Recent Read

Having been an avid fan of Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter Series I never hesitated to pick up and read her newest installments even in spite of the fact that I believe the series is taking a serious downturn by becoming more involved in metaphysical relations with several men at once and less on Anita's abilities to function independently as a necromancer. That aside I picked up Flirt at 11:30 pm and by 1 am I was finished. Laurell definitely has a gift for storytelling in that it's nearly impossible to stop reading her books because you're so eager to see what happens next.

The best part about Flirt wasn't the story, although that was good too. The best part was the after notes where Laurell explains not only her writing process for the entire book (why she stopped writing Divine Misdemeanors to bang this one out, what music she listened to, etc), but she also gives the inspiration for the story and the names of everyone involved. According to her Flirt was inspired by one scene which took place in real life while she and her husband, Jonathan, were visiting with THE Jennie Breeden, creator of the web comic "The Devil's Panties", and her husband. The four of them were at a restaurant and Jennie's husband accidentally began flirting with the waiter, which made Laurell wants to find out if the waiter responded to women as well. The result was a funny series of strips in the Devil's Panties web-comic as well as a familiar scene unfolding within Flirt. In the web-comic, Laurell makes a joke about putting the scene in one of the books. To see this amount of intimacy where a writer exposes part of her writing process and inspiration to the reader makes the reader really feel as if he/she is part of the author's world if only for a few minutes, as they recall their own misadventures in flirting.


On a bit of a downside, I did finally finish the loosely based trilogy penned by Lois Lowry: The Giver, Gathering Blue, and Messenger. I have to say I was wholly disappointed with the final installment, especially with the ending. There were some loose ends tied up and some left untied. The narration did not seem to flow as well as the previous two books and I felt less invested in the characters and more interested in where the plot twist would be appearing. You're left disappointed. Stop at Gathering Blue and you'll get a good sense of fulfillment if not closure.

DC Public Library

I was interviewed a few days ago by Carrie Wolfson, the head of the Volunteer Corps at the DC Public Library. I told her I was planning on moving to Manassas in July and am trying to dig my heels into working in the DC, NOVA area. By volunteering at branches in DC this will get me into the city. After discussing where I would be best suited to volunteer, I requested to be put on a rotating basis within the main branch, she gave me a tour of the library. I was thoroughly impressed by the library and its departments but did not think the Teen Room was big enough. Because of its size volunteers are not needed there very often as it's only staffed by one person. I am eager to try my hand in all the special collections, science, humanities, teens, circulation, and children departments. She gave me a list of events such as the DC Big Read and ALA Annual where I might be able to help.

The best part about Carrie was her advice to me that instead of working in a bookstore I apply at D.C. Learns. D.C. LEARNs works with adult and family literacy programs here in the District to raise public awareness of literacy issues. This lead to me to look at a Literacy*Americorps for a possible job. Getting involved with literacy organizations doesn't seem like a bad idea since the budget crisis is effecting libraries in VA and DC so terribly.

That old warble

I wonder if you've ever heard that saying, "Networking is more important than your resume/cover letter." As an extrovert it surprisingly takes special effort for me to approach others to becoming part of my network or for asking them for favors (i.e. letter of recommendation, etc). I was pretty despondent with the lack of results from applying to jobs online, and feared I would never get a job that way. Then we had a guest speaker in our "Libraries and the Social Process" class, and she helped enlighten me as to how librarians can be saved, with advocacy.

I was being a huge pessimist and asked her would the community even respond to advocacy pushing until their resources were taken away, the old "you never know what you've got until its gone" deal. By telling real live patrons how important the library is and how underfunded and desperate times are, they can lobby to their legislature who in turn can make the difference with the governing bodies. It's not enough for librarians to meekly work with what they have. We have to make some noise and get people to care.

Some of her comments:

• You need to demonstrate to the public that if your budgets are cut, you will close. One way to do this is to take your furlough week during the busiest time for the library.
• Librarians are professionals. We have skills.
• People like those who will fight for their security. When government officials hear from the public, that's what they do.
• Librarians shouldn't have to make due with less. They should fight to get more.
• There has been a huge emphasis on don't cut teachers or law enforcement. Not librarians.
  
• My world class library service is about to become third class library service.
• How many bake sales is it going to take? Not enough
• We don't need the school library media center anymore. Apparently there are those that think we can put everything on a kindle and rent them out (this is actually happening in some school libraries)
• Relationships are key. Journalists need to fill pages everyday. The best news is a national trend and a personal story.
• Legislators love to interact with cute little kids. Makes great pictures.
• There's no emphasis of library's active involvement in early childhood learning. We need to explain the link between these two.
• There's no three year old who is going to learn how to read from a Kindle.
• They need to understand that libraries are in jeopardy.
  

