Method #12

Overall, I enjoyed the Texas Two-Step program. Some of the tasks were things that I had never seen before (Tagging), while others were things that I had seen and had never thought about (Cloud Computing, IM). And finally, there were things that had been covered previously (Flickr, Youtube), but that I found out new things about.

I would definitely take a follow-up course, but I honestly couldn't say what the follow-up course would cover. For one thing, software and applications change so rapidly that who knows what's going to be popular and necessary in a few years from now. After all, think about how many things that were on the list that didn't exist until a few years ago. And, think about what might possibly pop up in the next few years to come.

One follow up program possibility is the same list that we've already reviewed (Podcasts, wiki, youtube, etc.), but geared specifically towards libraries, their applications of these services (Podcasts towards learning ESL, Youtube "Round-Robin" broadcasts reviewing books, etc.) and their success, failures and improvements.

Podcasting #11

This, possibly more than anything else presented so far, is something that will truly change the world as we know it.

Podcasting allows anybody to live the old Mickey Rooney and Julie Garland fantasy and "Put on a show". Aspiring playwrights and other writers, wannabe actors and actresses, teachers and amateur enthusiasts of all stripes can put on a production and potentially reach an audience as big as any of the major networks. And, thanks to moviemaking, music composition and CGI software, the at-home productions can reach suprisingly good quality. Education and entertainment where ever you go and whenever you want it.

Of course, that same ease of access can work against the people producing the podcast as well. When I looked under the comedy section of Podcastalley, there were nearly four thousand podcasts. I hardly knew where to start.

For libraries, I see the most direct applications being with the special interest groups such as the writer's club. But, this can be used by any group with creativity and an urge to share it with the world.

Task #10

The wiki task was the easiest (so far) of them all. Logging in was a piece of cake and the editing process is very straightforward. For my favorite blog, I posted a link to "Next Big Future", a science blog that looks at new technology and ground-breaking experiments. And, as a bonus, I contributed another entry, this time to the favorite movie section. I chose Casablanca, Drunken Master II and Blues Brothers and did a small blurb about each of them. These are not my favorites so much as being some of my favorites. But, If I posted my entire list of favorites, it wouldn't be a top three, it would be a top twenty. Or more.

Finally, I realize that I've mentioned the possibility of "Cyber-Vandalism" before, but with the Wiki format, it becomes a tangible possibility. While entering my entry in the movie section, I accidentally deleted the first two words of the next entry. I retyped it and fixed it, but that demonstrated how easy it is to mess with or remove something you don't agree with. Even Wikipedia has been having some problems along these lines. If we do use this at the libraries, we will have to be very carefull about who gets access and how much they get.

Task #9

To me, IM's represent what I like to call "One-Sided Apps". I read them quite frequently, but I rarely post to them.

For example, the author of one of my favorite webcomics posts his new ones pretty late at night. His IM, which is right next to his comic, shows his progress. So, I can know whether or not I can wait an hour and get a chuckle before bed or to wait until the next day to look.

That's probably the best application, the "Broad Audience" appeal. Since Jeph (The guy who makes the webcomic) is "talking" to thousands of people, posting an IM makes the best sense.

It also explains why I never use it. If I ever have to talk to people, it's always one at a time and I'll just call or text them. I've never had the "I need to talk to a whole bunch of people right now" scenario happen to me.

For the library, the best use for IM would be for programs. Again, that's the need to talk to a broad audience.

Skype, with the webcam and all, sounds a little too advanced for me.

I did the second option for the exercise, but tslacdl isn't currently online. So, I left a message and she should post a response soon. Then, I'll post an update.

Method #8 Social Networking

Right off the bat, I can tell you that one of the strongest advantages of social networks like Facebook or MySpace is that the patrons (Especially the kids) are already knowledgable about it. Or, for that matter, more experienced than we are. (Again, especially the kids) So, any library program involving Facebook or MySpace would simply be a "Plug in and play" situation.

When I looked up "PCL Library at UT Austin" on Myspace, It said that it was "Invalid, user has either cancelled or has been deleted". Odd.

It's hard to picture the Library of Congress having Twitter. When you hear "Library of Congress", the first thing that leaps to mind is historical documents written on centuries old parchment. But, it is very usefull. Lots of "Bulletin Board" style notifications, which I could also see the Little Elm Library doing.

