Monthly Archives: December 2010

Fahoo fores, dahoo dores

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Have you ever seen or participated in a Christmas miracle?  I know, most of the world does not celebrate Christmas, so, think miracles in general, perhaps.  Either way, I have recently witnessed some outpourings of generosity that border on the miraculous.

The last few days have blown my mind and touched my soul.  It’s so easy to get caught up in all of the hate and anger so many people have for their fellow human beings until you honestly think the world is full of nasty people with hateful vendettas.  However, there are good people out there that will reach out a hand to the people around them, if someone just asks them. These good people have restored my faith in humanity, making me feel guilty for ever having doubted them.  It makes me think of Anne Frank saying “I keep my ideals because, in spite of everything, I believe that people are really good at heart.”

The first of my Christmas (or holiday, if you prefer) miracles came from the Bloggess.  She is the sweet, sarcastic Texan that can make me laugh even on my crappiest days.  However, this week, she didn’t talk about taxidermy, sex toys, or making Mrs. Claus uncomfortable.  She talked about her yearly donation to Toys for Tots and how she was offering 20 $30 gift cards to people in need.  This was incredibly generous and thoughtful and touching, but this isn’t the miracle I’m talking about (not that I don’t love it but the best is yet to come!).  Because those gift cards went fast.  I think they were gone within 30 minutes with heartbreaking stories of people that couldn’t make rent, let alone buy their kids Christmas presents.  More people kept telling how hard this Christmas would be beyond the twenty.  But, then one of the Bloggess’s readers offered to contribute another gift card to the 21st person.  Then another offered to take of the 22nd, and it ballooned out for there.  As I’m writing this, over 600 gift cards have been sent to people in need from people around the world.  The Bloggess (Jenny, if you know her) organized it all and has people waiting with more gift cards in case more people write in with their stories of hardship.

My second miracle came with this year’s Project for Awesome.  It was different than it has been the previous three years because YouTube got behind it, featuring P4A videos and hosting a live show on their website.  #P4A became a trending topic on Twitter.  And thousands of people promoted charities by making videos and commenting on videos to promote them.  It was definitely more big-time than previous years but the dedicated groups of Nerdfighters still made their own liveshow where they could still congregate as a community to promote the charities.  This was just as fun as previous years (staying up until 3:30 AM commenting or “Spam-wowing”) and a lot of great charities were promoted.  But the miracle comes from the raffles and concentrated giving hosted on the Project for Awesome site.  As of now, over $91,000 has been raised for some amazing charities (and that doesn’t count any of the giving that went straight to charities from the video promotions).  This is a ton of money considering most of it came from $20, $25, or $30 donations.  People bid on items from authors like John Green and Maureen Johnson and from famous YouTubers like Mystery Guitar Man and Shay Carl or made direct donations to the charities.

Anyway, if you want to participate in the next day or so from this posting, I believe that both P4A and the Bloggess will continue accepting donations during that time.  The Bloggess will also be giving out more gift cards, if you’re having trouble this year.  I hope just knowing about the generosity of strangers when a lot of people are in need can make you feel good about being a part of the human race.  This wasn’t meant to be preachy or obligate you in any way.  I just want to share some things that really touched my heart.  And, to finish off, another piece of Christmas that always makes me feel good:

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Project for Awesome

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If you want to see thousands of people, including a ton of young adults, involved in making the world better, you need to check out the Project for Awesome.  It’s a day (well, two days, really) where Nerdfighters take over YouTube to promote charities, and it starts today at 12.  You have less than an hour.  Or, it’s already started, depending on when you read this.  I made a video again this year (it’s my 3rd P4A video in as many years!).  I had a lot of fun with the Children’s Hunger Alliance making the video, so I hope you’ll check them out!

Thanks for your support!  Don’t forget to be awesome!

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All I want for Christmas is…

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You!  No, wait.  My two front teeth!  No, wait. A hippopotamus!  No, wait.   A pony!!

