Posts tagged ‘interesting’

October 21st, 2011

13.1 & the circus

Last Sunday was The Day – my first half marathon.
And it was great! [I'm even pretty pleased with my time.]

My running companion was my coworker Devon [our Deputy Director] & it was nice to have someone to chat with along the way. I stole this photo from him, in which we both look awesomely goofy.

I had so much fun that I’ve already signed up for another half, the Rock CF Rivers Half Marathon in Grosse Ile – a run that raises awareness & research funds for cystic fibrosis.

Besides running, I’ve been taking classes at the Detroit Flyhouse for the past 2 months. They’re called “ariel yoga” classes, but it’s easier to tell people I go to circus class. It’s an amazing upper body workout [I have shoulder muscles!] & the most fun [as evidenced by my giant smile in all the pictures below]. I also got a hair cut.

I’m signed up for classes at the Flyhouse through January [& may stay on longer].

Next project  - building a pull up bar in the basement.

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October 13th, 2011

A Day in the Life [Of me!!]

This morning I had the honor of returning to my alma matter to be on a panel as part of the SAA student chapter’s “A Day in the Life” series that lets students learn what Real Archives Professionals actually do. As a fairly recent grad, I was slightly intimidated, but very excited, to speak alongside Jennifer Schaffner, an OCLC program manger, and Lisa Schmitt, the Electronic Records Archivist at MSU.

I’m not a huge fan of PowerPoints [both watching & delivering], so I made picture-heavy Prezi presentation. You won’t have the pleasure of hearing me explain everything, but if you’re interested in the many different things I do, it’s worth clicking around.

AANM Archives Collaboration on Prezi

Also, COME INTERN WITH US! Do it!

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July 31st, 2011

I went to camp!

That’s right, I went to camp on Friday.
Copyright camp!!

Hosted by MPublishing (including Open.Michigan), Copyright Camp is a one-day unconference about, well, copyright.

Copyright & openly licensed content is an issue that’s near & dear to my heart and I recently blogged about it. On Friday I was able to explore these ideas in depth, with some wise & phenomenal peers.

The opening session was a talk by Deb Wythe who runs the Digital Lab at the Brooklyn Museum. Serendipitously, I had tweeted about their History pin project just a few days prior. She spoke further about that project and about working toward their newest goal, which is: :

to make as much of the collection available as possible, with as few restrictions as possible, as openly as possible, while respecting the rights of the artists.

That’s an awesome goal.

I took 3 pages of notes on their process of working toward that goal, but here are the highlights:

  • They release everything they can under a BY-NC (attribution/noncommerical) Creative Commmons license – they want to encourage creativity by allowing derivitives.
  • Recognize and accept risk.
  • Be willing to take the heat, revise & correct – perfection is not the goal.
  • Don’t make users guess about the copyright status of your collections online – be helpful.

The Brooklyn Musuem has a phonemenal list of resources for copyright issues that you can check out here.

At the “Open Content Roadshow” my coworker & I asked about making the content on ArabStereotypes.org [our fantastic new online exhibit] more open, even though not all of it is ours. Dave pointed us toward the U of M Library’s License page which release their own content under a BY license, but clearly marks out the exceptions [such as third-party content].

One of the best take-aways, in addition to exploring opening up our online exhibit & Flickr images with Creative Commons licenses, but the idea of adding or collections into Wikimedia Commons.

And I even got a water bottle & sticker to take home, to keep those warm & fuzzy camp memories alive.

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November 1st, 2010

NaBloPoMo Challenge!!

It’s November & that means it’s time to get writing. I’ve been aware of NaMoWriMo [National Novel Writing Month] for a few years now, but writing a 50,000-word novel from scratch in one month never appealed to me. Luckily there’s NaBloPoMo [National Blog Posting Month] for people like me!

The challenge is simple – post once a day, everyday, for the month of November. If you know me at all, you know that I love challenging myself [see reading 50 books in 2010, going to Egypt alone, my favorite quotes, buying a house while finishing grad school etc].

For today, I’m keeping it short & simple.

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June 20th, 2010

Futbol & sunset walks along the Nile

Friday night, in an attempt to cultivate some interest in football [mission not accomplished], I headed downtown to watch the game with Dan & a new friend, Liz. We watched at Johnny’s, a pub on the Le Pancha Nile riverboat in Zamalek. Very overpriced & a little too fancy for my taste, we were still able to enjoy the game & conversation in the air conditioning.

After, we decided to walk back downtown, with a quick stop at the Cairo Tower. I really want to go up in the tower, but I’m really having a hard time justifying the 70 le entrance fee. I made do with photos from the outside, instead.

Mangrove tree, Zamalek

Cairo Tower, Zamalek

We then walked across the Qasr el-Nil bridge, through Midan Tahrir & back to Midan Talaat Harb [where Dan lives.] We spent an hour or two in a cafe, got ice cream & then I headed back to Heliopolis.
Midan al-Gezira

crossing Qasr el Nil

Coke sign at Midan Tahrir

thirsty kitten at a cafe

I’ve tried write an introduction to this video, but I can’t find the right things to say & I’m too privileged to make pithy remarks . It’s about Palestinians watching the World Cup projected onto the Israeli separation wall.

Last night I laid in bed, unable to sleep. It didn’t really help when, at 1am, a wedding party came down our street, car horns honking nonstop, parked in front of our apartment & set off fireworks in the middle of the street. I’m happy for them & love the enthusiasm, but it didn’t really lull me to sleep…

Now it’s nearly 10am & 90 degrees & the forecast is mid-100s all week. Yikes.

Here’s to cold water, fresh fruit & the luxury of air conditioning!

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