BORED. Bored bored bored, and starting to get testy about it, darnit. We're in the middle of migrating to a new catalog system (as I believe I've mentioned before), and at this point, I've done all the paperwork I can do without a catalog. We've had very little business, and there's only so far I can help patrons if they want to know if a *specific* title is checked in or not. (I can tell them where it *would* be, but not if it's there or not. Sigh. No, I can't look on the computer. No, you can't check from home. No, no other library in our system would know, either. Your tax dollars at work.)
I've run out of work to do. I have no one to talk to. I'm BORED. I'm so bored I'm almost tempted to read my spam mail. (DANGEROUS. Do not try this at home. And certainly don't try it in your local library when you're the in-house techie and would have to clean up your own messes.)
And so, without further ado....
The amazing, ever-changing, stupendous, tremendous, sometimes-horrendous Wikipedia RANDOM ARTICLE link!!!!!
Global warming (Actually, this was in answer to a reference question on the Kyoto Accords, to grab a quick date. But this was my starting point.)
Liang Quichao, Chinese scholar, journalist, philosopher and reformist of the late the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) .
IATA- ever wonder who makes up those airport codes? These would be the blokes.
Bezau, Austria. Population under 2,000. No, I don't know why it has a Wikipedia entry, either. But they even have their own web site!
roots (the plant kind). See what *really* lies beneath!
Raffelsia - a digression from true randomness, off the roots page above. This genus of plants has haustorial, or parasitic roots. This also happens to be the famous giant "corpse flower" that smells like rotting meat. It's only coincidence that the discoverer of this parasitic flower shares a name with a famous fictional gentleman thief. (And no, that wasn't a random link, either. Bad me! I'm actually managing to entertain myself, here!)
Edward Short, Baron Glenamara, former Labour MP for Newcastle upon Tyne in the mid-20th century. Right, moving on.
Hoberman sphere - cool! I have one of these. ^_^ Can *you* say "icosidodecahedron" five times fast?
Labor unions in Japan- Pretty self-explanatory. Um. Okay. Not viscerally excited by foreign economics, I must admit. Moving on.
Balance (metaphysics)- Oh, bah, a stub. I know, I know, put up or shut up, as I'm not a contributing editor to Wikipedia... still, it's an intriguing concept, and I should have enjoyed reading an entire article on it. Ah, vell.
1959 Governor General's Awards- Canadian awards for literary merit. Hm. This article's a pretty good example of why Wikipedia *isn't* the best of all encyclopedias... a whole entry on one year's worth of awards, with no explanation of what the award, in general, is or who awards it? (A little digging found an explanation here, but that's a little sloppy, IMHO).
Penetanguishene, Ontario, an "historic community" (I'm guessing rather like Williamsburg). It's pretty. These location entries in Wikipedia interest me... mostly, though, I'm wishing I knew how to pronounce this one. (PEN-et-AN-gwi-SHEEN?)
Fairy chess piece , a chess piece not used in conventional chess, but in certain chess problems or variants. This is sort of a cool idea, and would likely play holy hell with standard chess tactics.
Hippocoon, a character from Greek mythology. (Now be honest-- weren't you hoping, as I was, that this was some sort of mythical cross between a hippopotamus and a raccoon?)
There. And now it is time for me to go home. I can only *imagine* how bugnuts I would have gone without web access this evening.
Posted by gris at August 17, 2005 08:56 PM