very handy. However, I have been reluctant to go purely "paperless." I like having that paper statement in hand when balancing my account or entering data in my Microsoft Money program.

I have not used the service to pay a bill, although I do have many bills set up (with the utility companies, phone company, etc.) to make automatic deductions from my back account. That is even easier, as you don't have to enter amounts each time. I also have many automatic deposits made (like my paycheck). I have never had a problem with these kind of deductions or deposits.

I know the bank is very interested in protecting the security of my account. It is critical to their business. If I follow common-sense practices for protecting my login information and passwords, I should continue to have no problems.

I appreciate the possibility of being able to get e-mail alerts for deposits or for unusual activity. This gives added peace of mind, and would help detect any situation before it gets out of hand.

2) Budgeting

Of the free budgeting tools discussed, www.mint.com looks most intriguing. I signed up for a free account, but was a little disappointed. It was very quick to set up an account, but when I tried to enter data for six of my accounts, only two of them made connections. The checking account popped up right away, as did one credit card account. However, others had messages like "Legalese has changed on your account" or "Unable to connect, try later."

I currently use Microsoft Money for managing my accounts, and was tempted by the automatic transaction entry and categorization of Mint. It could potentially be a big time-saver, as I now spend multiple hours per month on updating. The time-saving feature may eventually be true, but up-front, Mint is still a lot of work. All of your accounts already have to have online logins established, and the categorization involves a lot of tweaking. I think Mint might be useful for my son, who does not have the patience to do the data entry for a program like Microsoft Money.

My biggest concern is a security issue. While it would be convenient to be able to access my data over the Internet in one place, I am still uncomfortable that it could be too accessible to hackers. After creating my account and trying it out, I deleted it. What it it did inspire me to do is to explore the newer editions of Microsoft Money, to see if easier data capture is possible with that program.

I definitely would never use a site like rippleplay.com. The latest "news" update on the front page was from July 2007!

3) Spending

I read the article on cutting spending, but I have already incorporated most of these suggestions in my lifestyle. One that is on my "to do" list is to investigate bundling our telephone with our cable/internet package. A great savings for us came with the discovery of Skype. Using this service, my husband can talk overseas with his relatives for free. Best of all, they can add web cams to the process, and even see each other! The quality of the transmission is pretty amazing, and it's hard to believe that their words and images are crossing thousands of miles.

Another suggestion for saving at holiday time is to share your family news through a blog, rather than buying, printing, stamping, mailing holiday newsletters. We created an online journal in December of 2008 in the midst of the financial crisis, so that we could share pictures and thoughts and ideas with our friends and family in a cost-effective way. What could be better than FREE! Take a look at http://agafiteijournal.blogspot.com/

For fun, I took the quiz to see if I have a spending problem. I was surprised that I got only 85 out of 100, until I reviewed the ones I missed:
*** I learned that Treasury bonds have higher interest rates than CDs, which is good to know as they are also safe investments.
*** On the question, "What happens when you get a raise?", my response "I don't notice" was considered not correct. I guess most people must get bigger raises than library employees do.
*** On the question, "Which investment portfolio is likely to earn the best return over 10 years?", the answer considered correct was one that include 85% stocks. This must show the age of this quiz. Stocks have certainly been in the tank in the current economy, and I doubt that this is really the right answer now.

My biggest advantage in saving money is that I HATE SHOPPING.

Potluck #57: Texting

Cell phones have been shrinking in size over time, but I guess there is a practical limit to that unless an alternative to texting by keypad is developed.

Have you ever sent a text message?

I avoided owning a cell phone because I did not want to be "trackable" by anyone, at any time, at any place. But during Hurricane Ike, my husband's cell phone became invaluable. I learned to text, as for weeks it was often the only way to communicate with family, friends, and co-workers. It wasn't pretty to watch, as I learned everything the hard way (no YouTube available at the time!). I kept grabbing people and asking questions like "How do I type a number? Get a capital? Correct [MANY] mistakes?" I am a little better now, but still not very fast.
Now, I find it is often the only good way to get my son's attention. E-mail is too "old-fashioned" for him. He seems to think that if he can't get it in seconds over his phone, it is not worth reading. I still don't have my own cell phone, but I am precariously leaning in that direction.

