New Years Resolutions

The big question:
Whom do I want to become?
What is she like?
Is she brave, fearless?
Does she learn new things and practice until she is better?
How does she differ from whom I am becoming today?
Maybe she makes and eats real meals, after years of living from lunch bags and car snacks?
What does she do for an income?
What does she do to make that into a life?
Who and how does she help others?

One thing for certain is that she is in control of herself, but takes her circumstances in stride.
She accepts her humanity, and trys to improve and stretch it.
She accepts her body, and trys to take good care of it, build it, stretch it, use it, enjoy it.
She believes there are no limits, when given enough time and work.
She accepts that everything is a work in process, including herself.

The Birth of a Paper

Writing a Seminar paper is a lot like giving birth to a baby.
Going into it, I get an urge to clean, only this time, not the kitchen, it is shelves of the library. I scour them for everything I can find related to my topic. I waddle out of there, my hands low, wrapped around the big belly of books that reach to my chin.

When the labor of writing sets in, there are lots of deep breathes, moans, squeaks. Inbetween expulsions of words, I get up and pace, looking for nourishment to fuel my task, to stretch my sore muscles. My back aches, my hips are sore. Sleep comes in fits. No diversion works for long, back to the pushing, relentless and seemingly never-ending, until in full bloom the paper emerges, full of the red squiggly lines, mucus of misspelled words and grammar mistakes. It needs to be cleaned off. It needs to be wrapped in the proper format.
Then exhausted, I sleep, snuggled up to dreams of concepts that came to life as the paper's ideas were born.

How I spend my time.

Let’s see if I play this game:

Sleep = 56 hours

School = 24 hours

Homework = 30 hours

Karate = 7 hours

Shopping (mostly groceries) = 2 hour

Piano lessons (for my daughter) = 1 hour

Church = 6 hours

Dog training = 2 hours

Household chores = 10 hours

Getting dressed, showered,  breakfasted = 7

Cooking = 3 hours

Helping my kids with their homework = 3

Free time= 10 hours per week. (this week I spend 3 hours of that helping my mother, 3 hours doing genealogy, and 3 hours on a date with my  husband, and 1 hour playing suduku.)

Beauty of Life

Part of the beauty of our lives, 

is that we survive it all; 

the mistakes, 

the happenstance, 

other people's choices.

Speaker for the Dead

Ever read Orson Scott Card's Speaker for the Dead? It is the very end of the Ender Games series. So Ender goes where asked and researches and speaks the full truth of the dead's life. The beauty in the speaking is finding the humanity in the mistakes and lives of the dead.

I feel that I am attempting to do that for my Grandmother, preparing to share her history at her celebration of life. But, unfortunately, I do not have the time to interview all involved and search up the truth of all her actions. For much we know only as much as public record searches will reveal. Which on the parts of her life she spoke the least about, so do the records.

Unfortunately, we end up editing her life. How sad, to edit a life. Some may feel we are doing this to make it "Acceptable" or"safe". but that is not the purpose. All of her mistakes, all of her hard times made her into what she is. They all gave her experience and will ultimately work for her good.

But, unlike Ender, I only have about 10 minutes to speak, not unlimited time. But I will endeavor to speak her truth, which like all lives, ultimately point to the beauty of the great plan, the plan of happiness, of redemption through Christ of both sin and death.

Grief

Today I helped to pick flowers for my Grandma's funeral.

There is something about standing, your head bowed while trying to make decisions for something you always knew you'd have to face, but never hoped to.

We flipped through flower books, casket sprays, stand displays, table arrangements. Choosing colors, themes, flowers, that reflect the life and heart of the one you dearly love. We started the night before, working with the family that are flying in in a  few days, hearing their ideas, sharing pictures.

Grandma was pink. Not light pink, not bright pink, but all pinks at once and intermingling. She was as pure and innocent and gentle as a daisy, blooming on roadsides, in fields. Authentic in her truth, no matter where she told it.

Standing next to my mom, being gentle in our words as not to draw tears. We worked together, again in preparations for her funeral Celebration of Life. I am glad to have my mother with me. We provide comfort to each other. At least I didn't lose my mom. One day that will most likely happen, but for now, I am side by side with her, as we work through this process. As I learn how to do it one day for her.

There is something interesting about grief. How well it hides, perhaps behind your ear, until it breaks forth into songs of sorrow, joy, redemption. Breaks forth into tears, the leak unbidden, from the deep wells your eyes have become.

It is like a weight that hangs on your back, maybe in your heart, that you carry it with you and it doesn't disappear when you shower, and you can't get under it with soap either.

I suppose that over time, the weight gets easier to bear, we strengthen from the carrying of it, but at the same time it puts the extra stress on your knees, our hearts.

Grief isn't easy, but somehow it happens, whether we try to ignore it or not. Somehow it is just one more scar that adds character to our personality.

But yet, in the end, does it make a difference if we grieve? Does joy swallow up sorrow? Does gratitude replace uncertainty? Is human frailty made strong in Christ? Does death lose its mighty sting in the resurrection?

Shall we all not dance again together, in the streets?

financial straws

Americans are going broke- in fact, most of them are broke, but rotating lines of credit allows them to still spend.

The only reason we have not faced the 1929 style crash are those ubiquitous credit cards. Meanwhile, we are still working 3 jobs just to pay the interest on those credit cards. How long will it take to break the vicious cycle of spending?
Spending makes us feel good and accomplished. We spend to hide the fact that we work ourselves to the bones just to sustain our lives and make the very few very rich.

Right now, healthcare/health insurance are major financial bloodsuckers. But most of us sally on, even though in the back of our minds we are wondering if we are going to pay the dentist or the pharmacist.

But yet the retail market is as strong as its been in 30 years.

What straw is going to break the camel's back? For many it has already been broken.

I suspect rising gas prices will impact us... but yet as oil prices rise, solar and wind and other renewables prices are dropping. So if you have the cash to switch over, it ends up being to your advantage.

Interesting puzzle . . .

Any insights?

Prayer and the Time Line

Prayers are not static in time.
They have to power to move things forward and back, to set up the little details that are needed for miracles and tender mercies to occur in our lives.

Motherhood is the Nessicity of Invention

Bloody Cucumber
Bloody Cutting board
and Bloody baby finger.

Egon tried to help me cut up cucumbers for pickles today. He must have nicked an artery at the tip of that finger. But I caught him and a rag and slowed it enough to bandage and went back to pickle making (after a brief stink washing blood off of it all).

Soon enough he tore the bandage off when we weren't looking and managed to get blood everywhere.

Bloody floor
Bloody couch
Bloody baby

It looked like a murder scene in here. After I caught him and a rag again I stanched it enough that it wasn't bleeding so I didn't bother with a bandage.

