T-Minus 6 Hours

Well we're in the home stretch. Most everything's packed and ready to go, I've got my ride to the airport set up, and most of the last minute tasks are completed. There are still a few things hanging fire, but those will have to wait until later today or tomorrow in London. But I'm feeling good and fairly relaxed. All is in order.

One of the last things I wanted to do before leaving was to make sure I could upload pictures from my camera. I haven't done it with this laptop before, so wanted to make sure everything would work smoothly. And it did. The wizard took me through a few steps once I connected the camera, and the picture went right where I told it to go. I'm probably going to grab a few more batteries before I leave, just to make sure I've got power.

So here's home sweet home, covered with a bit of snow. We had about 6 inches last Friday and Saturday and the temp went back down to near zero. I'm hoping there will be hints of Spring when I return, but Minnesota has a tradition of big storms right around high school tournament time, so we'll just have to see how things unfold. I was reminded yesterday that daylight savings time will go into effect while I'm gone, so I'll miss an hour somewhere along the way. No big deal. We'll just go with the flow. I've been checking the weather in London and Portsmouth and it looks like mostly 40s and 50s with a bit of rain. I polished and mink oiled my boots this morning and I've got my "brolly" packed so I should be all right.

I received confirmations from Catherine and Kimberly for my visits to Marylebone and the British Library this morning, so those pieces are all set. I'm giving myself plenty of time at the airport so check-in and security should go just fine. I'm a little concerned about the return trip as my flight back home leaves mid-morning. I'll just have to make sure I catch an early Tube ride back to Heathrow. But I'm getting way ahead of myself. Time to sit back and enjoy the ride.

My next post will probably be from London. More later from across the Pond.

T-Minus One to London

For the next sixteen days or so I'm going to turn this blog into a travelogue or diary of what went on during that particular day during my travels in England. I've been sharing my blog url with family and friends in the hope that this will be a fun way to share my experiences in London and Portsmouth. I hope you enjoy the ride and will feel free to share comments along the way. You might have a favorite site that you'd like me to see; send it my way. Each evening I'll be planning my "attack" for the next day and would be delighted to get your feedback and suggestions on places I should visit.

At the same time its fair to say that this trip is not totally "free-form." I've been thinking about this trip since before I sent in my application for a staff development grant and have a number of activities planned already. Indeed, I've been thinking about this trip since I missed out on the chance to attend the unveiling ceremony for the Holmes statue in London some years ago. My thanks, again, to the staff at Portsmouth who have been very helpful in putting together a meaningful and productive itinerary during my week on the south coast. And my thanks to Phil at the Campus Club for his suggestions related to my accommodation in London. My supervisor, Kris, has been very supportive of helping make this trip a reality. My friend and brother in the faith, Bryce, has been a wonderful help and given me some great ideas. Also, it feels good to be able to get away for a couple of weeks knowing that the office will be in good hands through the work of my colleague, Jean, and our student assistants. Thank you, all (and others not named), for making this trip possible!

All right, I'll step away from the Oscar-like thank yous and give you some sense of what's ahead. I spent a good chunk of today trying to tie up as many loose ends as I could at work, touch base or get notes to everyone I needed to talk with or, in other words, nail down as much as I could and make sure the work continues while I'm gone. I'll be finishing off a few other projects at home tonight and think about getting around to packing. Generally, it doesn't take me too long to get my bags together; I might even leave that for the morning (depending on what else needs doing tonight). I'd really like to finish off my taxes before leaving; I'm close, so that will be one of the main priorities tonight. Thank goodness (and the IRS) for e-filing. My aunt gave me a little note case for Christmas; its been getting a good workout today as I've been jotting down little reminders (e.g. don't forget the cord for downloading pictures from the camera; make sure your ATM will work in England. And don't forget your passport!)

My flight leaves late in the day tomorrow. I'll spend the morning finishing off anything here at home, have lunch, and then get to the airport. I arrive early Wednesday morning at Heathrow. I'm planning on taking the Tube into the City and then walking a short distance to where I'm staying. Check-in isn't until 2pm, but I'm going to see if I can get in early or else drop my stuff off for storage and come back later and get settled. After that, unencumbered by my bags, I'm going to go walkabout, scouting out the area and maybe make my way over to Baker Street. I'll stop back at my digs, take a short break, and then head to St. Paul's for an Ash Wednesday service. After that I'll probably look for something to eat, head back to my room, update this blog, check e-mail, and do a little work on my Facebook page. By then I'm sure I'll be ready for sleep.

On Thursday I have an appointment in the morning at the British Library with a colleague who used to work here at the University. She's setting up my visitor's pass and I'll have a chance to meet some of her colleagues from the Rare Books department, find out about a digitizing project she's been working on, and get a behind-the-scenes look at the Library. In the afternoon I'll wander west to Marylebone and get my first look at the Doyle Collection. Thanks, Kimberly and Catherine for these opportunities on Thursday!

Well, that's how the first couple of days are shaping up. Time to get to the taxes and the other odds and ends here at home. Oh, and since my wife is working tomorrow, I need to call my sister and see if she can take me to the airport. Or my folks if my sister is busy. Here's to family (at home, work, and play).

Planning for England

Two weeks from today I'll be in London. I'm really looking forward to the trip, funded in part by a staff development grant from the Friends of the Libraries at the University of Minnesota. The trip will have three "legs": the first leg is in London, from my Wednesday arrival until the weekend. During that time I'm planning on meeting with my colleague, Catherine Cooke, of the Marylebone Information Service and viewing their Doyle/Holmes collection. On Sunday I'll take the train down to Portsmouth (the second leg), where I'll be for the following week, looking at the Richard Lancelyn Green Collection and getting to know the staff who have worked so hard in making Richard's collection accessible. The following weekend its back to London and a few more days of research and visits before heading home on March 12.

