Happy 11/11/11!

I was in a meeting this morning, but I kept looking at the clock for 11:11 so I could make my century of a wish.

I have some Halloween photos! As you can see, I dressed as Dad for Halloween. Someone asked me if I was a hipster. I guess Dad was hipster before it became mainstream :-) Emily, clearly, is a natural cowboy.

 Abbie's Rick Perry Pumpkin

 At the BRC in Houston

I spent Halloween weekend in Houston with iSchool Emily. She has some friends there from Rice, so we hung out with them and went to the art museum and did other Houston-y things (if such a thing exists). A girl who graduated last year is living in Houston after spending four months as a cruise ship librarian. She said it was interesting, but "you are living with all the patrons you hate".

At Barley Swine eating pig face

 Emily and I celebrated our 6 month anniversary doing what we do best: eating delicious food. Two family members of mine might remember visiting the Odd Duck trailer, which is the baby of Barley Swine. Our server warned us of the "small" plates, which weren't actually that small. We had some amazing acorn squash soup with tempura fried mushrooms, but didn't get a picture in time.

We also had goat with goat fondue and I wondered if it came from the same animal.

 Shuffleboard at Doc's

But we couldn't be too classy. We usually play shuffleboard here during happy hour, when there's no table service, and we had a very overeager server who asked us "you guys doing ok?" at least 7 times (no exaggeration). When two people order 4 beers, we are going to be ok for awhile, thanks.

Emily and I are representing Doc's in this video (check out 1:04), which was taken last summer. The camera guy told us the name of the website and we proceeded to forget it until I had an epiphany a couple weeks ago and remembered the name of the website. Emily deems the shot "unnecessary".

Dessert!

I've started applying for jobs and hope to do a lot more over the break (if winter break would ever get here!). I know, I know, "I can't believe you're almost done!". Well, I wish I felt the same way.

Spaghetti aglio e olio with smoke-dried tomatoes and fried eggplant with Balsamic reduction

I'm splitting one of those farmer delivery services with a friend, so it'll help me keep up on my veggies. This week I got an eggplant, some green tomatoes, peppers, arugula and a lot of okra! I might try pickling the okra if I have time this weekend. It's opera season again, so I'm going to see The Magic Flute on Sunday. Oh, and a WWII re-enactment tomorrow. It's an iSchool thing (really). And try to get some work in, I suppose.

Aaand another one

Not long after Banned Books Week, I got an invite to be interviewed about online personas since I just taught a class on online identity management. I was woefully unprepared, but the editing made me look like I knew what I was talking about.

Travis also mentioned my upcoming Longhorn spot in the Tex Libris blog. This time next year: more famous than Nancy Pearl.

Video on the Daily Texan!

The video for our Banned Books Week event is up! Well, it's been up for awhile and I just have no time these days. 

Did I mention the commercial I extra-ed for? Well, it should be out soon. I'll let you know.

A Couple Cool Things

 Shockingly immoral books

My Monday started out pretty interesting. It was ALA's Banned Books Week. I was in charge of putting on the Read-Out, which is a common way to celebrate (people get together and read passages from their favorite challenged or banned book). I got up before class, and got to my e-mail to find 1.) an e-mail from the Daily Texan requesting to cover the event and 2.) an e-mail sent out to the Ischool's listserv calling for a protest of the event! The e-mail was from another student who is sort of known for having a worldview that differs from most librarians. He basically said Banned Books Week is about celebrating placing age-inappropriate materials into the hands of children. All the work I meant to get to was placed on hold while I dealt with the PR.

 Luckily, no protesters showed up and we had a pleasant read-out. Actually, I didn't do as much promotion for the event as I'd wished, but the call for a protest sort of did the promotion for me. The Daily Texan article is here.

 Even cooler news: Blondie! My seats were not this good, I'm just lucky to have an amazing camera.

I'll leave you with that. Lots of work to get done this weekend! I'm looking forward to a Dutch Baby for Sunday brunch.

Happy Fall, Everybody!

It's 103 degrees outside!

Grad school, part 2. And some vacation

 Emily at her aunt & uncle's

My 2nd and final year of library school is well underway. In order to stave off the impeding doom, Emily and I went to Galveston the first weekend after classes started.

We started in Houston, actually, to visit Emily's aunt, uncle, cousins, cousins' girlfriend and wife, and their baby and dog. The dog's name was Anna which threw me off a few times.

From what I've heard, everyone in Houston lives in a gated community. This one had a variety of flora and fauna. Have you ever had an egret look straight at you? They are paper thin! It basically disappeared.

 We made it over to Galveston the next day and were looking forward to balmy 90 degree weather after weeks of 105. 

