Wonderland Revised...

Its the weekend, and I find myself at a hotel that will remain unnamed in San Jose, at a convention in which you can find everything from Munchkins and The Tin Man waltzing down the stairs, to Klingons and Jedi sitting in a bar attempting to figure out the age old question of who can drink more beer without embaressing themselves. Personally I would bet on the Klingons. Yes, it is once again time for a Sci-Fi convention, which is actually an umbrella title for everything imaginary, fantastic, futuristic and fun. Have no worries! I did my homework before I came to have fun, and am STILL checking in on Discussion Boards to be sure I keep up on everything. No fun is without a price! Basically this is my vacation of sorts and I only really do this once a year. There are lots of authors here to talk to, artists to meet, costume balls to attend, and of course seeing friends you haven't seen in a year. ;)

So here I sit in the free internet lobby having just finished off my homework, and watching the Sci-fi world walk by. For instance, I was just passed by two Storm Troopers , The Doctor and a Dalek, Daredevil and Elektra wearing a dark costume instead of her typical red, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, and a full entourage of characters from Chrono Trigger. I'm not sure anyone is going to recognize any of those references, so just ask if you want to know what any of those are. Things are going well so far, except that I keep falling asleep. I guess the off duty nurse from work was right and I'm borderline exhausted. And here I thought I might be able to sit down and read a book without too much trouble. Ah well. Perhaps later one this weekend I can finish off the book I'm in the middle of. This is one of those rare posts taking place in the middle of the day and I'm not running on fumes. ... okay, so maybe I am running on fumes. I will catch up on sleep, I promise. For now though I am off to enjoy the convention to the best of my feeble ability. This will probably equate to me wandering from panel to panel, or sitting down somewhere and watch the entirety of several genres walk past me. In any case, its a good time out for me. Talk to you all later. ;)

PS. Later was sooner than I thought! Thought I'd mention that this picture of Boba Fett on a Segway was taken in Australia as a Sci-Fi Convention I went to there. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, so I asked if I could take his picture and he said sure. So here is Boba Fett on a very archaic vehicle by his standards. ;)

All Tattered and Torn...

Nobody panic! The title does not mean that I ran afoul of uncoordinated legs and the harsh reality of pavement, but in fact refers to me decorating my library for Halloween. Ghosties in the windows, ragged, torn unpleasant looking cloth hanging in the kids section, and of course some well placed spider webs, both silver and black. Complete with their eight legged creators, they make for a real scene in the kids section! Still to go up are the ghost costumes for the regular fair that hangs from the ceiling (a trio of plush jellyfish) in the kids section and to keep them company will be some little blow-up pumpkins and ghosts. Now all I have to do is figure out how to hang them up there when I have a lack of means to do so. High ceiling.. no ladder. However, I am nothing if not resourceful, so it shouldn't take me long to figure something out to get them up there. The wall also requires a little Happy Halloween sign. The themed books are already pulled and set on display. Perhaps I have been over zealous in my anticipation of Halloween. We'll see. ;)

Once again, I am up late past my bedtime. So much work to do and not enough time to do it in. I was supposed to be taking this weekend off so I could catch up on sleep, but alas, it appears I will be catching up on homework! ;) Its fine. I need the extra time this week to really do some digging for the assignments. Anyway, I do have the internship tomorrow, so I must away to my sleepy spot for the night. Retire would've been a much more optimum word, but sleepy spot is a lot more fun imagery wise. Night night! ;)

October Days....

Welcome to October! I love October! I hope I haven't just shot myself in the proverbial foot with saying that, but it is my favorite time of year. The woods smell great after the first rains, and its getting quiet out there too. Darkness settles early, and most of the critters are settling down to sleep for the winter. At least those that haven't flown the coop already. Its also time for Halloween!! This is always a good thing in my book. Everyone gets to go out and be someone else for a day, and everyone really needs that I think. In honor of Halloween I have been playing with my blog to add fun little elements for the occasion. The font will also switch from blue to orange for a while, unless it looks really bad. In which case it'll go to blue again, or another color. Hopefully I am not alienating anyone by doing that, but... I've always loved this particular semi holiday, in which we don't actually get a day off from work, but get a day off from ourselves. And it lets the creativity spill out in many many ways, which I love to see. I was going to try and go as a Brown Coat from Firefly this year, so we'll see if I can get my costume together in time. :)

This weekend I should've been working on the project for the Lib Sci 20 class, but I managed to feel no too great the last couple of days. I basically just slept a lot and felt generally bad. This particular set of circumstances seems to be righting itself, so I decided to play with my blog some more. You may have noticed that I added a real of clips to the side. These are from Cartoon Network's Boomerang channel. All are musical clips having to do with Hannah Barbarra cartoons, or older. Once you watch one, be sure to check out the little clips that are related at the bottom. One of my favorites is the one with El Kabong by Calexico. Great short, and well done. Yes, I am a cartoon-o-holic. I freely admit it. The one for JabberJaw is good too, as well as Josie and the Pussycats!

