Comments for Playing in Puddles

Comment on Catch by Tina

Tina — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 22:27:35 +0000

Shiny? Is your Mom’s fondness for stainless steel rubbing off? Have fun with your new one.

Jes was showing me pic of Bobs last night at 11:45. ugh! I sure need my beauty sleep. I can email you some if you want. Love Mom.

Comment on Scrap of Paper by Jenny

Jenny — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 14:21:26 +0000

@Sara: Encouraging, thanks for looking!

Comment on Scrap of Paper by Sara

Sara — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 12:55:08 +0000

I really like the mobile interface, to the point that I need to make a mental note to grab it myself. (I have no idea whether anyone reading my various blogs CARES, but it’s nice functionality to have just-in-case.) On a mobile browser, it definitely is much better than the standard theme. It’s pretty plain-looking, but I think that’s a good thing for a mobile interface because it makes for faster loading and easier viewing on a tiny screen. Functionality and simplicity wins over pretty-fancy every time, mobilly speaking. (Is that a word?…)

I should go upgrade too, I suppose…

Comment on Life, a Miscellany by Sara

Sara — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 11:39:56 +0000

I’m using IE8 at work. (Which I’m not happy about, but.) I thought it was surely just a work thing (wouldn’t be the first weird error that seemed to happen here but nowhere else), but… I checked it out at home in our various browsers, and oddly enough found I had the same problem in Google Chrome 5. The rest of the page loads just fine, but then the browser just sits there telling me there’s one item left and it’s waiting on the server. The framing around the jQuery slider is even there–I can see the arrows pointing left and right, and the “Taming the Banshee” and “Writers Wanted” titles below. It’s just the actual content of the slider that’s hanging up; I’ve got a big white box where the content should be.

Safari and Firefox work great and it looks wonderful, though!

I’m wondering if there’s some kind of security thing going on with the javascript that runs the slider. I think that’s out of my hands at work, but I’ll try to remember to poke around with Chrome tonight and see if I can find anything.

Comment on Life, a Miscellany by Jenny

Jenny — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 18:28:10 +0000

Thanks for the feedback! What browser are you using at work? There’s a YouTube video next to the news feed, which I threw in there just to test media load-times on the front page. I’m more worried about the jQuery slider (right under the menu bar) that is hiding from you…

Comment on Life, a Miscellany by Sara

Sara — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 18:12:20 +0000

Site looks good. I’m having some problems loading parts of it (whatever’s in the big rectangle under the menu bar, and the video), but that may be an under-construction problem or it may just be that some stuff (*coughYouTubecough*) is blocked from work. I like the design, though–simple and clean while retaining enough “busy-ness” to be interesting.

Northanger Abbey I thought was a riot, but then I was specifically not looking for anything resembling depth. I’ll admit that the only character I had any fondness for was Henry Tilney, and even that was mostly because I found his uncomplicatedness rather a refreshing change. He’s just… a guy. Not a guy with a past, or a problem, or whatever, just… a guy. I doubt I’d want to read anything more about him, though; his uncomplicatedness might be refreshing, but also I guess does make him kind of uninteresting in the long run. ::shrug:: I dunno. I guess I kind of just got caught up in the story being told (or maybe the one being mocked), and this is one of those situations where character development kind of just wasn’t something I was that concerned about.

That said, if I read it now I don’t know what my response would be. I seem to have gotten more critical in my reading lately, something I didn’t realize until I was talking with Dad about Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series (which I found rather poorly-written) and he was doing basically the same thing I’m doing here: “Well, I, uh, liked it and I guess I just wasn’t really reading it critically, just having fun reading…” Which made me go, “Huh. When did I start reading like that?” Not that I think it’s a bad thing.

