How to use this Page

I went to library camp in Montrèal and had a very good time. This was the second library event that I’ve been to recently where I stuck around for the whole thing and I’m glad I did. I even woke up early so that I could see John Fink and Jason Hammond’s talks which were before mine and worth getting up for.

The promo materials said I was going to be “inspirational” so I tried my best. I basically did an anti-pecha-kucha talk with six pictures slides that were each on the screen for about eight minutes each. And I wrote out a talk, with all the words not just my usual “now talk about the digital divide” notes. I was pleased with it, though the informal no-podium nature of the event meant that I still wound up riffing a fair amount and doing weird things like this. Plus it was 100 degrees [37.7 C] but people were nice and stayed awake. The Library Camp event was in the Cyberthèque in the basement of a McGill building which was an awesome place to have an event. Big tables, lots of computers, working wifi, nearby bathrooms and snack machines, good screens and projectors and AV. Big big pros to Amy Buckland and Amanda Etches-Johnson for creating a terrific event and to everyone else for coming out and participating.

My talk — NOW I WILL INSPIRE YOU — is available in a few formats.

• The main page where slides are available in various formats (not super helpful)
• The actual words from the talk itself
• some live-blogged goodness which I had to make a real effort to not read while I was talking

Montreal designer, Roadkill Roadkill, has made a series of pendants based on my comic Ojingogo! There are three of them and she has them up for sale in her Etsy shop.

They’re beautiful. I love them - but whatevs, yeah, I ‘m biased.

Check out Roadkill Roadkill’s blog for more great designs. I also highly recommend subscribing to her Google Reader favourites. Lots of great design links there.

Also check out:
Matt’s book available online
Ojingogo Nominated

Check out this trailer for The Astronomer’s Dream - a great new animated film by Montreal animator, Malcolm Sutherland.

Also of interest:
Previously: Malcolm Sutherland
Forming Game short film by Malcolm Sutherland
Making of Forming Game short film by Malcolm Sutherland

If I was in Montreal I’d go to this.

Kid Koala has dedicated three Mondays in March (kicking off tonight) to quiet music he has found in his travels, so people can get creative. Show up for five hours of quiet-time records with your sketchbook, knitting, notebook, or any other creative project. Says Kid Koala:

I was working on the Space Cadet book and realized at 8 hours a page I would have to log another 800 hours of alone time before this book would see the light of day. It would be great if there was a place I could go be social and anti-social at the same time. Somewhere I could look up from my desk and see something other than the wall.

As the site says, “Quiet people are invited. Bring something to work on. No dancing.” What a great idea. I hope it’s a huge success and we begin to see more events like this: creative anti-social socials.

Link: Kid Koala Presents Music to Draw To

(Thanks, Tamu!)

If you read my blog with any regularity, you know that we love winter at my house.  A big snowstorm, in all its fluffy white glory, is about as good as it gets for this family of skiers.  But every now and then, we start to miss colors like green and red and purple.  Yesterday, the Montreal Botanical Garden provided a welcome breath of summer.






The best part?  Butterflies Go Free...a special exhibit of thousands of butterflies, set free in the main greenhouse. (Those within striking distance of Montreal may want to know that the exhibit runs through April 26th.) The butterflies were purchased from free trade butterfly farms in Costa Rica, and they are spectacular.



   

















Now that I've breathed in some green and feasted on the colors of summer, I'm ready for the rest of our North Country winter.  Just in time, too.  There's another storm on the way, with a foot of snow expected Sunday into Monday.

Montreal is a big, yet managable city. You’ll find the locals to be quite friendly, and we had no trouble finding people to speak English to us. (I used to speak French quite fluently but did not use it for many years and now cannot remember much of it. Bummer!) Other than great shopping, historical sites, culture galore, the best food you’ve ever had (gaining oodles of weight), this place is a photographer’s dream. So next time you are here, walk around with a camera and try many different angles. This place is gorgeous.