Best and Worst Jobs 2010

According to the Wall Street Journal's list, "Best and Worst Jobs 2010", a librarian ranks at #46. A lot of factors about this list surprised me. Jobs I thought were more beneficial, high paying, and safe ended up being lower on the list, such as Nurse Practitioner. In addition, fields a lot of my friends majored in but ended up switching out of are higher on the list, #6 Mathematician, #11 Philosopher.

Full list behind the link, but the top five jobs and the worst five job are as follows:

1	ACTUARY	$49,000	$85,000	$161,000
2	SOFTWARE ENGINEER	$54,000	$85,000	$129,000
3	COMPUTER SYSTEMS ANALYST	$45,000	$76,000	$118,000
4	BIOLOGIST	$39,000	$71,000	$148,000
5	HISTORIAN	$34,000	$62,000	$111,000

1st figure is starting salary, second figure is midlevel salary, and the third figure is top level salary.

#4 Biology?. Also, what on earth is an actuary? Wikipedia says: "actuary is a business professional who deals with the financial impact of risk and uncertainty." Moreover, "Actuaries evaluate the likelihood of events and quantify the contingent outcomes in order to minimize losses, both emotional and financial, associated with uncertain undesirable events."

Worst jobs

196	WELDER	$23,000	$34,000	$51,000
197	DAIRY FARMER	$21,000	$32,000	$45,000
198	IRONWORKER	$22,000	$32,000	$49,000
199	LUMBERJACK	$22,000	$32,000	$47,000
200	ROUSTABOUT	$21,000	$31,000	$49,000

I'm a lumberjack and I'm ok, anyway. Roustabout? Wikipedia: "A roustabout is a labourer typically performing temporary, unskilled work. The term has traditionally been used to refer to traveling-circus workers or oil rig workers." Reminds me The Final Sacrifice. Rowsdower the Roustabout!

Jobs my friends have

13

TECHNICAL WRITER

$37,000

$62,000

$97,000

28

DIETICIAN

$31,000

$51,000

$73,000

47

ANTHROPOLOGIST

$32,000

$54,000

$89,000

52

SOCIAL WORKER

$27,000

$46,000

$74,000

68

BANK TELLER

$18,000

$24,000

$32,000

70

PHYSICAL THERAPIST

$50,000

$73,000

$104,000

58

RECEPTIONIST

$17,000

$25,000

$36,000

109

PIANO TUNER

$18,000

$32,000

$54,000

116

TEACHER

$33,000

$49,000

$78,000 teacher ranked one notch above sewage plant operator

123

RAILROAD CONDUCTOR

$33,000

$53,000

$80,000

125

WAITER/WAITRESS

$14,000

$17,000

$30,000

126

PHOTOGRAPHER

$17,000

$29,000

$62,000

143

CHILD CARE WORKER

$15,000

$19,000

$29,000

174

DISK JOCKEY

$16,000

$27,000

$76,000

Famous Authors

I've been lucky enough to meet quite a few famous authors in the children's, young adults, and adult circuits. Some of them were brief and resulted in an autograph or a photograph, and others lead to long lectures and advice in the field. The latter was thanks to Maria Salvadore's classes where she invited colleagues of hers as guest lecturers.

Children's Authors
Mo Willems - Autographed my copy of "Don't Let the Pigeon drive the bus"
Rosalyn Schanzer - Author of "What Darwin Saw"
Susan Stockdate - Illustrator of "Fabulous Fishes"
Katie Meizner - Author of "Going Places with Children in Washington, DC"
Jean Gralley - Author of "The Moon came down on Milk Street"

Young Adult Authors
M. T. Anderson - Autographed my copy of "Feed"

Adult
Jodi Picoult - She autographed my copy of "My Sister's Keeper" and took a photograph with me.

I really hope to meet more YA and children's authors like Julie Andrews, Louise Rennison, John Green and Sarah Dessen, whom I really admire. But this list is definitely a good start.

Famous Authors

I can remember a few famous authors that I've met this year and year's past. A lot of names I keep seeing over and over again as they were guest lecturers in my classes with Maria Salvadore and also very active on the children's author circuit. Other encounters were just that, encounters. I also missed a few big chances to meet authors I was really interested in, like Sarah Dessen. So hopefully I'll become better with that.

Fred Bowen - Guest Lecturer, writes sports fiction for children
Jodi Picoult - Got a picture with her, she autographed my copy of "My Sister's Keeper"
Mo Willems - Autographed my copy of "Don't Let the Chicken Drive the Bus"
M. T. Anderson - Autographed my copy of "Feed".
Roz Schanzer - Author of "What Darwin Saw"
Kathie - Meizner - Author of "Going Places with Children in Washington, DC", Guest Lecturer
Susan Stockdale - Illustrator, "Fabulous Fishes"
Jean Gralley
and that's just to name a few.