Yeah- pickles, and dinner and  My husband and big boys disappear to scouts. So I play outside with the toddler. How many times does a baby have to be pushed on a swing? How many times can you pull a wagon around the yard? How many times do you walk in circles balancing the bike the toddler rides (and by ride I mean sit on the seat with his legs not touching the peddles)? I think he might be learning to steer. I open the garage so he can pull the wagon in more directions. And sit down to brush my old black dog. That always leaves a pile of fur that makes it easy to imagine his bones had melted away and that's all that's left of the poor pooch.

So now its bedtime and the someone roughly handles the toddler and his finger starts bleeding again. Nowhere near as bad. But he had to be caught and bandaged so that my bed is only made bloody by me. But he puts the bandage in his mouth and chews it off. So we add it back on with a layer or two of duck tape.

He still manages to get it off. So We get a big boy's sock and safety pin it to his shirt. So far 5 minutes and the bandage is still on.

But between the dog fur and the bloody little kid, one would think I had brutally murdered the dog and forgot the clean up after myself. Only the dog is happily staring at us through the glass door, wondering when we will give up and go to bed.

Interview Today!

Its a rainy Friday afternoon in the summer, and today we are interviewing Mom.

IG: Hi Mom, it's me; interview guy. How are you doing?

M: (no words, she gives me a glazed over look while six children zoom around her, looking a bit like electrons orbiting a nucleus.)

IG: That good, eh? Well, today I have some questions for you.

M: (shrugs)

IG: So rumor has it that you've been the mom of young children for 20 years. How did that all begin?

M: (narrows her eye to a slit at me and glances over to Dad, who is asleep in his chair.)

IG: Ok, I guess we will move on to the next question. What do you see as next for you in this field?

M: Chocolate. Chocolate is next or it all ends here.

IG: I think we are fortunate. I took a piece of chocolate cheesecake after lunch today. It is in my car.

M: Go get it. NOW!

IG:  All six of children leave the mom orbit and follow me out to the car, chanting "Cheesecake! Cheesecake!"  As soon as we out of the house Mom locks all the doors. The chanting gets louder. Wow! I have never seen a cheesecake disappear so fast in my life! Hungry children with chocolate faces turn to me demanding more. They slowly circle in closer. The chocolate covered teeth glint in the sunlight that has just broken through the clouds. I fear this may be my last interview folks, the end is coming soon.  Hey, I think I hear a voice of an angel.

M: Dinner time, kids! Come and get it!

IG: (Every last kid scampers off) I am saved! An angel has saved me!

M: Go wash your hands, then wait for prayer. Mr. Interview Guy, would you like to stay for dinner? We have meatloaf, and mashed taters, followed by some chocolate cake.

IG: Mom, how did you do that? How did you transform from (I don't know what to call it), to an angel with dinner ready?

M: Never underestimate the importance of a few minutes without the kids.

Jesus has Piddies

We were visiting the Hill Cumhora LDS Visitor's Center, and there is a big statue of Christ, the Christus room, the 2 missionaries were talking of Christ. So we were brought into this room and Egon runs up to the statue and stares at it. He points and says "Jesus! That's Jesus!". Then he reaches out to touch it "Jesus has piddies" he said as he touched Christ's toes. Then the audio of Christ's words came on, sounding like it was Christ's voice, and he jumped back and looked all around trying to determine where the voice came from. He looked at the statue, then heavenwards in awe and confusion.

After the audio played all the little children came up to crawl at Christ's feet. We had to tell them they shouldn't climb the statue.

Children have become a luxury.

Children have become a luxury.

Instead of new cars, I have kids.
Instead of a fancy house, I have kids.
Instead of touring Europe, I have kids.
Instead of ATVs, camper, boats and other toys, I have kids.
Instead of jewels, designer clothes, or the newest iPhone, I have kids.

With birth control easily available and cheap, compared to a pregnancy, I have chosen to have each of the children I had. The last several I very specifically remember asking for. They are the jewels, the work, and glory of my life.

They are my focus, my entertainment, my joy and my hope for the future.

The birthrates in the US have fallen to an average of 1.77 children per women. That is sad. "Why don't people want babies?" is easy to ask, but most of it has to do with economic reality and not desire. Many people would also buy that fancier house/car or iPhone if they could afford it. However, most women still carve out space, time and money, for at least one of the cute little mini-mes in their lives, often at older ages than ever before.

Are children now status symbols? if so it is an ironic one. 

The one that almost precludes all others. For if you choose to have kids, you choose to have your walls colored on, you choose to stay up all night with inconsolable infants, you choose to wear sweatpants and forget to brush your hair some weeks. You choose to stretch your belly out of any recognizable form. You choose to spend your evenings at little league games and PTA meetings, weekends camping with Boy Scouts.  You choose to have your names scratched into your car's paint by a kid who just learned to spell. You choose to have the iPhone thrown in the toilet. And you choose to love them, again and again, no matter what they did to your stuff. You learn that the things that make you the happiest are not things at all, but are the relationships and growth of those around you.

Perhaps, kids are a status of your state of mind, one where it not only points to your economic status, but to your priorities.

Read it and Rise Up

/https://happiness-seekers.com/2018/04/30/gods-secret-tribute-to-women-a-hebrew-word-that-will-change-the-way-you-see-womanhood/

It sure seems to be a more accurate job description of the jobs we as women actually do.

Chief Glory of Women

Virginia Woolf might have done her best to talk about what was not being said. In this regard, she quoted Pericles “The chief glory of a woman is not to be talked of” (242). That, of course, begs the question: What is the chief glory of a woman? With all those books written on women, we are left wondering what could there possibly be left to talk about? (right now I am snuggling my baby who fell asleep on my chest, and I am beginning to suspect that the chief glory of a women lies somewhere around the snuggling of babies.) Unfortunately, Virginia Woolf never had that opportunity, and neither did any of the male authors, and that is why they couldn’t talk about it. They never experienced it for themselves. So perhaps Woolf and Pericles saw the chief glory of the women in terms of what is considered taboo, the things that are not to be talked about.

(stolen from my seminar paper)

Hiding Under the Bed

Final Writeup for Mr. E's Monsterous Monster Wiki Project

About eight weeks ago, knowing that a project was coming up for my wiki and weblog class, and also having just learned about the awesomeness of wikis, I embarked on a daring and dangerous project of cataloging the monsters of Mr. E's imagination and putting them into an online encyclopedia.

The dangerous monsters nipped at my fingers and crashed my phone's camera, but I claimed success after the initial cataloging of 26 of these monsters, and prepared plans for a further expedition. Expedition and cataloging plans.

