A Song for Closing

Sometimes, one must change up the routine to get the attention of perfectly fine, but busy people when the time comes to empty the building. One method for this is my "Poorman's Al Yankovik" Fair Use parody of some helpless, innocent song.

I submit for your consideration, "I Think We Are Closed, Now," wrenched from Tommy James and the Shondells' "I Think We're Alone Now," also covered in the 80's by Tiffany.

Print files or save!
That's what we say when we are closing
And don't let's delay
Let's close like we planned
And so we're checking out as fast as we can...
Giving to you a helping hand
Trying to get away into the night
And then you gather up your items and you wander to the door
And then we say, "I think we are closed, now
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
"I think we are closed now,
The beating of our hearts is the only sound."

The song ends there, because when you're making closing motions, people really don't want a two or three minute radio ditty. About a minute is enough inflict on people without rousing their annoyance beyond having been interrupted in their task and being asked to leave in the first place.

Overheard

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"Where are you going?" she asked back.

"Ummm, I'm following you," he replied.

Quite understandable. She was definitely followable, and he had those puppy, round following eyes.

#26 Reflections of a Chocolate Bunny & 27--One more Thing

3169_ChocBunny "I'm thinking, '27 Things, but
at least no one bit off my ears!'"
Originally uploaded by YorickWell.

Ah, I remember that Learning 2.0 project, 27 things to learn and play. In terms of affecting my lifelong learning goals, I couldn't say that it has, because I'm always looking to learn new and amazing technologies--at the level of playing.

As in, "What do you play?"

"Oh, I play the cassette player; I play the MP3 player; I play the CD player." (I actually play the guitar as well, but that's a litter deeper than I would say I can do with technologies. I also play the word processor, but I don't play assembly language, C, C+, C++, nor any of the other current computer languages. I do dabble in HTML, of course.)

Having said that, L2.0 has assisted my lifelong learning goals in that I have now done several things I hadn't done before even if I had known about them or not. I had never put any photos online--although having gotten a digital camera in late December, it is likely I would have posted soon, but this program provided the impetus (not to be confused with the Pompitus [of Love] which is a mysterious phrase in a song lyric that is not clearly defined, even at this moment! Oops: This just in.
http://www.algebra.com/algebra/about/history/Pompitus.wikipedia is an article about what the word means and where it probably came from. Amazing). I'm also easily distracted at times, and the multiple lessons and exercises assisted me in the sense that I had no time to get bored by anything. (I hope the readers take longer than I deserve to become bored with my blog entries.)

I've been captured by this blogging thing. And the ability to start posts off with a picture, somewhat like an allusion to illuminated manuscripts or to stick a picture in the middle of a post to illustrate some point or just to relieve the readers' eyes from all this text has been great fun for me. I think the combination of Flickr and Blogspot is much better than either of them by themselves. I'm also pretty addicted to LibraryThing, although I must say my cataloging much more resembles copy-cataloging than original cataloging. (When I see a book in someone else's LibraryThing that I've read or own, there's a button that allows a signed in user to just add the book to her own library catalog! Whoooo hooooo!!!)

I've been surprised at how easy some of these Web things are; I've been surprised that some sites (like Myspace) strike me as less useful than I had hoped.

Moving to the next landing of this controlled wandering, I can say that I had enough help when I needed it, but I didn't necessarily feel that I was approached as much for help as I had imagined I might be. Most of my colleagues either had a different schedule from me or else didn't need much help (or possibly found me less than approachable, but people I've asked have said that's not the case.) I have had a few people ask questions, just not as many as I expected.

Improving the format or the concept:

I think I would have appreciated a written transcript of the podcasts (although, someone would have had to have transcribed them and that would have been a drag!). I don't quite know how to justify that feeling--I listen to audiobooks all the time, I listen to other mp3 files on my Palm. I guess that it has to do with perceptions of time pressures: I felt I needed to keep moving to the next activity, to the next lesson, and the information at the speed of sound (podcasts), was slower for me than information at the speed of sight (text, duh!). Also, the one time I had to use dial-up access, even the loading of the website and the loading of the links was slower than I could endure. I used dial-up for longer than many people, but now that I'm on faster connections at home and in libraries, it is a stress to operate at the speed of dial up. (Although one thing libraries should keep in mind is trying to have alternative services for those with slow Internet. The text-only version of the catalog is one of those dial up compensations that I think is still a good idea.)

One other format improvement would have been if the progress logs had had room for more than one URL, given that several weeks actually comprised two or three of the 27 Things each. The current progress log required that these two and three things be in one post in order to list the response in just that one URL.

I thought the concept of Learning 2.0 itself was sound, albeit somewhat second-round trendy. But I'm more of a second- or third- stoner* myself in relation to technology, so the drifting close to "me too!" nature of this program was probably just right. (*allusion to the proverb/quotation "[L]et ... him cast the first stone.")

