The 26th & 27th Things

I've been racing yesterday and today to finish the 27 Things and--ta da!--I'm here. This whole thing turned out much better than I expected. The lessons were impressive. Good job of there at the SC.

Although I was already familiar with most of the 2.0 "things," participating in this training exercise provided the motivation to explore in systematic, and therefore deeper, way. The modern yogi Ravi Singh says the best way to make progress in life is to be systematic about it and I couldn't agree more in this harried world. Otherwise we are simply overwhelmed by it all.

Has participating assisted my life-long learning goals? Sure thing; I now subscribe to a couple German language podcasts in hopes of brushing up--my favorite being Deutche Welle's "slow news."

My favorite discovery was the cover view display function on LibraryThing.

Surprises? Well, I am actually considering starting my own personal blog. Shocker. I have a special somebody out there who I hope will be my co-blogger. Possibilities!

Val K. offered lots of help. Thanks Val!

Improvements on format or concept? Hmm. More jazz, i.e., more pictures and colors and pretty things on the blog. Aesthetics really improve the quality of life, imho.

Would I like to see more? Yes, especially if there are rewards at the end. ;)

Would I participate if I had it to do all over again? Yes, but I would rather have done it at a more leisurely pace instead of cramming like I did.

What else would I have included? I don't know if Open Office counts are a 2.0 technology, but I think everyone needs to know about it. I really believe libraries should use open source software. I mean, our patrons would benefit so much if we used free (and very high quality, which is more than we can say for Microsoft) software like Open Office and Firefox. For goodness sakes, Firefox! We do we make our patrons suffer through IE? Hours of my life at work would be spared if we just used Firefox. Somebody please!

Now I am done.