Too much information?

Take a deep breath before checking out the image here. Those of delicate sensibilities should probably do something else. I thought it was amusing, but to each their own. But you have been warned ...
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Where's the Old Site?

It would seem that despite the efforts of the Powers That Be, Warrior Librarian is not quite as dead as some folks might wish.

A colleague is in the process of composing an article on the topic of the Image of Librarians, past, present and future for Access, the journal of the Australian School Library Association.

Said colleague was looking for the World-Famous Online Satirical Journal for Librarians, with its own ISSN and everything; yep, at the time of writing this, Warrior Librarian is still accessible at the old URL - Unfortunately as a Read-Only version.

Seems like a lot of folk miss that small piece of information at the bottom of the index.html page.

That very same customisability is one of the things I miss most about hand-cut html coding. But for now, at least this particular e-format allows folk to maintain the rage, as it were, without undue (and I guess ultimately unnecessary) Net Distress. This is a term I have just coined to describe what many folk have expressed in long outbursts of uncontrollable angst regarding the frustrations of hand-cutting code. If you've been there, you've done that. There isn't a t-shirt, as far as I know.
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A theatrical experience ...

OK, I've spent four days sourcing, sorting, storing and moving boxes. I guess if truth be told, I played more of a 'facilitating' role than an actual physical contributor - but By Golly! Had it not been for the gnashing of teeth and the wringing of hands etc, not much would have actually happened. But this way, we Reclaimed the Site with regard to the spare bedroom, the space under the stairs, and what was laughingly referred to as The Homework Room.


So really it was without any guilt that I trotted off to our local cinema for a few hours comedy relief. What did I think of Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps? Given that I'm apparently not allowed to publish any book reviews (in case I somehow make some sort of gain as "secondary employment"!) , and I still haven't been informed as to whether or not there's a prohibition on other types of reviews, I'm a little hesitant to say very much at this stage.

I can reveal - I believe without risk to myself (although notably I have been wrong in the past) that this movie did not actually run from 6:30pm to 9:30 pm, as shown on the ticket. Sure, the doors opened at 6:30pm, and shortly thereafter the mobile Candy Bar arrived. There were even gaps between the ads and the trailers. They turn the lights off for a reason - so you can't see the time when that movie actually starts. I'm not sure what the reason was for also turning off the air conditioning. But I guess as long as they could still power-up the projector, things were probably largely in our favour.

And no, there hasn't been much change in status to the Home Office Cleanup Project. But thanks for asking.
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Will four days enough?

Today's proactivity was to hire storage space for a 'number' of boxes which can't be tucked into any more corners, under anything, above anything, or anywhere else. Everything that can be trashed has gone - more or less. And quite a few things uncovered that will one day make a fine display in a yard sale.

But just as "you can't clean anything without getting something dirty", a flurry of activity has erupted in other areas of the house (and household). The spare bedroom is going to become a sewing room. Apparently. The former "homework room", once the cobwebs have been removed and the archaeologists have finished their dig in there, will become a sort of shared "Kraft Korner". I am told (by my teenage daughters) I will be allowed to make an appropriate sign saying just that. "Kraft Korner". I am to spell it that way, and not use apostrophes. Is there no end to this cruelty?

Our Home Office will also become semi-devoid of assorted boxes, which will also go into storage. Which I figure is sort of a shame, considering how much time and tape I devoted to giving them that professional archival appearance. On the bright side, after four more days of this level of disruption, it won't be quite so traumatic to go back to the Day Job. Will it?

You'll have to excuse me now for a while. I'm off to check out Neat for inspirational ideas on being ...errr... neat. Which is way better than actually lugging around heavy boxes of stuff.

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Can productivity = fun?

Made using Image Chef (www.imagechef.com), with whom I have no financial or any other relationship. Geez, I don't even know who does their brilliant coding, but by golly! it sure is a lot of fun over there.

When technology meets culture

Maybe it's because it's the end of the footy season here, or the influx of immigrant folk from places where body art has significance in the native culture, but there does seem to be a huge increase in tattooing at the moment. Not that I'm suggesting in any way, shape, or form that there is anything intrinsically wrong with a 'tat', mind you. There used to be a tattooed librarians website.

I'm all in favour of people expressing themselves in any manner that does not impact on anyone else; that said, my kids have been told the consequences of getting tattooed. They will be disinherited; other worthy recipients will be identified and have have our accumulated debts bequeathed to them. Possibly someone in Nigeria with several million dollars that they have to dispose of quickly.

