The Very Rich Hours of the Lambrights

A couple more thoughts before I move on to the next thing.  I use ScribeFire to post to this blog.  It’s a free add on for Firefox that really makes the posting process quicker. Once it’s setup, I just hit a button in the browser to call up a text box where I type the post.  It provides all the standard formatting tools and allows me to use WordPress-specific functions.  It’s not specific to WordPress, though.  If you’re a Firefox user, I recommend it highly.

I’ve implemented Outbrain to let readers rate the blog posts.  You’ll see that each post now has some little stars at the bottom.  Just click the stars to show what you think.  One star means the post was boring; five means you found it excellent.  I’m really curious to see if this feature gets used.  It’s free and supports itself by adding some links to (presumably) related websites who are no doubt paying for the service.  I’m not wild about ads on my blog but these are pretty unobtrusive and the company does need to stay in business. 

Thing #25 of the 23 More Things on a Stick program has us looking at little doodads that improve the functionality of your blog, either for you or for your readers.  Here’s a few thoughts:

I hate SnapShots and have disabled it in my blog.  I also have set my browser not to display them when I visit other websites.  Why do I think that SnapShots is a horrible abomination?  Because it solves a problem that doesn’t really exist by compromising the readability of the page.  Ever tried to read a blog post that is festooned with these things?  Every move of the mouse seems to rollover one of the links.  And everytime you rollover one of the links, this little popup window appears.  It’s too small to really give you a preview of the linked page.  It’s just the right size to block what you are trying to read and throw you off track.  The things are also covered with ads.  Ugh.  Please don’t use SnapShots.

Having gotten that off my chest, I’ll say that I’ve been using a Flickr badge for sometime to show recent pictures from our photostream and it’s really cool.  Very easy to install, too.  Just paste in a bit of HTML code to a text box and you’re ready to go.

I’ve heard a lot about Disqus but don’t get enough comments to my blog to warrant spending the time it would take to set it up.  Maybe I’ll take a look.  Maybe I would get more comments with a better commenting system.

If you read this blog regularly, you will recall that many of the posts in 2008 had to do with the 23 Things on a Stick program.  As described in my first post on the topic, 23 Things was designed to help library folk learn about Web 2.0.  Each of the “things” was a task involving some new, shiny internet toy.  To complete the thing, you had to write up a blog post about the tool and talk about the experience on your blog.  I got through all 23 of the things and it was a lot of fun.  I already knew about many of the tools but I did pick up a few new ones.  And I got some fresh insights on how to use some of the tools I was already familiar with.

Well, there’s a new program following up on the success of the first one.  23 More Things on a Stick picks up where the first program left off with 23 more things for us to learn about.  I registered back in the Winter but never found the time to do much.  They just extended the deadline to June, however, and my life is not quite as hectic now as it was a few months ago.  So, I’m going to take a crack at it.

Thing #24, Refresh Your Blog, asks us to take a fresh look at our blogs.  One of the suggested tasks is to update the look with a new template or design.  I’m not going to do that because I’m happy with my design and got to it after trying out several others.

I am, however, going to add a new feature to the blog.  Like many other netizens, I have been using Twitter to microblog.  I’m not going to talk much here about Twitter; if you haven’t heard of it, check out this cool short video introduction.  I’ve added a new gadget to the blog so you can follow my tweets here.  Now you too can immerse yourself in the minutiae of my daily life.  Is this what DARPA was thinking about when they created the internet 40 years ago? 

I found the 25 Basic Styles of Blogging slideshow interesting.  Like most blogs, mine fits several of the styles, including Life Blogging, Insight Blogging, and Link Blogging.

Well, I finally saw the new Star Trek movie.  And I have mixed feelings.

I’ve been a Trek fan for a long, long time.  And while I love it all, the original series holds a special place in my heart.  So, you can imagine my excitement upon hearing that the next movie would feature the original characters.  And, I have to say, the movie was great.  The plot was exciting and kept me on the edge of my seat.  The actors all did a fantastic job portraying the younger versions of the old, familiar characters.  The guys who played Scotty and McCoy really stood out and were a blast to watch.  The new Spock was even better.  I haven’t seen a Trek movie this good in a long time; probably not since Wrath of Khan. So that’s the good news.  What’s the bad news?

A few days before seeing the movie, I was channel surfing and found the original series episode Balance of Terror among the recorded shows in the DVR.  Excellent, I thought.  The new movie features Romulans and this is the very first Trek episode featuring Romulans.  Perfect way to get warmed up for the movie.  It’s one my favorites.  The Enterprise is sent to investigate the sudden loss of contact with several outposts on the very edge of Federation space, along the border of the Romulan Empire.  Earth fought a war with the Romulans over one hundred years ago, in the very first days of intersteller space flight.  The ships were so primitive that no Romulans or Earth people had even seen each other face-to-face; the ships were just powerful enough to launch nuclear missiles at each other.  That was all the contact that was possible.The war was tragic and destructive and had finally ended with a treaty negotiated over radio.