Meh. I babble…

Comment on No Joke by Sara

Sara — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 18:21:42 +0000

Aaargh! I totally forgot about BEDA. As for acronyms as verbs… I can’t really say much, as I was just drafting a “to NaNo or not to NaNo” post for Journal. So. Um. Yes! It’s allowed! ::grin::

Inches, not pounds: Likely. It does happen sometimes. :) That’s progress too! ::cheerleads a little::

Comment on If You Build It/Lead a Horse to It by Kristen

Kristen — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 01:30:05 +0000

I guess I’ve been in the remote phase of interacting with libraries longer than most people. Because I’m blind, (um, obviously I know you know, but for anyone who stumbles on the comment), all of my books arrived by mail. I never had the experience of browsing a library, taking books down and skimming them and putting them back. Instead, I would decide whether I wanted a book or not by its title and the little LOC anotation, and then it was in my room, whether I wanted to read it or not. I interacted with the children’s librarian quite a bit over the phone. She graciously helped me until she retired, even though I was no longer a child. But then, I never found out who I was supposed to talk to at the library after she was gone. No adult librarian made an effort to let me know. And I use their online feature. So I don’t interact with librarians at all anymore. Whose fault is it? I don’t know. I think as I’ve gotten older, I’ve been more cynical about the groupy events the library has. I just feel weird hanging out with people I don’t know. It might even be a little snobby of me, but shyness certainly plays a big part in it too. But if I have a child, I wonder what my role and responsibility will be in shaping his or her future as a social being. Should we go to the library, not just read books at home?
The only time I’ve been intrigued by the library as an adult was when the Princeton Public Library got Chinua Achebe to come and talk. Obviously that was a very packed audience. But after that, did I go and read up on other events? Did I get involved? Negative.

Comment on If You Build It/Lead a Horse to It by Sara

Sara — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:57:44 +0000

And having gone and taken a closer look at the programs: Er. Honestly, there’s not much there that’s drawing me in. I don’t need tax or legal or job search help, the book currently under discussion doesn’t interest me, some of the lectures sound interesting but not enough that I feel I need to make time for them. (Some of the teen stuff actually sounds more interesting, but I’m not a teen by any stretch of the imagination.) The computer classes are all way below the level I’m already at. Even the children’s programs are mostly out of the question; Natalie’s the wrong age for many, and most of those remaining are either during the day on weekdays when I’m at work or during her naptime.

I guess I kind of feel like this stuff just isn’t being aimed at me, but… Is that because my demographic isn’t being addressed, or because my tastes and schedule are weird? (Although that does beg the question, “What exactly *is* weird in Bloomington?”) I mean, you can’t please everyone all the time, I guess. I don’t know.

Comment on If You Build It/Lead a Horse to It by Sara

Sara — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:13:02 +0000

Well, I’d fall into the demographic too. And I don’t even have the excuse of waiting until I have a kid who’s going to storytime–I have said child but realized when I was at the library for the board meeting Tuesday that I hadn’t yet taken her to the library, at least not since she was an infant. And she’s two and a half. This seems like a gross oversight on my part. We will have to remedy that soon.

I have just realized, also, that I have no idea what programs our local library offers. That’s not really the library’s fault, though; I have to take some initiative there, and I haven’t. That’s for a couple of reasons, neither of them terribly wonderful excuses. One: I’ve just gotten stuck in the usual routine and not thought to look at things that might break it. Two: My perception, at least, is that “programs” means “going to some sort of group activity with a bunch of people I don’t know”, which frankly makes me incredibly anxious. I know I complain about not getting out of the house sometimes, but I kind of want to do that in solitary fashion or with a couple of friends, not with random strangers. (I am aware of what a silly excuse this is. I know most people probably get a little nervous in situations like that, and they go anyway. Still.)

I don’t know what to suggest the library do about people like me who just haven’t made the time for library programs. I’m not sure if there’s anything that *can* be done. If we don’t take the initiative — well, you can lead a horse to water and all. The only thing I can think of right now is to try to get word-of-mouth spread, get people who are not necessarily related with the library (or, OK, the specific library under discussion) to blog about it and talk to their friends and such. Ads and announcements from the library itself, my brain files as “advertising” and thus pays very little attention to. A blog post from a friend, though, has now got me thinking I need to go see what programs are offered, or at the very least see if I couldn’t fit regular library time (other than MCCT board meetings, which hardly count) into my schedule. Maybe it’s just me–but personally, discussion in the community does way more to get me interested in things like this than communications directly from the people running the events. Of course, it’s also more difficult to get going and more difficult to control once it’s in motion, among other problems I’m sure…