But back to the issue of tattooing. I couldn't work out why The Other Half's jaw dropped when I told him I was popping out "to get some ink". And the visible relief when I returned with a twin pack of printer cartridges.

Is truth stranger than fiction?
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Upgrading overdue notices?

I was looking for a novel way to present overdue notices; but could only produce a novella. (It's OK to laugh here ... I did.)

Anyways, it occurred to me that one problem with the effectiveness of such reminders is that being generally small and flat, they tend to get lost. OK, they get thrown away in many cases, particularly by recurrent recalcitrants. Making them bigger would only lead to the backs being used for shopping lists, or plot outlines - dependent of course on the identity of the defaulter.



That left only the option to change the shape - but into something that might be considered "fun" for the sender as well as the recipient. I have not patented this idea, nor do I intend to do so. You have my blessing to use as-is, adapt, modify or otherwise alter in any way to suit your purpose.

However, given the recent past history of my more creative innovations, it may be best to check with the NSW government to see if they want to claim copyright on this, me being an employee and all ...

You can find one set of instructions for making a Creative Overdue Teller here, but please note I have no affiliation with that website and do not receive any pecuniary rewards from same. It was the first one to come up on a Google search for "fold fortune teller".

Disclaimer: I am not cognisant of my employer's relationship with the above linked website, although I am given to understand there is a financial relationship between them and Google.

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I've been busy ...

I ought to feel thoroughly ashamed of myself for being so slack in the blogging department, but I do have a good excuse. I've been busy. I have just completed my seventh morning schedule of these holidays. It's been a gruelling program of events each day, commencing with the struggle to disentangle myself from the doona, and throw myself into the herculean (Herculean?) task of getting to the kitchen to make coffee. On each and every one of these days, I've managed to fulfil these two particular tasks before lunchtime - although on a couple of occasions, it needed a redefinition of the time frame of "lunchtime".

Nevertheless, I'd like to argue with anyone who says that the body does not need downtime to regenerate not only physically, but mentally and spiritually. Mind you, I'm free to take on anyone who would have the temerity to disagree with me on any topic. Unless they're awful to me, or shout or something.

Having thus reached a stage where I can at least attempt to communicate with my faithful fan, I thought it might be amusing to show the world how much progress has been made in the Home Office Cleanup Project. But to save myself yet more embarrassment, here's a picture of my cat up a tree. Enjoy.

So everyone now wants my copyright?

Still being in "discussion" with the NSW Department of Education and Training regarding "ownership" of educational material hosted on Warrior Librarian (and written by me), it seems now that the Victorian Department of Education is also claiming copyright ... not just of the Information Literacy Online resource, but apparently the whole Warrior Librarian website!!!

Investigation Reflections ...

My good friend Ashleigh Brilliant (OK, we had lunch together once a few years back, when he and his good wife were in Sydney) once wrote: "I hope one day to be important enough to be investigated by a government department'.

It's amazing to think that even if you *aren't* important you can still get investigated. At tax payer expense. And nothing more 'criminal' found than you didn't ask yourself permission to give your own work away.

An added irony is the fact that said government department also wants to claim copyright on a body of writing that basically demonstrates that same department's incompetence in comprehending copyright.

As one of Australia's most famous criminals also once said "Such is life". Mind you, they hanged him just after he said it. Which in itself is a valuable lesson, I guess.

Smellchuck corrections?

Haven't stopped smiling since seeing the student essay on the political influence of "socialites like Karl Marx" and the revolutionary changes in Russia. I now have an unshakable mental picture of ladies Of A Certain Age swanning around in evening gowns and diamonds, being photographed at posh soirees and complaining about the food and the service ... and having chefs and sommeliers sent to Siberia ... with maitre d's being downgraded to maitre E's or F's.

Seems like the upcoming vacation break could be just in time?

"Can I have a note?"

"Miss, Miss ... can I go to the ...." toilets, office, clinic, canteen, Deputy, here, there, everywhere. "Can I have a note?" "Can I?" "A note, Miss, please". "Can I have a note?" A what? "A note!"

So I gave him a high-C. At least, that's what I attempted. Sounded pretty good too, at least to me :-)

The Great Picture Book Lesson ...

... is on tomorrow with Year 7. The MS PowerPoint is ready to go, as is the trolley ("cart" to many) full of exemplar tomes. I'm feeling pretty chuffed with myself, after working out a great segue from "types" of visual texts to the visual elements of the same.

