A Bloy and his Blog

For the past several weeks I’ve been using Mozilla Thuderbird for email, and liking it a lot. Prior to that, I had been a loyal user of Eudora. Would you believe I’ve been using that for at least 15 years now! In fact, for the past 5 years or so, I’ve been buying the full version to take advantage of the extra features (like spell check). When I opened up the program a few weeks ago, I got a notice that there was another new version available. Did I want to shell out $50 for the upgrade?

Lately, I’ve been hearing good things about Thuderbird (made by the same folks who created my favorite web browser (Mozilla Firefox) and I decided to give it a try. Like Firefox, Thunderbird is open source software and free to use.

read the rest of: Mozilla Thunderbird

I am now officially a member of Arboretum Cohousing. After investigating the project and attending a few meetings, I decided it would be worth my while to invest $500 into a possible change of living locations. And for me location is the key word.

The beauty of the surrounding landscape and recreational potential is huge. I would live one just or two blocks away from Lake Wingra, the University of Wisconsin Arboretum, the Henry Vilas Zoo, and the excellent network of recreational trails that go through Madison. That’s a lot of potential bicycling, hiking and kayaking, very close to home.

read the rest of: Moving in 2007?

Madison got socked in with snow today. About an hour into my work day, the “powers that be” decided to close the college because of the storm. I felt like a school kid who had the day off because of the snow.

read the rest of: Snow day!

This past October, The New Pornographers were scheduled to perform here in Madison. But an emergency appendectomy for band’s bassist postponed the show until last night. When they walked onto the stage at the Barrymore Theatre and began playing, I knew waiting those four months was worth it. The band started off the show sounding energetic and tight with the opening songs “The Jessica Numbers” and “Use It.”

read the rest of: New Pornographers worth the wait

Just over a month ago on this space, I talked about a new television show I thought was worthwhile, Love Monkey. It hasn’t been on for a while and I was blaming the Winter Olympics. Now that they’re over I figured it would show up last night (it had been airing on Tuesday nights). It didn’t and it turns out that after showing only three episodes, CBS has put the show on hiatus, which probably means it won’t be coming back.

So we’ve got a good show that was getting pretty good reviews, and the network pulls it before it has a chance to develop an audience. They’ll probably replace it with some stupid reality show. [sigh]

At least PBS is putting some classic television scenes back on the air for a bit. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, know what I mean?

There’ve been a couple of interesting science stories in the news lately. First, marine biologists have discovered what can best be described as a furry lobster in the South Pacific. Every time scientists discover a new species on our planet I’m amazed. Humans have been on the Earth for how long, and we’re still seeing things we’ve never encountered before.

Yesterday, NASA announced their Cassini spacecraft has photographed water geysers spouting from one of Jupiter’s moons. Scientists are speculating that having geysers on the small moon could mean it has “a warm, water-based environment reasonably close to the surface – one that could be conducive to living organisms.”

Discoveries like these are exactly why we need to maintain funding for exploring our universe, both on and off our humble little world. I wonder how many other exciting things are out there, just waiting to be discovered.

All day today, the weather folks have been telling us about a winter storm headed our way. By this time tomorrow, the Madison area is suppose to have 5-7 inches of new snow on the ground.

After supper tonight, I needed to head to the store for a few groceries. When I got there I couldn’t believe the number of cars in the parking lot. Lines at the checkout were so long it was like the day before Thanksgiving. It looked to me like people were buying enough provisions to last for weeks. I only had a few things on my list and that’s all I bought (made it out pretty quick in the 15 items or less lane). I was not about to succumb to the hype before the storm.

Today is the first day of spring (in the northern hemisphere). Here in Madison it’s been pretty cold and windy. It reminds me of a song written by David Gray, “What Does It Matter,” an outstanding version of which is on Mary Black’s excellent CD, Shine.

What should it matter if the sun don’t rise
Its midnight forever in my Janie’s eyes
What should it matter if it comes on spring
When I’m finding winter in everything

Lived in this cold wind city all of my life
Walking around still looks the same
Same people coming and going
It doesn’t feel right
See it all now
From so far away

All of the wisdom that I held so high
Shining and useless as this April sky
The hedgerows are singing and it comes on spring
But I’m finding winter in everything

Yesterday I came home from the Computers In Libraries conference in Washington DC. Recognizing the importance of technology in libraries, this conference has been going on for 21 years, and it was great to be able to attend the 2006 edition.

If I were asked to name one underlining theme of the conference it probably would be Library 2.0, the library specific counterpart to Web 2.0. Web 2.0 refers to the latest generation of web sites, which are more interactive, collaborative, personalized, and customizable (using tools like AJAX, blogs, wikis, podcasts, RSS feeds, etc.). One speaker said that traditionally, libraries have been somewhat behind the technological times, or as he put it, “Libraries: giving you yesterday’s technology, tomorrow.”

read the rest of: Computers in Libraries 2006

While I was in Washington DC, I was able to do a little sight seeing.

read the rest of: Photos from Washington