I know you've all missed me horribly, but I have a good excuse, honest. You see, I had a baby. Or rather, my wife had a baby. Our second child, Maxwell Elijah, was 8 lbs 11 oz, enormous compared to the rest of us. Fortunately, my wife had a c-section, which from what I've heard is so much easier that real childbirth (*sarcasm*). What a slacker! But really, it's amazing all the crap she had to go through and I'm very proud of her. Especially since she makes such cute babies! Zoe was and is beautiful and Max is adorable! Except he looks like me at the same time. I don't know how that works. Anyway. Hopefully, I'll have some time regularly after this to come back to making entries here. Seeya!

Had to take the day off yesterday because I was sick. I hate that. I hate being sick. Other than the usual reasons, I hate it because I get behind in my work [at work and at home]. It's not that I'm such a workaholic but rather that I don't like having to do all that extra work and making people make up for my absence. And it was an evening shift too. I hate having to cover someone's evening shift so I hate forcing someone else to.

And the last of the triple war Hollywood movie-a-thon is "The Last Samurai" by Edward Zwick. This concerned an American war hero that is hired to help the current Japanese administration destroy the Samurai rebels [classic modernity versus tradition play] My least favourite of the three, this still had some good aspects to it. You know, I'm really easy to please when it comes to movies. I don't think I've ever just walked out of a movie without watching the whole thing. Except "Dune". I guess I have to rest up for that one. It needs preparation. But I'll usually watch pretty much anything because everything has something good in it. Even in the case of a incredible horrible film, there always the possibility to MST3K it. Anyway, the thing this movie had ws ninjas. I like ninjas. Samurai are close and so it might have been ok without the ninjas but with is icing on the cake. So watch this if you like ninjas.

Watched "Master and Commander : The Far Side of the World" by Peter Weir on Wednesday. Again, another war movie this time it's between the English and the French, on the open seas. Some interesting concepts brought up -- not new ideas but interesting ones -- such as the burden of responsibility of authority, not only for the lives [physically and emotionally] of the crew but often for the outcome of the war, friendships, and sometimes even the nature and rate of scientific progress. If not for the character of the doctor this would have been any other sea battle movie, and it was played well by Paul Bettany.

Watched "Cold Mountain" by Anthony Minghella on Tuesday. Much better than I thought it would be. I'm not a big fan of war movies [despite the fact that I've seen three of them in as many days recently] but this truly deals with the horrors of war and violence and troubled times, as well as some small triumphs because of hardship. And not in a cheesy way either. If you can stomach the gore, I would suggest this movie.

Skimmed through a good portion of this book, "God? A debate between a Christian and an Atheist" by William Lane Craig and Walter Sinnot-Armstrong. I've heard, read and used a lot of these arguments and points many times before but this makes a very good introduction to the argument with mention made of most of the usual arguments and their usual responses. Probably not going to convince anyone of anything other that their own original position but at least it may make a few people think about why they believe what they believe.

A HUMAN CAPITAL
Although I see her point about valuing the human touch that the library provides, I still think that streamlining and automating as much of the libray as you can is important. For each of those people with no one to talk to, desperately seeking contact with the staff at their local library [and bank and grocery store, and gas station and...], there is at least one person desperate to get their assignment done, the new book from their favourite author, a few minutes to check their email, etc. without having to deal with another person who may be having a bad day, who's on their first day on the job, or who's as lonely as some of the aforementioned customers. I like the self-check machines. Especially when the line for them is empty because everyone else is talking to the circulation clerks!

Bookstore survival
I've always wanted to run a bookstore. I've worked in them in the past and, as a librarian, I think I have the training and the knowledge to do well. But I know running a small business takes (or should take) pretty much all your time and I have too many things I want to do, all at the same time, to devote myself to such a project any time soon. Maybe later.

We are becoming digital pack rats
This is so me. Of course, I've always been a pack rat, physically and electronically. As a child, I would save books, pamphlets, schoolwork, notes, business cards, whether foreseeably useful or not, just so I could feel... powerfulk? That's what it is, for me at least. That's part of the reason why I like philosophy and librarianship. I need to know. Or at least know how to know easily. But I think my difference is that I also like to sort and organize and create classification structures. Yes, I have at least hundreds of mp3s and pictures and annotized links and more. But I also go through them and sort, file and name as appropriate. Whatta geek. But whatta librarian!

US lawyers say secret court could hear Patriot Act challenges
Wow. A secret court that has been searching and seizing with abandon for years. The fact that it outpaces pretty much any other court in searches and seizures [I'm gonna have one] just shows that the public's eye can have a big effect on procedure. But it's both good and bad. In this case it sobers the tendency for officials to just disrupt people's lives and belongings as they wish, but it can [and often does] convict the [even legally proven] innocent while hardly blinking.

Book lending falls 30% as libraries turn to technology
Although I like books... I mean I REALLY like books... this is a understandable and unavoidable situation. At least for informational purposes, reading online is much more efficient than using a books most of the time. There are exceptions, but when the information is available online [and that's really a necessary condition], it's better to learn it there than from a book. Although books tend to be more comprehensive, that's not always true and there are issues of currency, flexibility of medium and ease of access at stake. Also, once a certain level of technology is reached, online information is cheaper than the same in print. And as a source of entertainment, there are many more technologically improved games and time-wasters (some just as valuable and enjoyable as reading your favourite paperback) competing for the dollars and the time of those who would otherwise curl up with a book. It has to be.

