No Week. No Thing #. Just some Final Thoughts

As I suspected, the blog was generally amusing when I had nothing else to do. However most of the time I have enough on my plate without feeling a need to publicly post on a regular basis. I feel that if I actually created a library blog for my school's library, it would languish for long periods of time with no updates. So I don't see myself starting a liblog anytime soon.

More importantly, since some folks have asked, my little guy is doing great. He has not had any seizures since the first two. The neurologist says not to worry since he is fine developmentally. Sure, his brain is physically abnormal, but it functions just fine which is the important part. As far as why there are physical abnormalities in his brain, my doctor surmises they developed in utero. This means that things won't get any worse. We are not looking at anything degenerative. And though his lobes are not balanced, he is missing large bits of white matter, and bundles of neurons appear where they don't normally, his functioning pathways are all working quite well. Apparently he has rewired himself to compensate for the structural glitches. The seizures themselves may have absolutely nothing to do with his brain structure anomalies. So, we are not medicating. The only difference in our lives is that one of his parents always sleeps with him. If he goes a year without seizures, we will stop monitoring so closely. For now, his attention is on kindergarten and playing soccer.

And my older son is doing quite well, too. He just finished HP7. He is 7.

Week 3: Thing #6: Photo Mash-ups

My photo mashup used an image from my son's MRI made into a horror movie poster. It seems to capture my current mood. I realize this has nothing to do with libraries, but it has everything to do with my summer. My little guy had a couple of seizures so now we are in medical purgatory running a bunch of tests, looking at data, talking with doctors, learning more than I ever wanted to know about brain anatomy. At this point, nothing major has been found. Developmentally, he is fine (slightly ahead of the curve, brags his mom). But the neurologist is concerned. They keep finding minor abnormalities in the anatomy of one lobe of his brain. That is not something a parent wants to hear. So, I am applying all my good research skills on my personal I-Search. Below is a photo of him with skin for comparisons sake.

Week 3: Thing #5: Flickr

In June I traveled to Barcelona with my family. You can see lots of photos (119 to be precise) of our trip on Flickr with my boys' smiling faces. One of those photos (without boys) was, conveniently for this exercise, of a library. This is the comment I originally wrote for the photo: "This was the local library in Gràcia. I think the two apartment buildings behind it are a really nice example of the contrasts in Barcelona architecture. What I wish I had photographed was the dog-rack next to the entrance. It looked like your typical bike-rack, but had a little metal dog placard and a large bowl of water next to it. " What I also noticed about the libraries in Barcelona was that they were open late into the evenings and were usually located next to other amenities such as parks and public transit. Great city!

Week 1: Thing #2: Lifelong Learning

My thoughts on life-long learning: How can someone work in a library and not be an active learner? Considering the random queries that come to the desk on a daily basis, not to mention all the other information needs that we are constantly seeking out and identifying, of course I am a life-long learner.

I guess if I had to choose one of the 7 1/2 steps as the hardest, it would be goal-setting. This is simply because all the other steps seem so obvious and intuitive to me. Setting goals in my learning would be more of a conscious step. The other steps like seeing problems as challenges , having confidence in myself as a learner, using technology, teaching and playing all seem a bit like breathing to me; I do them without even noticing.