Part #8 of the assignment was pretty easy, since I'm already signed up for MySpace.

I really don't see too much of a problem with privacy online for myself personally, since I honestly don't go online that much. However, if we choose to do this as a library program, a warning about posting should be included.

Tags #7

I found Tagging to be an interesting concept and I think it could be useful in a library setting. But, only with a few caveats.

First and foremost, there needs to be a decision about how "Social" our tagging network should be. Opening it to everybody, especially the younger crowd, invites the risk of "Tagger Vandalism". One way of combating this would be to resrict tagging to staff only. However, in a small library like ours, it would severely limit the input.

Two other alternatives that exist are that we could co-opt other bookmark lists. For example, a bookmark list done by Stephen Hawking would be a great place to start for physics assignments. Since delicious is a social site, you can search for specialized networks to "piggyback" upon. Second, we could do temporary tagging or specialized tagging. A mystery book club or anime club would set a bookmark list.

After exploring the delicious site, I have to say that I really like the search engine. You can search by typing the tag and then refine the search by typing in another tag. Visually, it acts as a straight line, one word leading to the next and, if you want to slightly alter the search, you can "X" out the words that you don't want. For example, if you want a recipe for turkey stuffing with cranberries, you type in thankgiving-turkey-stuffing-cranberries. But then you decide that you want to do the stuffing differently and have the craberries by themselves. So, you just "X" out "turkey" and "stuffing" and leave thanksgiving-cranberries.

Simple, but effective.

Task #6 P.S.

I tried to post the Hsing I video and failed. Definitely trickier than I thought. I'll keep trying in future posts.

Task #6

I've always found youtube and google video to be a very useful tool. People are looking for, well, anything and you can find it on one of these two sites. The other day, I was looking for a movie made off of the novel "The Girl, The Gold Watch and Everything" written by John D. MacDonald in 1962 (Also famous for his Travis McGee novels). And, I found it on Youtube, made into a TV movie in 1980, starring Pam Dawber (Mork and Mindy) and Robert Hayes (The Airplane movies). Frankly, the book was a lot better.

This was the first time that I'd ever heard of TeacherTube, but I like the concept. Many colleges other schools are uploading vids of basic courses and this is a great site for students.

Overall, I would rate Google videos as the best, chiefly because they post vids from other sites as well. Sometimes you can't view the video on the Google site, but you can always follow the link back to the original site.

The video that I've posted is an example of Hsing I, one of the martial arts that I practice. What's being practiced is called the Five Element Fists and the gentleman who is doing it is not linked with our style. So, the way that he's doing it is somewhat differant from the way that we practice.

Ironically, Google does have video of Kenny Gong, the master who taught my teacher and who has since passed away. But, apparently the vids were posted without permission and so, I'm kind of leery about re-posting

Task #5

I found this to be very interesting because of the contrast with what I had learned previously about photography and privacy laws.

I've been through journalism school and we were always told that the standard was "Expectation of Privacy".

For example, if somebody is walking down the street, they are in the view of the general public. If I take a photo of that person walking down the street and post it online, I'm adhearing to the same standard that he was, I'm just showing the image to a wider slice of the public.

On the other hand, if I post the picture and say that his name is "such and such" as well as his address and phone number, that's actionable. Nothing in his appearance condoned the release of that information and he has a reasonable expectation of privacy towards that information.

This, by the way, is why the press can be more intrusive with celebrities. They're much more public figures and a lot more of thier lives are commonly known. If I post a picture of the President and say that "He lives at the White House, here's the phone number", it's not exactly a secret.

I can see why many libraries are being carefull. In dealing with the general public, it's always better to have that "Extra Mile" worth of Ettiquette. But, if the event that you're photographing took place out in the pubic, written consent forms are a bit much.

Furthermore, I don't think that privacy would be much of an issue in using photos from Flickr. Because it's been posted into the public domain, any privacy (Or copyright) issues would be targeted at the person who posted them. Any person or institution that used the photo afterwards (Such as a library for a school report) would simply be an innocent bystander.

Finally, I found that I preferred Flickr over Picasa simply because of the fact that with Picasa, you have to download a program. If I was a hardcore photographer, I might prefer the software. But, for a casual user (Like me and, I suspect, most of the rest of the public), you just want to get a picture for particular purpose, leave and be done with it. In that case, the software is just one more thing to clutter my computer.