Shakespearean text lives online
Hey, I love the man's work. But like we really need more Shakespeare. It's already posted on the internet by everyone and her brother. I personally have like three copies of his complete works...

Finished cleaning the closet yesterday, just in time to get some lungs full of dust, making me all wheezy for when I got up extra early this morning to go to my library's annual "Staff Awards Breakfast". So I'm sick, getting a headache, eating bad breakfast fare, listening to everybody get awards except me... lots of fun. But at least I got to ride the 7 train. It's above ground! And a subway! A sup-way! It's the only way to see New York City, up close and personal, stressing the "up" part.

S.D. governor pulls plug on part of library Web site
A library creates a collection of legal useful resources for teens, some people complain about the 'planned parenthood-edness' of some of the links, the Church tattles on the them and calls the Governor, and the resources are scraped off the face of the site. That's great. Because instead of having access to badly needed information about your health and nature (one of the links pulled was to the well-known and informative Go Ask Alice!) there is now nothing. Because no information is better than good information... right?

Had an adventure trying to get into work today. Thanks supposedly to Hurricane Frances, subways and roads were flooded which made it an Herculean task to get from Elizabeth, New Jersey to Jamaica, Queens. I tried the F line uptown from 34th street as I always do but they weren't even letting people into the station. Then I tried the E line but only made it a couple of stops before they said they weren't going to Queens like they're supposed to. I finally had to take the C to the J all the way to the end and walked. I got there at 10:45 when I normally get there by 9. Oh well, everyone else was late too.

I apologize for the last few entries. I've been talking about cleaning up and doin' the chores and I know that has got to be boring and unrelatable for a lot of you out there. I apologize to those of you who don't ever clean up your own respective messes, due to excess of money, excess of youth, or excess of something, I know not what, that would lead to a life without cleaning, unimaginable by me, longed for by me. Oh, wait, I know. Cowboys. Anyone living in a cave. The homeless. Sexist men. The dead. They have lives without cleaning. Except that last one. Unless you believe in an afterlife. An afterlife without cleaning. Heaven probably doesn't include cleaning. Hell probably does.

Anyway, those of you who, for whatever reason, don't have to clean make me sick. And then I'd have to clean that up too. And that would make me feel sick. Fortunately I would have nothing left to throw up. *laugh*

Well, I've tried. I've been cleaning as much as I could. I didn't get everything done but I think I've done ok. So let's look at the list.

• Cleaning the linen closet. Done.
• The dishes. A few pots and pans left. Will do tomorrow.
• Bedroom closet. Damn. Not a scrap.
• Sleep. Could have some more.

• Cleaned behind and beneath the stove. Bee-yawtch!
• Grocery Trip. Ok. We always go shopping on the weekend but we went twice this weekend. Whew!
• Creativity Page. I know I already mentioned this last entry but I have to have three in the list... duh...

I've been procrastinating. But for a good reason! I've been working on the new creativity section for a while and I've finally sat down and finished most of it. It's not all done - I plan on fixing up some of the "display" pages so that there is more information about each project available, they are each shown to their best advantage, and it's organized a little bit better. It's not bad right now though, I think. I did play around with a bunch of things like button making and PhotoShop.

Ok. A nice long three day weekend that I planned on getting a lot done in but now it's one third over!!! Hurry, hurry, hurry!!! Ok. I'm going to list a few things I want to get done so that I have millions of witnesses [I'm rounding off my readership, conservatively, I think...] so that I'll feel guilty if I don't get it done.

• Cleaning the linen closet. We can never find anything in there.
• The dishes. See here for a guide.
• Bedroom closet. Filled to the brim. Literally. Damn.
• Sleep. I think I can handle this.

Well, I'm officially a potential terrorist now. Walking from Herald Square to Penn Station I got stopped by a probably-very-nice-person-when-off-duty-but-well-armed-and-surrounded-by-hundreds-of-his-friends-who-probably-liked-picking-on-geeks-like-me-in-high-school police officer. He asked to see my train ticket. Which, I don't think is really kosher, legally speaking, what with the right to privacy and anonymity and what not, but anyway. Quite rude, he was. And ignorant. Didn't really know anything about the train tickets. Could have shown him a coupon to Nathan's and he wouldn't have known the difference. Not to mention the fact that I have been walking down that street for almost 4 years. And today I'm a freakin' suicide bomber. Dorky, pale, knock-kneed lil me. It is to laugh.

At least he was working. I wish I could get a job where I could stand around with a few hundred of my football buddies [hypothetically speaking of course, if football were say, in some alternate universe, interesting in any way... and I had more than a handful of friends...], eating donuts [really, I saw them], laughin' and jokin' and, um, packin'.

Tough day today. The database our library uses to hold our catalog and patron records was broken so therefore so was all access to the computers. [Watch them dominos fall! All your eggs in one basket, kind of thing.] They got it fixed though. But not after I spent the better part of the day telling people, "Don't worry, the computers are horribly slow or frozen right now but soon, soon..." and running back and forth restarting, logging in, explaining, soothing, calming, wheezing... it's a lot of running. Well, walking fast. They didn't tell me how physically fit I had to be [AND I AM *growl*] to be a librarian. *laugh*