Southern Writers Online - critiques/opinions

Porgy - Liked this one more than I thought I would. Dialect needs to be read aloud in your head - or actually aloud if you're an extrovert - then the words become understandable. Sympathetic characters considering the time it was written and the difficulty in understanding another race and culture; difficult today as well although it may not be pc to say so. The plot was classic Greek tragedy - foreseeable and fore ordained. Interesting considering the real "Porgy" who was a combination of the hero and the villain of this piece and died as a result of his lifestyle. Both more and less interesting than fiction but not classic tragedy. Thought the writing was well done to develop plot and characters in such a small book.

Fair and Tender Ladies - Slow start in developing the characters but they grow into interesting "people" in the course of the book. Really came to like the main character and her attitude to living. The plot was fairly predictable but the characters were sympathetic enough to enrich it. Satisfying ending with most of the loose ends tied up; the author kept track of her characters and reintroduced them from time to time in a lifelike history. Epoch novels crossing decades are not my favorite type so wouldn't have read this by choice but very glad I did. Think the main role was written with Nicole Kidman in mind?

The World Made Straight - Interesting characters neither all good nor all bad, quite complex and 3 dimensional although the mentor character is rather weak as a person. The setting and culture ring true as far as I know - or it's a good job of creating convincing ones. Liked this one better than his other books. I look forward to trying him again.

Walking Across Egypt - Loved this main character - spunky and independent mind within a traditional being and setting. The secondary characters were well developed with a few words and scenes. The plot had some nice twists and built to the end. Not sure the whole premise is believable but if you suspend reality and enjoy the humor and characters the book is lots of fun.

Tales of Uncle Remus: Adventures of Brer Rabbit - Read this with the Children's Book Club last summer so researched the background and was very impressed with Lester's scholarship and interest in the Brer Rabbit stories. The children enjoyed them on a straight forward level and adults can appreciate the underlying ideas as well. Brer Rabbit is the classic mischief maker who gets away with it all, much to the chagrin and sometimes anger of the other animals. Since we all knew someone like that, these tales are easy to empathize with from one viewpoint or another which is probably why they endure so well.

St. Dale - Good book, destined to be a movie I think. Found myself envisioning who would play which role as I read. Nice variety of characters if a little predictable. A plot involving lots of diverse characters from different backgrounds develops a life of its own - "Loveboat" anyone? The plot developed and moved along quickly. I was impressed with the author's knowledge of NASCAR and/or the amount of research that went into this book. Did like the ending which was somewhat open - for another book?

Flikr was easier than I thought... thanks to Robin's advice. Actually, I find Yahoo easier to manage than many other sites - if you follow their "step by step" it really gets you where you want to be instead of in some cyber loop. Posted Marf and friends - one of the better pix I've taken, there may be hope for me yet...

After much gnashing of teeth and with the kind help of Shannon and Tracey, I downloaded an MP3 file to the MP3 player and to the PC. Exhausting. Can I just play vinyl on my turntable now? Could really have used a quick class in "how to" before I tried, would have been much more time efficient. Should have snagged a passing 15 year old who could have figured the whole thing out intuitively and instantly. However, c'est fini and many thanks to Shannon for her patient help.

MySpace is fun and often funny - look up Gummy Bear Dance, Gummy Bear Dance 2, and Tredmill - great animations. Some very amaturish videos from folks with more chutzpah than talent too but I can see this site as a great showcase for talented filmmakers trying to break into The Business. Interesting chat options, interesting classifieds.

Librarything is interesting if a little intimidating. Put in a dozen of my books (the ones I can remember offhand) and found I was the only one who listed about half of them. Can't be the only one in the world who has them... lots of them are old books picked up second hand or republished so somebody out there has them too... I can see using this to keep track of books esp if you loan them out and want to be sure they come back.

Bookmarklets - what a great idea. Can see lots of uses for much of it ... and probably all of it if I were better at using computers up to their potential... I like the word counting aspect alot. Interesting that there are varieties for Netscape, Explorer etc.

