Thing 17: PBWiki

On Monday, during Storytime, I read The Cat in the Hat.  So now, talking about the 23 Things of this Learning 2.0 program makes me think of Thing 1 and Thing 2!

PBWiki is great.  In my Resources for Youth class, we used PBWiki to do our group project and make a website of resources for young adults.  It’s nice when all group members can edit the same site.

I wasn’t as impressed with the Learning 2.0 PBwiki, because it’s fairly unorganized and full of clutter.  Maybe someone being in charge to keep things looking alike would help.  Still, it’s an easy way to have lots of people contributing to a finished product.

My co-worker, who started a month later than me, has finished her 23 things.  I need to get busy!  I just finished my Master’s coursework, so now why don’t I finish this up!

The Golden Compass

I went to see The Golden Compass movie last night.  I enjoyed the book, and there has been some controversy about the movie, particularly on library lists.  I did have reservations about the trilogy.  The author is an atheist, and did put that mind-set in his books.  In the third book, there’s a scene where “The Authority”–what the people of that world think of as God– is portrayed as a senile old man and dies.

Some of the internet rumors say that the movie is against the Catholic church.  I thought the Magisterium portrayed in the movie sounded more like a totalitarian government of our world than like the church of our world.  It wanted to control everyone and squelch independent thought.

But the Magisterium in the movie didn’t strike me as at all scary.  They say it’s trying to control everyone, but it seems to be failing miserably.  All the characters the movie follows are not giving in to the Magisterium’s wishes.

I brought my thirteen-year-old son to the movie, though he has not read the book.  He was not impressed.  I think the movie is more likely to keep him from reading the books than the other way around.  My personal opinion was that they tried to pack an epic book into the much shorter format of a movie–and it simply didn’t work.  The issues and plot points that seem important and earth-shaking in the book seem trivial and minor in the movie.

My son pointed out that Lyra says, “I thought I would lose you” to the armored bear–but that didn’t mean anything to him, because in the movie she had only just met the bear.  Condensing the timeline in the movie takes away much of the story’s impact.  I had to explain several things to him that weren’t clear in the movie, as well.

All in all, I think it’s kind of ironic that anyone protested against the movie, because I think that will be responsible for most of the attention it gets.  An excellent, well-done movie might influence people’s thinking–but I don’t think this particular movie would have a lot of impact on its own.

It was interesting.  I think the main point against the Magisterium was made that they were trying to “tell people what to do.”  Phillip Pullman seems to exalt free will as the ultimate value.  (Adam and Eve were noble for deciding to act how they wanted to act.)  This came out in both Lyra and Mrs. Coulter saying, “I don’t let anyone tell me what to do.”

Well, in Lyra, she came across as a bit of a spoiled brat.  As for Mrs. Coulter, what she was choosing to do was some pretty evil things.  Those things were sanctioned by the Magisterium, but they were clearly supposed to be horrific.

So instead of illustrating how wonderful it is to have free will, I felt like the movie illustrated that SOME rules are good, that everybody doing what’s right in his own eyes will facilitate chaos.

Just today, I read the line, “We looked at our pain and struggles, even our terror, and recognized God’s patience and his amazing gift of free will.”  (Patty Kirk, Confessions of an Amateur Believer.)

I’m not sure what religions Philip Pullman has encountered.  But I believe that free will is a gift of God.  I do believe that God has given us laws as guidelines–the designer telling us the best way to run our lives.  (Is an auto manufacturer impinging on our free will by telling us to keep oil in the engine?)  You can ignore Him and bring a lot of pain and suffering into your own life and the lives of those around you.

Even in the story, Lyra has a strong sense of justice–trying to restore stolen children, trying to restore a rightful king to his throne, and trying to keep her father from being killed.

But all told, the movie wasn’t nearly as thought-provoking or memorable as the book.  Kind of fun to watch the computerized creatures, but not the sort of movie that sticks with you.

Grounds Against God? Never!

My husband and I invited God into our marriage, right from the start.  Steve looked for a wedding band for me with two diamonds, to represent us, with the larger diamond on the engagement ring to represent God.

Right now, I’m wearing a necklace Steve gave me for Christmas right before we married, a braid of three strands of gold.  Steve told me this was to represent God, him, and me, our lives entwined together in the marriage we were beginning.

So, God was invited into our marriage, right from the start.

And God uses the language of marriage when He describes His relationship with us.  Isaiah 54:5 says, “For your Maker is your husband — the Lord Almighty is his name — the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer; he is called the God of all the earth.”

I got to wondering.  If you wanted out of a marriage with God, how could you do it?

Could you claim that God had abandoned you?  That can never be, “because God has said, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you'” (Hebrews 13:5).

How about Cruelty?  Again ludicrous.  “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)

Of course, God cannot be accused of Adultery or a Felony.

However, in Virginia, you’d be able to get no-fault grounds.  Even if your spouse does not want a divorce, if you leave them and are separated for one year, you can get a divorce.

So–do you think that would work on God?  God, Who has “loved you with an everlasting love” definitely would not agree to a separation.  You would have to leave on your own.  After a year of staying away from Him, a Virginia court would grant you a divorce.

But would that dissolve your marriage in God’s eyes?  I don’t think so.

If we are faithless, he will remain faithful, for he cannot disown himself (2 Timothy 2:13).

So how can you possibly dissolve a marriage when God is one of the participants in the marriage?  Legally, maybe you can do it.  But morally, how can you ask God to renege on his part of the covenant?  And even if you ask Him to, what makes you think He ever would?

