feed-to-Organic-Learning

So, I think I have stumbled across what may just be the best book of 2011 and it is amazingly titled 'It's a Book'. In a world full of gadgetry everything can be by replaced by one. With Kindle and other E-book viewing and reading devices it is not surprising that the 'jackass' of this book has no idea what one is. It is a full illustration of the separation that is starting to occur between the individual and the everyday bound paper book.

Put in my hands by a young child hoping that I would read it for them I was totally blown away by the content of the book. I have not seen a book like it since 'Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus' and loved every page of it. I think I have found my 'gift of the year' not just for nephews and nieces but also for each and every one of my geek girl and geek guy friends. :)

This is my book of the year for sure. Set with a sense of irony that it is published in a print format rather than an online cartoon this great book illustrates the gap between a reader and the hard copy print of a book as a result of the digital age. Poking fun at the gadget comparisons of what a device can or cannot do this book shows the absolute wonder that comes from opening a seemingly plain book. It is fantastic book and I recommend it for any child or adult as it has put everyone I have spoken to about it into roars of laughter and even tears. It truly shows how times are changing...

Every political generation we see a new round of advertising on matters of health. From the 'Slip! Slop! Slap!' campaign of 1983, through to the spin of Life Be In it advertisement where even Norm took up the advice.

Norm was Life Be In It's poster child for not being active and had a long history of advertising in Victoria before being adopted nationally. With ads looking at his habits and then campaigning to him they covered all in ways that simply would not be 'politically correct' today. (Oh, how I miss seeing those campaigns).

Gone are the simple fun advertisements to be more active of yesteryear. Today, we are bombarded with the 'be active' campaigns. They are not as pervasive on television. But instead, bombard our car parking at the supermarket instead, telling us that we should park further away from the doors just to 'be active'.

And, of course, it wouldn't be political unless they were also promoting it through our schools with their 'be active' Challenge. Yes, each year some schools run a 4 or 10 week challenge for their students to undertake an hour of activity each day for 5 days a week. At four weeks the child gets a medal and at ten weeks the school has a chance to get a certificate and some State Government funded sports gear without tapping into their own budget.

Of course, I do wish that more Aussie schools and communities would become more pro-active in and of themselves. I love our local walking groups and all our sporting teams that play locally. With all the global media now it can be so hard for the profile of these vitally important local groups to be raised. Of merit too, are those schools and community groups who organise something active and fun that is outside the norm. One school in the United States captured my attention this week.

Primrose Schools are having a competition-based family dance off. Of course, none of the silliness of the school dance-off on Grease, no, of course it will be crazier than that! You can find out more, watch some hilarious footage, and be inspired to shake that bootie for yourself by checking out the web site for the full scoop as "legal residents of the 50 United States or the District of Columbia" submit their videos in the hope of snatching up the cash grand prize whilst raising money for charity. Now, that is community and charitably minded and, by golly, I hope to see more of it!

Holidays where Dad is home is always very special. Each of our children has their own way of finding special time both with Dad by himself and with he and I together. Today Boof had his special time.

With his brothers occupied with a DVD they got for Christmas he saw his chance and jumped at it. With a busy home schooling life, and PJ Bear's special needs, I need to be ever so mindful to make time for Boof and, thank goodness, he is mature enough to be able to seek our attention in truly positive ways.

We have been on a mass cleanup in preparation for having tradespeople romp through in coming weeks and we had spent most of the day collecting up all the odd toys, bits and pieces with a view to getting them sorted and packed away where they belong.

We made some great in roads though I am still left with a large pile on the floor. Mid afternoon, though, my back was feeling the strain of all the effort of shifting all our furniture around to thoroughly clean and I was due for a break. In the process of cleaning, Boof noticed that I had made some games more accessible for him and as I stretched my back he picked up his favorite family game, Boggle and asked to play.

Of course, Boof is not a child prodigy, he is barely forming letters let alone identifying words. In reality he just loves shaking the box with all the letters in it. (Yes, I know the new version doesn't need a box). It is loud and when he is done he has his own pad to write on as we get to the serious task of word finding to 100 points.

It was great to be able to play without the children so that we had an evenly matched competition for once! Of course, my husband beat me 108 to 73. I am sure that it is only because he writes faster than I do as we are never usually short of word finding with only one exception this time around. It was a doosey and we were stonkered. I put it aside to show you all but, in typical fashion, absentmindedly either misplaced it or threw it out. Oh well, next time!

Well, surgery happened two days ago now and being my first surgery ever I was not sure what to expect which has it's pros and cons.

Firstly, I had an in depth discussion with the anesthetist about my concerns. After taking my pulse he asked whether I had ever seen a cardiologist about my bradycardia. Of course, the answer was no, because it was always associated with my fitness levels. However, he spiked my concern enough to follow it up with my GP because my resting heart rate has continued to decline even since I stopped working with my personal trainer and started to slacken off a bit.

So, that is on my 2011 to-do list.

He decided that, yes, a general anesthetic would add risks related to lower heart rate so we decided to go with an epidural and a foot block with some other drug that will make me drowsy. Of course, that was not administered until they started the surgery so they knew for sure that I did not feel the pain. It was a good outcome from my perspective as they could keep my heart rate at around 40bpm that way.

I guess it was strange having a Surgeon that was approximately my age working on me. He was listening to the same music I listened to as a teenager in the Operating Theater. It was a little disconcerting listening to Metallica as they cut me open but I got over it.

So, foot blocks are great until they wear off and if you have had your foot cut open then you can't expect paracetmaol and codeine to cut the mustard. Instead I have been juggling in Endone to manage the pain the best I can. Night-time trips to the bathroom are the worst as the meds have worn off whilst you were sleeping so moving more than 5 meters induces a great desire to vomit and pass out with the nausea.

The whole thing looks pretty messy right now. I am not meant to remove the dressing for two weeks apparently. I am not sure that it will last that long with the sensitivity of my skin grafts but I guess we will see. I am sure that if the weather gets any warmer I will be pulling them off at the first available opportunity.

In the mean time the couch has become my bed as it allows me to elevate my foot in a way that allows me to lie on my back front or side without having issues with the way my foot rests. It is nice to be able to minimise that throbbing feeling where possible.

Many a day of living on the couch ahead - I am looking forward to the time off.

As a household, we are now 'known' for our library and for a long time I have been lost as to how to get it into a maintainable order. This has been, in part, owing to the need for custom shelving to be put into place but that is a separate matter.

One of my big issues is classification and recording the content of our collection (primarily for insurance purposes) because we have about 2,000 titles varying wildly in the cover price of each. Something that makes this harder is that indexing records are held behind a barrier called 'money' so that doing these things for yourself, in your own private collection, becomes a problem.

So, on my pre-bed quest of the night I went searching for answers...

..until I stumbled upon Library Thing. This was a dream come true that had me asking, "Where have you been all my life?"

The web site is primarily made up of forums and your profile which includes the ability to list books from your collection which is great! Now, don't be thinking that's all because I am sure there is more there but I have been overwhelmed with the wealth of information I have gleamed already.

They also have Group forum areas. This is where I will say it is not necessarily child friendly because there are some very liberal groups in there. For the discerning adult, this is a fine place to visit as long as you make an active choice to just not visit the groups that you may have moral/religious/political/other objections to.

So, as part of my group subscription trawl I came across an interesting group called the 'Build the Open Shelves Classification' which has a wiki that it is working from at the moment. It appears to still be at a grass-roots level at the moment (from my brief reading) but I look forward to delving deeper in the nearer future. It has been a while since I have been on the Open Source scene so it may be a good chance to dust myself off and get to work for a change!