Thing 10 again, Meez images

Drat, the jet pack actually costs money. I'll just have to stay on the ground. But I don't have to stay on my feet.

Thing 11, Library Thing

I created a private account in Library Thing to see if keeping track of my books online instead of on paper will work for me. I added the science fiction title "Blindsight" by Peter Watts, my choice for the Hugo Award this year. The recommendations machine generated a very good-looking list of quality hard SF. The "unsuggester" is rife with Oprah books, certainly a category many hard SF readers would find boring. I see reader's advisory possibilities here, for sure.
Mom liked to read Victoria Holt.

Thing 10, playing around

Still working on the image generator. My avatar needs a jet pack.

I explored the Generator Blog and took a shine to the Random Technobabble Generator. Bad science fiction writers could have a ball with this. It says things like, "Sir, the core processing of the tractor beam has been redefined." And, "Will calibrating the activation circuitry of the distortion field increase the power supply of the semi-fluorescent generator, Lieutenant?"

Wait, what does this have to do with librarianship again?
Generator Blog: http://generatorblog.blogspot.com/
Random Technobabble: http://www.ics.mq.edu.au/~msjj/index.html

Mom says, quit reading that science fiction, it'll rot your mind!
Too late.

Return to Thing 6: Flickr mashups

Look, a picture.

Thing 9, Merlin

First, a thank-you to Albert Kazooba for alerting us to the trick for typing in the title bar. His message saved me much frustration!
So, I've looked at Merlin and subscribed to its newsfeed. The dangers of RSS: I looked at Salon's postings and got distracted by an article on people betting who dies in Harry Potter. However, Salon only lets you look at the first page and then you have to register. So, forget that! And I refuse to even LOOK at the feed search tools, because the last thing I need is MORE stuff to read. I have a JOB, people! I appreciate knowing what tools exist, but I intend to be selective about which ones I use.
Wow, I'm sounding wonderfully curmudgeonly today. Mom says stop frowning, your face will freeze that way! (Remember the Calvin & Hobbes strip in which Calvin goes around with a grotesque expression, trying to get his face to freeze that way? What a guy! He's my hero.)