I would like to see similar training opportunities when some new library-relevant technologies emerge, but I think we should try to come up with some steps or protocols for determining which things should be explored and taught, and which things are likely to be analogous to 8-track tape technologies. Libraries that had vinyl disc collections, that had (and have) cassette collections, and that have CD collections turned out to have guessed/bet right for the most part. Any libraries that had 8-track tape collections, I think probably had them go obsolete sooner than it was worth to have them. It's easy to say, but we should avoid adopting 8-track tape technologies.

In closing this ever-so-long post, I'd like to thank my parents, without whom I wouldn't even be here. And if I could go back in time and tell me stuff, I'd freak out. Er, no, that wasn't the question.

If I could go back in time and tell me to either participate in this program or skip it, I'd still tell me to participate. I'd also tell me to be careful of typos in naming my blog's URL so that I wouldn't lose all my readers when I fixed the typo of the URL and then no one could find where I had "gone."

#27. One more Thing.

At first I couldn't think of "one more thing." I re-read the wiki article on Web 2.0. Still nothing else. Then I gazed at the comments on the KCLSU #27 blog entry, and someone mentioned Second Life. An excellent example of how this collaborative can work: other people working together can help give ideas that we recognize as great but we might not have thought of on our own. (I'm thinking of a Venn Diagram here with overlapping and discrete areas of coverage.) So, anyway, my one more thing would be training and collaborative activities in SecondLife (which I had briefly looked at earlier in the program but didn't proceed on my own yet, because of so many other choices to look, learn, and play with.

Ooooooooooooooooooooohhh! Shiny!

Non-27things Post / Sometimes I hate the world I live in.

`Not an actual picture from the story.
Actually a night picture from Dublin.~

Last night I was driving home from work. Given the two hundred mile commute and my 40-mile bladder, I stopped in at the rest area to empty said bladder, mooch a free cup of coffee and a couple cookies and be on my way. Normally it would be just a quick stop and then I'm on the road again (sorry, Willie).

This stop was longer than usual. While I stopped, I finished listening to a radio episode of Selected Shorts: it was the short story by Audrey Niffenegger "The Night Bookmobile." Then all I needed after all was the coffee and cookies.

Up at the volunteer hutch between the bathroom buildings, a young woman was telling the coffee volunteers that she's out of gas and she ran out of the house without her driver's license or wallet. The volunteers ask me how far the next exit is--like I would know!!

I explain I just drive between Seattle and Portland and I get off at rest areas and I don't really pay any attention to actual exits. The woman has stepped back and is trying not to cry and listening, but it doesn't sound helpful. Then some trucker steps up and tells me that the next exit is only ten miles to the south, I say thanks, but I wasn't the one who wanted to know, I was just here for some coffee.

The volunteers look back to me and say, "Oh yes," and they take my cup and give me coffee. They say, "we can't really leave here; we're dropped off, and he can't drive because he has Parkinson's." (Which explains something else that I had noticed, namely that the man had an old scar, rectangular-looking running from the one side of his head, across and above his forehead and back the other side of his head towards the back. It looked rather like a temporary lid had been put in, but you don't like to ask about those things. [some kind of brain surgery was and may still be a palliative treatment for Parkinson's])

Anyway, the woman went over to the pay phones and put some money in and dialed and then waited, hung up and the change dropped back. So I asked (since I have a cell phone), "Is there anyone I can call?" I know, it sounds stupid, but I didn't know what else to say.

She said, "No, I've tried calling, but no one's answering, and my family is out of state on Spring vacation. My girlfriend called me up to come pick her up, she's finally getting out of a bad situation and I just ran out to my car and started out and didn't bring my purse or my wallet or anything. Then I noticed I was low on gas, so I turned around and idled into here."

I have to say here that I am really, really suspicious of people in need at rest areas, and especially people with gasoline issues at rest areas. I mean, how did they even get there if they don't have gas? And if you give them money to help get them back to Arkansas or Montana or New Mexico or whatever isolated outpost of Americana they claim to be from, how are they going to actually get gas if they're out as they claim!!!

But I ask her, "If you got a lift to the next exit, do you have anything to put gas into?"

"No," she says, "and I don't have my wallet even, I ran out of the house without it. I might have enough gas to get to the next exit, but I don't want to chance it and have to walk in the dark on my own."

"Would it help if I followed you to the next exit?"

"Well, if you wouldn't mind...."

"No, that would be fine. I'll follow."

She goes down a ways to her car and I go to mine. I get in and start up and let her drive past, then I pull out behind her. No doubt to improve gas mileage, she's going 60 in a 70 zone. But I follow at a safe distance anyway--but not so far as to make her think I'm abandoning her. We turn off at the next exit and there's a gas station. There's also a car following me through the exit off the freeway, so I'm starting to sweat bullets in 45 degree weather, hoping that someone back there isn't getting ready to put them back in me. She turns right toward the gas station, I turn right, the third car turns right. She pulls into the gas station parking lot, I pull into the gas station parking lot....the third car drives past.

