Judgment Day (aka NCIS explodes)

FYI: Spoilers from Season 5 Finale: Judgment Day. You have been warned!

All summer we'll bemoan the loss of Jenny, or not, depending on what you thought of her and Gibbs and how she used Tony for her private ops. We're happy Gibbs is still alive. Most think the show would crash without him, see ratings at the end of season 3 after Hiatus. (A beach in Mexico is much closer than six feet under as we found out with Kate [Sasha Alexander]. No we're not looking forward to the team's nightmares when Jenny haunts them in the near future.) Many were glad to see Mark Harmon in the opening credits at the beginning of season 4. The question now being asked: how many of the 'regulars' will we see in the opening credits of season 6.

No word from Director Leon about Abby, Ducky or Palmer. Palmer does count for those counting. Leon doesn't yet. NCIS has many lab techs, probably more than one medical examiner and assistants to said examiners. I seriously doubt that Gibbs gets one ME all to himself, but maybe not. He does get Abby and she will have a fit if they try to take her from Gibbs' team.

Next question: the team's broken up now, far as Leon's concerned. Does that mean all the get-togethers the NCIS fans have been writing about for years will finally come true? (I did say far as Leon was concerned the team was busted up, didn't say Gibbs. And because the second 'B' is still there we won't bet on it just yet.) Sorry Jibbs fans, wasn't in the cards, well it was 9-10 years back, but no longer. Is Col. Mann going to show up to console Gibbs? We'll think about that one.

We do know what Mike Franks does with evidence though and that would be worth it to see the look on Leon's face when he gets walked out the door by the MP's (we can only hope). Or maybe Ziva will find some justice more 'Biblical' to invoke on him. Wonder if Mossad needs an agent on the Reagan. That would make Tony's life bearable, maybe.

But enough speculation, I'm sure many have many more and I've not had time to read the wiki yet so bear with me. I'm sure I won't finish reading all of it until next summer.

Backyard Ministries 2008

Backyard Ministries is set for July 20-26, 2008 at St. John the Evangelist in Vancouver, WA. For more info or to register visit: www.backyardministries.org

BYM poster project I'm working on for 2008. To find out more about Backyard Ministries in Vancouver, WA check out: www.backyardministries.org

ALA National Library Week Commercials!

Hi All,
National library week is here! Here's some promotional videos from the American Library Assoc.















Enjoy!

Wrap-Up/Reflections (Activity 23)

What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?

Meebo, YouTube and Sign Makers were probably my favorites. I'm being very cautious of YouTube until after Easter since I'm not watching TV for Lent. I don't know that I'll give up TV entirely, but cutting back certainly can't hurt me. It's too easy to sit in front of the TV or YouTube for hours without thinking about it. (Update since Easter: I still watch too much TV and YouTube.)
Meebo allows me to be connected to multiple IM accounts at the same time so I don't have to log into all the accounts. Plus it's web-based so if I'm using another computer that doesn't have the IM software installed it doesn't matter.
The sign maker site was just plain fun. I don't currently have a printer. However, I can make a sign, save it and run it to the printers or to my online photo company if I need a poster for an amusing birthday present.

How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
I appreciate this program's allowance for play. It allows me to work at my own speed and spend more time with the things I enjoy or find useful. Several of these things I may or may not use all that much in the future. I can see how most of them are useful, but I don't necessarily have these needs and so probably won't use them.

Perhaps the most confusing is the RSS feeds. I understand how they work, but not necessarily why one would use them. I don't read enough news or blogs that are constantly updated to use RSS effectively.

Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
I most appreciated the time to work on this project with my co-workers. In helping each other and teaching each other we learned more about the program and the skills necessary to make it work better. Though I was often asked the questions, everyone participated and in many cases started punching buttons until something worked. The hardest part was figuring out what buttons we pushed a second time to do it for ourselves or the next person who wasn't sure.

What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?
I would cut back one of the RSS assignments. Picture plays are fun for everyone. When you're sitting on top of Information Services it's easier to call them than sift through my RSS feeds.
I appreciated being given time to do this at work, however it is difficult to retain the process one week to the next. Early on we were given two hours to work with Discover 2.0 and that was very helpful.

Feel free to write about whatever else comes to mind.
I had fun doing this project. Somethings were slightly Greek/Geek to me. Next time I would like a little help getting through RSS and a few of the other activities. I did have a great time showing my friend smiley faces on Meebo. (My personal favorite: >:D<>

Tumblr Alternative Blogging (Activity 22)

I suppose for most of this assignment I could have used Tumblr. Only a few of my posts really needed more than a few hundred characters. It's a good thing I used Blogspot though because I tend to be long winded. So I'll quit here.






WAIT, WAIT! Here's my tumblr url: http://mcdata.tumblr.com/

Podcasting (Activity 20)

So if I did this right you can click the link and then the play button and listen to the title theme of, what else my current favorite show, NCIS. By the way, the writer's strike is over (YEAH!) and the next new episodes for NCIS start April 8th if my info is correct. Thanks to the NCIS fans wiki for keeping me up to date on these important things.

http://audio.search.yahoo.com/search/audio/view?back=http%3A%2F%2Faudio.search.yahoo.com%2Fsearch%2Faudio%3Fei%3DUTF-8%26sngid%3D7a571a15617c477c%26p%3DTheme&p=Theme&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fireflyfans.net%2Fthread.asp%3Fb%3D13%26t%3D3751&name=navyncis.mp3&dur=0:36&rate=160kbps&no=1&tt=1&size=712.9kB&artist=Navy+NCIS&weburl=http%3A%2F%2Fslidersweb.net%2Fblinker%2Fnsr%2Fnavyncis.mp3


And for those interested here's the link to listen to Air1 online. Air1 is commercial free Christian radio.

http://www.air1.com/broadcast/playnow.aspx?media=listen&bt=3&

Pandora/Archive.org/Mango (Activity 19)

Pandora is online music streaming. I pick what I like and it creates a station based on that choice. Yahoo's is more restrictive in that you must have a different e-mail for each station. A small fee opens many opportunities. I've been on Yahoo long enough that it mostly picks stuff I like based on artist, album, genre and song title. Yahoo allows for a wide variety on a single station. Pandora selects music based on an artist or genre entered, then plays similar stuff on that station. Pandora allows the user to create multiple stations, one for every mood. Skipping songs is limited by licensing, with Yahoo that's all the skipping for the month (at least it used to be, may have changed). On Pandora skipping is limited per hour. I tested a couple of my favorite radio stations as well. Many now have online streaming to allow people to listen to the radio at their jobs without needing the radio at their desk. Useful as sometimes being in the basement or away from windows limits the radio stations available through the antenna.

Archive I can see as very useful for people researching who need primary documents that are out of print or perhaps too fragile for transfer or even handle. Being more into current items I didn't find anything terribly exciting to me, but when the books I like go out of print I'll be able to access them there. It will also be useful to me when my kids need primary resources for school projects.

Mango looks like a blast! I didn't get very far because I've not created an account, but what a positive way to teach people other languages. We're so caught up in this English thing. I'm taking a trip to Europe this fall so I hope to use Mango to learn some French and Italian and brush up on my Spanish before I go.