The photo that I chose from Flickr? No special meaning. I just chose it because it looks cool.

Task #2

I've revisited Task #2 in order to fully complete it. Watched to short video, went through all the details, revisited blogger, etc. It never hurts to cover the same ground twice, because you never know what kind of details you've missed the first time.

Task #4 The Reader

Catch the Movie reference?

Seriously, I logged into Google Reader and subscribed to three different blogs: Dojo Rat (A blog posted by a Martial Artist in Seattle), Next Big Future (A blog about cutting-edge science and new developments in technology) and Instapundit (a general/political blog). All three are pretty interesting and you should check them out.

In examination of the RSS feature, I, personally, don't see what the big deal is. Yes, it is nice to have everything in one spot (Brought to you on one plate as it were), but I really didn't see how the old way was such a travailing experience.

When you go to a blog or newssite, all you have to do is go to Google, type in the name of the site and you are there. It's a process that takes only a few seconds. 99.9% of the time you spend on a blog is taken up with reading content, which you do with a reader anyway.

Secondly, a blog is often more than just the posts. A lot of times, I've found new and interesting blogs because I've followed the links posted in a sidebar and the reader didn't have that.

Admittedly, I've only tried the Google Reader. Others may have that option.

I won't be using a RSS on a regular basis, but this was good to learn so that I'll know enough to talk about it to patrons that ask.

Note

I skipped #2, because I already have a blog set up.

#3: Cloud Computing

Task #3 is one of those things where you have a moment of recognition and say, "That's what they call it. I've been doing that for years."

To me, the biggest advantage of Cloud Computing is the proliferation of small computers. Notebooks are really starting to take off and a lot of cell-phones are beefed up to include features that you used to only see on desktop computers. Add in the fact that Wi-Fi is constantly becoming cheaper and more accessable.

In order to save memory and computing power, instead of having software installed, you just use the online options whenever possible. This way, instead of having a dozen computers rooted to one spot, you could have two dozen notebooks for the same price that a patron can use anywhere in the library.

Texas Two Step #1

It was interesting to see and hear of all the various interactive possibilities for library patrons af the present and the future.

One particular thing that blew me away was the mention of Second Life within this context. I've been reading articles about how online Avatars are becoming more interactive and even learning to adapt to a user's own needs and wants. But, I've never considered such a thing in connection to a library.

Think about it. An online program that, after years of seeing what you check out at the library, understands your preferences well enough to suggest books and authors that you might like. Some people might think that's cool. Others will consider it to be a little too "Frankenstein' for thier tastes.

Me, I'm in the "cool" category.

Finish Line

By and large, I liked the 23 Things experience. It was a little overwhelming to sign up for or sample so many web services in a constant stream, but a lot of interesting "Things" were presented.

I liked the image generator and the motivational poster that I made, simply because that's the one that I had the most fun with. I liked Youtube, because I felt that that was the one with the simplest search engine to get the subject that you wanted. Although, admittedly, that might be because that was the one site that I was already most familiar with before it was assigned.

Finally, the one that appeals to me the most in a library setting is LibraryThing. It has the most comprehensive amount of information geared to and for book lovers. And, ultimately, that's the number one patron for a library.

Developing Your Own 23 Things

In developing a library's own 23 things, I think the most important issue is customer input.

Kids, for example, are way at the forefront of the learning curve for computers. If some new site or portal or web service becomes popular, odds are that they'll be the first to hear about it.

Second, the next source of input would be from "niche" groups. These are specific groups that use the web technology to flourish. Notable points are groups that use blogs, Facebook, Ning, etc. to facilitate meetings and to get new members. Another adaptation is that food trucks (The kind that sell take-away lunches) are using Twitter to let people know we they are at a moment to moment basis.

Finally, and specifically for library staff, there are online books and databases. This is a way to access huge amounts of info on just about any subject at virtually no price. This is a hugely useful resource.

Podcasting

I have to admit. On this one, I'm far behind the technology curve. For some time, I've been constantly chewing on myself to get an IPod (I'm not even sure about the grammar. Do you capitalize both the I and the P? Just the I? Or, maybe you leave the I as uncapitalized "i". It's a brand name, so it's hard to tell sometimes.)