I appreciated learning about the http://www.txt2day.com/ website that I can use to send text messages from my computer. I used to be able to do this through the website of my son's cell phone provider, but they removed this service a while ago. I tested http://www.txt2day.com/ just now, and got a reply back within a minute.

Do you use text lingo? Did Lingo 2 Word help?

Text lingo is about the same as the shorthand that developed earlier for Instant Messaging. Recently I enjoyed reading the book "TTYL" by Lauren Myracle that chronicles, in IM format, the day-to-day experiences of three girlfriends as they begin tenth grade. The Lingo2Word site would have helped me decipher many of the phrases like OMG, WTF, TTFN that I found in that book.

I enjoyed playing the 60-Second Challenge in Lingo2Word to see if I could translate five text messages in less than a minute. The most I ever got was 2 out of 5. I learned a lot by playing, though! The challenge also includes some "real language" shorthand (TGIF) and some of the "pre-text" computer shorthand (GIGO). Those I knew! The Lingo2Word site could come in handy in the future. I think it would be especially helpful for anyone who texts with young people. Kind of a "teenspeak" translator.

Finally, what are your thoughts on the texting and driving after reading the New York Times article?

Listen to yo' mama: Don't even THINK about texting and driving! Talking on the cell phone is almost as bad, but at least your eyes can be on the road, even if your brain is not fully engaged.

Potluck #56: To Tweet or Not To Tweet...Twitter

I learned about Twitter as part of the committee for the original iHCPL. Together with a couple of other folks, I captured some of the more quotable quotes from iHCPL participants in a Twitter feed on the blog. For this exercise, I logged in and added a few new ones. It's amazing how time flies. The last time I did an entry was 202 days ago!!

Exercise 1) Browse a couple of different Twitter profiles.

I looked at a few of the celebrity profiles and could find none that I cared to follow. TMI.

I think I will stick to reading the status updates of people I know in Facebook, rather than opening a personal Twitter account.

Exercise 2) Use the search feature to find tweets about a topic.

I searched for the "Barbara Bush Library" and found this tweet:
"Sadly my TV watching is on pause while I visit the infamous Barbara Bush Library (right down the street) for tax help."

Also found a tweet that one of the staff must have entered:
"Knowledge Exchange @ Barbara Bush Library 2day @ 2:30p. Call 281-376-4610 for info. BYO project or conversation!"

These verify what the Forbes article said: "Most important, Twitter can be an effective way to build a customer-centric organization that not only communicates authentically but also listens to customers and learns from that interaction."

I used Twellow to find some Tweets on raw foods, organic foods, and vegetarianism. I think tweets are better thought of as a path to information, rather than as a place for the information itself.


Exercise 3) Post your thoughts about Twitter to your blog.

The Twitter site boasts that it is "a modern antidote to information overload." I think I agree more with Entertainment Weekly that described it as "a time-stamped list resembling a short-attention-span blog."

I think that Twitter is just a passing fad, even though I currently hear EVERYONE talking about it. It was mentioned in an article I read this morning in the "Conde Nast Portfolio", and as I am writing this post, Meghan McCain is on the Larry King Show talking about how Twitter is her favorite thing. I heard Stephen Colbert talking about it last night, and it was a topic on "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" this morning. I think Twitter will be around for a while, but will lose its glamor and probably will be usurped by other sites (e.g. the status updates of Facebook)and become less important as a stand-alone network.

Pot Luck: #55 Getting the Most Out of Facebook

I have had a Facebook account since the Social Networks section of the original iHCPL 23 Things (Thing 18). I currently have 51 friends and 14 applications. As a result of this exercise, I just added a Friends Wheel and some pieces of flair.

Facebook is fascinating, and as a result, an incredible sink hole for time. I never fail to learn something new about my friends, and am often tempted by new apps. I suppose if you had a business or service to promote it could be a productive use of time. As it is for me, it seems more like interactive TV -- sometimes educational, but more often just lost hours.

I appreciated the 10 suggestions about protecting privacy, and implemented one of them right away. I intend to work more with creating groups, to try to make the flow of information more manageable.

I like following Friend Suggestions, Are You Related?, reading comments on the wall, and birthday reminders. Its hard to believe there are 26 million users every month!