I'd intended to speak briefly about the history of Beowulf; show a scan of one page of very dense text from a verrrry old edition; view a short - as in nine seconds - clip from the movie where the dragon comes over the parapet, then sprint into the graphic novel cover and talk about the use of colour, line, etc in depicting the dragon. Sounds all pretty engaging, huh?

The first nine seconds of this clip was going to be the introduction to the "artistic elements":



But the movie has a M rating; the policy being that M-rated multimedia cannot be used with under 15 years of age. So instead, the kiddies will get 9 seconds of Jurassic Park with the T-Rex shredding real live "familiar" stuff in a contemporary setting. But it's OK, Jurassic Park is rated PG.

So there you go! Sigh.

Fun with Xtranormal

How many billion bucks?

Some $65.5 billion was spent on the Australian government's Building a Better Future program; more than $16.2 billion on the national Building the Education Revolution (BER) program. "More than" $287 million was to be invested in the state of New South Wales public school's National School Pride (NSP) program - with "up to" $200,000 per school. Figures to make your head swim, no?

So, one high school built in the 1960's - for which the planned purpose-built library was never built - uses with three classrooms with the walls knocked out as a library. They had this:


Costing out at less than 500 bucks - including signage - they asked for this (image generated using the Arcsoft graphics program):


Read that top bit again, will you? This is what this library got after about $50,000 had been spent on painting "selected bits" the school

image coming soon ....

Election Joke (Australian)

This is a true story - not even the names have been changed, as there are no Innocent parties. If you're not Australian, or you're under 40 years of age, you're not going to see the humour. Sorry.

Walking into the Polling Venue, and being greeted by a Polling Official, charged with making sure every one was in the right line): "Are you voting for Chifley?" My reply: "I didn't know he was standing."

Hahahahahhahhahah.

Yes, I made myself laugh, and the elderly couple behind me.

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A feeble attempt to explain the humour for those who won't be able to get to sleep unless they 'get it" ... Chifley is the name of a Federal electorate, named after Australia's 16th Prime Minister .

65 years since the end of WWII

Seems like a lot of folk let this anniversary pass without much thought. Perhaps "65" is not sufficiently MileStone in nature to merit commemoration? Having watched Inglourious Basterds [sic] (again) last night, I can now forgive at least the spelling of the film title.

On another, although related note, I much admire the work of Quentin Tarantino, in this case for the film's originality and non-linear narrative - a Tarantino trademark. Given that I am currently under prohibition (yeah, another one) in regard to writing any book reviews - in case I might somehow make financial gain - I'm guessing I might still be OK to comment on The Cinema. Ah well, I'll find out on Monday if I have again broken a conduct regulation ... which might not yet actually be in existence. Not that that's any excuse. Apparently.

POETS Day

I am unreliably informed that Friday is "POETS Day" (P--- Off Early Tomorrow's Saturday), and yet here it is, 5 minutes after the final bell for the day - and indeed week - and I'm still here. And I'll still be here for at least another 25 minutes, and possibly much longer. The staff car park is just about empty; the cleaners are here.

The significance of the fact that the janitorial staff all drive cars several decades younger than mine is not lost on me, particularly as my 'ride' could not be classed as a "Classic" for at least several more decades. If it doesn't fall apart before then. Like me.

So now I'm off to clear my filing backlog, open this morning's mail (hopefully nothing important), and attend to similar tasks that could probably wait until Monday. Now there's an idea ...

Our future in their hands ...

Latest update on the outcome of The Determination, following the submission of The Response to The Allegations ... the decision has been made, but won't be advised until next week.

So much for Article 5 (degrading punishment) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Similarly for Article 10 (fair and public hearing), Article 11 (presumption of innocence), Article 12 (attacks on reputation), Article 18 (freedom of thought), Article 19 (freedom of expression) etc etc. Not to mention copyright violation - using resources I created without firstly getting my own consent.

Go figure.

At least Guyana is listening to me ...

Still no word on the pending Determination ... and apparently They have "a three month period" (plus any extensions They believe are warranted - or if they get Very Busy or something) before They are required to tell anyone anything. Talk about "cruel and unusual punishment"!

But at least they're listening over in Guyana; or to be strictly accurate the Guyana Chronicle Online published an editorial extensively quoting the excellent article Ataxia in the Republic of Letters. Thanks, folks. Nice to know someone listens, even if it is on the other side of the planet.