Over the last 6 weeks of hacking through jungles of paperwork, crossing rivers of maple syrup, and peering around mountains of pancakes, we captured and cataloged 55 different species of monsters.

The key components of success were listed as:

• 2-4 pages added to the wiki each week. That would be 24 pages for 6 weeks. We got 61!👍👍
• Pages on dyslexia and social media and dyslexia. 👍
• Wiki is well organized, with an index. 👍
• Wiki should have several contributors. (with the aid of pumpkin cookies, I did bribe someone onto the wiki, who fixed a spelling error) 👀
• Share on social media 1/week in an attempt at marketing. We got about 5 social media posts and 40 followers. I also blogged about online marketing for Mr. E. 👍
• Weekly reports (available below) 👍
• Readings that helped me to write and understand more about wikis 👍

Overall, the expedition into monstrous territory was a success, but getting other to tread where angels dare not is a challenge. There are a lot of people interested in and enjoying the humor and creativity of the monsters as cataloged, but few are brave enough to peer underneath their beds with their cameras ready, although at the wiki we welcome all contributions.

Mr. E became impatient with me, while he was creating and I was writing my seminar paper so that he began to take matters into his own hands and started taking pictures of the creatures himself. He did all the sock monster photography. I gave him a few tips on needing full light and a flat camera angle. But this excited me. He was participating in the wiki!!! Now, to see if we can move to the next step (someday).

When writing on the wiki I tried to keep it "wiki wiki," as quick is the nature of most internet surfing. For more or deeper information I linked to my sources. I  was amazed at just how much research goes into a good summary or introduction of a topic or new idea. Like, any good technical writing: the clearer and shorter the better.

Things I would change if I were to plan the expedition again: 

• I would look a little longer at wiki hosting sites before choosing one. But this one does have the largest 2 features I was looking for. (free! and easy to use) The downside is the side ads.
• I would set up a scanner to scan all monsters that come to light in 2-D, for higher quality resolution and better lighting.
• I would be more consistent on my marketing efforts. Having something worth posting every week is a challenge. Mr. E does not create monsters according to anybody's calendar.
• Bring more people with me, and more equipment (like cameras that don't crash every time they see a sharp claw)

What I like best about this whole project is that it does not end with the class (I can not deny it started with the class, though), the project is designed to continue indefinitely on the web, adding to that great curiosity cabinet of all real and imaginary things.

I have really learned to value the web for the voices it gives people. No longer do we need to interest a publisher to be heard, or have money behind us, we have the internet. And the internet has search engines that catalog and list the things they find even in the farthest corners. I don't like to brag, but my most viewed web post over the last 15 years has been the one discussing, in medical terms the impending birth of a 5th child and what that means for labor, that post has had over 500 visitors. The second most is a short post on universal health care and taxes, about 300 visitors. It excites me to be found as much as it excites me to find. We have a voice even if we refuse to pay for marketing.

And speaking of voice, (this connects into my lit project, which is focusing on women writers.) The web has given women a voice, who for centuries were silenced by the concepts of not needing education to bear children. Women came forward and blogged things that were specific to women, and often culturally taboo and connected with other women who have been in the same boat. Women's issues have been left out of literature for hundreds of years, But, it is precisely that it is left out that is so fascinating. There is a long history of not talking about the biological aspects of being a woman, for men either find it gross or uninteresting, or as my husband says "both." That is why we buy books on puberty for our girls, as it is not discussed in polite society: in case a man might overhear. At least today, the internet has helped bridge the gap. We have women willing to post pictures of miscarriage or early birth, husbands willing to show how their wife looks in the net panties after birth, no end of blog posts on pregnancy or those who are hoping to conceive. The internet marketing on period panties actually brings the word out of whispered obscurity and into our Facebook feeds.That is power, that is connection. Not only does it link us to the world, but most importantly to each other.

What the last few weeks of the semester feels like

Whistle while you work

I have a washing machine that plays a little tune when it gets done with its load. I feel happy and wish to dance all my way to the laundry room to change that laundry.

Do you think if I whistled/sang when the dishes needed doing that someone would come happily running and do them?

Weekly Refelction on Final Project week 5?

Yup, The wiki project is still going on. However, I agree with Bonnie, why can't school just be over yet?

Breathe, only 2 more weeks. You can do this.

Yes. I finished all my readings, played wiki fairy and fixed little details on the beast. And then added more monsters, because Mr. E just keeps making Monsters. I peered into his room this morning and what did I see?

A whole heck-a-lot of monsters waiting for me.

I haven't yet got Mr. E on his own wiki. I have barely been in the same room as him all week. So I managed the pics, the uploads and the new pages on some of these babies, but not with much input from their creator, as Dad was taking him to a movie. Maybe a chance tomorrow evening?

I also managed to put this pic on our Facebook page, inviting people, once again to that great wiki.

The readings I did this week did not provide further insight, but in some ways supported the written work on the wiki on dyslexia and wikis.

Studio Tour: Bonnie's Blog

Bonnie Robinson has been consistently blown me away with her thorough, well thought out and very well organized work this semester. I have looked up to her to understand how to be a graduate student. Her final project is no exception.

ok, Bonnie, that's a lot of writing in the last few weeks. One of these days, I'm going to get through it and finish this post.

That reminds me, thank you for the post on Abe's. I'm always looking for vegan eats when I'm in Rochester. I'll be there next May 14th. :) Maybe we can chat in a coffee house together :) And while we are discussing your post on Abe's, I didn't see a link to their website. Perhaps you could provide one? (although I did easily search it up). You could also provide links to other places you bring up, like the Rochester Public Library.

I feel like I am writing in a totally post-modern way, jumping time and styles and streams of consciousness in the middle of the paragraphs, but if anyone could handle it, you can Bonnie, after all, you've studied some Hemingway - the joys of teaching college-level English.

Bonnie is attempted to unfold and then mesh the histories of coffee houses and the internet, especially in their relation to the free exchange of ideas. This is rooted in the first-hand experience at local coffee houses in the Rochester, MN area, where she makes 3 different visits, including interviewing the owner, or barista for a better understanding of the underlying philosophies of the place.

She does a good job in these interviews. They are well constructed and relevant to her overall connections. I find them most fascinating. This project stands out as one that clearly has not reached its apex yet. It hasn't reached a critical mass for nuclear connection, which Bonnie hopes to achieve, and I  look forward to reading.

Studio Tour: Distinctively Dani

Distinctively Dani took on the world of travel blogging. And if there is anything that can give people a strong sense of wanderlust it is a good travel blog. Dani not only discusses travel blogs, looking at 2 of them per week, but she also tries to uncover the hidden meaning behind travel blogging.

