Family Stories

Well here we are on Friday once again. This work week went by really quickly, which probably has something to do with the long weekend we had to start it off. I actually went over to Seattle with my family over President’s day weekend, and it was a lot of fun! I haven’t been over there before (even though I’ve lived in Hayden for the past 10 years) so it was great to see the sites!

When you come back from a long weekend there is always a bunch to do. My next week is going to be absolutely packed with programs, so this week involved a lot of planning. There were phone calls to field, emails to send, and people to talk to. But, as that is next week, you’ll hear all about it next Friday.

Another reason this week went by so fast is the snow day that the school system had yesterday. I still have some classes down at North Idaho College and even they took a snow day. That opened up my morning for some time with friends, and opened up the afternoon for some more planning. I would have been over at Skyway for their Geography club, which was way too much fun last week, but because school was cancelled, the club was cancelled to.

This week has also been a lot of work with the Teen Film Festival. Our deadline for entering videos was today, so we’ve had several videos uploaded in the last few hours. If you’re interested in watching the entries, or you entered one, join us for our Red Carpet Event at the Coeur ‘d Alene Public Library next Saturday, March 5, from 7-9pm!

The last thing is the reason for the lateness of my blog post. We are having a Family Journeys Celebration at the Hayden Library right now. We served up some pizza, had scrapbooking supplies to make your own family tree, and recorded folks telling their favorite family stories using our Flip camera. The event is a part of the Smithsonian Journey Stories exhibit that is on display until March 12. The exhibit deals with early travelers to America, and we wanted to give families the chance to tell their own stories as well.

That just about wraps up this week, so I’ll catch you later!

Getting at the Truth

How’s it going, everyone?

Today is Thursday, but let the record show that I did write this Book Blurt on Wednesday. The internet was down at my house, which left me know way to get it up. I hope that the saying, “better late than never,” holds true for Book Blurts. lol

This week, I read a book by Chris Crutcher, called Angry Management. I had the pleasure of hearing Chris speak at a conference I went to last year. He talked quite a bit about his book called Deadline, and it’s been on my reading list for a while. It was going to be the next book I read when Angry Management came across my desk. I figured the time had come to read a Chris Crutcher novel.

Now I say the time has come as if reading the book was an ominous thing. In some ways it is. Chris’s novels have been banned, censored, and protested all over the place. Most of the time, I’m not a big fan of novels that have a lot of objectionable content in them. The only exception is if the content is in no way gratuitous and is realistic for the story. Chris’s novels definitely fit in that category.

When Chris spoke at the conference, he talked about intellectual freedom. His main point was that intellectual freedom is about hearing a story from a point of view, even if it is objectionable and controversial. He says his job as an author is to tell the truth in a story, and sometimes that means getting into some dicey subjects and situations. I really appreciated his take on the subject, and did enjoy Angry Management.

The book deals with three stories from some pretty messed up high schoolers. All the stories deal with anger in some way or another (as the title implies), and get tied together by each of the main students being in an Angry Management class together. There are three stories told in these pages. The first deals with parents, obesity, and child abuse. The second deals with the first amendment, journalism, adopted kids, and control. The third deals with racism, homosexuality, and forgiveness.

Each story is written from a different perspective, but all get at the truth behind these stories and keep you interested and questioning what you believe and think on the topics. As mentioned earlier, Chris’s novels do have objectionable content such as language, sexuality, and mature themes, but they are necessary to the story. Including this content lets Chris deal with some tough topics while getting to the truth of the matter and pulling no punches.

Augmented Reality

Last week, I mentioned my involvement with SPLAT (Special Project Library Action Team), and there is a really cool technology that SPLAT brought to my attention. It’s called augmented reality. Basically, a web cam and QR codes (a special barcode that is two-dimensional instead of one dimensional) allows a two-dimensional object in real space to become a three dimensional object on a computer monitor. It’s cool to say the least. You can check out a video demonstration here.

Speaking of cool stuff, I once again had the chance to do a Ka-Boom: Science Experiments program this past Monday. We had a great group of kids show up, and we had fun experimenting with magnets, static electricity and attraction (obviously, attraction is the principle behind magnetism and static electricity, but it also seemed so appropriate for Valentine’s day hehe).