Went to podscope.com - fun to pick and choose what you want to watch and cut off those with whom you don't agree politically... Found Ourmedia.org and Brightcove.com which are similar altho Ourmedia seems to be more like Youtube. Found (stumbled on) USC Annenberg site through podscope - has great How To Guides like "how to shoot better online videos" and useful info.

Went to the King County Library site (think Seattle) which of course is wonderful. Lots of good lists of books for every category plus GOOD graphics. Texas State Library and San Antonio Library good for for hispanic/Spanish info (kind of boring looking). All had good links to even more info. I think GCL website is great - easy to use and has lots of good info. Think it might be better if some of the categories were updated more often - as more and more patrons rely on computers for info instead of calling, we need to be up- to- date accurate. It is easy to navigate and straight forward which is a real plus. Some other sites are so "designer" that they become hard to use. Would like to see more links someday and a real ad campaign to make people aware of the Homework Help. The info is there but patrons aren't clueing in.

Blinkxx has a Consumers' Guide write-up about movie downloads which recommends Butterfly as the best and offers a link. Butterfly is $39.95 a year w. unlimited downloads - but the way things are changing, think I would rather pay as you go since a year from now who knows which ones will still be in biz. You can burn DVDs through them so you can keep your old favorites or see the latest, very tempting... You can get to internet radio programming through their podcast site . Some great music available and well organized by type. Reminds my of the short wave radios which offered programs from all over the world - depending on which way the wind was blowing in the upper atmosphere...that was fascinating too.

MovieFlix - What a great site for OLD movies, the kind that used to be on tv in the afternoons and aren't anymore. Noticed most of the free ones are very short but that's ok for free. WC Fields "The Dentist" was a freebie and he's always good. Hadn't heard of most of the free cartoons but worth a try.

Wikipedia edit under" Papiamento"

(needs specific references to include in Wikipedia - glad to know they are careful of what they allow included and demand research references)

"Papiamento is linguistically similar to Ladino, the language of early Portugese/Spanish Sephardic communities. Since many early residents of Curacao were Sephardic Jews either from Portugal, Spain, or Portugese Brazil, it is logical that they brought their language with them and continued to speak it among themselves and in communicating with their servants and employees. These servants and employees would have used the language with their own modifications and taught it to their families since jobs existed for those who spoke it. As the Jewish community became the prime merchants and traders in the area, business and everyday trading was conducted in Papiamento/Ladino. As various nations owned the island and official languages changed with ownership, Papiamento/Ladino became the constant language of the residents. " Ellis

mytrialanderror

Librarian, patron, and bookseller admire a children's book donated in memory of a beloved member of the community. Thanks to everyone for posing willingly and smiling real smiles...

On bloglines with a small blog and blogroll w. subscriptions. Interesting info - could definitely spend hours and hours reading all this. Fun but I think I need the Cliff Notes or start using the text messaging abbreviations, even speed reading couldn't keep up with all this info...

Looked at Firefox - finally. Apparently Google has bought it/created it and wants to get you to sign up for Google Plus with 8+ add ons - wouldn't let me proceed to Firefox without it... Very annoying. I LOVE Google but this was frustrating. Have now looked over Firefox and it seems ok - so used to Explorer I'll probably continue with it until there is a real reason to switch. Netscape was the one I used about 10 years ago and didn't realize it was still an entity. Seems fine - lots of opinion messages from "members" who must have lots of free time. Do like the little news blurbs on the first page but it is so easy to get sidetracked following an interesting tidbit and forgetting why you logged on...

mytrialanderror


LibraryELF has a wonderful link to bestseller lists! Great for all those patrons who want suggestions or can't remember some title from Oprah's list of 3 years ago... I'm definitely putting this link on my Favorites list.

mytrialanderror

OK, I looked at Facebook.com - probably a good way to interact with fellow grads now scattered or within a large company with many branches. The TERMS are someone's law degree thesis and remind me of those lovely disclaimers with medecine nowadays. I did catch the "cookie" part which must be where they make their money. Really like the new setting they put on where you can chose how much info to get from which friend - cuts down on the friend who loves to babble just to be babbling. Not sure I would want to share that much of myself online and alot of trouble to create a much more interesting persona...