Its late, and I need to hit the sack so I can get up at the crack of dawn to get to my internship on time. So I bid you all a good night, and enjoy the clips, and the Halloween gifs I put in here. Night night. :)

Cracking the blinds...

Some weeks back when I set this blog up, I had left certain settings in place until I could look at them later. About a week and a half ago I set the blog to allow anyone to post mainly because I have friends and family who don't have google accounts and its not fair to tell them,"Well? Just sign up!" when they say,"But I don't wanna have a google account." In reality, this conversation never took place. Never fear, I'm not actually that much of a jerk. ;) My reasons behind having left the blog locked up tight is due to me never having ever been a very open person. In fact when this assignment first showed up as homework, I had to squelch a fast rising tidal wave of panic. Since then I've gotten to the point where I can babble on about things like I've never live with my best friend Phobia. Phobia, meet the public, Public meet Phobia. Oh good, we're all still grinning. ;) Keep in mind that this is a test run to see how this goes, and I will yank that priviledge the moment I start feeling uncomfortable, so bear with me.

In another comment by another unnamed individual, thank you for posting, they had asked if I ever get bugs inside the library. This question was probably spurred by the picture of my wonderful little green Praying Mantis who keeps my little planter box free of pests. The answer is, no I haven't seen any bugs like that inside the library. However, we did have one very angsty lizard run in and hide in the children's section. Once caught, the stowaway took up residence in one corner of its prison, and glared at me in consternation until I closed the branch and released the golden goofball into the nearby field. Was it at all thankful? No. It hustled into the tall grass, then came back out and glared at me for a while. More than willing to have a stare down with my reptilian antagonist I stayed for about 10 minutes, before deciding I should leave the little tyrant to his own devices and head home. I saw him lick his lips in satisfaction as I turned toward my car. Ingrate.

Notice that I said I had not seen any bugs like my Mantid friends inside my library. This does NOT mean I have not seen my fair share of bugs in libraries though. While working another branch some time back I ran across what I first took to be a wayward caterpillar. The fuzzy creature was undulating along the floor at a slow pace, its little head nosing to the left and right in search of munchies. In an attempt to rescue my little fuzzy friend I went and got a clear glass to I could contain him for the duration of the ride outside to a much more inhabitable place for his needs. He hadn't gotten very far by the time I got back, so I closed ground quickly and went to put the glass over him. This all was going wonderfully until I got close... and then the caterpillar stopped dead, lifted and swung it cute fuzzy little face towards me and looked at me. You ever been in a situation that could've been ripped from a First Contact Sci-Fi movie where you realize that you've wandered in the foggy unknown areas of reality? My first thought was, that is one aware caterpillar. My second though, much more accurate, was,"That ... is not... a caterpillar..." I watched it, and it watched me. I noted that what I had taken to be fuzz were actually legs scrunched up against the body to hide the fact that.. they were in fact legs. The long hairs I had taken for hairs were actually feelers. And the plump little head.. looked a heck of a lot more predatory now that I could make out a nasty set of mandibles and multi faceted eyes. My mind fired rapid stills of a certain episode of Star Trek TNG in which most of Starfleet is taken over by a hive like group of insects, the little intruders riding the brain stem to get what they wanted. Gee... this certainly looked similar. However that wild idea was quickly shot down when I moved the glass a little closer and the critter went from hover mode to hydrofoil mode, hitting MACH 1 as it literally became a blur of movement, disappearing beneath a wall mounted book case. My brain lamely informed me,"The bugs in Star Trek the Next Generation couldn't move that fast." as my eyes adjusted to the still lingering white line the bug had created when it moved. I have never in my life seen anything move so fast, and be that small and I spent most of my childhood catching Fence Swifts (a type of lizard).