I’ve been mentioning the Teens and Technology Course that I’m involved with, and this past week I fulfilled another one of the course requirements. As participants, we are going to create a booktrailer with a group of teens, and this past week I went down to a Canfield Middle School and met with their video production class. The class does a live video announcement broadcast several times a week, and they are considering doing booktrailers as a story. Originally, I thought we’d create a booktrailer at a special event, but having students create booktrailers as part of their school assignments works just as well for me. The teacher was also excited about doing booktrailers with some of her other classes, which is exciting for us. The whole idea of Teens and Technology is to encourage the use of technology and information about technology, so I’m really liking the way this partnership is shaping up.

In another school this week, I was helping out at a Geography club. Skyway Elementary is having a geography bee in late March, and Karen and I are helping to prepare the kids for the event. For the next few weeks, we’ll be playing games, looking at atlases, and asking questions to prepare kids for the local bee. The life of a librarian is a funny thing, because I know very little about Geography (as Karen can attest to) and yet I’m still able to help kids out through the information available to them. Should be a good time!

Last thing, you still have one more week to enter in our Library Teen Film Festival! Get your entry forms to a participating library, and get those videos posted to YouTube.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you next week!

Jacky the Cabin...Girl?

Aarghh, mateys! How goes the battle?

This week, I read Bloody Jack by L.A. Meyer. Bloody Jack is part of a long running series with the most recent book called The Wake of the Lorelei Lee, which is the eighth book. I’ve seen the last few books as they’ve come out, so I figured I’d read the first one to see where the books started.

Bloody Jack tells the story of Mary (now Jacky) Faber, who starts the book as a street urchin in London, 1797. Looking for consistent meals and a roof over her head, Mary gets onboard a British naval vessel, as a cabin boy! Mary chops off her hair, wears baggy pants, and changes her name to Jacky. Although she’s amazed at three meals a day and clothes on her back, she obviously has a hard time convincing the rough sea dogs that she’s one of them when actually she isn’t. Meyer got the idea for the novel after listening to folk songs from the period that had to do with cabin boys who wound up being cabin girls and falling for an officer or fellow sailor. Jacky has to find ways to keep her secret while wresting with puberty, creepy sailors onboard, dangerous pirates not on board, and her feelings for Jaimy, who actually is a boy and who she is crazy about.

Obviously, the premise of the book kind of presupposes some discussion on the differences between the sexes and how a girl could hide who she actually is from a bunch of men. There are a few rough scenes regarding her girlhood and a stalker sailor, and a few other violent scenes because they are on a naval vessel. But overall, the book is interesting to read and I enjoyed it.

Excuse Free

Hey, hows it going?

Well, I could make excuses for the lack of Book Blurt this week, but that’s what it would be: excuses. I think there is a difference between explanations and excuses. Sometimes, there really is no way you could have gotten it done, or no way you could have attended; I’d say that needs an explanation. But, when something could get done, but you don’t do it, well…then I would label that as an excuse. So, here’s an excuse-free blog post for you.

First, I figure I’ll mention a video that I put up on my YouTube channel this week. It’s a quick recap, trailer-like funness about our Teens and Technology 2011 Coeur d’ Alene Workshop. Check it out here.

The second thing is that our deadline for entering our Teen Film Festival is up in two weeks. Get your entry forms to a participating library, and get the YouTube Upload Instructions while you’re there. Then, we hope to see you at our Red Carpet Event on Saturday, March 5 from 7-9pm. Even if you haven’t entered a video, you can still join us for viewing the films at the Red Carpet Event. Check out the website here.

The last thing I wanted to mention today is my involvement with SPLAT. Last month, I sent in an application to the Idaho Commission for Libraries to join there SPLAT team. Two members had just stepped down, and they accepted my application. SPLAT stands for the Special Project Library Action Team. “The charge of the Special Project Library Action Team is to serve in a crow’s nest capacity to search for innovation, propose experiments, lead pilot projects and discover new opportunities for Idaho libraries.” SPLAT members use a lot of their time looking at new technologies and innovation across the library scene, and bringing that knowledge to other librarians.

Even though I’m far from knowing all there is to know about technology, I’m excited to learn more and to share my experiences with other librarians. Here’s to another exciting opportunity!