In her earlier blog analyzing posts, Dani uses quotes and descriptions to show us how the blogger shares his/her experiences with us. A great example of this is March's post on the Expert Vagabond. Her more recent posts seem to shorten the prose, perhaps the beauty of the blogs analyzed changed.

Dani gives 2 other posts per week, her weekly reflection, and a post where she discusses a particular topic in relation to travel blogging, one was identity and travel blogging, and the other was one was on perks for travel blogging. She reads and discusses articles on these topics with relations to the blogs she has analyzed.

Dani begins her blogging about travel blogs with a discussion on her trip to Savannah, Georgia. She is thinking about attending grad school in writing there. From her appreciation of beautiful prose, her wanderlust wetted and showing through every word she writes, I am sure Dani will make Savannah only one of many places writing will take her in her life.

Studio Tour: Andrew Hanson

Andrew Hanson's Bible Time blog project fascinates me from the perspective of trying not to be a teacher. I teach adult Sunday school, (and substitute for seminary ie: every morning teen scripture class) and also Argument and Exposition this semester and as I read his posts I want to do what all teachers should do best: ask questions! Every time he says something, I want to ask a question in the margins.

I love his initiative on the topic, how he has jumped in and try to understand and explain the verses he tackles. I am not sure the blog format is particularly better suited for this than a wiki would be, except for Andrew's desire not to have his words changed, in which case the blog is best.

When background information is given and links are given to connect the reader to a better understanding of the topic, it makes good use of the medium like his post connecting us links on burnt offerings and God's ransom. I also noticed that they linked to 2 different religious pages, one a non-denominational Christian, specifically on-line ministry and the other is a  Jehovah's Witness. With other posts, the trend continues as Andrew connects us to a wide variety of Christan theological studies. As a reader, it frustrates me that the links don't automatically open in a new tab and I have to hit the back button to continue on the blog.

Andrew gives us a nice amount, enough to learn something, but not enough to be overwhelmed by, of background information on these verses but doesn't tell us where he got this information, obviously, he knows his way around bible scholar sites, but a little credit to the source wouldn't be so bad.

After Andrew expounds on each verse he gives a nice summary of the blog post. Then Andrew ends each of his blog posts with "Thanks, Andrew" That is an interesting touch I don't often see on blogs. Does it make it personal, or does it make it epistolary? And in that case is he following the example of Paul?

Weekly Reflection #3

I bit the bullet and started into those readings, and now we have a nice little page AboutDyslexia.I kinda like how this page turned out. It is quick and hopefully an easy read that may give hope for some flustered parents of frustrated kids with dyslexia. It also dabbles with a little bit of academic research that is not usually connected with dyslexia, but I think Mister E's connection with it makes for a nice little case study.

For only the second time in the wiki, we have pages that link outside the wiki, not only the academic studies but also basic links on some of the learning disorders. Which reminds me, I should also link to a good page on ODD.

The wiki is taking on a nice shape. It is easy to add monster pages and we are beginning to get some good background information/resources available on it. I try to keep everything simple, neat, easy to read and am trying for consistent layouts. I expect layouts of more complicated pages will naturally fall into a standardized pattern and if not, then a little work will be applied to make it so.

For marketing this week, we did make our Facebook post and will have to make another one soon, perhaps tonight or tomorrow, (but I am writing this post today because my weekend is booked) as Mr. E made a really cool monster this week, but I haven’t had time to breathe. He would happily spend most days working with me on the wiki, which is something I just can’t do at this point in the semester (but I did a few weeks ago, which how this wiki got off the ground) But this may be an interesting opportunity to teach him to wiki and see what we come up with. He has started to text his grandparents so perhaps he can write a wiki page. Wouldn’t that build up my argument about how wikis and dyslexics can interact?

But I am once again afraid that everyone is so busy with their lives that I may have to bribe people to add something to the wiki.

Next week I hope to; clean up some details on the wiki, do more readings, write a page on creativity and dyslexia and move into the concepts of how wikis and dyslexics can be mutually beneficial.

As I review this blog post, that I am currently writing, I realize how stream-of-consciousness it is. As a general rule, I try to avoid stream-of-consciousness writing in all forms of academic prose. This week however, I am likely to let it stand because I have moved into the modern and postmodern eras in my literature class and have noticed the predilection of such writers to not only follow streams-of-consciousness, but also to use it as a way to play with time, to jump forward and move backwards with a whiff or a sound that stirs the memories. No wonder this is the era Dr. Who came to being, as we have learned to time travel in our thoughts and our stories.

descriptive word play

It was green, the kind of green that scientifically was chosen to calm people and so for decades graced ERs, hospitals and waiting rooms, but looking at it now made you feel queasy and brought to mind the smells of antiseptic and cries of pain.

Weekly Reflection on Final Project #2

Wiki grew by 2 whole pages this week. One of the pages was a step up in design than the others. It not only is a monster but shows a monster society in evolution, so it has section headings and a picture for each section.Some may argue that is too much info for one simple wiki page, and I am considering it, but as of yet, we di not have enough info to break it into a page for each section.  I am not thrilled with the layout for the pictures, perhaps that needs more work. See for yourself: http://mr-es-monsterous-monsters.wikia.com/wiki/GoblinMouth

I also worked on the readings. Marketing got its own post (see below) and by the time I was done with it, I felt thoroughly chastised as to how well I was not doing with it, especially in the continuity needed for a good marketing campaign. Luckily, I am not trying to make a living off of it.

I've dabbled in the readings for dyslexia, but only got through the first 2. I'm am just going to have to jump in and make an "about dyslexia" page on that wiki and add to it as I can.

The Facebook post went well this week. It was well received and shared. We reached a whole 17 people from the post on Mr. E's page, and another (or some of the same) 11 people from my personal page with that post.

Bonnie responded to last week's reflection and I invited her boys to add to Mr. E's Monsterous Wiki. I hope they do. (hint, hint). It would be greatly appreciated to have others enjoying the wiki too.

Discussion of Marketing Tactics and How it Relates to Mr. E's Monsters

Marketing something on the internet, according to www.entrepreneur.com, should add "add value rather than clutter to their lives." It should also be very focused. Focused is doable. Monster Art is Mr. E is nicely focused. But how does it add value it people's busy and hectic lives? I mean if I'm perusing Facebook (the main focus of the Monstrous Art marketing) what stops my scroll? Cute things. Funny things, or things that are not about Trump. I know I am going off topic here, but Facebook is more cheery when politics is not 90% of it. . . so things that make me laugh or kick in those cuteness hormones. Monsters are cute? Maybe they're funny?