If you aren't a bug fan, please be advised that there is a picture of a creepy crawly coming up in the near future. As in... now. ;)

What was it you ask? It took me about 4 days to track down a book that actually had a picture of what I saw. Sounds like I'm describing an alien encounter, and it was sort of like that. Anyway, before I tell you what it is, let me say that you actually want these in a library, because they eat the bugs that may damage a book. They aren't poisonous, they can't hurt you, and they are extremely fragile, needing a somewhat humid cool environment. If you catch them, and leave them captured they will die... and then fall apart. Delicate to the extreme! To most gardeners they're known as the House Centipede. They are also known as a Hairy Mary. I prefer the second identifier myself, because they do indeed look hairy. Dubbing them as a Mary however is beyond me. The picture on the left is not of the one that I came across, but I did nab this because it gives you an idea of just how small they are. With its long legs up against its body it really does look like a caterpillar.

Although its not late, I am going to fold shop for the night. I ran it very close to the wire last night, and as a result I'm straggling along at the speed of an arthritic turtle. So, I big you an early night. ;)

So, I Jumped the Gun...

One of the assignments for my Library Science 25 class was to post a second blog message. Um. Ooops! I guess I got a little carried away with the blog thing. My second post to this thing was at least a week back, so hopefully whatever number this one is will do. ;) For those of you who read this blog (and I really have no idea how many that might be) the assignment which I already blew half of, is to make a second post to this blog, reflecting on how distance learning has either enhanced or complicated my life. In honest answer that can go two ways because I've got two different classes. Library Science 25 while sometimes tough, because I have a hard time reading non-fiction (I get distracted very easily when reading it) it is by far my favorite of the two. This class is easy to follow, and I understand the assignments given and while it does take up a lot of time, I don't consider it a complication, but something fun to look forward to. Yes yes, I will probably be grumbling when I have to do the midterm, but I grumble whenever I have to take a test. :)

The other online class... I'm not sure what to say that won't get me keel-hauled. I will leave it with its a big complication and I'm somewhat irritated with it. Irritated squared. On that note, the answer to the main question is that distance learning has both enhanced and complicated my life. Good and Bad. I guess everything needs to be balanced somehow. Online classes are great. I have time to do the work, get to my job on time, and also do my internship! In between all that I have managed to carve out a few hours to sit down and practice the gentle art of becoming a relaxed individual. Difficult to achieve in this day and age! The downside is that not all online classes work. Again, I will stop there. Counterpoints are interesting though.

In the two days that I wasn't able to post, for those of you who actually want to know, nothing spectacular happened to me. Tuesday was extremely busy foot traffic wise at work, but not so many checkouts as I had expected. Ultimately it was just a large amount of people who needed help with the computer. Others needed library cards, and when I hand out library cards I always try to do a short tutorial on how to use the online services. Time consuming, but a lot of people are totally blown away, and enthusiastic about using the branch, so I do it anyway. This morning, I had 4 kids for storytime! That's pretty good for me! :) We had fun with a couple of interactive books and then traditional stories. Hopefully everyone will be back next week. Other than that I've lead a very boring 2 days, which speaking from experience is a very very good thing. May you live in interesting times is definitely the worst curse ever to pass the lips of a human being. I speak from experience mind you. Too many natural disasters have landed on my plate already as well as the more mundane. I will take boring any day, thank you. ;)

Once again I find myself teetering on the brink of unconsciousness since its past my bedtime, so I hope and trust that my fingers which have been on autopilot since 9:30pm have done me justice and there are no glaring errors. If there are glaring errors please have no qualms about pointing a finger and laughing hysterically. I live to lighten other people's moods. ;) I shall now retire to my humble pile of blankets and pillow perched a top my rolling fortress. Aka, the metal bed frame on wheels. Every time the dog lays down at the end of my bed, it rolls to the window. I never wake up where I fell asleep. Disconcerting. I bid you goodnight. ;)

Picture's as Promised...

Finally, the long awaited pictures of chickens. Apologies for the wait, but I was battling with a class assignment (not for this class) and Mom had absconded with my camera to detail her work on the house. So, without further interruptions here are some of the chicks as adults, and a dog... and a couple of other things that I put in here just because a I felt like it. ;) First off we have one of the Brahmas, who we named Pastey for reasons I will not go into unless you really REALLY want to know. Its something of an unpleasant story, but as you can see she came through just fine to be a happy healthy... sort of blurry bird. She's got a sweet personality. I can still pick her up and walk around with her and she just sits there contentedly.

Next up is a collection of the goofy birds and only one of them has a name. The biggest white bird to the right is called Brutus, because.. well, she was and still is, enormous. However looks are deceiving because if you pick her up, she is the ipitomy of a skinny chicken. She's also not a bully although it might appear that way. Believe it or not, the top chicken in the group is a little bitty thing with all the charm of a malicious sledge hammer. She doesn't have a name either, at least not a consistent one, although we rename her at random with colorful metaphores every time she walks up to one of the other birds and does a reenactment of a harvesting potatoes or carrots. Charming little raptor.