Books, Readers and Beyond: #54 Social Networking Through Books

Exercise 1: Membership in Book Clubs

I joined my first book club in the late 70's when I lived in Illinois. Those were the years when I was working for the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment and I met a bunch of terrific like-minded people. Some of us formed a feminist book club, named the Gutsy Women. This was a wonderful bonding among friends, and as I think about it now, it may have influenced my decision to become a librarian later. I had been on a science track before this, eventually earning a Ph.D. in Entomology. All I read was serious non-fiction, and I thought of reading as hard work. The Gutsy Women showed me that reading fiction was an acceptable pastime for intelligent people, and that reading could be fun. I was hooked.

Today I facilitate two books clubs, one at the Barbara Bush Library, and one at my church, Hosanna Lutheran. They are quite different from each other, but both are enjoyable. I would love to start more book clubs, but I am a sadly slow reader, and two required books a month is about all I can handle in addition to my personal reading.

I love the fast-paced face-to-face unpredictable interaction between readers discussing a good book, and I would never consider joining an online book club (unless perhaps I was homebound and couldn't get out).

Exercise 2: Implementing Book Clubs

I am helping to implement book clubs today by doing training for book club discussion leaders. This is offered as part of the "Big Read" grant happening from mid-April through May. The training session open to the public is on Friday, April 24, from 10 am to noon at the Barbara Bush Library. Any staff member who would like to offer this training at their own branch can contact me. I can do the training, help you do the training, or provide the materials for you to do the training yourself. The "Big Read" training will be focused on the classic book "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, but this training could be done at any time of the year, using any book.

The library book club that I host reads a wide variety of materials, from various fiction genres to non-fiction selections. The suggestions come from the participants. You can see what we have read by visiting our Library Thing site. Log in as "bushbookclub", password "barbara". By clicking on the tab for "Your Library", you can see the books this group has read and discussed over the last six years.

Books on Social Networking Sites

I searched again for "The Guide" by R.K. Narayan, as discussed in my first post for this exercise, with these results:

GoodReads: a rating of 3.9 out of 5.0, based on 282 ratings.

Shelfari: a rating of 4.0 out of 5.0, including 21 reviews

Library Thing: a rating of 3.61 out of 5.0, based on 343 entries; no reviews.

Books on Facebook: I had trouble finding this group on Facebook. The first one I found had comments all in Italian. The second was a controlled membership group that you had to be invited to join. All in all, this was not a user-friendly experience.

The sites where I found ratings were quite similar. It sounds like "The Guide" is a "pretty good" book, and one that I will want to read in-between book club selections!

Books, Readers and Beyond: #53 Finding Books Online [Exercise 3: Downloading an e-Book]

In 2008, I taught an adult Sunday School series on the book "Real Faith for Real Life" by Michael Foss. I bought the book from Amazon, and had the option to buy the e-book version at the same time for just $.99 extra. It was a good thing that I exercised that option, because I ended up giving the print version away to a student in the class, and had to depend on the e-book to prepare my notes.

With Amazon, you don't really "download" the e-book into your computer. Instead, you view it online through your Amazon account. This was one disadvantage --I had to be at my computer and online in order to read the book.

For the first few chapters, I was able to copy and paste lines into my teaching outline. This was great and a real time-saver. However, I soon hit the copyright "wall" and couldn't do this any longer. This meant that I had to flip back and forth between the book and my Word screen in order to make notes. This was NOT fun.

If you are just reading and not trying to make notes, an advantage is that you can highlight sections of the book, write online annotations, and bookmark special areas. To review what you have read later, you can choose to see just these sections.

I have to admit that I an really tempted by the Kindle 2. You can select from 230,000 titles, most costing only $9.99, and have them downloaded anywhere in 60 seconds. You can carry up to 1500 books with you at a weight of about 10 ounces. For someone who had to carry two or three volumes of the LC Catalog around during library school, that alone sounds pretty fantastic. The screen is supposed to provide an improved reading surface, and the battery is supposed to last 25% longer than the initial version of the Kindle. This sounds like a potentially BIG threat to print libraries as we know them.

Books, Readers and Beyond: #53 Finding Books Online [Exercise 2: Searching for a Book]

Exercise 2: Comparison Shopping for a Title

In the previous post, I decided that I might like to read "The Guide" by R.K. Narayan. Let's do a little shopping to see how I could get it.