The whole purpose of the monstrous art is to be a diversion. So how do I go about diverting people's attention from political posts? I feel if I continue on this train of thought I will go back to cuteness. Some of the monsters trade on cuteness...like this one.

Quality gets people to share it and discuss it. What is quality in cuteness or funniness? How do I get someone to like it enough to share it? Always make it funny or cute? The post I made about the Pancake Eating Hippo, was cute, not just the monster but the reaction to it by cute little boys. Between the cuteness of the pancakes and faces of the boys, it did gather more likes and responses and shares than any other monster posts up to that point. 

Plan for it to take time and grow bit by bit. Marketing involves patience? you mean it's not instant? Being that there is nothing beyond time and energy involved in this adventure at this time, the monsters have learned to wait. Mister E's mommy just doesn't have enough time to do it all right now. She made some excuse about being a grad student.

Connecting with influential people/groups can introduce you to a whole new group of people. Good ideas. I wonder who Mister E should connect with?

Build relationships with everyone that reaches out to you. Oh oh, this is beginning to sound a little bit like work. Respond to people? Maybe even in a timely manner. I have ignored my brother when he reached out to talk about picture quality. Since then I figured out how to crop and relight pictures on my phone before uploading them onto the net. I still haven't responded.

Consistently publish good content. I think this harkens back to the concept of better photographs. And making the posts worth stopping for. But what about that word "Consistently"? That goes back to the idea of trying to get new content on Facebook every week. So far I have managed every 2-3 weeks, probably not enough.

Share as you want to be shared. Think I could get my Sister-in-law to share my posts if I share hers? Maybe I could even make a deal of it. And perhaps even expand to other's . . . 
Sigh, marketing sounds like a little work, all the time.

Weekly Relection for Final Project #1

Monster Wiki is up and running. Good news. I have made/set up an awesome wiki. Once I learned the new system it became a breeze to load up pictures and put introductions on each monster. We have 46 pages on the wiki. The most work went into the Index, which is a great place to get an overview of what is currently on the wiki. I am not a programmer, so I am not sure how to make the index to build its self... so it will probably continue to be done manually.

To be honest I did not do all 46 pages of the wiki this week. I started several weeks ago, hoping it would work as this project, but knowing it would be worthwhile effort even if it did not. The additional pages of monsters that I thought might take longer, went up quickly with my son's drawing and input all week. These are fun because they create a connected reading and linking throughout that section of the wiki. I hope to introduce more of this interlinking between monsters. The Squawkapus is a good one to start this bit of interlinking tour on.

Moving forward, my largest obstacle will be to get the reading done and written about. The other large stepping stone is drawing people to it. The Facebook page and posts have drawn more interest on average each week. We get a few new views every day or two. Each post we make we invite viewers to the wiki, but so far the wiki has remained mostly viewerless, not to mention without other participants. I have a backup plan of offering pumpkin cookies to my father to add things to the wiki, but first I will see if there are less obvious-bribing ways to draw participants.

But I am not Angry

Death of a person who lived a good long life does not anger me. It the promise of mortality, that it comes with an ending. It is bittersweet. For I miss my grandma dearly. My heart is drawn out in gratitude for that amazing woman and the life she has led. She was a great example.

The last couple years I often stopped on the way home from school. Sometimes she was out to lunch with her friends or playing cards, and she didn't want me. Other times I was able to sit and talk and show off my baby (#8). She loved to hold him when she was able. I was able to sweep her floor and do little acts of service, although it was never possible to do enough to fill the debt I felt to her.

I wasn't there when she passed. I should have visited her in the hospital before we left on vacation. It is a regret of mine, but she was happily surrounded by wonderful family, even without me. Motherhood of 8 gives you a unique perspective on individuals' involvement in your life. You learn to accept and love them when they are there, and to love whoever is around when they are not. There is always somebody who needs your love, and usually, they are the one in front of you.

But with her passing, I finally have an opportunity to serve her in an eternal way. Finally, there will be something I can do that will be as useful to her as she was to me. My mom and I can take her name to the Temple and do her ordinances and then seal her for time and eternity to her parents, her husband, and my dear aunt Katy. All of which were waiting for her and were there to welcome her to heaven in a big embrace.

Spring Break Dreaming

One class between me and spring break. Then it is a mad 6-week dash to the end of the semester. With not just major paper and projects due on my end, but I got to get 20 students to get through their major papers too.

And I am already wiped. Maybe I should have planned to take spring break in the sun somewhere. Next year that is my plan. This year I am taking a kid to a medical specialist because that is how Mommies actually spend spring break.

But my last class before break is planned, and the last papers that are due before break are in. So, just breathe and I can survive tomorrow.

Too bad there are no sunny beaches in Rochester, MN.

A closet full

Ever see a picture of a cute baby and think"I want one" Then realize you have 8 more at home just like it, only a little older?

I mean, isn't that like wanting a cute pair of boots you see, when you already have 8 similar pairs walking around your house all day, eating your food and demanding that they sit on you rather than you wearing them?

I mean, I am really not big into shoes/boots. I have 1 pair of boots at a time. When they wear out I replace them with 1 pair of boots. I have 1 pair of tennies, 1 pair of sandals, 1 pair of dress shoes and 3 pairs of Vibrams 5 finger shoes.

 For purses I have 2- I travel one that can slip under my clothes and 1 regular one.

I might have a belt somewhere- should I deem it useful.

I have 1/2 a dozen scarves to wear with my work clothes. Most of the time the scarves carry all the burden of coloring my ensemble. My work clothes is based in navy blue. I have 3 pairs of work pants and 1 jacket. A navy turtleneck when it is cold, and a navy crewneck for when it is not. For warmer weather, I have 3 -4 short sleeve dressy shirts.

Whenever I find a tool that will allow me to get rid of 2, I do so. And stuff is just tools. I don't collect them.

But babies. They are something else.

Power of Re-vision

The first pass at notes on wikis I made were very similar to my blog posts- personal viewpoints with lots of quotes and material taken from my sources, but as I read up on how to write wikis, I had lots of revising to do.

And that ability to easily revise is what really helps give wikis power, not only is there a process to get better, but is it about as quick and painless as those processes can be.

Re-vision suggests seeing again, perhaps through another lens or from another point. Wikis not only allow our personal re-visioning processes but also allows collaborative processes. The power of collaboration is in essence what wikis are all about.

Now, I like google docs for collaborating in formats like a word processor or a spreadsheet, but wiki formats are for quickness and are always works-in-progress.

For general information on the real wikis work really well- whether a wiki on the local party scene or something as massive as Wikipedia. I am debating of the usefulness of wikis for my son's Monsterous Monsters. There a wiki would collaborate to create information on each monster and how it works within the Monsterous ecosystem. He is always creating new monsters and I think a collaborative work environment would make it fun to create monstrous puns and ideas with other creative people. A wiki full of imagination.