Well, that’s about it for this week, so we’ll see you this Wednesday.

Why wasn't I here last Friday?

How’s it hanging?

As some of you might have noticed, I didn’t get a Weekly Update out last Friday, and the reason was that I didn’t set foot in my library last Friday. For the past few months, I’ve been working with Erica and Sue from the Idaho Commission for Libraries on Teens and Technology 2011. In the past, the commission has offered web-based workshops and webinars that have helped Idaho librarians become more familiar with the latest technology. Although these workshops have been well received, the commission wanted to take a different approach this year. They decided to do four regional workshops across the state, and as I mentioned two weeks ago, I was the go-to guy for North Idaho.

Last Friday, January 28, was our 9 to 4 hands-on workshop at the Coeur ‘d Alene Public Library. We had eleven participants from Lewiston to Coeur d’ Alene, and from public libraries to school libraries. Our workshop focused on taking a booktrailer from a storyboard all the way to a finished project posted on the internet. Although there will always be a few hiccups, the workshop went really well! The librarians said the workshop was helpful and informative, and they were appreciative of the work we had put into it. Made the last few weeks of working on it totally worth it!

The Monday after the workshop, January 31, I got to go down to Mountain States Early Head Start for their Men and Kids program. I’ve been going down to this program once a month, and it’s always hard when only a few dads show up. But, this time around, we had a great turnout, which was exciting. Often times, fathers aren’t encouraged to spend time with their kids, or they just don’t have the time to do it. For that reason, I thought having a program that exclusively targets dads spending time with their kids was amazing, and I hope it continues to grow.

This morning, I had another opportunity to spend some time with younger patrons. The first Friday of every month is my outreach to the Kinder Center. Since I only see them once a month, I figured I would do some Valentine stories. Although the kids were a little bit squirmy today, we had a great time enjoying books together. In between classes, I got a chance to talk to Bonnie, the VISTA at the Kinder Center about e-books. We both agreed that e-books are changing the way people view literacy, but we also both thought that traditional books won’t be obsolete any time soon. Only time will tell I guess.

Hope that you’ve had a great week, and I’ll catch you on Wednesday with another Book Blurt.

P.S. I updated our Teen Film Festival website this past week. It now has downloadable entry forms and a list of useful and free online resources. Check it out! http://www.libraryteenfilmfestival.blogspot.com/

Why?

Well it’s been a full week since my last Book Blurt, so I figure it’s time to write another one. This week, I read a book that was suggested to me by my boss. For the past couple weeks, Karen and I have been joking about her recent tendency to read violent, depressing, or macabre novels, which we think is rather amusing because that isn’t her normal kind of novel. But, this one was a very well-written, although very intense, find.

Fall for Anything is a new release from Courtney Summers. It gives us a first person perspective from Eddie Reeves (who is actually a seventeen-year-old girl despite her name). The book opens a few weeks after her father’s apparent suicide. Her father was a brilliant photographer, who went the non-traditional route of sharing his work outside of galleries. But, at the prime of his career, when fame and fortune were in his grasp, he walked away from it all. He decided to marry a woman about half his age, and had a daughter named Eddie. And now, he is dead.

Eddie is still trying to deal with that fact, and the only question she seems to be able to ask is why? Why did he do it? Why is she still here and he isn’t? Her mother is almost catatonic, Beth, her mother’s “best” friend has invaded her home, and Milo, her best friend since forever won’t talk to her about the night it happened. To complicate things, Culler Evans, who claims he was her dad’s student, shows up looking for answers to the same questions she is.

Through this novel, Eddie comes face to face with the death of her father, and has to process what it could mean and why he possibly could have done it. Although it deals with death, suicide, and grief, I enjoyed the novel. It seemed to ask, what do you do afterwards? How do you move on? What is the point? Although Eddie doesn’t find the answers, her search makes you consider the answers you have to these universal questions. Although it’s hard to put my finger on it, a character searching through these questions might be where the appeal of the book comes from.

But, this novel does get into situations, that even though they are realistic for some teens today, are objectionable. There are a few nude scenes, characters drop the f-bomb and other colorful words pretty casually, and the subject matter is obviously pretty dark. Even though the book is well-written and interesting, these are some obvious drawbacks to consider before you dive into Eddie's search.