Chill Out, New England

Liz Reed is the Adult and Information Services Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column in the June 26, 2018 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

We all know that one of the great benefits of living in New England is that we get to experience all the seasons. Our iconic foliage draws busloads of tourists every Autumn, we usually get to have a white winter holiday season, and our landscape becomes furiously and gloriously alive every Spring. As a result, our New England summers can feel all too brief, and many residents look forward to summer all the rest of the year.

 While we’re busy bundling up for the other seasons though, we can sometimes forget just how hot and humid our New England summers can be. Heat waves seem to surprise us because they don’t happen very often in the course of a year - remember that stretch of 90+ degree heat a few weeks ago? Brutal, right? And no wonder we feel this way: in the course of June 2018 we went from chilly Spring temperatures in the 40s to blazing 92F, according to AccuWeather.com. That’s a pretty big difference, especially after what seemed like a prolonged winter.

First, You Take a Swamp Tour

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the July 19, 2018 edition of the Norwood 
Transcript and Bulletin.

In The World on a Plate (2014), Mina Holland describes 40 world cuisines and the “stories behind them.” Reading her book, you travel across Europe and down through the Middle East, east to Asia and south to Africa. She ends the book with the “melting pots” of the Americas: the Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese influences in South America and the French, Polish, Germany, African and Asian inspirations to the north.

City Girl, Country Girl

Lydia Sampson is the Technical Services Department Head at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column in the July 12, 2018 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

As a kid I dreamed of living in the Big City. On weekends my mom and I drove into Boston from the suburbs to go shopping at the iconic Filene’s Basement. I got such a thrill out of walking through the scary “Combat Zone,” past shops and restaurants in Chinatown, and arriving at “The Basement,” where we shielded each other and tried on clothes in the aisles, and I learned math by figuring out the “automatic markdowns.” The variety of different people in the city fascinated me and I longed to live among them some day.

YA Books - Are They Really for Teens or Adults?

Kate Tigue is a children’s librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read Kate’s column in the July 5, 2018 issue of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

One of my favorite responsibilities as a youth services librarian is choosing new young adult books to purchase for the library’s expanding collection.  Young adult books (or YA as we say in the library world) is one of the most well-known and fastest growing literary genres in this decade.  Most people learn about young adult books through the popular trend of adapting their plots for the silver screen. Recent films like Ready Player One, The Hunger Games trilogy, and The Fault in Our Stars have turned public interest to the books these movies are based and sparked adult interest in books intended for adolescents.

Making Radio Waves

Alli Palmgren is the Technology Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Alli’s column in the June 28, 2018 issue of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

A few weeks ago, I found myself dashing into the house yelling “Alexa, play NPR!” As my smart speakers all came to life simultaneously, my husband and I pulled up chairs on the deck to enjoy one of our favorite radio programs, “Live From Here” (formerly “Prairie Home Companion”). While my husband and I enjoy listening to audiobooks and podcasts on our own, we are one of those rare households that still crowd around the radio at appointed times every week to hear our favorite NPR hosts introduce us to new music, keep us updated on current events, share stories, or give us hilarius car repair advice.

The Light and Darkness of Anthony Bourdain

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the June 21, 2018 edition of the Norwood 
Transcript and Bulletin.

Anthony Bourdain describes himself as a child being irresistibly drawn to the headiness of fresh, raw oysters in France. As a young man he was lured to the restaurant kitchen to the love of food and the thrills of the unsavory truths of working in food service. Throughout Kitchen Confidential, he admits his attraction to the dark and risky, to the drugs and drinking, and to a life spent in restaurants and at bar tables. In that memoir, Anthony Bourdain invited us on a ride through “the culinary underbelly” of the kitchens, freezers, and back alleys of New York City restaurants.

Diving Into a Good Book

Nancy Ling is the Outreach Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts.  Read Nancy’s column in the June 14 issue of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

We all love to find a book that we can dive into. If that book changes our outlook or carries us away to a whole new world, all the better.

“If I Could Dive Into the World of Any Book” was the very topic of our essay contest this year for the younger participants. Thanks to the Andrew and Ernest Boch Memorial Fund, the Outreach department ran this event for the 7^th year in a row. Not surprisingly, the books chosen and the worlds disclosed were as varied as our own town’s population.

Before going any further, however, this might be a good place to announce the names of our essay contest winners:

Navigating Retirement and the Social Security Maze

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the June 7, 2018 edition of the Norwood 
Transcript and Bulletin.

Everyone who knows me, particularly my family, realizes how much I love my job. Ancient philosopher Confucius is attributed with saying something like this: “Choose a job that you love and you never work a day in your life.”

Certainly, in my profession that is very true. Most librarians are insatiably curious about knowledge and they love to give that knowledge away. It makes us a strange breed of generous know-it-alls who live that passion 24 hours a day.