What's with this Jane Austen thing?

I do not understand Jane Austen or the nature of her work. But I do understand there are a lot of devoted Jane Austen fans. Can somebody help me figure out what you see in her work?

When I have read Jane Austen, of my own accord. I got a chapter in, read snippets in other sections of the book and never forced myself to read it again. Now I have to get all the way "Persuasion" for my British Lit, women writers class. I am about 3/4 done with it. And I have to admit I am still confused.

Jane Austen writes like an 18th century middle school girl. All internal feelings and gossip of a character who can never act for herself. All about social positions and wondering if somebody likes them or not.

The story almost makes sense if I cast Ann as an Ogre or Vampire or some other social outcast that is hiding who they really are. (Hence the rise of the Twilight series?)

The class started so promisingly with Aphra Behn, who at least wrote of topics of action, then Evelina by Fanny Burney. In Evelina the character once again tells all her emotions and thoughts and worries about social missteps, and can not talk for herself, but at least it was written with every scene dialoged up and easy to play in your head, something that Austen doesn't do a lot of. Austen tells us about it, and doesn't show it. UGH if I were her writing teacher . . .

This is the same time period as Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Now there was a story. Of course Mary Shelley had an awesome mother who firmly believed women should not been as the frail, pale and ignorant. That treatsy today seem like no big deal, but Mary Wollstonecraft wrote a whole book on it "The Vindication of the Rights of Woman" and if I was any guess by the nature of what we have been reading, it was sorely needed.

Good, Bad or Ugly?

For Dana Boyd, blogging is about building bridges of understanding across the great gulf of the online world.

Every useful thing is a 2 edged sword. Most things can be as harmful as they are useful, that includes the internet. Dana tells a story about one awful Blogher conference. What a horrible thing happened when those in the audience instead of working towards building bridges, actively tore a live speaker down on twitter that was trending behind her on a big screen.

And hence we see the ugly side of social media, just in case speeches of hate or intolerance was not enough passed around on Facebook.

The most powerful use of blogging I have seen, which shapes my sense of the value of social media, was a vlog from the heart of the fighting in a city in Syria. It was a teen girl, describing the best she could what was going on. It was honest. It was raw, and it was needed to awake the world the awful situation we had allowed to develop.

Another powerful scene is social media is when 2 countries were preparing for war, but all over social media, notes of love and admiration were sent by individuals in one country to the other stating that they didn't support the war and had no desire to harm the others. This worked both ways and the governments had to back down from the full offensive action.

There is power in the tools of  social media. How are we going to use this power?

Service and Social Media are not always opposite, It depends on your focus

Another thing to think about when looking at Social Media use and Narcism

Linda K Burton said: 

We live in a culture where more and more we are focused on the small, little screen in our hands than we are on the people around us. We have substituted texting and tweeting for actually looking someone in the eye and smiling or, even rarer, having a face-to-face conversation. We are often more concerned with how many followers and likes we have than with putting an arm around a friend and showing love, concern, and tangible interest. As amazing as modern technology can be for spreading the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ and helping us stay connected to family and friends, if we are not vigilant in how we use our personal devices, we too can begin to turn inward and forget that the essence of living the gospel is service.

I have tremendous love for and faith in those of you who are in your teen and young adult years. I have seen and felt of your desires to serve and make a difference in the world. I believe that most members consider service to be at the heart of their covenants and discipleship. But I also think that sometimes it’s easy to miss some of the greatest opportunities to serve others because we are distracted or because we are looking for ambitious ways to change the world and we don’t see that some of the most significant needs we can meet are within our own families, among our friends, in our wards, and in our communities. We are touched when we see the suffering and great needs of those halfway around the world, but we may fail to see there is a person who needs our friendship sitting right next to us in class.

Templates, Forms how do I identify myself within thee?

Unless you are talented in writing code, you have probably used a template to create your page or identity online. Facebook is ripe with these, so is Blogger. I even built a whole commercial websites using templates, then I learned how to manipulate code and made it better ;p

Christine Rosen discusses social media and virtual friendship and does so from a very 2007 bend. Since then we have learned that Social Media is not a big scary monster for teenagers and young adults only, now it is old school, left to those of us not hip enough to move on the next trend of social networking. There has been no lack of research on how social media is connected with our, and especially our teenager's mental health.  Christine could say "I told you so." But she hasn't published much to The NewAlantas lately.

Something about gathering friends by those answering similar things in the same categories...
Hold that thought. It's a real-life distraction break intruding on my online musings.

This little cutie climbed into my lap, nuzzled me said "Mommy, Mommy, Mommy" and then hit my glasses off.

ok, Back to carefully constructed cyber-reality.

So identities we create online are often a result of filling in forms and are therefore limited to the nature and design of the forms or templates. Do these templates construct our idenity? Jenny Davis seems to think they do. Which brings me back to Christine, who thinks that we try to make ourselves unique on these online social media templates by doing things just like everybody else. Apparently, there is/was a tend of profile pictures with fingers up noses. With the group I hang with on social media, the trend is one of using our baby's pictures as our profile pics. I feel it helps send the message that I am a proud mommy and am not looking for social interactions with those looking for dates.

As I have worked on genealogy and indexing, a very addicting hobby, I have learned to value forms. Geneology becomes a much easier pursuit when forms became the rage. Forms make it so much easier to figure out what is going on, especially when they are typed. Before forms came on the scene you have to peruse the handwritten notes and books of the clergy. Not only do you have to decipher handwriting, but you have to wade through a lot of information that doesn't relate to what you are looking for at all, then you have to learn another language to read the clergy's notes from whatever countries your ancestors lived in before they immigrated to America, in my case a lot of German and Norwegian. Luckily for us, a lot of people volunteered hours to do "indexing." Indexing is taking these records and filling out the information into computer forms that become searchable, and are instantly linked back to the pictures of the original records.

So I guess, what we have now is not only templates constructing our online identities, but are also helping us construct the identities of our progenitors and also where we came from. Do you think they will help us figure out where we are going?  Do you think I could find an online form to see my grandkids?

How does Politeness work in Social Media?

Questions to consider:

How does politeness interact with social media, blogs, vlogs and minimal space mediums like tweeting?

Isn't politeness the grease of the social clockwork?s this grease ignored entirely for reasons of shock/attention span or character space? Or did it evolve and change forms?

We know some of the evolution:
All caps = yelling
Terminal periods on texts and tweets seem severe, nay even aggressive. Crair says that line breaks are more effective than the humble period, and terminal periods are completely unnecessary and therefore if they are used, they hold a different meaning, that being one of "pissed."