Anyway, Brutus hangs out with Pastey, and the other three tend to tag along. The brown hen is a Buff Orpington, and the Black hens are Australorpes. All of them are fairly friendly. They'll eat out of your hands and everything. I was asking if I live on a farm, and the answer is no, but the area is zoned for livestock, so I have chickens. Other critters include two cats, one is 18 and skittish to the point of insanity, and the other is 24+ years old and somewhat senile. As in she forgets what she was doing, which sometimes causes problems. There are also two dogs, one is mine (here's a picture). She's mostly Border Collie and 1/4 Australian Shepard. Not a drop of Dalmation. Sorry. The other is also an extraordinarily distracted Siberian Husky. Yes, I'll get a picture... eventually. ;) Its hard to get him to hold still!

I guess I shall add one last picture before I crawl into bed and do an unnerving imitation of a the seriously unconscious. For some reason there seems to be a serious attraction for insects to the little planter box outside my library. Odd insects in some cases. I have pictures of a very large moth, but that thing looks like a reject from a 1950s Horror Classic, so I may or may not post the picture. For those of you who hate insects I suggest not passing this point because I'm going to put a picture of a Praying Mantis down here for people to enjoy. They come in all different colors. In this case it happens to be a wonderful green. Here you go.So, there you have it. From the Planter Box outside the library, a little Green Mantis. Later there will be shots of an Angst Ridden Skink and possibly the MegaMoth which had adhered itself to the bulletin board outside the library. Big bug. Anyway, on that cheery note, I will say that things are going alright in my classes at least for the moment, and I am retiring to my bed... which has been looking at me as if I should be asleep already. Soooo, Night! :)

Ghost in the Machine....

So, it was late Saturday (late for me) and I was leaning back in my Captain Kirk chair (So named due to the fact that you feel like you're in Kirk's command chair when you sit in it) when my DTV box suddenly cuts out. As soon as I'm halfway out of the command chair, it blinks back on, and reboots itself, its little green light glowing innocently at me like a cyclopian child caught with its hand in the cookie jar. We proceeded to glare at each other suspiciously for several minutes, then I retreated to the minimal comfort of my chair. Thus far it appears to be behaving, but this is not the first time the traitorous box has pulled this, always when I least expect it, and generally when I'm trying to record something. I am sure that one day there will be a reckoning and it won't be pretty, due to the fact that I'm bigger, and stronger, and know the mysteries of wiring. Oh, just you wait little box of innocent charm. Just you wait.

No doubt some of you are chalking this up to anthropomorphism, the applying of human emotions to an animal. But this is not so, because this is a little box of hexed wires and boards, and not an animal. I'm not sure what the proper term would be for this particular circumstance, so we'll just go with "The Cursed Black Box" which works for now. One of these is bad enough, but it has a twin downstairs that remains unnamed. The box in the living room is almost worse, because when you turn it on, it reboots every single time and loses channels, which requires unhooking its nourishing (ugh i hate that word) wires and electricity every time. It retaliates by losing yet more channels. Dad says its because its little computer is the equivalent of a 286, and its being jammed with more information than it can handle. This is possibly true, however the CBB doesn't have the problem... it just shuts itself off at random intervals. Generally going months before giving in to its sense of humor. Come to think of it, this hasn't happened for over a year. I shall let sleeping jinxed DTV boxes lie.

In other arenas, the classes going okay, but I am still frustrated with my Circulation class. I managed to get the Role Playing assignment done, but the newest assignment that was posted was 8 pages long and sort of confusing. Eh, I'll figure it out, or hey I can ask. The class I made this Blog for is a lot of fun. I'm still playing with the Blog, trying things out to see if they work and taking out that which ... doesn't. I added a few more books to my favorite books list, and I was attempting go find a header I like. Also working on a music list to add. And yes, there will be some pictures at some point. Not of me. Sorry, I'm not all that excited about putting a picture of me on the net. ;) Apologies.

Duck Dodgers is on, so that means its getting close to 11pm. Thus I must away to my humble lump of bedding. Not to mention the joy of watching my the inside of my eyelids for the next several hours. Nothing like studying tiny blood vessels. The can't possibly be good for the psyche. Yes, I am aware that eyes roll up when closed, so technically you're looking at your frontal lobe. So picky. Good night. ;)