True Crime War Crimes Edition

Lydia Sampson is the Technical Services Department Head at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column in the May 31, 2018 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Long Walk to Freedom -
The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela

I already admitted to my true crime addiction in my May 3rd column/confession. The genre generally refers to murders, assaults, kidnappings and the stuff of Investigation Discovery programs. Although it’s hard to imagine worse crimes than these, victims throughout history have experienced such horrors on a grand scale: genocides, torture, ethnic cleansing. Grim as it may sound, my non-fiction leanings extend into the realm of some of the most disturbing events in modern history. A book that impacted me deeply, for example, bears the shockingly candid title, We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families: Stories From Rwanda, by Philip Gourevitch.

Love @ First Click

Liz Reed is the Adult and Information Services Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column in the May 24, 2018 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou internet Romeo? Buckle in and hang on to your hats, folks, we’re about to take a ride through the exciting, data-driven world of online dating. If you don’t agree that something data-driven can be exciting, then we probably wouldn’t be a good match. Swipe left.

You may have heard the phrases “swipe left” or “swipe right” bandied about in recent conversations or on weeknight sitcoms. These phrases have become part of our modern lexicon thanks to “swiping apps” where you swipe right to “like” a photo, or swipe left to “dislike” a photo. One of the earliest swiping apps was Tinder, a location-based dating service that launched in 2012 and that is still going strong today. When you open the app, you only see potential  matches within a certain distance of your location who are also using Tinder, and all you see are a person’s photo and some brief bio information.  Everyone swipes left or right through their potential matches, and when you and Mr./Ms. Dreamboat both swipe right, demonstrating interest, the app lets you start chatting. Location-based  efficiency of meeting someone is Tinder’s big strength, and therefore the app has a reputation as a “hook-up” app, yet many people who meet on Tinder end up in long-term relationships or even marriage.

The Day the Fugitive Stopped Running

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the May 24, 2018 edition of the Norwood 
Transcript and Bulletin.

I was eleven when I moved from the city to the suburbs in the East Bay Area west of San Francisco. I left all the city streets behind – in the 1880s Berkeley had been designed as a grid that easily and efficiently moved from the Bay waters to the golden hills above. Those foothills rose across to the Sierra in the distance.

Moving as a pre-teen, I also abandoned all of my elementary school friends and started afresh in a town where the valleys and grassy rolling hills were situated next to the freeway that headed to Sacramento and Nevada.

There were three or four floor plans in the houses of this post-World War II development of Pinole Valley Estates. Houses were lined up on the streets that were tucked among the ravines. The outside paint color and landscaping distinguished one home from another, but the interiors were eerily similar. Spending the night in a classmate’s home was always a bit surreal when the pink or green porcelain sink in the twin, back-to-bath baths matched those in my own home. Each kitchen had the modern miracle of a dishwasher; each garage was built for two cars.  One was usually a station wagon. The small, manicured yards were fenced and lines with wild, red berried pyracantha and tall, resilient oleander bushes.

A Surprise Royal Watcher

Victoria Andrilenas is a reference librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column in the May 10, 2018 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

After my one column about space turned into two I did not think I would be writing more anytime soon. However, when I discovered my colleagues did not share my level of excitement over the upcoming royal nuptials I knew I had found something else to write about. For those of you who attended our “Real Hollywood Royalty” film series featuring Grace Kelly (m. Prince Rainier III of Monaco) and Rita Hayworth (m. Prince Aly Kahn), I hope you enjoyed my attempt to build excitement for when American actress Meghan Markle marries Prince Harry on May 19.

As a child I was fascinated by Queen Victoria because we shared a first name. She was my go to option for any assignment on a historical figure where she could be made to fit the requirements. Given that interest in the British royal family, the marriage of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer in 1981 was very exciting for nine year old me. It came as no surprise, to my mother at least, that I wanted to get up early enough to not only see the 11:20 am BST ceremony (6:20 am EDT) but also the procession to St. Paul’s and guests entering the Cathedral. Fortunately it was summer so I didn’t need to worry about missing school, but I never voluntarily got up that early! Like many young girls I was taken with Princess Diana’s seemingly fairy tale marriage and so impressed by the spectacle that I decided I would require female guests to wear hats when I got married. I outgrew that fascination before I got married, much to the relief of my female relatives and friends, though not until after I graduated from college.

Of course I was excited to read about the births of Prince William in 1982 and Prince Harry in 1984. The 1996 divorce of the Prince and Princess of Wales four years after their separation made it clear the marriage was not a fairy tale. 4 am EDT was too early for me to watch the entire thing live but I did get up early to watch part of the funeral of Princess Diana after her tragic death in 1997. The 2006 film The Queen depicts the royal family’s response to this event.

When Sarah Ferguson married Prince Andrew in 1986 I was a teenager and we had a VCR so I had my dad record it and watched it at a more reasonable time of day. I had not been at my first professional job for very long when Prince Edward got married, and for some reason wasn’t very interested anyway.

When the engagement of Prince William and Kate Middleton was announced in 2010, my previous workplace had some lunchtime conversations about reusing an engagement ring from a wedding that ended so unhappily. The general consensus was that we’d be happy to have to such a beautiful piece of jewelry, but not as an engagement ring. In the months leading up to the wedding, whenever I was in a waiting room I devoured People, Us Weekly, and the like for photos of the couple and information about their wedding plans. I took the day of the wedding off so I could watch it on TV. 

