the pod bay door

:: Happy Birthday to me.

:: Haven’t posted much lately, been too busy with work and other activities. I am flying to Winnipeg on July 1 for a 9-day visit. My house remains a disaster area, with boxes and assorted materials, curios, doodads, books, CDs, papers and other junk laying about, the aftermath of the continuing, no-end-in-sight home renovation project.

I am hoping to switch over to WordPress sometime soon.

:: I renewed my membership in the GeekBoy Club this evening by purchasing two advance tickets to the May 19th, 1830 hrs showing of Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith. The early reviews are mostly positive, with the Critics Tomatometer reading 86% positive as of this evening. A number of reviewers are calling it the best SW installment since The Empire Strikes Back, which was directed by Irvin Kirshner.

:: Everything continues to move at a fast pace. Tonight I blew away Norton Internet Security 2005, despite having paid for a full year’s subscription. I’d grown tired of its increasing sluggishness, error messages, and for the past couple days, preventing me from connecting to my ISP. I replaced it with avast!, at the suggestion of Geoff. I’ve been running Microsoft AntiSpyware, which seems to function quite well as a firewall for now. The only thing I don’t like about avast! so far is that it unleashes a siren sound, followed by a woman’s voice saying, “Warning, there is a virus on your computer”; however, I could turn the sound off, but for now, I’m still learning how to use it.

:: I am pleased to report the publication of an article¹ co-authored by your humble correspondent and the amazing Geoff Harder, my friend and colleague (on the other side of the wall in my office). The article, “Weblogs: Their Use and Application in Science and Technology Libraries“, briefly covers the history of blogs and considers how they can be put to good use in the science and technology library setting:

Weblogs, or blogs, emerged in the late 1990s on the Web, quickly becoming a new way to communicate ideas, opinions, resources and news. Since that time, the community of blogs has grown to encompass specific subject areas of study and research. This article briefly discusses the history and background of blogs, including blogging software. Literature searches suggest very little has been published on subject-specific blogs in scientific and technical publications. Applications in science and technology librarianship are discussed, including team and project management, reference work, current awareness, and the librarian as blog mentor for students.

Please note that my work e-mail address listed in the article and on the Haworth web site is incorrect, and should read randy.reichardt@ualberta.ca.

I’ve written or co-written a small number of articles in my professional life, but this is the first peer-reviewed article I’ve had published, which is a nice accomplishment, if I may be so bold.

1. Reichardt, Randy and Geoffrey Harder. 2005. “Weblogs: Their Use and Application in Science and Technology Libraries.” Science & Technology Libraries, 25(3), p105-116.

Update: The pdf version of the article is here.

:: Help, my web site is drowning!

:: I am a volunteer with Big Brothers Big Sisters Edmonton & Area. There are different mentoring opportunities available to volunteers. Last year, I began as a Digital Hero – it’s like being a digital pen pal. The student and I e-mail back and forth through a monitored web site. The student asks me questions, and I try to help, and we get to know each other. Today I began another program called In-School Mentoring. I was assigned to a boy in Grade 6 at the Academy at King Edward. The school is in a beautiful old building that was built in 1913, and is a historic site in the city. The use of the word “Academy” to describe it is appropriate.

I met the student, Scott, today with the BBBS caseworker, and we discussed interests, activities he likes doing, and so forth. I will meet with him for 40 minutes once a week, over lunch hour. I learned very quickly some of his interests, including mechanics and electronics, robots, music, sk8boarding, and puzzles. He also told me he likes classic rock (Pink Floyd!) and SNL, so we hit it off quickly. We plan to play Scrabble next week.

I’ve not done this kind of volunteering before, but felt comfortable today. The meeting place will be the library, which is cool, given that I’m a librarian. I spoke with the library technician, and promised to compare notes at a later date!

:: Today while driving home from work, I heard a siren. An ambulance was approaching, so I pulled over with another vehicle, into a left-hand turning lane. As the ambulance passed, we began to move back into the lane, only to notice an idiot barreling up the same lane at high speed. He had chosen to use the ambulance as a wedge to clear other vehicles out of his way. He almost clipped my car as he sped by me.

It’s another example of a disturbing trend, what I like to call obliviousness. I’m not sure this idiot even knew what he was doing. Another example is when someone bumps into you while they are talking on their cell phone, unaware that other sentient beings are sharing the same space as they are as they walk and talk.

:: In the spirit of Christmas Letters Past, I’d like to report that today, I bought some pants.