 I really just wanted to see a pelican. Check.

 We visited the Elissa, the Official Tall Ship of Texas.

 Then took a dip in the Gulf, which was surprisingly warm. Almost bath warm, so it was a little weird. 

 We got the safari room at the Avenue O B&B which was charming, especially with touches like this.

 But after a too-quick trip, it was back to reality.

This semester I'm taking usability, archives and "Understanding Users". I've already taught two classes at work. I have already skipped multiple readings. So, the semester is pretty much underway. It's a little creepy to have a Major Life Change only 8 months away. I've already started one job application. 

But, let's talk about something more interesting. Food and Stuff!

 I accidentally went to an Austin Fashion Week show for Emily's friend's birthday dinner. What does this have to do with food? Phara's makes a mean tabbouleh. This is not it pictured. This is this made with quinoa. Just wanted to share.

 Now for Stuff. I got a new laptop and decided to become a Mac person. Except for the problem that I'm having transferring my backup files from my PC to my Mac, I'm sold. Any advice is appreciated (especially with transferring music from iTunes, although I'm enjoying the Aaliyah station on Pandora).

Finally, Food and Stuff. Because I can use my new iPad to read while I'm eating spaghetti. I LOVE MY NEW IPAD. Here is my almost-equally-great "stuff in my kitchen" spaghetti carbonara recipe:

1 serving spaghetti

2 slices bacon, chopped into 1" pieces

1 egg

2 tablespoons half and half

1/4 cup grated parmesan

salt & lots of pepper

parsley

peas if you have them

Cook the spaghetti (duh). While the spaghetti is cooking, start cooking the bacon with a little oil in a skillet on medium heat, stirring every once in awhile. Meanwhile, stir the egg with the half and half and parmesan. Some people only use the egg yolks, but that's a waste of good egg (what would the chickens think?). Season with salt and pepper. Once the bacon is cooked, but is still soft, drain some of the fat (if you're worried about health or whatever). Drain the spaghetti and add to the bacon skillet. Pour in the dairy mixture and peas while stirring constantly to prevent the egg from scrambling. When it looks like sauce and is heated through, put on a plate and top with parsley. Yum!

Didn't I do this a year ago?

I was able to get another trip home a few weeks ago. It was a lovely respite from the heat and the real world in general. Here are a few pictures to further emphasize the loveliness.

One extra dog was in the house. See Got Dachs? for further information.

Kristen got back a few weeks before me and Jessica just happened to be in town, so here is the reunion a year and a half in the making. Always nice to see old friends.

And there was plenty of family time.

Finally got to eat at How to Cook A Wolf. I had a pretty mean rhubarb cocktail, but they could really use a happy hour. $15 per small plate was about average.

There were dinos at the zoo.

The trip was too short and now I'm back and trying desperately to get back in the mood for school to start in three days.

I saw this truck after some retail therapy with Sarah.

Why can't life just be working 20 hours per week and weekly farm visits for pizza ingredients?

Oh well, I put on my best face and welcomed students at orientation. Feels good to be going into my final year, but also very scary to not know where I'll be in a year.
Let me distract myself from that thought...

Food I've Been Eating

Strangely, I've been cooking a lot lately. Here are some things that turned out well:
Peaches and Cream Cupcakes
Quinoa Cakes
Mini Banana Cream Pies

Ok, not exactly healthy, but oh well.

Something Nerdy Awesome!

So those silly little Tip Jar posts I keep showing off are now included in the Association of College and Research Libraries' PRIMO database of peer-reviewed instructional materials. Yay!
Click here to see all of them.

ALA in New Orleans

Ok, so I got back two weeks ago. I'm getting blog lazy.

Bayou off of I-10
It seemed like as soon as you crossed into Louisiana, it looked like how I imagine the state. We drove over MILES of swampy water, it was lovely.

As soon as we got in, we ran out to see Dan Savage give the opening keynote.

Then went to the exhibits to start the free book collecting.

I spent Friday night finishing my midterm that was due over the weekend (!!), so Saturday I got out and about.

Did some cultural things.

Decatur Street

Jackson Square

Mississippi River

I think this was on Royal Street. And it was actually raining.

Mark Doty
Aannd then it was back to conference time. It was surprising how quickly your day fills with conference stuff.

On Sunday there was a new members party and coincidentally, Meg's cousin's band was playing.

It would have been nice to have more NOLA time and to get out of the French Quarter area, but ALA dominated the weekend. A girl has to eat, though, and I made sure to do plenty of that.

Emily says hi

Now it's back to the usual. My cataloging class ends in a couple of weeks and then I'll have a month to enjoy the beautiful Austin summer. Imagine me saying that with sarcasm.