Twitter Me This

CPL twitters!

I have many friends far cooler than I who tweet and twitter all the time. Now I can tell them to connect with CPL and get quick little blips about what we're doing. I thought the CPL sites that gave current blips like - registration opens today for blah blah! - to be the best and most relevant to twitterers. The more humorous the better. Yay teen site!

I am patiently awaiting a device that will make twitter easily accessible to me, primarily for the stalking of celebs;) but until then, I will lean over shoulders and blog along.

Library Thing - Practical for Recommendations

I had heard of Library Thing, but had no idea what I would use it for. I thought the layout was fine, but I found there to be an overwhelming amount of information. Fortunately the tour is simple to follow and the motivation to get new book recommendations would make chugging through the info worthwhile.

What I know I will use in the near - once my boys are through with outdoor soccer - future is the recommendations by similar libraries to my own. I think it's fabulous that you can click on a reader with a similar book list and see what else they are reading.

Library Thing will be a great help for summer reading!

Google Calendar - No Pollock Painting

Google Calendar is gorgeous! So blank, open, uncluttered! Okay, so I would need to fill it, but at first glance - gorgeous! My ginormous wall calendar at home is like a splashed Pollock painting in comparison.

If there was a new Google app that I would use it would be this one. Do you hear the 'woulds' in that sentence? As much as I hate my wall calendar, it has been a staple in our kitchen for so long I feel I would starve without it. My life is better reflected by my own scribbled 'Pollock Calendar' than by this neat Google app - for now.

An entertaining Flickr through YouTube

The entertainment value of sites like Flickr and YouTube is unmeasurable. They both have a broad range of photos/videos to choose from.

I thought the Flickr site was very user friendly, esp with the tutorial. I know Tania Howells (Berkeley illustrator) has used Flickr for her blog, and I have always enjoyed her photos. http://tania.blogs.com/tania/

YouTube is very easy to navigate - simply type in the kind of video you are searching for and the more detailed you can be, the more likely you are to get what you want. I'll never forget my first YouTube experience - it was the Black Eyed Peas on Oprah in the streets of Chicago singing I've Got a Feeling. The whole family loved it!

Great entertainment - if you have the time to sift through the massive selection available at both sites.

Rice, Soup or Salad? RSS Diet too Rich for my Taste.

While logged into Bloglines I was able to add several RSS feeds to my account. I know it is supposed to be fabulously useful - even my son's grade 5 teacher was showing me the way his class uses RSS feeds in their assignments - but I found the volume of information I was being fed overwhelming.

I am comfortable peeking at my list of Favorites, and I know I could access Bloglines and my RSS feeds from any computer, but until a use for it becomes necessary to my online survival, I'm sticking with an RSS free diet... for now.

Colour Me Picasa!

I find Picasa to be invaluable in sharing photos with my family and friends. It organizes my picture files by date and allows me to make albums for future reference. I can easily upload large or small groups of pictures I want to share and email the link to specific individuals.

Before Picasa, I was only able to email one or two photos at a time before the file became too large to send... or receive. Picasa has made taking and sharing pictures worthwhile!

Also - re Google apps, I just toured the Moon, Mars, my brothers backyard in Vancouver, stopped at the Candy Shoppe in Nanton and checked out our house on Google Earth with my son in under 10 minutes flat. Fun fun!

Facebook: Fun for Friends'/Family Photos

The above is a photo of my brother and I on a hang gliding hill when we were kids. It's my current Facebook Profile picture.

I joined Facebook last year thinking it would be good for the promotion of my picture book. Since then, I have found it very useful in keeping up-to-date with friends and family that I don't get to see on a regular basis. Their status bars often give a quick peek into what they're up to, and their photos show their most interesting events.

You can get caught up in Facebook, and I found that was the case early on. But once you get used to it, you'll click on and off faster than you can say "Facebook is fabulous for photos!"

Getting Published Ain't Easy!

Regarding Wikipedia, I thought - why edit a few words or sentences when I can publish an entire article?

I'm always stressing to my boys that they use proper sourced materials, like from the CPL's shared databases, when doing their homework. Steer clear of Wikipedia because who knows what kind of nut has posted an article there!

Turns out you have to have several sources backing up a new article or Wikipedia will whip it off the web. I got started posting an article dedicated to Berkeley's Barn Owl Dance, a picture book I wrote (yay!;) but there were many, many steps and criteria that had to be met before it would ever see the light of day.

While I didn't have the time (takes several days and much backing and forthing) to complete the article, I did gain a new respect for Wikipedia's system of filtering out nuts like me.

Delicious: Sweeter Than I Thought

Delicious didn't leave a bad aftertaste, like I thought it would. In the past I used the Best Websites frequently on the desk and at home, but since it moved into Delicious I was leery of trying even a nibble.

I have re-discovered the sites I have been needing, most frequently under Homework. I am looking forward to wowing my Grade fiver when he comes home with assignments that require obscure images like a 1906 railway map of the prairies:)

Yum yum!

Oh! The Web Places I'll Go!

Oh, to have a place for my random ramblings:) I never would have blogged on my own - but with this gentle push from the CPL, here I go a blogging!

This 2.0 training will enable me to strum the strands of the web I have been avoiding for fear of getting stuck like a floundering fly. I have never twittered, I have steered clear of Delicious as though it was miss-named, and I thought RSS stood for 'rice, soup or salad'?

Oh! The web places I'll go!