What about things like  :), or ;p, Where do they come in for politeness? When and how are they properly used?

When does discussion get uncomfortable? or offensive?

Does proper sentence structure show respect to your topic?

Blogs as Literature?

Steve Himmer in The Labyrinth Unbound attempts to analysis blogs as literature.
 First he explains that blogs have codes to understanding, just like novels.

The novel ... is defined as much in how readers are trained to enter its shared codes as it is by the specific delivery of those codes. Likewise, the weblog relies on particular codes enacted by both author and readers—readers who become, in this case, secondary authors.
Interactive writing, how novel!

 Unlike a novel in which the author’s interpretations are viewed through the lens of a character, or traditional journalism in which the author is purposely made invisible, writing on a weblog can only ever be read through the filter of the reader’s prior knowledge of the author. As one day’s posts build on points raised or refuted in a previous day’s, readers must actively engage the process of “discovering” the author.

This author discovery is one of the joys of reading good blogs. Besides learning on whatever topic the blog posts about, you slowly unwrap and discover what makes another tick. I have enjoyed this on little bit of finding the underlying author while learning about baking cookies or environmental degradation. 

Unlike a printed text, a blog "offers is multicultural, offering multiple paths for traversing the text. There is not single defined narrative route, as in Ulysses, but instead a variety of possible movements from each point in the work to any number of other points in the work. The text is reassembled—thus rewritten—through the interaction of author and reader with each performance."

And now for a barely related fascinating tidbit: "Raymond Queneau’s Cent Mille Milliards de poèmes, for example, is a collection of ten sonnets with each line of each poem printed on an individually manipulable strip of paper. Because each line of each sonnet poetically “fits” with every line of every other sonnet, there is a potential for producing and reading 1014 (100,000,000,000,000) individual poems. "

The interaction of blogs can be infinite and ever changing and ever expanding, never completed- almost a performance art, the process of making the blog literature is as valuable to enjoy as the the literature itself.

The weblog, as its detractors criticize, is often characterized by mundane, banal, sometimes embarrassing personal content ranging from what the author ate for lunch to specific health problems and sexual issues. This personal content, moreover, is frequently intermingled with commentary on politics or culture, making the personal, the public, and the political inseparable in precisely the ways the avant-garde demanded.

"Personal content intermingled with political commentary or cultural issues of the day"? That's never been seen on this blog.

With the analysed nature of blogs as lit, the ever-changing, never finished, interactive styles, it will be interesting to see how this literary style is taught in classrooms in 100 years.

Minimal Poetry

As Mark Twain once said, "Forgive me the length of this discourse, I hadn't the time to make it short."

Minimal Poetry would tend towards that trend of saying more in fewer words. In our modern world, most of what we see of this would be related to either Social Media, Facebook posts, and Tweets, where brevity is required, or in commercial settings, names of companies, brand, and logos.

The Huff Post ran an article on this.  From which a take a quote that questions the lack of validity often given to such Minimal Poetry:

"If there was such a poetic form as the two-word poem, it would be the ultimate in literary minimalism and the vanishing point for that most characteristic of modernist trends in poetry: ever-greater compression, or breviloquence. Why couldn’t the form of just two words have its own unique esthetic challenge that is just as valid a self-imposed restriction as a rhyme scheme or the seventeen syllables of a haiku? If a haiku is no less a poem than an epic, why should a two-word poem be any less a poem than a haiku?"

Having worked hard in the commercial word to create some of this Minimal Poetry to express the aims and desires of the company instantly to a hopeful buyer and brand follower, I can testify to the number of hours involved in it. It takes a lot of time to get it just right.

The two words poetry to express some of the following are below.
RoundBelly = maternity clothes
Eco Sprout = organic children's clothing
These are by no means the best examples that exist out there, and I am sure I have written some better Minimal Poetry myself, but these are the ones that I used often enough to remember them.

Here are some others that come to mind:
Don't squeeze the Charmin
Finger Licken Good
Third Rock from the Sun
Sleeping Angels
Toddling through the Demolition Zone

Besides commercial and online social adventures in Minimal Poetry, protest signs are a great source.

What do you know of Minimal Poetry?

Common Place Books

A description of "Commonplace books " sounds very much like the eclectic nature of my (and many other) blog(s) :

These more undisciplined and disorganized commonplace books appeared in every permutation and degree of sophistication, and included nearly every imaginable type of text: lines of epic poetry, lofty quotations, and, just as often, medicinal and culinary recipes, ribald couplets, hermetical numerical tables, cartoons, monumental inscriptions, magical spells, bad jokes; in short, all the literary flotsam and jetsam of the more vigorous sort of reader.

Before the net, I actually had an unlined journal that I used for that purpose. Some newspaper cuts, quotes, drawings, poems, ect. These books "“often function as [arenas] for the shaping and consolation of a self” (p. 338)— sites for individual identity formation, reinforcement, and negotiation."

Farnam Street claims to think these collections spark creativity and recombination. He also explains that these books serve to extend the memory.

That self-shaping and self-understanding seem to be a common thread in the value of blogging. As Efimova suggests, Something akin to the oft thought concept of learning through writing or Composition Epistemology.

But do they also shape the unwitting readers of our blogs?

Perhaps with creative commons and the sharing economy, when we blog, we are not only building our commonplace books but end up adding to a collective commonplace book, one for all mankind.

Surfin' the Web (nostalgia attack)

I remember the days when we could spend hours going from one interesting link on the internet to another. Ah, when the web was young (and so was I). The web was full of amazing ideas and discussions and little communities built up around particular interests and you could actually have conversations with people in comment sections, and because it required a little bit of self-education to get on and surf the web most posters treated each other as equals and conversations remained polite and kind (at least the groups I participated in.)

What brought on this nostalgia attack? A nice little article dating from the year 2000. I bought my first HTML book in 1997. At that time I used the internet for meeting men to date and communicating with my parents.  Interestingly, Rebecca Blood dates the first 23 blogs to 1999. Trying to remember what the web was like back when I had my first baby, who now could be in college, is the reason for the nostalgia attack. It was before 9/11 changed the world. But after I met my husband online, and after my college went to 100% online course registration and required everyone to check their school given email addresses weekly.

I remember one school paper on Hamlet that I didn't have enough source materials for, so I went to the web and ended up quoting some of the work a high school English class put up. It satisfied the teacher, although there were no conventions on citing it yet.

