Saturday we will set off for a week's vacation -- no ferries, no airports, no borders to cross, just a whole lot of Island exploring.
While there were a number of reasons we chose to do this trip this year, I feel really good about keeping our tourism dollars on the Island. Many of the places we will be visiting are mill-towns that are gradually losing their mills. News stories are full of woes from the tourism industry in BC, finding it difficult to attract American tourists (usually the region's mainstay) in the current climate of economic uncertainty and with the hassles of crossing even our "friendly" border.
At any rate, we are going to be spending a fair bit of cash on food, gas, and lodging over the next week. Our route will take us up to the top of Vancouver Island, staying in Parksville, Courtenay, Campbell River, and Port McNeill but also visiting Comox, Port Alice, Port Hardy, Nanaimo, and anywhere else we choose to stop the van.
We are taking the EEE and should have some opportunities for web-access along the way, so I will likely blog en route or at least upload photos to Flickr.
17 July 2008
Ending on a positive note
Put in my last day of work for a while -- I'm off for just over two weeks -- and ended on a really positive note. The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, serial edition from 1836-37 has been digitized and posted on one of our databases at work; the collection is visible globally, though -- feel free to have a peek if you are interested (it still needs an entry page, but the content is there).
Some of the most amusing pages (to me) are the advertisements inside the covers and (in later issues) surrounding the text, though the prices might as well be in ancient Hebrew because I cannot for the life of me work out the price of anything that involves a shilling.
All the stakeholders seem to be pleased with the results including the professor who had requested that it be made available for a class she is teaching in the fall. Due to the time constraints of mounting it before September, we did not run the text through the OCR software; given enough time, that would be my preference for almost every project.
Our next priority (on my return) will be to work through several shelves of theses and upload them to our digital repository. OK, enough about work, I'm on vacation!
Some of the most amusing pages (to me) are the advertisements inside the covers and (in later issues) surrounding the text, though the prices might as well be in ancient Hebrew because I cannot for the life of me work out the price of anything that involves a shilling.All the stakeholders seem to be pleased with the results including the professor who had requested that it be made available for a class she is teaching in the fall. Due to the time constraints of mounting it before September, we did not run the text through the OCR software; given enough time, that would be my preference for almost every project.
Our next priority (on my return) will be to work through several shelves of theses and upload them to our digital repository. OK, enough about work, I'm on vacation!
16 July 2008
A capital G Good Day.
After a seriously crummy lack of sleep Monday night, I slept well and woke up rested. I got a seat to myself through both bus rides to work and didn't have to wait long to transfer. On campus, the bunnies were extra cute, but what was most amazing was a patch of grass outside the SUB that was sparkling with dew that was catching the sunlight. I couldn't quite capture the real beauty of it, but you can sort of see it in the top of this shot.
Work was also good -- we finished one project and figured out how to fix another. I was worried that I wouldn't get enough done by the end of my week, but now it looks much rosier with those off my plate.
After work it was off to dinner at my Mother-in-Law's followed by ice cream at the Beacon Hill Drive-In (mmmMMmmm!).
Work was also good -- we finished one project and figured out how to fix another. I was worried that I wouldn't get enough done by the end of my week, but now it looks much rosier with those off my plate.
After work it was off to dinner at my Mother-in-Law's followed by ice cream at the Beacon Hill Drive-In (mmmMMmmm!).
14 July 2008
Regrets...
This video is wonderful on several levels. Found via BoingBoing and well worth seeing (more than once):
It was created by searching Google for "my biggest regret" and using some of those words to illustrate the artist's song.
It was created by searching Google for "my biggest regret" and using some of those words to illustrate the artist's song.
13 July 2008
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