Shopping for the librarian in your life during your holiday shopping?  The Swiss Army Librarian has already done such a great job for librarians.  However, the YA librarian is missing from the list, so I’ve added a few more excellent gift ideas here, if I do say so myself.  You might want to check out the YALSA gift guide, the ALA Store Teen section, or perhaps pick up a copy of books from the Teens Top Teen, though chances are any good YA librarian has already read many of them (I owned 2 before the list even came out)!  If you want to go a different book route, you could check out the best adult books for teens, since these are a little rarer.

Ooh, or what female librarian doesn’t want to be compared to Batgirl?  (Holy reference librarian, Batman!  Dun-anun-anun-anuna, dun-anun-anun-anuna, Batgirl!)  Another good set of posters would be the Harry Potter Read posters from the ALA (although, while I adore Emma Watson’s new short hair, she just doesn’t look like Hermione anymore… actually, that is probably the point!)  However, when buying the posters for a librarian, be sure that he or she wants them in their home, unless you want to give them a gift for work.  I, personally, love the ALA posters and would put them up EVERYWHERE, if I had the space.  In fact, my parents still have my ALA Little Women poster up in my old bedroom at their place.

However, regardless of your holiday of choice (Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Winter Solstice, New Year’s Eve/Day, Bill of Rights Day, Boxing Day or whatever), I’m sure the librarian in your life is just glad to know that you’re thinking of them and is happy that they can serve their community with pride.  A Kindle wouldn’t hurt, either.

christmas tree with many presents

UPDATE: Honestly, if anyone wants to get me anything from this list on Forever Young Adult, I’m totally cool with it.

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The Source of All Knowledge- Your Reference Librarian!

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So, I am working toward my MLIS degree to become a public librarian in teen services.  However, in this day and age, every librarian is expected to fill many roles around the library, so I imagine that I will serve as reference librarian for the teens, adults, and children’s sections.  Believe it or not, this is a little intimidating.  There is a LOT of information out there (whether you call it a wealth of information or information overload is up to you), and it can take some doing to sift through it to find the right answer.

A lot of the librarians in the field say that the public is often surprised at how long it takes a librarian to get their information.  Sometimes, the person types their question into the instant message service and expects Google’s .25 second response time.  However, unlike your standard search engine, the librarian is going and searching only the most reliable places in human time, not computer time.  Your search is ONLY what you are looking for because a person sat at the computer and searched the library catalog and databases right then, just for you.

I love this service.  I think it is brilliant.  It’s like KGB (the text messaging service not the Soviet Union’s security agency) but free!  However, Boolean operators and everything, I am a little bit intimidated at being the one providing the information.  I imagine this will subside a little as I take my reference librarian classes (next semester!) and have a standard list of resources (ready reference!) to go to when I have a certain kind of question.  But still, you never know what someone is going to ask, yet you have to be be prepared for anything (like a Boy Scout!) or at least have somewhere to turn to for the info.  (OK.  All of the interjections in this paragraph come from my incessant Christmas music- think Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer and “like a lightbulb!”)

If you still don’t think being a reference librarian is hard, check out some of the questions answered over the last few weeks by Columbus Metropolitan Librarians.  So, hats off to all of the reference librarians out there and all the great work they do!

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Wikileaks Updates

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I posted some links to interesting coverage of the Library of Congress’s banning of Wikileaks’ info on their computers a few days ago, but there have been some interesting updates in library world since then.

Agnostic, Maybe, a blog I follow, posted an interesting response that detailed two articles about the media freaking out about wikileaks (granted in our society, it’s not news unless it’s screamed by every channel for hours on end…) and how governments are giving mixed messages about the importance of Wikileaks.  Agnostic, Maybe pulls some of the best stuff out, so I would check him out first.

However, on one of the listervs I’m on, a rather heated debate cropped up about the importance of government security versus the importance of a free, informed society.  In this debate a couple of interesting posts came up.  One comes from the Progressive Librarians’ Guild and is an unequivocal statement that the Library of Congress’s block of Wikileaks is censorship that goes against what librarians stand for.  The other is a report that the White House says that no government agencies have to block Wikileaks, despite so many claiming they were required to by law.  Apparently, there is no law saying that… Oh, snap.

Updated, again: The ALA weighs in with some commentary: http://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/news/12102010/federal-ban-wikileaks-website-embroils-librarians?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=amlibraries

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