Book Reviews of Various Kinds

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter weekend. I certainly did--downing more Easter candy (my favorite kind!) than is necessary for any human being, dyeing eggs twice, receiving the most AMAZING Easter basket from Skyler, and visiting with lots of family and friends. I just adore Easter. Great holiday, all around.

I recently finished reading A Tale of Two Cities for the second or third time. I love that book! Even when I get a bit lost in the language (Dickens isn't always the easiest to follow in his long asides and crazy descriptions), I still adore the story. And the end? THE END! Is amazing. I'm always so moved by how things turn out. Brilliant. If you haven't read it yet--get 'er done, peeps. You'll be glad you did.

I have also recently returned to the world of Facebook, after taking a break for the Lenten season. (Is that actually a phrase or did I make that up?) Taking 40+ days off of Facebook has taught me a few things about myself, life, social networking, etc. The most fascinating thing to me was realizing how many friends I don't have any connection with outside of Facebook. Even friends who literally live 5 minutes from my door were fairly nonexistent in my Facebook-free world this Easter season. What is that all about?! Well I'll tell you what I think its about: this whole social network world skews or shuts down any REAL social life you may have. Or--to say it another way--perhaps it gives you a false sense that you have a social life when in reality...yeah. Anyway, think about it. (And read this!)

Secondly, I discovered that {GASP!} I don't need Facebook in my life. I had plenty of activities with friends, dates with my BF, enjoyable evenings, and I even had things to keep me busy when I wanted to veg and do nothing (i.e. books to read! blogs to peruse!). To be honest, I often forgot about Facebook. The idea of hopping on the site didn't even occur to me most days. AND THAT WAS OKAY. Crazy, right? I'm sorry if I just blew your mind, but I've got to speak the truth.

My conclusion, really, is that Facebook has its place. But its "place" shouldn't be anywhere near the center of my life--social, or otherwise. Spending time on Facebook should be kept to a minimum. Using it to keep in touch with long distance friends is awesome, but using it in place of actually talking to or seeing friends who live down the road is RIDICULOUS. I'll still use it, I think, but I'm going to also make extra effort to maintain real connections with friends, too. You see, I still like Facebook, but I'm wary of falling into the trap of its addictive appeal. If I'm not careful I fear I'll be poking everyone I know within the week. And we don't want that, now do we?

**Gold Star to all of you well-balanced people who figured all of this out without needing to shut down FB for more than a month. I salute you.

Images from here and here

Loves me this Job!

In an attempt to illustrate to the Blog world why my job is the cat's pajamas, I'm going to update this Blog post on an hourly basis today--telling you what I do hour by hour, on this, a fairly normal day at the office.

Hour One: First off, this is awesome because hour one starts at 8:00 am. Mucho better than the 7:30 call time I had for years. Anyway, in hour one of the day I had a mini-meeting with The Boss which involved us shootin' the breeze about High School Musical On Stage and my BF, and then discussing a few important matters that need to be dealt with today. I sent a couple Emails about an upcoming "Movie Morning" with our participants, and readied a few Primary Resources for my archives project. I also figured out how to add members to my wikispace.

Hour Two: I twice emailed my contact at Apple.com to hopefully nudge him along on getting me a quote for some of our materials (Yay for iPods!). I sent an Email to one of our teachers who is withdrawing from the program and then went through all our materials to change things up due to her absence. In the midst of doing that, I decided to finalize our picture directory and figure out how to get it printed.

Hour Three: Picture directory! And the daily apple break. Today I consumed a Gala--one of my favorites.

Hour Four: I semi-finalized the picture directory. Still waiting on a few things before beginning the printing process (Might be tomorrow). I also made some copies for our Master Teacher, made a few orders through Noreen (Secretary Extraordinaire!) and left for my lunch meeting with the JHAT Team.

Hour Five: Lunch meeting at the SIZZLER :) Let it be noted that I ate too much. Let it be further noted that eating too much is something of a habit with me...

Hour Six: With my trusty colleague in crime, Judy, I completed a last-minute assignment from The Boss about what the district history department has provided to the schools in the past year. I attached pictures to the Email and SKIDOOSH!--on to the next...which happened to be Primary Source research for the archives project. The main focus this hour was on Revolutionary War-period pieces. Luckily I remembered a great website from UEN.org that was chock full o' good stuff! Letters from a Loyalist lady, anyone? Don't mind if I do!

[Editor's note: I am tired. A nap sounds really good right now.]

Hour Seven: Archives. Archives. Archives.

[Editor's note #2: I really, really, really want a nap...I think the events of Hour Five are to blame for this overwhelming lethargy.]

Hour Eight: Archiving again! It takes a while--trust me. Not only do I have to seek out good resources, but I usually have to read through them and make larger journal entries, articles, documents, etc. into readable excerpts appropriate to a 5th grade audience. I think my eyes may very well be bloodshot after so many hours of intently staring at a computer screen.

But now! It is the blessed hour--4:00 pm. I get to go home. I get to go home without any papers to grade, lessons to plan, or work-related issues on my mind (for the most part). And that, ladies and gentlemen, is yet another reason why I loves me this job! Lots and lots and lots.

Picture from here

Your MOM loves history!

For the past week I've been working 8 hours a day on resource research. As part of our TAH grant, I am putting together archives of resources to give the teachers in our summer academy. The resources range from maps to photographs to political cartoons to picture books and things in between. When they're actually finished, I think you could argue that these archives alone will be worth the three weeks of summer vacation the teachers will be giving up. If you disagree, you're obviously not a teacher.

I'm pretty much a history buru, if you will, and I really adore that I'm getting paid to find snarky journal entries from William Clayton, letters to the editor about bobbed hair, and awesome photographs from Ellis Island. However, it can get tiring. Staring at the computer and reading article after article, for hours on end, to try and find just the right resource...can be frustrating.

And that's why I appreciate the lighthearted approach to history one can often find while trawling the Internet in the spare moments.

Exhibit A--brought to you by xkcd.com:

Because that's just funny, ladies and gentlemen. FUNNY.