Thing 16: Wikis

For Thing #16, we’re supposed to learn about wikis and explore some.

My 13-year-old son, a few years ago, was the one who introduced me to wikipedia.  He loves to have his browser access a random article and read it.  He’ll look at wikipedia to research something specific, and then get snagged into reading about something else.  Since that was a reason people would give for having an encyclopedia set in the home, it seems like a good thing!

Although I do remind him to take Wikipedia information with a grain of salt, I’ve been reminded that the venerable Oxford English Dictionary started life as a wiki.  But compiling the little slips of paper that people used to present definitions of words was a much more tedious process than today’s internet!

We used PBwiki in my Resources for Youth class in order to create a group website.  It was much simpler than what the other groups were using.

Wikis are perfect when you want to have lots of people contributing to a website, and a wonderful way to do a group project.

Thing #15

I’m back to LCPL’s 23 Things program.  Thing #15 is just to read some articles about Library 2.0 and comment on them in your blog.  (That’s what I’m doing!)

I see the lipservice to 23 Things in the official program.  However, I don’t see the library carrying it out.  They’ve set up some things on the official website, but I would like those of us out meeting the public to be encouraged to post about our reading on a blog, or maybe to be able to tag books in our library catalog.

Taking a grad class in Content Representation while looking at Web 2.0 tools is fascinating.  Content Representation talks about metadata–how do we organize information about information?  Tagging is a form of metadata, but on the web in general it’s very nonstandard.  So it’s interesting to see these new tools interacting with libraries, and to think of the possibilities with that interaction.

Meanwhile, I’m making a blog form of my book reviews website, so I can now get comments, and interact more with other people about the books.

A friend of mine talks about limiting her son’s “Screen Time.”  But I think that calling computer time “Screen Time” fails to appreciate that a computer is much, much more than a TV.  Nowadays, computers are about social interaction, about contributing–and getting a response back, about connecting to other people.

And that’s exciting.

Skyline Drive

Two Sundays ago, we were having unseasonably glorious cool weather, and I was meeting my husband to bring my son back home.  They had been exploring the Shenandoah Valley–so I arranged to meet them and come back by way of Skyline Drive.  After meeting, I was running late, so we only did one segment of the drive.  But it was so beautiful, and wonderfully peaceful, with very few other travelers, and the leaves just beginning to turn.  Here are some pictures:

Mom, just drive on!

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Many panoramic vistas:

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We even saw a flock of wild turkeys!

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Hiking at Great Falls

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After looking at the waterfalls, my son and I went for a short hike along the river.

There’s something about hiking that refreshes my spirit, no matter how hot the day.  I love it that such a beautiful place is so close to the big city.

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Setting off on the hike.

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The sky was so blue that day.

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Unfortunately, the bridge didn’t work for Poohsticks.

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A peaceful spot by the canal around the falls

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In a tunnel of trees

Throwing rocks into the Potomac:

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Thing #14

The 14th “Thing” in our library’s program to do 23 Web 2.0 activities is to explore www.technorati.com.  It’s a site where you can search blogs.

I had some fun with it, searching for my own posts.  I did not find the Great Falls post I posted most recently, but I did find my goodreads post.  It was fun to look for authors I have recently quoted on Sonderquotes and find other people quoting the same authors.

Then I looked up a title of a book I just checked out, Keturah and Lord Death.  It came highly recommended on the YALSA-Book Listserv, and I thought it would be interesting to find bloggers reading YA literature.

Sure enough, I really like the sound of one of the first blogs I looked at–“Jane on Books,” (http://janeonbooks.edublogs.org/)  with the subtitle–“I Love Kids’ Books.”  I’m going to have to start following that blog….

But wait, there’s more!

The Librarian Soul: http://sonjjjah.wordpress.com/

Talking Teen Books: http://talkingteenbooks.blogspot.com/

Everything Under the Sun: http://everythingunderthesun-booklady.blogspot.com/

The Book Blog: http://anderson8th.blogspot.com/

Book Trail: http://booktrail.blogspot.com/

Pell Mel:  http://melindamorley.com/blog/

So Many Books, So Little Time: http://tannergirl.livejournal.com/

Liz’s Book Buzz: http://lizsbookbuzz.blogspot.com/

Wow!  I was only getting started!  I think I like this method of finding blogs I will enjoy following.  Probably too much.  It’s not like I need more blogs to follow!  But I did want to add to the Blogroll on my site, and I think I’ve hit on a good method.

Oh, by the way, everyone enjoyed the book!

Great Falls

My son and I went to Great Falls, on the Potomac, the Saturday before last.  It was hot, it was crowded — but there’s something about the outdoors, and there’s something about waterfalls.  I’ll include some pictures.

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Kayakers out on the river.

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The water’s very low, so more rocks are showing than usual.

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I saw this bird — An egret? — on a rock in the river.

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Here’s the bird flying away.

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The Falls from another outlook point.

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Better than LibraryThing?

I just found another site for cataloging your books–www.goodreads.com.  It is positioned as social networking for readers.

It seems very similar to LibraryThing.com.  However–and this is a big however–it doesn’t seem to charge you after you’ve entered 200 books.  It does allow you to post reviews and rate your books and all that good stuff.

I’m curious–Do people out there have an opinion on www.goodreads.com as opposed to www.librarything.com?  I’m thinking perhaps I should make a goodreads account and post my reviews to that site as well…  But I will probably only go with one of those two sites, and I already know of a few friends who use librarything.  What do you all think?