Man, I hate being a coward!

Anyway, I get out, she gets out. I ask, are you going to be okay? And she does start to get red-eyed again and mentions that she still doesn't have any money. (and you're thinking, well, duh!! nothing changed in ten miles except she's at a station instead of ten miles away, but she didn't suddenly come into possession of the wallet she said she left at home!!)

And then I wrestle with my thoughts: I hate being stupid, I hate being in a position of being taken advantage of by a con artist. On the other hand, if she's acting she really should be on film or stage because it doesn't look a bit faked to me. On the other hand, it's not like I have expert social skills in knowing when someone is really telling the truth or faking crying. On the other hand, I really want to help if the need is real and I can help.

Oh well. I decide given how bad gas prices are, offering to fill up her car would approach painting the word "Sucker!" on my forehead; also given how bad gas prices are, offering anything less than $10.00 of gas might not get her any meaningful distance towards home and her wallet where she needs to get so that she can start her trip over right and fill herself up.

"Listen," I suggest,"I can't fill up your car, but if you drive over to the pump, I'll go in and have them put ten dollars on the pump. Would that be enough to get you back home and you could get your wallet?"

"Yes. And give me your name and address I'll send you the money in the mail."

I go inside and pay the cashier.

I come back out, and she pulls down the hose and puts the ten dollars in her car. As she's filling, she says again, "If you just write your name and address on a paper, I'll get the money back to you."

"Thanks, but if you'll forgive me, I think it's okay if you just keep it. You, know I...."

"No, I understand...strangers, right?"

"Yeah, right." Momentarily, I think about offering to give my email address, but she doesn't really want a conversational relationship, she just was in an awkward and embarrassing position and didn't want to be thought of as somebody trying to con or cheat ten bucks of gasoline from a gullible stranger. And it seems self-evident now, but I hadn't thought about it until I read it recently somewhere, but it's ungallant and NOT selfless to try and make some deeper acquaintance out of helping somebody. It's like taking advantage of THEM. So I just ask again, will that be enough to get you home or to your friend? She says, I'm going home and get my wallet, and then I'll go get her. She'll be there, because she told me she ran down the street."

"Okay, then. Well hope it goes okay." (Literature is what we have to save us from the boredom of what dull real people actually say. That, of course was not literature.)

As I drove back on to the freeway, I thought again how much I hate that I would even have any reason to think someone might be trying to trick people out of money at a rest area; how much I hate the several minutes of fear as I thought it might really be a scam with a confederate following in the car behind me, waiting to spring the trap and perhaps even thump on me as they decide what they're going to take from me or my car. And I worried whether 3.324 gallons of gas would really get her where she was going. (It was an older Toyota; figure around 20 miles to the gallon, lower bound and she'd have about 66.48 miles, not counting whatever fumes she had still had in the car before she added the gas.)

So I was replaying everything, second-guessing whether I had really helped enough, was I a mark in a con, was the real con getting my name & address (which she didn't do) for use in a later, bigger con or identity theft? Then, on the radio, Harry Chapin came out of no where and sang "Taxi."

And I felt better. It is, of course, making too much of it to think "it was a sign." But having said that, Harry Chapin is just a comfort in so many ways. He was philosophical, sophomoric, philanthropical and inconsistent. His song coming on just then make me think that what ever had just happened was as okay as I could make it, and to quote from Dick King-Smith's book, Babe, the Gallant Pig, "That'll do ...That'll do" (118).

Addendum to post below--I rather hate how time flows backward in posting

Although it was brief, there were several things going on at once, so to speak, in terms of goals and objectives for the post below. I wrote out what I wanted to say with pen on paper as I was going along and then when I was ready, typed it into the post blank. Even then I had to correct typos and one spacing issue.

I hope there were no other errors that got past me.

Waiting for the Light

100_Waiting for the Light
Originally uploaded by YorickWell.

Art seems to frolick in the spirit of pretension.
In that spirit, and having to do with spirit and art,
I offer this picture:
stacked chairs in the modern cathedral in Coventry.

They are empty, except for other (chairs) like them, and yet...
Three points of light shine, suggesting more light to come.

Speaking of more light to come, I'm hoping the 27things beyond FlickrMashups are better. I played with the Montag, and it was kinda fun, but my mugshots didn't show up in the mosaic I made, so I left it.

Then I tried the Make a Trading Card Mashup, but for some reason, even when I gave the program/system/mashup permission to go to my flickr account (because I didn't want to upload more pictures from my computer), it wouldn't actually open a photo chooser for me to pick from my Flickr account. So I think I would have liked this one best if it had worked for me as I was hoping/expecting.