Life in Denim and Flip Flops

Wow. Those last few days of March just flew by. I've been a little crazy trying to get this whole B3DA thing rolling on top of my normally crazy week. But that's when I realized I was made for this challenge. The organizing and brainstorming ideas collaboratively as well as encouraging (or...coercing) people into doing crazy things are totally skills I've learned as a librarian. I can list, throw ideas around, and sweet talk people with the best of them. All while attempting to make things accessible and teach people how to do something (i.e. start a blog or make a blogroll). Love it. And the seemingly ridiculous idea of doing anything (much less blogging) every day for an entire month, totally speaks to my experience on the block plan at Cornell. After getting an entire college education one class a month for 4 years. Nothing seems too daunting for a month. As I used to say you can do anything for 18 days (the number of days in our blocks). So bring it on B3DA I'...

It's almost that time again! BEDA (Blog Every Day in April) is just around the corner. A few of us from last year's group are back and ready to roll for BEDA 3.0 (BEDA Part 3? BEDA the Third?). Are you?? Autumn and Christina and I are game and we're waiting for confirmation from our Glaswegian Nicola . EDIT: Confirm received!! She's in! Don't know what BEDA is? It's a little thing lauded YA author (and TIME magazine twitter of note ) Maureen Johnson started 2 years ago on a whim. And by whim, I mean...she made a comment on Twitter and someone said "hey me too!" and the next thing you know there are 400 of us crazies following her lead and blogging every day for an entire month.Half way through the month she offered to pair us up with other people for motivation. And that's where the original foursome came from. We were chosen by Maureen. She did a pretty good job pairing us up, and we've become friends and stayed in contact ever since. ...

Reading or writing by candlelight is not romantic. It's difficult and kind of awful. I can see where a different kind of candle might have been useful, but a girl has got ot work with what she's got. Now you may be wondering why I'm whining about writing in the dark when clearly I'm blogging. You're wrong dear reader. I'm not. (Also clearly I have been reading way to o many books that refer to the reader in second person.) I wrote this by candlelight during my earth hour observance and will dutifully transcribe it later. Last year I spent earth hour on the phone. In the dark, but on the phone. It felt a little like cheating so this year I thought I'd go a bit further and cut myself from technology too. I thought writing by candlelight would be fun. Well more fun than the alternative of just sitting in the dark. Now it is, but not by much. It's not a project I'll be repeating soon. :) But it's a good reminder and reality check. It is possibl...

I've seen my fair share of live theatre productions. Not a huge amount. I've seen local and college shows. I've seen regional things. I saw the Chicago production of Wicked. Last year Autumn and I saw the touring company of RENT with Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal. (Squee!) I've never seen anything on Broadway. I know the music from a broad range of musicals. I'm hesitant to say a lot because...well I know Autumn and Emily. And compared to them I am strictly an amateur. Maybe that's why this last weekend hit me like it did. I know to some of you this might be blasphemous, but seeing Next to Normal last weekend was like five times more amazing than seeing Adam and Anthony in Rent last year. Partially it's the show. The story of a woman who is bipolar and her (and her family's) dealing with that. And about living life. And finding love. And finding a way to back to something next to normal. But it's also the music. So singable. A bit rock, a bit jazzy,...

I've decided not to do a hugely indepth post about each conference, instead giving you the bulleted point list of things I've learned instead. (in no particular order...of course) Not all Twin Cities driving is awful--but it's not particularly fun on icy mornings. I survived. So did Cara; 'nough said. Android phone as GPS works surprisingly well, but sadly no Daria voice like Autumn's real GPS It's super windy in Pella. There's a sign on the hotel door asking you to hold on to the door. It's that bad "It's a great place to work. You should apply there." is Vicki's mantra right now. (Love you Vicki!) Poster sessions are way faster when everyone puts a QR code of their content on the corner of your poster. (Well faster for me anyway!) "Wow, that's so cool, but we can't afford it" is everyone's favorite and sadly truthful line. Even the technology conference isn't immune to tech problems. Librarians find ...

I should never be let in a bookstore with Autumn. Much less 3 of them in one day. I totally splurged. She managed to get out looking pretty good with just the top three of that pile. The rest are mine. Oops. Now that I've given up tv and my conference presentations are done...I'll have a lot of time on my hands :) and now I've got some books to fill them with. Yay. P.S. I'm still on a high from the show. There are not words right now. Pics of goofy smiling Autumn and Becky to come soon. Now off to go find the supermoon! (And Maureen!) Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.7

Wow! I knew this week was going to be crazy, but I don't think I quite imagined it like this. My 2 days at the Library Technology Conference were amazing. I met some really great new people (Rachel, Vicki, Alan, Chanitra), saw and heard about some great new tech ideas, and had a great session presenting. I had a fabulous audience for my prezi session, really engaged. I think I scared them a bit with my energy and volume, but once I got going with the prezi they seemed a little less skittish. I've got some work to do when I get back to convert their brainstorming into prezis. The conference gave me a lot to think about. (And a new autographed book to read--The Googlization of Everything) Today was ILA-ACRL. A much smaller, but more intimate conference. It doesn't hurt that I went to college in the same state so I know some academic librarians from then too. It's always great to catch up with the Cornell people. Plus this year it was good to see my own library peeps w...