The strongest use of this would be for subjects and media geared around sound. I.E. Music, Talk Radio and News and Old-Style Radio Programs. Personally, I've always been a fan of the comedies of the Twenties, Thirties and Forties, such as W.C. Fields and Abbott & Costello.

Education would be useful as well, particularily the literature and second language podcasts. I listened for a while to some of the Shakespeare podcasts on the Education Podcast Network. Very Nice. Hearing the words spoken, rather than slogging through the reading(and the numerous footnotes) would be a big help to students.

Other subjects, like math or chemistry are more visual, but the podcasts can be a good suppliment, particularily with the vocabulary or definitions. Stuff like that.

Used in conjunction with Youtube, just about every subjust used for distance education should be covered.

Home Stretch- Task #20

The fact that the next task is about Youtube is excellent timing. Just yesterday, I was helping an older gentleman with a question and the solution involved Youtube.

Originally, he was looking for lyrics to old time country and western songs (Ernest Tubb, circa about the 1950's) as well as other artists that might have sung the songs as well. The problem arose when he wanted to hear the songs before he decided to download them. Most of the music sites either cost money to download or only had samples of the most current songs. Usually both.

I steered him over to Youtube, because it's a safe bet that enough music aficianados are on the site and upload variations of the song, even if it's only for backgrounds to thier own clips. He searched for "Filipino Baby" and found a version, sung by "Cowboy" Copas, that he liked.

Back to Task #18

It seems like 90% of all computer frustration comes down to one small detail. You get that one thing right that you were previously missing and suddenly, it all goes as smooth as silk.

Apparently, you can't use a header to start the new page that somebody else has used. For example, I kept using "Hobbies" as the title for my new page and somebody had already taken that for thier sub-page. I used "Martial Arts" and then, it was no problem.

For my other two sub-pages, I used "Literature" because Books was taken and "Cinema" because movies was taken.

Task #19

This was much easier than the last one.

The following is the document that I created:

There's a blog I go to on a regular Basis called "This Why You're Fat".

People can send in examples of the most over-the-top food dishes ever seen. Stuff like the Pizzaburger, which consists of a hamburger the size of a manhole cover served between two whole pizzas. Or, a model of Stonehenge, done with Kielbasa, standing on a field of baked beans. And, below you have the ultimate:

The 30,000 Calorie Sandwich

Sandwich filled with ground beef, bacon, corn dogs, ham, pastrami, roast beef, bratwurst, braunschweiger and turkey, topped with fried mushrooms, onion rings, swiss/provolone/cheddar/feta/parmesan cheeses, lettuce and butter on a loaf white bread.


Pretty cool.

WikiFrustrating

The practice Wiki that I, well, practiced on proved to be one of the more difficult tasks out there. I posted the page, but when I tried to create the sub pages, it seemed like nothing was happening.

Now, when it comes to computers, I have no shame. I'm not afraid to ask for help. But, the WetPaint site had no "Help" or "FAQ" section. In my humble opinion, every site and piece of software should be equipeed with one or the other.
This task, I'm going to have to leave half-done and come back to it on a regular date.

Thing #17

This is a much more "Behind The Desk" tool than the other items were. Use of LibWorm will probably come more from the process of running and evolving the library than in response to patron questions.

The subjects ranged from Censorship to Wifi. When I enroll in Library School, this will be a great toy to have in my pocket.

LibraryThing

Before I even signed on to LibraryThing, I was impressed with it's concept. All of the ther services and utulities that we've used/reviewed for the tasks are useful, sometimes extremely so. But they were only useful in the sense that they are for the general public. LibraryThing, on the other hand, is created specifically by readers and librarians for readers and librarians. Pretty cool.

This vibe was re-enforced once I joined the site and started looking around. I've never even heard of the author Alain De Botton, but he has a group solely for him. Other book and author subjects ranged from Scuba Diving to Midieval Europe.

It'll take some to do an in-depth perusal of this site, but I would be willing to wager that there are very few subjects or authors that are not covered.

Digg it

I searched for a bit and then took the option of joining Digg.

In order to test the search options, I chose a rather obscure subject to look for, the Bussard Fusion experiments that are ongoing. The most recent posting was from Feb.

To contrast, I went and looked for a more recent subject, Michael Jackson. The most Dugg pieces ranged from his appearence on the Simpsons to his first moonwalk.

