Earlier this week, I read a post on Lifehacker that got me thinking.

When new people come to my apartment there’s usually a point in the visit where they stop and ask, “wait, how many screens do you have?” (from http://lifehacker.com/5625890/why-technology-is-so-addictive-and-how-you-can-avoid-it)

I started wondering how many screens I had in my house! First, though, I had to define a screen because there are some gray areas. For my purposes, a screen is anything that displays information digitally (even just time information) but is not a digital clock. That would have sent my numbers soaring… So, the cable box is a screen as it displays the channel I’m watching, but the digital clock next to it is not. Clear as mud? Yeah, you may want to re-work that definition If you decide to do this…
For me, I came up with 21 screens in my house. Considering that I have 6 rooms (not counting bathrooms), that’s kind of crazy. We have TVs in four of those rooms, a desktop computer with 2 monitors in one and laptops, e-readers and cell phones sprinkled throughout. Is it any wonder we get distracted and sidetracked so easily? In my living room alone, I found 9 screens from the entertainment center, to the Harmony remote to the two laptops, iPad and Kindle that tend to live in there while getting charged up. These are, admittedly, decidedly first world problems, but it can be a problem.
I’m a reader, I love to consume books in any format and fashion that I can get ‘em. Even though most of my reading these days takes place on a screen (Kindle or iPad), I still don’t read as much as I used to because there is nowhere in my house where I am not presented with the distraction of a screen. I could go outside – we don’t have a yard TV yet – but if the weather isn’t cooperating (and I live in Missouri – the weather rarely cooperates) that isn’t all that comfortable.
These are not just passive screens, either. Some are – the TVs don’t generally turn themselves on and beg to be watched – but some, such as the cell phones or the iPad, have reminders, alerts and various other ways they try for our attention. (Also – I just realized I’d not counted our land-line phones, all of which have screens to display the caller ID information. That’s three more, for a total of 24 screens – and I bet I’ve forgotten a few others!)
I’m the last person to argue for fewer techie toys (did you notice I have both a Kindle and an iPad? I’m a gadget whore….), but I do wonder what all these screens will do to the attention span and distractibility of our upcoming generations? There are some interesting comments at Lifehacker’s post, so if you haven’t read that one yet, go check it out.

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I talked to a local IT manager recently about his library’s planned migration to Google Apps. He’d emailed me late last week, saying he’d read my article on the subject and wanted to discuss it with me. We talked for quite a while and, during the conversation, they brought up the fact that Gmail may be E-rate eligible. I had not even considered this – even after learning that Amazon’s cloud services may be eligible.
This is one of the great things about being willing to share what you know – I, at least, always learn something from the people I’m ostensibly teaching or providing knowledge to. I’d like to say that my willingness to share what I know is purely selfless – a true act of generosity, but in reality, it benefits me as much as it does (hopefully) the people I share with!

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Friday night we had a big storm come through Jefferson City. Power went out in places, tree limbs were scattered about, that sort of thing. At the library, we must have gotten some kind of power surge that knocked out one of our Universal Power Supply units and did some damage to its connected server. This is when I’m glad to have done the work involved in creating a disaster plan!
The server is still functional – it’s handing out IPs and such, but I can’t log into it at all, which means that if I didn’t have a disaster plan which lays out the hardware, software and network configuration of each server, I’d be hurting right now. As it is, I’m pretty lucky. It works well enough that I don’t have to rush configuring the replacement server and I just happen to have an extra server around, so I don’t have to order one.
As disasters go, this one was pretty mild. A fast trip to the library on Saturday morning to reroute the electrical connections and restart, then everything was going again. Heavy duty work can wait until I have time to do it this week. That’s nice – and it’s all due to my disaster plan!

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I’m coming up on the final classes needed to complete my BSIT (Bachelor’s of Science, Information Technology) degree. Now I need to consider what I’m going to do after that milestone is reached. I’m considering (while whimpering about student loans) going on to get a Master’s degree (in Library Science? In IT? In ???) but that will put me at paying back my student loans just about the time my son goes to college and I have to start paying for that…
Basically, I’m trying to decide what I want to be when I grow up. I’m excited about finally graduating from college, but now I have to consider what I’m going to do after that. I’m positive I’ll stay in IT, but as a librarian? As something else? This grown-up stuff is hard. Can I opt out?