So the last of my 10 mix cds is currently being burned. I ended up with quite the eclectic mix of stuff. the "friend" mix -- the one I listed originally a Broadway mix -- my favorite track from each of my 20 fave musicals a "vocal" mix -- 18 tracks from choirs or recitals Nerdfighter/DFTBA mix -- 21 of my faves listed under the nerdfighter genre in iTunes Blue Skies mix -- 23 tracks including my fave originals and covers, and his new covers Mom and Dad mix -- 18 songs from Boston, Billy Joel, Queen and the Beatles Next to Normal mix -- most of the songs from the show I'll see Saturday Actual Friend Mix (#1-3) -- 55 songs from the list my friends suggested  The Actual Friend Mix was fun to put together. I didn't end up buying all the songs you suggested that I didn't own. I started with the ones I did own and the ones that Manda and Emily (the two poor souls on Gchat at the time) could easily email me. Then I bought a few tracks here and there t...

Those of you who know me in real life, know that I'm not the cleanest or neatest person in the world. And living alone has not helped that at all. So long story short, my apartment has been a mess since the last time I've had guests. Which was ... New Years? No after that, when my sis slept here when we moved grandma to the condo. But well over a month at any rate. The point you're wondering?? Right. So I've also got these two conferences I'm presenting at next week. One of the presentations I have done, have done a run-through and feel decently confident about.  The other? Um. I have 2 slides of a powerpoint. I leave Tuesday. So I really need to get that done like yesterday. So what did I do today? I procrastinated by cleaning my apartment. I am a super on task cleaner when there's no tv to distract me and my only other alternative is to work on my presentation. Sheets washed, beds made, floors swept, dishes done, kitchen cleaned, vacuuming done, and all my l...

Ok so I lied last night. Still pissed about the stuff in Wisconsin. You'll get that post tomorrow. Instead I attempt to find a few things I've loved this week. There may not be any silver lining on the Wisconsin stuff, but I'm going to find something to smile about. Next to Normal soundtrack: Autumn and I are headed to see Next to Normal next weekend. I still can't believe that I'll get to see Alice Ripley live in a role she won a Tony for. I mean seriously. So stoked about it. I've been listening to the soundtrack non-stop since we bought tickets. I'd heard it before, but hadn't really listened to it all the way through before. I adore it. A great rock opera that isn't a jukebox musical. I especially love "Everything Else" and "Who's Crazy/My Psychopharmacologist and I." cranberry scones: I don't know when this happened, but I've become a bit addicted to cranberry scones. My fave downtown coffee shop (as opposed t...

This was the blog post I had planned for the day. After what went down the Wisconsin legislature I was tempted to write about that, but I realize it's still too raw. Just like I shouldn't grocery shop when I'm hungry, I shouldn't blog when I'm angry. So I'll leave that for another day. Instead I'll return my original topic. Lent and sacrifices. Growing up Catholic I always gave up something for Lent. I don't remember what that something was pre-middle school, but since about 1996 I've had variations of the same 3 fasts. The most recent of which has been to go vegetarian the entire 40 days instead of just Ash Wednesday and Fridays. Before that I would traditionally kick my caffeine habit cold-turkey, withdrawal symptoms and all. But it's my original big sacrifice that I'm returning to: abstaining from television. I wanted to return to something that really was a sacrifice. The vegetarian thing was a little too easy to comply with. And the ...

I've been dragging my laptop to work with me recently to work on my prezi for the conferences you've heard me going on about. This meant I've had my music with me, but apparently some of my favorite artists haven't gotten the message. They've been cranking out new ways to listen to their music free online. Now I've been a fan of Accuradio , Pandora , and Songza for a while. However my new problem is that most of the artists I'm really digging right now are a bit too independent for any of those services. Thankfully some of my current faves are using Bandcamp to stream their stuff ( Charlie and Dave ). Today Dave goes out and tweets a link to his new song Wildflowers on a new site called SoundCloud. He's also been streaming some of his stuff on his blog. Not only does it allow you as a fan to listen to it but it also lets you embed a player and customize the color. Like this: Wildflowers by BlueSkies The other new listening experience is t...

Ugh. No caffeine in the house today. The headache wasn't so bad before, but now I'm just waiting for the Aleve to kick in. The diet pepsi at dinner helped a little, but not enough that I didn't need the aleve when I got home. I want to be a bit productive tonight, but I'm not sure now if that's going to happen. Poor Molly, I left my character in the middle of something. I sort of want to get back to her. :(

Today I wrote 1500 words at Writer's Gym. Writing is like working out, you're more productive when you're not alone says our local poet laureate, and I tend to agree. So the get together is called Writer's Gym. Don't know where, when, or how it started, but I went tonight. And I wrote. And it worked. I wrote 1500 words and transcribed 500 more that I wrote last week at the college writing community gig. They aren't perfect, or even great, but they're 1500 more words than I started the afternoon with. It was a great 6.5 hour thing. The 3 hour writing turned into pizza which turned into storytelling time. Always fun to just chill with a group of people I sort of know, but don't know well. So much more than I was expecting. I'm really glad I went.

I've got these conferences coming up mid-March that happen to be on back to back days, which means lots of road time for me. I'll be in my car for approximately 14 hours to, from, and in between conferences. Normally I'd throw my Blue Skies albums on repeat or find an audiobook to listen to. However reading Amy and Roger's Epic Detour got me wanting to create a bunch of playlist/mixes myself. (I don't have an ipod to radio adapter, so I'll be old-schooling it with burned cds.) And I need your help with ideas. The first mix is pretty well set. I went with ever-obvious, but always-entertaining "friend" mix. Basically just a mix of songs with the word friend in the title. A nice mix of musicals, pop, and indie stuff. We used to be friends---The Dandy Warhols I think my girlfriend's been cheating on me--Blue Skies I will be your friend--Amy Grant Friend is a 4-letter word--Cake Friend like me--Aladdin Friend like you--Joshua Radin My friends-...