All in all, I'd have to say that the results are somewhat "scattershot". Because this is content created by the general public, it has enormous potential. But, becaused it's content is created by the general public, it has the potential to get bogged down with inanities.

Task #14

I joined Delicious and I did skip step 2 and 3 in the process. I'm working off of someone else's computer and, as a result, I'm hesitant about adding features. I then searched for "Steampunk" and bookmarked three sites.

Steampunk refers to the literary genre of old masters like Jules Verne or H.G. Wells and more modern types like Neal Stephenson. It basically infuses the dawn of modern technology with the old-worls style of Victorian England.

Some people have taken the notions and have gone a step further, making steampunk toys, clothes and gizmos.

This is from one of the bookmarked sites: Datamancer.Net.

This guy is an artist who refinishes items, mostly computers in classic steampunk fashion.

There's some other good sites as well. Here the link to my delicious site:http://delicious.com/Fenriska

Tagging

Tagging could help users in finding the more obscure bits of information. For example, some guy mentions in his blog about an article on a chapter in an American History book that's relevant to Florida during the revolutionary war. Five years later, a search turns up the tag and a student able to snag the book for a report.

What I'm curious about are ways that you could modify searches for tags. Limit searches to published articles or for anything newer than five years? Or linking keywords together to create more precise searches? That would cut down on a lot of the confusion that the article mentions.

Twittering Away

Signing up for Twitter was a little bit more involved than the previous one. I had to provide my email password for this, which I'm still questioning. If we assist our patrons in signing up for this service, I anticipate that that will be a particular stumbling block for our more security-minded people.

Also, all the cool names were taken. A minor complaint, sure. But, again, it's something that we'll be hearing about from our patrons. Some nine-year-old wants to twitter under the name of "BobTheMighty", he'll be disaapointed when he finds out that it's gone.

For the record, I don't know if "BobTheMighty" is actually taken yet. After my first dozen choices were ruled invalid, I went with "Savateur10".

What is cool is some of the people on Twitter. One of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman, is on Twitter and I've signed up to follow him. So is Amanda Fowler, who I've mentioned in a previous post and I've sent an invite to her.

Probably the biggest flaw with Twitter is me. As you may have noticed, I can get pretty wordy sometimes and limiting myself to 140 characters will be very difficult.

Task #11- IMing

This was educational, especially all the abbreviations and acronyms that exist in "IM shorthand". It's amazing how new languages pop up and I dare say that "l33t Speak" fits the criteria for at least a sub-dialect.

The IM service that I chose was Yahoo, under the name "Kelley_M_Anderson". This was mostly out of convenience's sake since I already use Yahoo for email. Once I logged in, the 1st person that I could think of to IM was my Nephew, Graham, since he's always texting messages. However, he's offline at the moment. And, it occurs to me that he may have already gone through his minutes for the month, since he's always texting messages.

Ning

First off, great name.

Second, I took the option of not signing up for this network. To start with, I don't have a camera or video recorder (Unless you count my cellphone), so I can't really upload anything onto the Ning networks.

Also, I have to say that I'm a little twitchy about posting too much information for the public to see. For years, we've all recieved warnings about internet safety and heared horror stories about identity theft. I know that if you're carefull, you've got nothing to worry about. Still, the thought of posting so much of myself online causes a bit of a twinge.

I looked through some of the networks. It seems to me that one of the biggest benefits to this from the video postings would be the realm of "How To". Actually seeing something being done speaks louder than the most detailed book on the subject. I typed in cooking and got access to recipes demonstrated online. Pretty nice.

More of Facebook

I've joined three groups. Two martial arts (Pa Kua and Savate) and one group for writers. And, I became a fan of an Aikido page (A rather large one, they had over twenty thousand fans)

There's a bit of a gap between the local and the global in terms of content on Facebook. The martial arts page that I'm a fan of and the groups that I've joined are all global. I tried searching on the Dallas/Ft. Worth selection and the results were somewhat skimpy. I then tried to widen the search to Texas in general, but I couldn't make that work.

I've also tried to hunt down old friends that I have not seen in a while. The problem there was that I'm not sure about the details enough to refine the search. For example, the last time I saw Amanda Fowler, she was married. Did she register on Facebook on her maiden name or her married one? Is she even still married? Most of the people that I have enough information to track down with are people that I still stay in touch with and don't need to track down.

Still, this is only the first day that I've tried this. Maybe it'll get easier as I go along.

