NOTE! Although of course my hope for 2012 include world peace and the defeat of both SOPA and PIPA, this is not that kind of blog post….
My hope for 2012 is to continue to hurtle toward old-person-ness with Rachel. Seriously, you’d think we were each 68 years old instead of just having a combined age of 68.
To wit, we:
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Have a spare buck in your pocket? Allow me to recommend Matthew Pearl’s dramatization of “The Shocking Campus Shooting in Virginia You Never Heard Of”. This long short story/short novella (you can argue which it is among yourselves) is set in 1840, on the grounds of the University of Virginia. On November 12 of that year, the dean of the faculty was shot—and later died—after attempting to quell a student-led disturbance on the Lawn (it’s true). The true story itself is interesting, but as usual with Pearl’s books both his characterizations and the locale are richly described and the tale told well.
I thoroughly enjoyed Pearl’s work, despite being in the perfect position to nitpick it to death since I work on Grounds and have held in my hands and read original accounts of the shooting and John Davis’s death courtesy of the Albert & Shirley Small Special Collections Library. But there’s no nitpicking from me—just praise, and the fervent desire that you all go take that dollar that’s been burning a hole in your pocket and spend it on this story.
While reading “The Professor’s Assassin” (available as a download from Amazon and numerous other outlets) you’ll be introduced to one William Barton Rogers, the future founder of MIT. This tidbit is important, as the novella is a prequel to The Technologists, a novel that focuses on the first class of students at MIT and, well, a fictional, yet historically-grounded, mystery. Intrigued? The book has its own trailer…and it’s about science and technology…in the nineteenth century. What’s not to love?
sort of interesting note: Matthew Pearl’s The Dante Club was one of the only books I read for pleasure during my PhD work in c19 American Lit.
I don’t really know.
I haven’t blogged much in the past year, but several months ago I wrote a blog post about what I do in my job at University of Virginia Library. All of that is now “what I did,” because I’ve resigned from that position effective the end of the year.
I’m not going to detail the reasons; you can chalk it up to philosophical differences in terms of technical focus, personnel, and institutional organization (and its resulting inertia). These are not unique to UVa or its Library.
The other day I wrote up a “it’s June 1st, sounds like a good time for a quick status update” email for my bosses, and in doing so stepped back for a second and said “holy crap—we’re really doing a lot.” It’s true, we are. “We” in this case is the Online Library Environment group at University of Virginia Library. Seven super people (three senior engineers, a senior programmer, two programmer/analyst/DBAs, and a librarian/project manager) report to me, and I report to a director who reports to the Deputy University Librarian. Like I said in my post about an internal presentation I gave on the development lifecycle, my group is responsible for many of the public-facing web services that the Library provides plus the technologies that sit behind those interfaces. Almost every project we take on is driven by stakeholders outside of our department who have their own highly valued areas of expertise (e.g. librarians, archivists, media specialists, etc.)
The reason I thought about writing this blog post was because this morning I had the opportunity to see some of the folks at the NINES / NEH Summer Institutes for Evaluating Digital Scholarship…not because I was participating in the institute in any way, but because I was on my way downstairs to get coffee and the participants were all working in the beautiful, wonderful, comfortable Scholars’ Lab. I was able to talk for a few moments with some scholars I like and respect very much, and one of them (Amy Earhart, if you’re playing along at home, who—to reiterate—is pretty great!) asked me what project I’m working on right now.
Project, singular.
I’m throwing in the towel with the Reverb 10 project—not because it was hard (I mean, it was, but in a good thinky way) but because with all the crazy traveling and life stuff I got so far behind that it seemed silly to go through the motions to catch up.
Honestly, I thought about each of the prompts every morning. I just didn’t write the posts. And really, the thinking is more important for me. I mean, sure—I know I’m just utterly fascinating and therefore who wouldn’t want me to hold forth on introspective personal topics (I’m kidding. No, really. I’m kidding.) … but really, the process was just for me to start orienting my brain in a different way. I’ve been doing that (independently of the Reverb 10 project), and will continue to do that, and hey, maybe I’ll actually blog about stuff in 2011. I’ve already declared it the year I get my life back.
I have some posts brewing—mostly technical thankfully (I know!) but maybe some personal as well. Or at least about nature. Or music. Those are good things.
The Prompt: “Wisdom. What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out?” (Author: Susannah Conway)
Don’t worry—I’m not so arrogant as to write “the smart one” on my own wine glass name tag. Someone did that a long time ago and I kept it because it made me laugh. A lot.
Ever since I was wee, I’ve been “the smart one.” I contend I’m not all that smart. Lucky, for being in the right places at the right time, sure. Also, lucky for having parents who taught me to read early on and let me do my thing with regards to learnin’ stuff…and bought me a TRS-80 and a Commodore64 and a subscription to Byte and…well, generally nurtured the nerd. Ok, it’s not like the label “smart” is untrue—and for sure at the party with the name tag shown above I was the smartest person in the room, Stanford degrees be damned (no offense, Stanford), but have you met some of my friends? Some pretty smart folks there. It is so wonderful to hang out with people these days and not be pointed out as the anomalous “smart one”; the…not-smart-one would be the anomaly.
The Prompt: “Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans.” (Author: Shauna Reid)
Interestingly enough, just last night I was talking to the two introverted chuckleheads pictured here about social gatherings and the introvert/extrovert personalities. All three of us, and I believe everyone I’m close to who knows their type, tests as a Myers-Briggs introvert. In the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the introvert/extrovert type is determined by how you prefer to engage with the world, and where you gain energy from. It does not necessarily correlate with whether or not you spend a lot of time in social situation. To wit: I test as a really strong I, but I love a good party.
The Prompt: “Beautifully Different. Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different—you’ll find they’re what make you beautiful.” (Author: Karen Walrond)
[And yes, that is how I interpreted this prompt. Feel free to interpret that as you will. ]
I would like to reflect on what it is about you (people in my community) that lights me up. In the long run, all I really want to do is match that. For all my bluster (which isn’t terribly blustery, you know) about “winning” or “everyone go be awesome today” or whatever, all I want is to witness and be part of something continually moving forward (including in iterations of stopping, thinking, building, reflecting). What lights me up is when my friends geek out, period.
The Prompt: “Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011?” (Author: Cali Harris)
Really. Name the subject, and I have people who will have my back and I’ll have theirs—regardless of where we actually live, or where we stand in some academic hierarchy, or whatever. I should know, because I’ve had occasion to call on people in several areas over the last few months: personal, pedagogical, professional…all the biggies. And never has my community (whichever it was at the time) failed me. I hope I haven’t failed them.
The Prompt: “Make. What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it?” (Author: Gretchen Rubin)
I could also punt and say “well, I made a dissertation, and an article, earlier in the year,” because that’s what academic sorts do, but that seems kind of lame, too. While the article is pretty good if I do say so myself, I made it in 2009 and just polished it up a little in 2010. And the dissertation? Well, if it were a cake it would be a lumpy, lopsided cake with too much baking powder. Never good. Not my best work.