A DMZ was established between the two powers and both sides had stayed on their own side of the line ever since with no further contact.  Were the Romulans back, testing our resolve as prelude to another war?

To make a long story short, they were.  And the rest of the episode features a cat and mouse game between the Enterprise and a Romulan warship.  Based heavily on WWII submarine/destroyer combat, the two ships dodge and weave, trying to get a firm view of the other so that their weapons can be brought to bear.  One of the great things about this episode is that the time is divided evenly between both sides.  Kirk and our heroes are there but we also get a detailed look at the Romulan captain and see that he is just as passionate and patriotic as the heroes.  He’s just doing his job, fighting for his country and trying to get his crew back home alive.  No one in this episode is truly a villain.

Of course, you know who wins.  With no Enterprise there could be no show.

So, now I arrive at the movie.  And about halfway through, I learn that Balance of Terror, along with about 700 hours of TV shows and movies has been cast aside. Due to the wonders of time travel, the whole timeline has been eliminated.  Effectively, this is the very first new Star Trek story.  Now, I know that they were careful to say that the original timeline/alternative reality/whatever isn’t destroyed.  It’s just that we now have a new one.  But the bottom line is that it is extremly unlikely that there will be any more movies or TV shows using that original timeline as background.  Major buzzkill.

Like all Trek fans, I love the characters.  And like many, if not all fans, I regard the various ships named Enterprise as characters.  But here’s the thing.  I considered the whole universe of Trek a character too.  The history, the various planets, all the people who showed up or were described; it was a cohesive whole, a sweeping backdrop against which all kinds of stories could be told.  Not all the stories were great and the Trek universe wasn’t always 100% consistent.  But was the best, most detailed future landscape we’ve seen on the screen.  I love that universe as much as any of the characters or ships.  And now it’s gone.  And that makes me sad.

I’ve read the fan forums and am familiar with all the arguments.  Trek was dated; it needs a reboot to reach new fans and energize the franchise.  Sorry.  I don’t buy it.  I think they decided to scrap the whole thing and start over so that the screen writers could have complete freedom to do anything.  Who needs a bunch of fanboys like me complaining everytime a movie contradicts the increasingly complex past history?  I get it.

But let’s be honest.  The last few movies and TV shows didn’t do poorly because the canon had become too restrictive.  They did poorly because, too often, they were poorly written and/or directed.  Over the years, there were many examples of great and successful shows and movies that somehow managed to succeed within the “confines” of the canon.  If the new people running Trek cannot manage that, it’s because they’re lazy and/or incompetent.

Lest this sound like a sour, bitter rant, I want to emphasize my first points.  The movie was great and I loved it.  I will continue to see anything that Trek puts out in the future.  I’m still a fanboy.  I’m not angry at J. J. Adams.  But I will miss the canon.

NOTE:  I cannot take credit for the title of this post.  Mike, one of the guys I work with, came up with it and I laughed my butt off when I heard it.  If you’ve seen the movie, you get it.

Kaylee said “thank you” last night for the very first time!  She is changing almost before our eyes.

Just finished Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. It’s a weighty tome (aprox. 750 pages) that took me six weeks to read.  With a subtitle like The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, it should be pretty clear what the book is going to be about. Kearns shows how Lincoln created his cabinet by assembling the best and most talented men available, including several heavy-hitters who had also ran for the Republican nomination for President.  The fact that these men all believed themselves superior to the “prairie lawyer” didn’t deter him from enlisting them into his “official family”.  Several, like William Seward (Sec. of State) were confident that they would dominate this midwestern lightweight who had managed to get himself elected.  To his credit, Seward quickly realized how he had misjudged Lincoln and became the President’s closet friend and confidant.  Others such as Salmon Chase (Sec. of Treasury and then Chief Justice of the Supreme Court) never seemed to get it figured out and undercut Lincoln at every opportunity.

Lincoln’s political genius lay in his ability to harness this unruly bunch, impose his will upon them, and ultimatly use them to achieve his goals to win the war and reunite the country.  This is familiar territory to anyone who has read a lot of Lincoln but Kernes does a great job of making the case in one authoritative work.  One thing that struck me was how Lincoln foreshadowed Teddy Roosevelt’s admonition to walk softly and carry a big stick.  Lincoln consistenly spoke softly, almost never failing to treat those under him with consideration and respect.  But when it came time to get out the big stick, he could show the steel under his softer exterior.  One of the measures of Lincoln’s success is how often he achieved his goals without having to resort to such measures.  It was very common for those who opposed the President to end up liking and respecting him even after being defeated by him.