Photo 1 - Old Montreal

Photo 2 - Spectacular City Hall Building

Photo 3 - Old Appellate Court Building

Photo 4 - St. Joe’s Oratory atop Mount Royale

Photo 5 - Curious Cat in Highrise Building

Photo 6 - Pace Des Armes

Our travels have brought us 1,600 miles from our home in Mami to Montreal, one of my favorite cities. This is an ideal spot for a summer or fall vacation for the entire family. The city is compact and full of historic and modern sites alike - not to mention some of the BEST food in North America. Today we toured the Notre Dame, and unfortnately photos cannot do it justice. The true grandeur can only be experienced in person. This neogothic structure dates back to 1829 and is beautifully situated in Old Montreal. The altar, ceiling, statues and staircases are more elaborate than most any church you can find. You’ve got to see it!

We spent our Sunday in Montreal enjoying three of my favorite things...food, the performing arts, and a great book.

First, we went for dim sum at La Maison Kam Fung (yes, that's the right name...stop laughing. That's what happens when you have a Chinatown in the middle of a French city).  Our table was littered with empty bamboo steamers after we consumed huge amounts of shaomai (steamed pork dumplings) and har gow (steamed shrimp dumplings). 



After brunch, it was off to Place des Arts to see...



...Swan Lake on Ice, performed by the Imperial Ice Stars.  We bought the tickets as a Christmas gift for the kids and weren't quite sure what to expect.  We were absolutely floored.  This show was an incredible marriage of theater, ballet, and figure skating.  It was truly stunning, from start to finish.   I checked the tour schedule, and it looks like there's just one more stop in North America -- in Toronto.  If you live anywhere near there, it's definitely worth checking out.

On the ride home, we finished a read-aloud of Andrew Clements' No Talking, a lively, funny book that can be enjoyed equally by a six-year-old, an eleven-year-old, and a couple parents.  We spent the rest of the evening trying to talk only in three-word sentences (if you've read the book, you understand).  Thanks, Andrew - your characters were fabulous company in the car, and the game they inspired ended our weekend perfectly -- with terrific fits of laughter.

I managed to do two talks in two days from the same set of slides that were, in many ways, totally different.

I talked about Library 2.0 stuff to McGill SLIS students on Thursday and then to professional librarians (mostly) today. Good talks, interesting people, all followed up with some delicious food and grand socializing in Montreal, one of my favorite places. If anyone would like to see my list of links and handout, you can see them on this page: Library 2.0 - links & resources. The pdf is sort of large, but the list of links goes to almost all the websites I talked about, and the handout is the standard “places to find me online” if you want to explore a little but don’t know many people using the tools yet.

Thanks to everyone who came out and listened and responded and limboed and chatted with me.

Katy cannot believe that her mother is leaving her with her father while she goes off to an archaeological dig in Peru. After all, her father is actually referred to as "The Rat". From the band "Suck". Can you imagine? How embarrassing.

She knew that her mom has somewhat of a sordid past. Ran away from home. Hooked on heroine. Pregnant so young. But her mom changed as soon as she found out she was pregnant with Katy. The Rat didn't change quite so quickly. Katy has not even seen him in years. His yearly visits dried up when she was about 7.

But here she is now in L.A. in the Rat's dive of an apartment. For two weeks! How will she last?

When Katy is introduced to Lake (who she finds out has been paid to hang with her), Lake dubs Katy "Beige". As in boring. As in milk toast. It's not that Katy doesn't have interests. It's just that they have always been safe interests. Predictable. Katy thrives on order.

When she finds out that her mother is extending her stay in Peru, Katy is devastated. She just can't understand why her mom would do this. They have always been a team. They keep each other steady. Now Katy is stuck in L.A. for the summer with her aging punk rock dad, and her only friend is a paid friend.

This is my favourite of the Castellucci novels. I loved the Montreal touches, and I really believed in Katy. No, there wasn't a huge transformation in Katy, but she's not the kind of girl who would change so drastically over a summer. Her layers of fear do peel away, and it is a pleasure to read. And look to the chapter titles to give yourself a bit of a punk rock education.

Fans of An Abundance of Katherines may have a great deal of interest in The Internet Anagram Server. I'd never really seen this before, and I'm going to take a guess that maybe 73% of you already have. The title of this posting is my full name anagramed. My nickname yields, "RIBBED STY" (still not very flattering) and this blog easily becomes "A OBEDIENCE FIRM THONG UP RUT US" which manages to sound nasty without making any sense.