Facebook

Was interesting, but felt a little old hat.

This probably due to the fact that the whole process of registering for Facebook felt a lot like signing up for an email account. There's the same customed information, access to groups, etc. The whole thing is more "me" oriented than "site" oriented (The way an email account would be) , but the similarity is unmistakable.

The article that was posted mentioned the use of Facebook to disseminate new software and apps, which struck me as cool. Hopefully, the more I explore Facebook, the more stuff will pop up.

Gizmodo

..... is the name of the site I was talking about in the previous post. For the seventh task, I went ahead and got a subscription.

You should visit. A lot of the stuff on the site would only appeal to the hard-core geek (Like learning the latest hack for your IPhone), but there's a fair amount of other interesting items on there as well.

For example, if you search the site, there's a video of a rubber-band gatling gun. Loaded with a thousand rubber bands, it'll do something like 500 per minute. Wicked.

Pretty Simple

The title says it all for the sixth task.

I don't know if I'll be using this method on a regular basis. One of the things that I like about visiting some of the other blogs is that they have links to other interesting blogs. Which in turn leads to more interesting links, etc. It gets a little Alice in Wonderland sometimes, but you can stumble upon some interesting surprises.

On the other hand, the really busy sites are a little hard to keep up with. There's a couple that, a few days go by, and you're thirty posts behind.

This application, I'll play by ear.

Fifth Task

The fifth task is inserting text into a photo. I decided to give martial arts a rest and went with the Three Stooges.

Pretty Neat.

Mashups

When I read Task #4, my first thought for a mashup post was "DeMotivational Poster".

You've probably seen them around the net. These are take-offs of the standard "Motivational Posters" using all types of photos with a punch line attached.

One of the benefits of this being a popular mashup is that there are lots of sites that lead you through the steps of doing your own.

I had two main difficulties. The first was getting the photo to save and then upload. Luckily, Bighugelabs (Which is the Flickr site that does motivational posters) has lots of options and i finally stumbled though by posting with the photo's URL.

The second problem was inspiration. It's hard to come up with something clever and funny on command. I finally went with a photo that I had spotted on my earlier search through "Martial Arts" and snatched a clever tidbit from Wikiquote.

The only flaw remaining is that I can't figure out how to select the location of posting the poster. I tried to put the poster about marriage (The one that I did) at the end of this post. But, for some reason, it keeps being sent to the top of the post.

Minor detail. All things considered, it came out pretty well.

Using Flickr

It was interesting.

To begin with, I liked the fact that anyone with a Yahoo account was automatically registered with Flickr. I just signed in with my regular Yahoo pass and that was that. Very Easy.

I did a search for "Martial Arts" and then narrowed it down to "Hsing-I" and "Savate", the two styles that I practice. I liked a couple of the illustrations found under the Savate search. Here's the link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/snakeblocker/58525037/

Savate's a French style, developed during the early 1800's. I love the fact that you've got these guys in top hats and formal coats doing Bruce Lee poses with high kicks and elbow strikes.

Video's a lot better for demonstrating the flavor of a martial art, so I went to Advanced Search and started scanning for videos only. The pickings were much slimmer, with no good choices under Savate and Hsing-I. So, I widened the search to Martial Arts again and I found nothing that really caught my eye.

On a whim, I did a search for Charlie Chaplin and found a video for a great old routine of his. Here's the link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarita_xispa/3462185816/

Enjoy.

Almost Forgot

A shout-out to my fellow librarians and 23 "Thingers"

Time To Get Serious

As the title of the blog suggests, I've been a dabbler in the things of life. And, the important stuff, I've managed to avoid completing.

I've always mean't to lose 30 pounds.

(Which has morphed into 60 over the years)

I've always mean't to write the Great American Whatever. Depending on my muse at the time, it was either a play, novel, or a great cinematic masterpiece.

(Fortunately, I never tried poetry)

And, there's a whole host of other things that never got completed. Teaching myself sign language. Learning how to cook African cuisine. Stuff like that.

(To be honest, unlike the first two, not learning that stuff was no big loss)

But, I'm going to be graduating soon (And, straight back in for Grad School) and I need to start getting serious.

So, I figure that, if I post my goals, it'll give me a lot more motivation to finish. You know. "Put it writing".

At the very least, it'll take me a lot more time to blow smoke.