Rebecca Blood points out "These weblogs provide a valuable filtering function for their readers. The web has been, in effect, pre-surfed for them. Out of the myriad web pages slung through cyberspace, weblog editors pick out the most mind-boggling, the most stupid, the most compelling." This is one of my favorite reason for the blogs I frequented, most had pre-selected, or even curated a selection of news or articles that were important to me, mostly on subjects of ecology, economy, and midwifery. I even have a section on this blog where I summarize a book on global warming called 6 Degrees. As overwhelming as a change of 6 degrees seemed at the time, there is no doubt we are living through a lot of it now. 

I also agree with Rebecca's conclusion, some of the most valuable things the internet does is to allow the little guy a voice, whether it is inside view of a war zone or a sting to corporate media it is what the world needed then, and still needs now.

Reflections

When you look into a mirror or standing water you see a reflection, not reality as it actually is, but one that is flipped. Often times reflections allow us to see things in a different way or notice things we did not by looking straight on. So here I am going to attempt to flip my reality of the last 2 weeks on its head.

Starting school again is always hard. Christmas vacation was very challenging this year. We lost 2 dear family members, one expected due to cancer and the other my dearest Grandma, very unexpected. And what hurt was not so much her loss, because of my faith, I know that she is still with us and that I will see her again, but because I could not be there for her transition. I was in Florida on a long-awaited vacation. Vacation was fun, and still hard in some ways. Losing Grandma in the middle of it put additional pressure on the family and organizational challenges a trip of that size demands, but then my baby (toddler) sprained his ankle and had to be carried everywhere and required a fair amount of doctor visits. So I was nowhere as prepared for school as I would have liked, but it came roaring down upon me, and my baby who just started walking again the night before school started got used to having Mom always hold him, and wasn't happy about her going away routinely at all. (I am beginning to suspect grammar is one of the early things that get distorted in a reflection.)

So when I enter the class, I was relieved that most of this stuff is old hat, to a blogger of 14 years. Yup, this blog has been running since 2004. When I started the blog it was to connect with my extended family and share with grandmas lots of baby pics. The blog ended up connected with an online internet business I ran for the next 5 years and then Facebook came on the scene and stole the blogging steam. In some ways that freed my blog from the self-editing of having readers I knew and loved, and in many ways it just plain ignored it.

It is fascinating to blog again, to bring about snippets of life that deserve more permanent time than Facebook would give them, and to also share knowledge gained in the process. In this blog resurrection, I have updated both the look and functionality of my blog, adding widgets and blog roles (at the bottom of the page). I finally gave up pink as my background color,  as I no longer hope for little girls, but am a proud and exasperated mom of one pre-teen girl and one sweeter, smaller one.

I am enjoying using the RSS feed on Feedly. It has proven a most effective way to keep on top of class bogs and assignments, however, the news feeds are overwhelming.  I am much less enthralled with Twitter. The best thing about Twitter is the NASA feed I connected with. I guess I enjoy some permanence, some continuance as if I could save the perfect day (or minutes) on my blog and come back it when I need a lift. Wait, I do that. I lose myself in my blogs past to rediscover myself in the now. That alone is the most valuable reason to blog.
To see all the blogs for class, click on my tag #en3177

What does it mean to copyright a website? And what good does it do me?

I have always worked my websites under the assumption that I can not use anything I didn't create or get express permission for. Here is wisdom to the affect. Being Safe about Copyright.

But what about my work?
This information is useful. copyright
I have always kinda assumed this quote "Original work is copyrighted from the moment of creation, provided it’s fixed in tangible form." Which is one reason some of my creative work is on this blog somewhere, I wanted to have evidence it was mine before anyone could lay claim to it. 
You could use a copyright symbol to hammer the point home, but "you don’t even need the notice to claim copyright; the law eliminated the requirement of public notice in 1989."

For $35 you can legally file a copyright, which allows you to sue for infringement, but it only includes the parts of the website that are uploaded at that time, or you could file for a 3 month copyright.

That all seems like a lot of work and money for a starving college student. So I would normally just let things be copyrighted from creation. However, when I consider that the most sincere form of flattery is imitation, I would be honored to have others think anything I have done on this blog are worth sharing, and I am excited to be part of the sharing economy. My conclusion to do a creative commons style licensing, this licensing will allow others to use and share my work. I would love my work to be shared and passed around, but I am not sure how I feel about other people making money off my work. 

Behold, my sidebar says it all.

Creative Commons and the Sharing Economy

Have you heard about Creative Commons? It is a sharing economy's way of maintaining credit for your work while allowing people to use it and share it and add to it. There are similar platforms for Live Open Science, instantly shared and connected science works. The creators of that were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2013. The developed software for that has been superseded with a more advanced platform called Open Hab (although this may not be the right name, as I  can not find evidence of it).

Anyways, back to Creative Commons. There are many different levels you may copyright your work at, depending upon how open you want to be with how others can share or add to it. And they have a multi layered tag attached that is instantly read by computer and humans. It is a cool interaction between the human creativity and the computer technology.

I really like concepts related to building a sharing economy and realizations that as robots/tech can replace a lot of our daily work what will we have left except our humanity/creativity? Therefore I would suggest that part of the change towards the sharing economy that we should consider is the concept of Universal Income or Basic Income. I know experiments are being tried in Finland and Norway and Washington state.

I wonder how much of a golden age we could enter as a world society if everyone had their basic needs met and were left to their creativity, especially if they were up to sharing it all?

RSS feed

Easy as pie. In fact, pie takes longer, especially if you are making your own crust. I used to use RSS of the blogs I followed and then Facebook took over and we all shared our interesting tidbits on Facebook instead of a blog, many of us dedicated bloggers stopped blogging and of course people stopped reading blogs because the info was on Facebook.

So I am going to run a test. Does my news feeds come better through Facebook or an RSS reader? Specifically I am comparing the Feeds for Washing Post, Huffington Post and The Atlantic. So far the RSS feed is winning, less cat and Trump videos to scroll through to get to the news.

What do you think?

Wow- insightful

Read this article on social change

We’re currently at the very edge of an abundant future, and the pace of change isn’t going to slow down. As Ismail put it, “…[civilization] is heading into a trough. I think it’s about a 20- or 30-year period. We need to get to abundance on the other side by creating new leaders, new projects, and new institutions.”

Not asking a lot is it?

Take Note Dads, this is how it's done

Interesting Ideas in Digital literacy:

"Digital literacy is not about the skills of using technologies, but how we use our judgment to maintain awareness of what we are reading and writing, why we are doing it, and whom we are addressing."

Maha Bali makes a most interesting point that judgment and awareness are needed even as we are quietly sitting at home on a computer because now this time is spent connected to the world.

Wow- makes me want to snuggle up with a good book.

What do you think?

Real or Fake- how to determine the difference

This is worth learning:
https://www.facebook.com/quartznews/videos/1871421812891512/

How do you tell fake from real news?