I do so love Commoncraft.
Best photos ever
I am just blown away by the 3D ultrasounds that we had done yesterday. Not just because she’s my little girl (or soon will be) but the technology is insane. I watched it being done, and grok the how of it, but seeing it in action is difficult to wrap one’s head around. Tiny slices of imagery, layered and stitched to build a virtual 3D model, and then displayed and rotated for the best possible angle…
In any case, I’m trying not to go too much into babyland with this blog (that’s reserved for Brand New World) but I had to throw one of these up.
Eliza in 3D
Yesterday was a day we’ll never forget. We got 3D ultrasounds of little Eliza (see Flickr stream to the right). She is soooo cute, but then again we’re biased. The technology was absolutely stunning, and although we were in there for an hour and had to pay for these, it was absolutely worth every penny. It’s hard to describe seeing her face for the first time…
People are saying she looks more like me than Jason. The chubby cheeks and thighs are definitely mine! Seeing these just made me all the more excited to see her in person in just 8 short weeks (or less)!
Just another amazing video from the maker of The Machine is Us/ing us. Digital information, as much as we like to treat it like paper, is just different.
The sooner librarians get their heads around this, the better for our patrons. I’m trying desperately to wrap my head around how this influences our new library building…
Here’s a great example of my very favorite misuse of quotation marks: the use of quotation marks to indicate emphasis, where it should probably be underlined or bolded. This is a card we recieved at our latest baby shower.
So it’s not for Betsy; it’s for someone like Betsy, or perhaps someone pretending to be Betsy?
This weekend = more shower
So we head north this Friday to take part in the second of our three showers. This one is in concert with my sister, and is being thrown by my family.
Here’s a shot of our haul from last weekend:

and here’s my favorite gift:
A travel bottle warmer. I know I spend a lot of time in my car, but I’m hoping we never actually have to use this. 🙂
Or maybe just Opera in general.
I own a Samsung Blackjack, and it probably comes as no surprise to anyone that Internet Explorer on it sucks. Just a horrible browser. Enter Opera Mobile, a really great little browser for mobile devices. I downloaded the trial version and gave it a month…good interface, fast, let me do everything I wanted.
So I decide I want to purchase this piece of software. It will make my life much easier, and is worth the $24.
I got to the Buy Opera page, tell them I want to buy a copy of Mobile for Smartphones, and it asks me for some info…including my “Device ID” which is evidently their method of DRM. By using a code specific to the phone, they can control whether or not I share the program by making it impossible for me to do so.
Ok, whatever. I can still move my install to another phone if I want by calling them, not perfect but I’ll deal. So how do I get the Device ID? By going to the “menu” function on the browser, on the phone.
Which doesn’t work, because the trial has expired, and all I get is an error message when I try to run it.
So…I can’t buy the software I want to use, because I tried the software to determine I wanted to use it.
Somehow, this seems appropriate again:

Loot! Part I
Back from the first baby shower (with my folks, in Nancy, KY). Got tons of great stuff. All the usual: lots of clothes, some diapers, wipes, toys, wash cloths, bottles, baby bath stuff. Jason will probably report on the more unusual stuff, so I’ll leave that to him. It was actually quite fun, although weird to be in the spotlight opening presents. Felt a little strange, but I’d better get used to it (two more showers to go!).
Me and my Big Mouth
So, yesterday asked my doctor if it was truly okay that I only passed my glucose test by 1 point. Then, I casually mentioned that diabetes runs in my family (brother, several aunts, cousins). That made her decide that we should do the three hour test “just in case.” So, in two weeks, I have to do a three-hour glucose test, which involves fasting overnight and four needles (which I hate). At first I was horribly depressed about this decision. But the more I think about it, the more I think “better safe than sorry.” It really is a problem in my family, and I’ve gained quite a bit of weight in this pregnancy, so I just want to be sure. Anything I have to do to keep little Eliza safe is okay by me. I can take it.
Philosophy at 2:30 am
Thought before collapsing into bed:
Librarians have always been concerned with informational objects that have metadata associated with them that enhance findability…for example, a Book and it’s equivalent Catalog card or MARC record. We’ve layered metadata on top of our physical objects for years. We’re only now in the very recent past began scratching the surface of metadata for digital objects.
When we digitize a book, which is the “object” and which is an instantiation of that object? What is Primary? Where is the Real when you have a physical book and the digital copy both in existence? And what does the metadata describe then? I think Plato may have some answers, maybe.
Or maybe it’s way too late for me to be thinking about this.


