Thing # 9: Information Overload

It is Flex Day. No, I am not going anywhere special. I am sitting in my rocker with a laptop, and I am watching The Plague episode which is airing on The History Channel. That reminds me .... My retired librarian friend just purchased a copy of Daniel Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year at Barnes & Noble, and Valerie Koehler, of Blue Willow Book Shop, recently purchased a book she thought I would like: The Pesthouse by Jim Crace. A man and a woman, in what was once the land of prosperity, join forces and traverse the United States, which in this future time is sparsely populated and rife with lawlessness. Valerie was right; it is my kind of book.

All righty then. Blogs. I started looking for blogs by seeing what other people have listed. That could be construed as cheating, I suppose. You see how much that bothered me. Then I went to Google Reader, which, after trying the others, is my favorite because it is the least complicated. Next, I tried Syndic8, which interestingly lists 5 random syndicated feeds, 10 random headlines, 5 most recent actions, and 5 most viewed feeds, among others. I searched for blogs dealing with "YA Lit" and subscribed to " Teen Reads," which I may or may not keep. Topix permits searching by keyword or phrase. Again, I searched for blogs dealing with YA Lit, but I didn't find any I wanted to read on a regular basis. As you can see, I listed few blogs--not wanting to get blogged" down!

Thing #8: All Googled Out

Following directions is for linear sequential people; I like to jump around. Maybe that is why I get confused! Anyway, I made friends with Google Reader and added blog sites and RSS feeds. This is WAY too much information to digest at one time. That is why Google Reader is such a great idea. I can read what I want when I want.

I am sharing three items that appealed to me: a video of a volcano eruption; a video about climbing Everest; and, a news item about malaria. My favorite is the Everest video, although it is rather long. I have just finished reading Peak (couldn't find the underliner and didn't look very hard) which is about a teen whose father is an Everest guide and renowned climber. Dad wants his son to become the youngest person to climb Everest. I have read a handful of books about Everest and the people who climbed it (him? her?) and thought this was a credible novel for YAs. I would use the video, or a bit of it, as a hook. Oh, I know how to climb Everest, but I would need to borrow a different body!