A Librarian's Guide to Etiquette

This blog provided a necessary chuckle to my sleep-deprived state. While it is directly mainly at librarians, I do think that many of these can apply to non-library workplaces. If it doesn't, then it will provide a window into the perverse and twisted world of librarians. As much as I hate to say it, I'm actually kind of surprised that it is written by two men. One, because it seems like many of the sentiments come from women, and two, because there are so few men in the profession. Enjoy!

Announcing our newest arrival!!

Harper Elise Carr arrived healthy and very happy on Sunday, May 11, 2008, at 2:10pm. She was 6 lbs., 11 ounces ("a little peanut!"), a little over 19 inches long. She is the most beautiful baby I have ever seen, but I'm a little biased. So far, Aaron and I are having a wonderful time just sitting and staring at her. I have a few pictures of her with various family members, but will be adding more to the blog in the next few weeks.

Yes, Virginia, censorship does still exist

While on the one hand I love to hear librarians in the news. It thrilled me to hear an interview with a librarian on NPR this morning until I realized why they were talking to a librarian. Recently, a large medical database decided that "abortion" would be a stop word. Essentially, this means that it stops the search from working. If you were to try and search for abortion in this database, you would retrieve nothing back. You might ask, "how can that be? Aren't there are a lot of scholarly, research articles about abortion?" The answer is yes, which is a big problem. In my mind, this is a perfect example of politics determining access to information, which should not be. If we allow these practices to continue, it could be as bad as the futuristic society found in Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Luckily, the change to the database has been reversed, and the ever-previous access to information has been restored. But if it happened once, do we have to worry about it happening again? It could. Optimistically, I'd like to believe that it might not happen after a change in our administration, but that's just too Polly Anna-ish for me.

Read more from Salon.com

If you're going to San Francisco...

We went to San Francisco a few weeks ago, partially because I had a meeting in Sonoma, but partially to have our last weekend getaway before baby. We took advantage of the fact that work was paying for part of it, and flew up to hang out in the City. Saturday, Katie took us around town and we saw the Chinese New Year's Parade in Union Square. It was rainy and really windy, and all of the marchers and floats were covered in plastic. But it didn't take away from the festivities.

Sunday we hung out with Katie at the SF MOMA. They have some fabulous exhibits, but I have to admit, that I really don't "get" it all. But I still appreciate it.

Monday, we leisurely drove from San Francisco to Sonoma, through the Presidio and up Highway 1. We didn't do much but sit in the car, but it was absolutely gorgeous. Once we made it to Sonoma, we had a fabulous dinner at the Fig Cafe, in Glen Ellen. I highly recommend it for anyone in the area.

Even though it was a short trip, we managed to eat really well, and enjoy ourselves as usual.