I'll be posting to this blog during the trip--I hope every day--and probably putting stuff up on my new Facebook site as well. So, if you're interested, you should be able to track my progress day-to-day.

Now on Facebook

All right, I took the plunge. I don't know why, exactly, I was hesitant, but I'm now on Facebook. Maybe it was just something about not wanting to invade my kids space. But as other colleagues and friends are on FB it seemed the right thing at the right time. Maybe its one of those generational things (I'm not that old!). Anyway...deed done!

Inauguration

A number of things have crossed my desk in the last few days about the inauguration of President Obama. I thought I'd post a few observations on how this Web 2.0 world made it possible to view the events and be a little part of history.

Part of this was fueled by my daughter's last minute decision to travel to Washington with a group from her college to be a part of this historic day. From her first message wondering if this was "crazy" to make such a quick trip (I told her I wanted to go with), to the time she returned home, there was a lot of texting going on back and forth. (She left Chicago at 6 pm Monday, arrived in DC and was on the Mall the next morning by 10am, left DC about 7 that night, and returned to Chicago the next morning, just in time for breakfast and her first class.) There were a number of reports about a possible overload of the cell system in DC, but I didn't experience any problems with text messages or phone calls (I talked to her while she was warming up in the Museum of Natural History, before the parade began). This was the second such experience with my daughter; the first was on election night, when she was in Grant Park, text and pictures flying back and forth between Chicago and Minnesota, as I watched on TV and she in person.

Another interesting experience was related to trying to watch the festivities from my computer at work. I figured that there would be a lot of traffic on the web that day, and I wasn't disappointed. I logged in first to MSNBC and watched for a while (trying to get a little work done at the same time), but the stream was bumpy and constantly rebuffering, so I looked for another option. I figured there wouldn't be as much traffic on the PBS site, so went there, loaded up their stream, and was able to watch the proceedings without a lot of bumps and rebuffering. It was a pleasant experience. (This makes me wonder, not being a really technical person, how traffic flow on the 'net works. I'm assuming that there were tons of folks looking for streaming coverage of events, so the total traffic had to be high. But I'm wondering why the PBS site was a lot smoother than NBC. Less traffic to their site and therefore fewer chances of things clogging up?) While watching, I was keeping my daughter informed as to the schedule of events, so she could know what to watch for next. For example, when President Bush departed on his helicopter from the Capitol I sent a quick text telling her to keep a lookout for the helicopter as it flew down the Mall. Later, during the parade, she was on Constitution near the beginning of the route and I let her know when the new President's limo was heading out. (I have to admit that this gave me a little bit of a chilly feeling, thinking that anyone with evil intent could communicate in the same way.) In any event, I could keep my daughter informed of what was happening next and what to look for (from my vantage point of the TV coverage).

Somewhere along the way one of my sons texted me as well, so for part of the time we had three members of the family communicating about what we were seeing and experiencing. (The same thing happened on election night; it was a fun way to share the event from different parts of the country.)

Finally, sometime between the inauguration and the parade, I visited the White House web site and was pretty amazed at how quickly the transformation had taken place and how much information was already available on the new administration. I took advantage of my visit and clicked through a number of the links, set up an RSS feed to the White House blog, and sent a congratulatory message through the Office of Public Liaison link from the blog. I had a fair sense of how the Obama campaign had used the Internet and was very impressed with my first visit to the new White House site.

So that's a few snippets from my inaugural day experience. When my daughter returned to Chicago she sent me a text message wondering where she could get a DVD of the inauguration. I did some quick checking and found that NBC was ready to take an order. Pretty amazing!

End of the Semester

Last night was my last class of the semester for the class I teach at the College of St. Catherine, "Preservation and Conservation." If you want to get some flavor of the class you can check out the class blog. It was, I think, a fun and productive class. I'm in the process of reading the journals kept by the class (thanks to Kevin Driedger for the idea) and getting grades submitted. All of which is to say that I should be a little more active on this blog again. I've missed writing here, but really needed to keep track of what was happening with the class.

It's been a bit of a crazy fall semester, beyond the class. We have a vacant position (that won't be filled any time soon, given our "hiring pause") and another staff member was out most of the semester with medical issues (thankfully, he's now back), but it meant that I (and my students) were carrying most of the load for keeping the unit going.

On the plus side, I presented at two conferences (at the University of Regina and the Minnesota Library Association). The Canada paper should be posted online sometime in the future. I'll put in a link when that happens.

Now I getting reading to head to New York after the New Year for the annual birthday festivities of the Baker Street Irregulars and then to England in late February and March for a Sherlockian research trip.

We'll be open during the semester break, except for the holidays. Click here for the full rundown on holiday hours.

Happy Holidays to all!

A Pirate Hoax (and a good one)

There's an interesting article in the Chronicle of Higher Ed about a class project that is worth some attention, especially as it relates to historiography, archives, and what you can get away with on the Web. Here's the opening of the article:

Did you know that a pirate roamed the Eastern Seaboard as late as the 1870s, and lived into the 20th century? Edward Owens haunted the lower reaches of the Chesapeake Bay after the economic crash of 1873 wiped out his living as an oyster fisherman. Owens robbed but didn't kill his victims, and when the economy picked up, he gave up piracy for good. He died in 1938.

Owens's exploits might have been lost to the mists of time if not for an undergraduate student named Jane Browning, who stumbled on the story in a cafe in Gloucester County, Virginia, and tracked down the man behind the legend. You can read more about Owens in his Wikipedia entry and on Ms. Browning's blog, The Last American Pirate. On YouTube, you can watch Ms. Browning visit the site of Owens's house and interview a couple of historians about his historical status.

It's a good story. None of it is true.