Things I learned from watching Legion:
Good hearted yet simple people have southern accents.
God’s one true accent is somewhat British.
Jan 012010
Ah. 2010.
I don’t normally make new year’s resolutions, and when I do, I don’t generally publish them. But I’m feeling like sharing this year. My resolutions aren’t very exciting as they mostly just involve following through on the projects that I’ve been thinking about for the last 6 months or so. Anything really exciting, like bike touring or going on other trips is dependent on having a steady income so it’ll have to wait.
- Finish my MLIS program. This isn’t really a goal so much as a thing I know I’ll be doing this May.
- Get a real job. Duh. I think this will involve putting together a proper professional website. Yip.
- Finish two king sized patchwork quilt tops. My mom was super awesome this summer and took me to this great locally owned quilt shop in Apple Valley over the summer. My intention was to make a duvet cover for my king-sized comforter that is made out of two quilt tops. I want to finish those bad boys.
- Finish my sweater. I’ve got this super cute, super simple cardigan on needles right now. I gotta finish it!
- Learn to can things. I’d like to be able to have a couple of jars of homemade tomato sauce and the like hanging out in my cupboard. I think Annie can help me with this.
- Use my camera more. This is always on my list. The poor Hassy has been neglected. I really should try taking at least a roll of film every month.
- Bake once a week. I used to do this all the time, but I sort of fell off the wagon in 2009.
Jan 012010
It is New Year’s Eve and I’m hanging out at home, listening to Matokie on KALX, drinking wine, and making polenta in anticipation of having the Stones over for brunch tomorrow. I’m not up for going out tonight what with being pretty exhausted and feeling a bit pouty.
So I’ve been Little Miss Never Blogs again. Time for a quarterly update!
My semester ended a couple of weeks ago. I took courses in Metadata, Research Methods, and Records Management this semester. I just got around to looking at my grades. Straight As. Good times. I actually enjoyed every one of those classes, which was a little surprising and gratifying. I’d had such a difficult semester last Spring for a whole host of reasons that I’d started out the Fall feeling pretty crappy about school in general and my abilities as a student specifically. I’m pleased with how things have worked out this Fall.
I’d assumed that I wouldn’t find the Research Methods course to be very useful, but it turned out to be pretty awesome. I learned about how to put together a sociological research project and different methods for collecting and analyzing data. My semester long project was writing a research proposal, which involved defining a topic, variables that would effect the research, doing a short literature review, and putting together a questionnaire that could reasonably be sent out to study subjects.
In my Metadata class, I was introduced to different metadata standards used in the library and museum worlds. My end of the semester project was putting together an archival finding aid for my own photographs and then writing a tutorial about how to put one together yourself. Good, geeky times.
The Records Management class was less exciting. But I discovered a strange, yet true love for color coded file folders.
In other news, I’m still working at the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission. I’ve been working on a scanning project for them that involves scanning engineering drawings dating back to the 1920s, when San Francisco began construction on the Hetch Hetchy damn up in Yosemite. Engineering drawings from that time period are absolutely amazing. Seriously, they were hand drawing so the originals are basically one of a kind works of art. I’ve learned all kinds of random things, like how blueprints are made (They’re literally sun prints. Neat!) and about the development of standardized paper sizes.
So yeah. Life’s been mostly about weird, archival based geekdom.
This Spring is my last semester of school. I’m taking Vocabulary Design, and a culminating course wherein I create something called an E-portfolio. I think I’m going to spending my next few weeks off trying to learn XSLT and thinking about how to write coherently about my ideas about librarianship as a profession. So, more geeky good times to come.
Oct 282009
From a book review in Salon about the book The Lexicographer’s Dilemma: The Evolution of ‘Proper’ English, from Shakespeare to South Park:
To protests that the language police are only protecting the accuracy, precision and clarity of our tongue, Lynch lifts a skeptical eyebrow. Many of the most roundly deplored “debasements” of English are nevertheless perfectly comprehensible: I didn’t confuse you by writing “Ain’t it the truth?” in my opening paragraph, did I? The only truly unbreakable rules of grammar and usage are the ones that, when broken, result in a genuine failure to communicate. The rest is a form of covert class warfare, and today’s usage reproofs constitute a status-protecting thump on the head delivered by the upper middle class to uppity members of the lower middle.