Barnes and Noble online: $14.00 / $12.60 member price. I was not able to tell if I could get it locally. I was told to "call the store." There were also used booksellers listed on this site, offering prices from $7.00 to $13.30 (plus $3.99 shipping).

Amazon.com: $10.20 new. The used books were priced from $7.00 to $28.99 (plus $3.99 shipping).

Swap Tree Four swappers had this book available. It was recommended that I post ten books I have to swap in order to use the site. It would cost me only postage.

Book Mooch One swapper in Sweden has this book available. You have to post ten books to swap in order to use the site. It would cost me international postage in this case.

Books, Readers and Beyond: #53 Finding Books Online [Exercise 1: Nearby Bookstores]

The listing of books stores on Houston.com now includes one more -- I added a free listing for the Barbara Bush Library Friends Used Book Store in Spring. The only danger of the free listing is that anyone can edit it. I did notice that a listing for the branch library itself was full of errors and had been co-opted by an outsider! I tried to make corrections, but was unable to do so.

It's ironic that the iHCPL-suggested Google search for book stores includes near the top of the second page of results a link to the iHCPL blog entry suggesting the search. It's a new type of circular reasoning.

Exercise 1: Nearby bookstores
Barnes & Noble, Champions Village location -- This store has been a good partner for us. We have an institutional buying card there, and get a 20% discount on all purchases. They let us do a book fair there periodically, and we earned an $895 gift card there from the last one. They also let us wrap gifts for tips at Christmas, which has been good PR as well as earning a little cash. They do have an online store that is easy to use, and great for building Wish Lists that I take to my local store.

Half-Price Books, FM 1960 and Stuebner-Airline -- This is a good place to buy new cookbooks, gardening books, pet books, etc. for the library using gift funds. It is also a fun place to buy interesting used items for personal use. It has an online website, but the inventory of the stores is not online and is continually changing. This is a place where you can sell your used books, although you are unlikely to get rich doing it.

Bookland, on Louetta and Stuebner-Airline in Spring.
Bookland is a used book store with a good selection of paperbacks. It does not have an online component. Neal, the owner, has been in business a long time, and has helped out with the Friends' annual used book sales in the past.

Cush City, has a retail store in Houston, Texas, located at 13533 Bammel N. Houston Rd., Houston, TX. It also has an online site at cushcity.com. Cush City has the world's largest selection of African-American items. The owner is the organizer of the National Black Book Festival happening at the George R. Brown Convention Center on May 16 and 17 this year.

Books, Readers and Beyond: #52 What to Read (Sample Advisory Requests)

Because I liked Novelist best in the previous exercise, I used it to do these searches.

Request: Two books suitable for a fourth grade girl interested in animals

"Because of Winn Dixie" by Kate DiCamillo. Summary:Ten-year-old India Opal Buloni describes her first summer in the town of Naomi, Florida, and all the good things that happen to her because of her big ugly dog Winn-Dixie.

"Misty of Chincoteague" by Marguerite Henry. Summary:Set on an island off the coast of Virginia, a brother and sister have their hearts set on owning a wild pony and her colt, who according to legend, are descendants of the Moorish ponies who survived a Spanish shipwreck long ago.


Request: Two books for her thirteen year old brother who is interested in ghost stories

"Real ghosts, restless spirits, and haunted places" by Brad Steiger. Summary: Presents a description of the common characteristics of ghosts, spirits, apparitions, haunted places, and phantoms.

"All the Lovely Bads Ones: A Ghost Story" by Mary Downing Hahn. Summary: While spending the summer at their grandmother's Vermont inn, two prankster siblings awaken young ghosts from the inn's distant past who refuse to "rest in peace.".

Request: An author who writes like Dean Koontz.

John Saul ("The Manhattan Hunt Club") [Novelist]
Charles Grant ("Symphony," first in the Millennium Quartet) [Novelist]
Stephen King ("The Shining") [Fiction_L Booklist]

Request: Other books in the series that includes "Alanna: the First Adventure" by Tamora Pierce.

