I've been uncharacteristically silent

these past few days, simply because I've been extremely busy. Here's a recap of things I found interesting enough to blog about:

1. I fell Friday, spraining my ankle and exacerbating some hip pain, so I've been hobbling about. I worked Friday night and most of Saturday, so I wound up standing on it more than I would have liked. But it does seem to be getting better and you won't hear me whinge about it...although thank goodness for ibuprofen.
   
2. I was turning from Rio Dosa to Richmond Road the other day when two birds came plummeting from the sky. At first I thought they were mating (I'd seen mockingbirds doing so earlier), then I realised once they landed that this huge red-tailed hawk had made a kill. Fortunately it took its prey and got out of traffic. They're so majestic. I couldn't help wondering if it were some sort of omen. Must look that bit of folklore up.
   
3. Sunday in the game one of my characters went on a date. Since art often rehearses what later happens in life, maybe there's hope for me yet. I did pretty well going through the interaction. Maybe I could do that for real.
   
4. My counselor gave me some homework, a section from a workbook on self-esteem. Reading the definition made me realise my self-esteem isn't as low as I thought...I'm actually pretty balanced in how I view myself. It's my self-confidence that's in the gutter, so I have some idea of what to work on now.
   
5. This week I have appointments with my primary doctor (to get back on my diabetic meds), my dentist (a filling), and my psychiatrist (medication management/light counseling). So I'll continue to be pretty busy.
   
6. Yesterday I had a library committee meeting that went pretty well. I'm proud of the job I've been doing in the library lately, having catalogued the whole collection including videos, set up a lot of electronic resources, and continuing to keep our funding for our literacy programme going. There's been a suggestion of providing a book cart to circulate around the inpatient unit. Do any of you have something similar, and if so, do you have suggestions? Most people I've talked to have volunteers take the cart around with books that are donated so that if they're lost it's no big deal.
   
7. Today's weather is beautiful and springlike. I hope it holds.
   

Okay, I guess that's all for now. I'll try to write more often.

Government pubs bookstore

An announcement sent out by Judith C. Russell, Managing Director, Information Dissemination (Superintendent of Documents) U.S. Government Printing Office:

On Thursday, February 23, 2006, GPO will launch its new Online Government Bookstore at http://bookstore.gpo.gov.

This new system has many distinct features not previously offered to our consumers, but often requested. Some of these include:

- Improved search capabilities;
- The ability to process International orders & GPO Deposit Accounts online;
- Speedier delivery options; and
- The ability to save your "Shopping Cart" for up to 72 hours.

These are just some of the many great new features you will discover when you place your next order online with the new and improved U.S.
Government Online Bookstore.

Thank you for your time, and we hope you enjoy your next online visit with us!

If you have questions or comments, please use the GPO online help service
at: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/help/index.html. To ensure that your question is routed to the correct area, please choose the category "Online Bookstore" and the appropriate subcategory, if any.

You may also contact the GPO Customer Contact Center at 866-512-1800 (Toll-free), or at 202-512-1800 (DC Metropolitan Area), Monday through Friday, 7:00 a.m. - 9:00 p.m., EST.

A professional organisation's response to hurricane disasters

MLANET: Medical Libraries and Hurricane Katrina

Free consumer health book available to libraries

A copy of the American Cancer Society's new consumer health book Lymphedema: Understanding and Managing Lymphedema After Cancer Treatment, is available free of charge (shipping is also waived) to Medical Library Association members thanks to a grant to deliver the books to libraries. [If you're not a member of the MLA, you may want to check and see if the book is available to other libraries; I got this from an MLA announcement so it might apply more generally. It certainly couldn't hurt to ask.] Interested parties may order by emailing trade.sales@cancer.org. Please include complete contact information, including your name, library name, street address, city, state, zip, and phone and fax numbers.

Personality Windows

The Nohari Window - Personality Flaw Map: Eilir's Nohari Window

and

The Johari Window - Personality Visibility Map: Eilir's Johari Window

Some interesting problems related to ADHD in girls

Gender Differences in ADHD (an advertisement for Concerta that includes a discussion of this subject, free with registration at Medscape)

Among other things, criteria for the disroder are weighted towards behaviours found in boys; girls tend to be underdiagnosed even though they have many of the same impairments, and those girls diagnosed under the criteria tend to have more severe symptoms than girls missed by the criteria. The programme makes it clear that girls should be compared to other girls in terms of functioning rather than to boys for a clearer picture of which girls suffer impairments. Inattentive type of ADHD is more prevalent in girls rather than boys, and it's harder to diagnose this rather than the hyperactive type more often seen with boys. Also, apparently with girls, there is a higher onset at puberty, although the related criterion states that ADHD symptoms must be demonstrated before age 7, even though other developmental disorders do not have a similar requirement. The programme discusses the need to revise criteria to be less gender-biased. Essentially girls, being inattentive or mixed hyperactive-inattentive rather than hyperactive, tend to be less problematical for teachers, do not suffer as much in terms of schoolwork, but tend to be more isolated from their peers and suffer socially. Check it out for some great information on studies looking at the differences between boys and girls with ADHD and how girls with ADHD differ from their unaffected peers.

Scary

Lexington Herald-Leader | 02/21/2006 | Shell gas station robbed

This is across the street from where I work. Fortunately, we close at midnight. This was at 3:20 in the morning.

Yipee!

I just went over my raise information/performance appraisal with my boss. I did well, and I'm getting a 3.5% raise on top of the market raise I received at the beginning of the year, so about $1.50 more than I made an hour last year. In the nearly nine (?!) years I've worked here, the pay has, with market raises and regular merit ones, gone up nearly a dollar a year. Not bad for a job that started at $9.02 an hour back when I first took it. If only it were full-time. :)

Avoid Jump Links in Web Design

Avoid Within-Page Links from Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox, discusses how users react to jump links and why they undermine the user's basic understanding of how webpages work rather than helping.

How heartbreaking

No mud miracle in Phillipines as landslide death toll rises

Rescuers, including US Marines diverted from a war games exercise, are frantically digging by hand in torrential rain to reach an elementary school where 240 pupils and teachers were buried alive. There were earlier reports of text messages received and sounds under the mud that could be survivors, but so far they're only finding bodies. Like the recent mining accident in West Virginia, misinformation led to an announcement of survivors at one point, raising hopes further. All told, 1,371 people were reported missing from the village buried in liquid mud and boulders when a mountainside collapsed after La Niña rains.