Awesome. I’m glad there’s a book meant for popular reading that makes this point. Grammar rules are like rules of etiquette. They should just function as a way make things clear, but they’re mostly just a way to mark class differences and make rich people feel superior.
That said, using quotes on signs used for emphasis drive me nuts. Choose bold, people. Choose bold.
Sep 142009
My bike got stolen tonight. This would be the same bike whose back tire got stolen about a month ago. I parked it outside of 19th Street Bart in Oakland this afternoon at around 4:45. When I got back at around 10, it was gone. There’s no evidence that I even left my bike there except that the plastic bag I was using to cover my bike seat in the rain was on the ground.
When I parked my bike, there were three other bikes parked at the same spot. There were also bikes parked across the street. When I got back, every single one of them was gone. I don’t know if that means anything, but it was sort of weird.
I have no idea what I’m going to do for transportation now. I don’t have the money to buy a nice folding bike. I could replace the bike with some used beater, but I don’t really want to have that one get stolen a month from now, you know? Plus I don’t want to spend what little money I have on some crappy bike that I don’t even like.
Bah. Total bullshit.
Sep 122009
You know, I used to vaguely wonder what the conservative equivalent of threatening to move to Canada was. Did they all promise to buy 300 guys and live in a shack in Montana or something?
Now I know. They bring guns to town halls, throw hissy fits over nothing, and talk about about Russia like it is 1965.
So weird.
Sep 052009
Wow. It has been a good long time since I updated this thing, hasn’t it?
I’ve been putting off updating because while I really didn’t want to talk about the death of one of my best friends, I also felt like following up the announcement of her memorial service by my regular posts about Twinkies and missing the bus would seem, well, undignified. So I’ve avoided the whole mess all together.
But I rather miss blogging. Sometimes I have things to say that take longer than a Twitter update, you know? So I’m going to try out getting back to baked goods and having my back tire stolen. It is, after all, the stuff of life.
Feb 112009
Saturday 11am @ The Mills Chapel.
There will be a reception after at the Student Union. Everyone is asked to bring food to share. Everyone loves a potluck.
Flowers can be delivered to the Mills Chapel between 8am and 10am the day of the service.
T’s sister Norah wanted me to make sure to emphasize that this is intended to be a celebration of Timanna’s life. Bring your best Timanna stories.
We’re trying to get together photos of T and a play list of music that she loved. If you have photos of T that you really like or have a song that always makes you think of her, you can send them to me and I’ll pass it along.
Also, people are getting together at The White Horse tomorrow night for drinks and music in honor of Timanna.
Feb 092009
It’s crazy when I think about it. With the exception of a few people here and there, all of my very closest friends are people that I met between August and October of 1996. My friendships with these people have waxed and waned. We’ve shared apartments, helped each other move, cried on shoulders. We’ve fought and made up. I grew up with these friends and they’ve made me the person I am now.
Timanna was one of these people. She was one of the most amazing, insightful and funny people I’ve ever know. She died last night, surrounded by friends and family. She’ll be missed deeply. I was lucky to have known her.
Nov 212008
I have an interview for a cataloging internship at the Academy of Art library today and I am having trouble figuring out what to wear. Librarians do not dress formally for the most part. Especially librarians who work in tech services since they don’t interact with patrons. My cataloging professor wears trainers to work, for god’s sake. But it is an interview so I feel I should dress up a little.
Thing is, though, what I have to dress nicely in is a black pencil skirt and short tweed blazer. If I were interviewing a different kind of establishment, this outfit would be totally fine. But I feel weird going into talk to librarians dressed like a “Librarian”. (I find the Librarian stereotype to be really weird. Were librarians the last hold out of 1950s suit fashions? What’s with the tweedy pencil skirts?) I feel like if I walk into a library dressed like that, I need to explain that I’m not in a costume, I really dress like this in real life. What to do?