Aocording to Novelist, "Alanna" is No. 1 in the Song of the Lioness series that also includes:
"In the Hand of the Goddess" #2
"The Woman Who Rides Like a Man" #3
"Lioness Rampant" #4

Books, Readers and Beyond: #52 What to Read (Comparing Resources)

READ-ALIKES
Novelist
I chose Alexander McCall Smith as my author, since I dearly love the "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency" series.
Novelist suggested five authors for me:
1)Agatha Christie (an author I know but do not like very much)
This seems to stress the mystery aspect of the book.
2) R.K. Narayan (an Indian author with whom I am not familiar)
This selection reflects McCall Smith's desire to explain other cultures through the lives of the main characters. I think I might enjoy reading the suggested title "The Guide."
3) James Thurber is an author I like. One of my favorite pieces is his fable called "The Unicorn in the Garden." Thurber was probably selected because of the humorous nature of his work.

4) Clyde Edgerton is another one of my favorites authors. Novelist describes his books as being about communities of normal people with normal problems treated with humor and compassion. I thought this was a great suggestion.
5) Jon Hassler is the fifth author. I am not familiar with his work, but Novelist describes his writing as darker and more serious than McCall Smith's. It doesn't sound appealing to me.

Fiction_L Booklists
I tried searching by McCall Smith, and had no luck. I then tried searching by setting, since all occur in Botswana, Africa. The closest match I found was "Mysteries Set In Africa." However, his books were not on the list.
I found this site awkward to use because of its organization.

What Should I Read Next?
This site also seemed more limited than Novelist. People who have read "No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" listed other books they liked. From the results, ten titles by other authors were listed. None overlapped with Novelist. One was a mystery I did like ("Guardian Angel", by Sara Paretsky, that I liked because I know the Chicago setting), and one was a novel that I very much disliked because of its disfunctional characters ("Accidental Tourist" by Anne Tyler). McCall Smith has much more normal characters in his work. None of the other titles gave enough information for me to learn whether I might want to read them or not.

#48: Check it Out!

The possibilities for videos at the library are endless. Here are a few ideas:

(1) Clips from some of our programs. A series featuring authors from our recent African American Read-In will be up soon on our branch page.

(2) How-to clips: It would be helpful to show customers how to use our self checkout machines, or demonstrate how to print using the print vending system.

(3) We'd like to earn goodwill for the library by giving customers some "behind-the-scenes" glimpses, like "What happens when you make a request for an item?"

(4) Our Friends group can do a commercial for their used book store.

One thing I have learned -- all of us have different gifts! There are many tasks involved -- generating ideas; writing scripts; filming; editing; appearing on camera. Myself -- I am definitely an off-screen person!

#47 Video Challenge: Post Your Video to YouTube

Here's one of my first attempts at a video. I can already tell you lots of things I would do differently next time.

I do love the music, though. It's my son Victor playing on his electric guitar.



If you can't see the video, go to this link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cc6x9DUkTt0

#46 Movie Maker Basics: You Oughta be in Pictures

This was a terrific iHCPL segment. Thanks to Beth for using the "capture" method to demonstrate the use of the Windows Movie Maker program. I had experimented with it on my own before, but I learned a lot from Beth's tips and suggestions. They were much easier to follow than the tutorials built into the program itself.

There is really a lot of power within this little package. There are so many options for titles, transitions, audio, narration, etc. that we can do a lot with it for the library. I think it will take a while to get something that looks even a little professional, though. My products now look like a higher tech version of the old home movies. Practice may not make perfect, but it does create improvement. All I need now is TIME ... and probably a higher quality camera.

Video #45: My First Animoto Video

Animoto: Cypress Creek Life

Video #45: Making a Video

Last year I used an RCA Small Wonder EZ201A to film a video of a program at my branch. It is the RCA version of the flip camera. I was pleased at how easy it was to film. I got some usuable footage on my first try. I was a little disappointed in the quality of the image, though. It was interesting to read the reviews of this camera on the Consumer Reports and CNET sites. They matched my experience exactly.

I downloaded the clip easily through the UPS connector built into the camera, and was able to edit it (add titles, select sections) using the Windows Movie Maker software on my computer.

Animoto is a quick way to make a little "music video" out of some still photos, but you don't have much control over the final product. I had to try several times before I got a reasonable result. I finally discovered that I had to downsize my photos a LOT before I selected them for the video. The 30 seconds of free video goes by too fast. I guess that's the point. It's just enough to wet your appetite for more.