To help make her point, Kearnes provides biographies of several rivals who lost the nomination to Lincoln but wound up in his cabinet including Seward, Chase, Edward Bates, and Edwin Stanton (who didn’t run against Lincoln but had a very low opinion of him at first).  I found this valuable;  my knowledge of these poeple was a little sketchy.

Another thing that stuck me in reading this book was not really relevant to the thesis but still got my attention.  I knew that death was more prominant in the 19th century but was unaware of how prevalent it was.  Almost all the major figures in the book had lost a child.  Several had lost two or more.  In a ghastly 20-year period, Chase lost three wives to disease and complications associated with childbirth.  Stanton was known as a irritable man who went out of his way to antagonize people but, as a young man, he was known as a cheerful, happy sort.  Then, in the course of a year, he lost his wife, child, and younger brother.   Those who knew him all agreed that the experience changed him forever.  I’m not really going anywhere with this; it just struck me.

Having worked my way through this book slowly but surely, I think I’m going to relax and read fiction for awhile.  More on that later.

Just a few days ago, on Saturday, we got Rayna signed up for preschool.  We’ve decided to send her to St. John’s Creation Kids.  St. John’s is our church but I will admit that this is a big step for me.  Only a few years ago, I had a pretty dim opinion of any kind of parochial education.  My views on religion in general and Christianity in particular had already begun to change when I met Nicole, however.  And having a family really does force you to reassess your core beliefs.  So I’m comfortable with the decision.  The classes (two per week) will be a little smaller and Nicole knows most of the teachers, having had them in public school as a kid.

As you may recall from a previous post, Rayna had to get tested for preschool.  I was under the impression that these tests were only a means of gauging each child’s starting point and couldn’t be used to keep her out of preschool.  Wrong.  Turns out that it’s pass/fail.  And Rayna failed.

I could go on for a long time about the tests they did and why I feel they were not administered appropriately but my friends, family, and a few colleagues have already had to listen to me ranting and raving on the topic.  So I’ll just give a couple of examples:

The tester told Rayna to count to three.  Well, we’ve been working on numbers at home and Rayna is pretty proud of her counting ability.  So she got excited and counted to ten.  The tester failed her for failing to follow the instructions.

In another test, Rayna was shown a circle and told to draw it.  She drew three or four circles.  Failed–again for not following the instructions.

Most of the failed tests had to do with not following directions.  She also failed the vision test.  After a costly visit to the doctor for a second opinion, we learned that Rayna’s vision 20/20.  The doctor mentioned that four out of five kids he sees because of a failed preschool screening vision test turn out to be fine because the testers failed to administer the test properly.  Maybe I should send them the doctor’s bill.

St. John’s doesn’t have to adhere to the results of the testing so we’re not going to worry any further about the screening.  She will start in the Fall and she’s already getting excited.

There are pictures of the current St. John’s students and teachers here.

And I’m too tired to write much else.  Go to our Flickr account (via the sidebar gadget to the right) where each picture is worth a thousand of my words.

Rayna is off to the doctor this morning for her three-year checkup.  We’re hoping to have her tested for allergies; we’ve been convinced for a long time that she suffers from them but haven’t been able to confirm it.  She gets sick every year about this time with a harsh cough, sore throat, and general fatigue.  We had quite a weekend of these symptoms so maybe now we can get some answers.

After the visit to the doctor, she goes off to preschool screening!  She’ll get to play with some other kids and she’ll be assessed for learning and development levels.  To be honest, I’m a little unclear on what all will be happening.  My understanding is that these tests couldn’t actually keep her out of preeschool; they just give teachers some info on where she is starting from.

Nicole is with Rayna while I’m staying home with Kaylee.  I have some appointments to visit libraries for work this afternoon, so I’ll have to take off then.  Rayna and Nicole won’t be home yet but Roger (Nicole’s dad) is going to dome over around noon to fill in the gap.  Grand Central Station around here!

Haven’t posted here much since I landed here at CIL2009.  Most of my blogging has been on library technology and thus went up over at SELCO Librarian.  But I thought I’d take a moment this morning to link to those posts:

• Opening Keynote
• Talking about Web Development
• Global Library Automation Scene
• More on the Global Library Automation Scene
• SELCOtv #16 — CIL2009 (video of myself in my hotel room talking about the conference)

Today is the last day of the conference but I’m not flying out until tomorrow morning.  I’m looking forward to a little sight-seeing tonight and a trip to my favorite bar in the world.  More on that later.