Although I watched the repeat broadcast rather than the live version, I was up early making British scones and cakes to eat with my friend who came to watch it with me. I was not alone in having a wedding watching party. In fact, serious royals fans would consider me an amateur since I didn’t watch it live and we didn’t dress up or wear hats. I did get some awesome swag though: a commemorative tea tin and china mug. The births of their children has also been exciting and I eagerly awaited the arrival and naming of Prince Louis last month.

While I’m sure there are many people who will find it easier to watch Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding on a Saturday, I would prefer a workday since my family would be busy at school and work leaving the TV, and my time, free for binge watching the wedding. My understanding is the British would have preferred a work day as well so they could get a Bank Holiday. Unfortunately my friend who watched the 2011 wedding with me will be working, and my other potential watching partners live elsewhere, so I probably won’t spend much time creating a special menu just for me.

I was too young to pore over gossip magazines when Princes Charles and Andrew got married and am not a committed reader of them now, but if you are, Morrill Memorial Library’s Flipster app gives you access to several of them. I prefer to look at a few blogs that follow the royal family. My favorite is written by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan. Each week they do a “Royals Round-Up” with links to articles about and photos of European royals from the preceding week. When the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge travel, the site often has daily posts with photos from the trip. The two also wrote book The Royal We about an American who goes to college in England where she falls in love with the heir to the British throne. What Kate Wore has fashion coverage of the Duchess of Cambridge and an offshoot called What Kate’s Kids Wore has information about what the young princes and princess wear. Meghan’s Mirror covers Ms. Markle’s style including an entire page about her handbags (a weakness of mine).

I know some of my coworkers were surprised to learn just how interested I am in the British royals.  I am clearly not a slave to fashion, do not watch reality TV shows, and generally have very little interest in celebrities. The truth is I love some of the fashion worn by the Duchess of Cambridge and Miss Markle but my practical nature means that even their off the rack styles aren’t likely to be found in my closet since my lifestyle doesn’t call for cocktail dresses or high heels. But now you know I’ll be glued to the TV next Saturday morning!

Being Mom Versus Being a Librarian

Kate Tigue is a children’s librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read Kate’s column in the April 26, 2018 issue of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Everyone assumes that if you work with children professionally, you’ll be a natural in the parenting department. There definitely are some overlaps that help with the adjustment to family life, but some things are harder to translate.

Working as a children’s librarian has kept me abreast of current issues in the parenting world and in particular, in the world of early literacy. I know all the stages and signs of pre-literacy and how to build to a good foundation for lifelong readers. I encourage and advise parents about this topic regularly as part of my job at the library.

Little Green Mountain Men

Alli Palmgren is the Technology Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Alli’s column in the April 19, 2018 issue of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

A few months ago, my husband and I were having dinner at my sister’s house when my sister floated the idea of buying a family vacation property. We gave her some grief about buying a Kennedy-esque compound on Nantucket Sound so we could “summer,” until she said, “No, I’m serious. Let’s buy that Vermont house you always wanted. Life’s too short, let’s do it.”

Shooting for the Moon: Part II

Victoria Andrilenas is an Adult and Information Services Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Mass. Look for Victoria’s column in the April 12th edition of the Norwood Transcript & Bulletin.

In addition to the many anniversaries I mentioned last week, the Space Shuttle program has two this year: the 35th anniversary of the first American woman in space, Sally Ride on Challenger STS-7, and the first African-American in space, Guion Bluford, two months later on Challenger STS-8. As with last week’s column, all titles mentioned are available through the Minuteman Library Network.

The first Space Shuttle flight with astronauts was in 1982 on Columbia. The final flight of the Space Shuttle program was in 2011. Unlike earlier spacecraft, the shuttle was designed for reuse. The program had 135 flights with all but two, the Challenger explosion in 1986 and the Columbia explosion in 2003, returning safely. Spacelab was flown on the Space Shuttle until its decommissioning in 1998. Shuttle crew constructed portions of the International Space Station and launched the Hubble space telescope.

The 1978 astronaut selection group included the first six American women astronauts and the first African-Americans who would go into space, three men. Sally Ride’s first flight was twenty years after Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space. Frederick Gregory’s first spaceflight in 1985 made him the first African-American shuttle pilot on Challenger STS-51B. Mae Jemison (selected in 1987) was the first African American woman in space in 1992 on Endeavor STS-47. Eileen Collins (selected in 1990) was the first female shuttle pilot on Discovery STS-63 in 1995 and first female commander on Columbia STS-93 in 1999.

Margaret Lazarus Dean’s 2015 book Leaving Orbit: Notes from the Last Days of American Spaceflight is my favorite of the adult books mentioned this week or last. Although the book is primarily about the end of the space shuttle era, it includes quite a bit of NASA history. Dean writes about traveling to Florida for the final launch of each of the remaining three shuttles and the friends she makes during her visits, including NASA employees and other fans of space flight.

Space Shuttle: the First 20 Years includes essays and interview excerpts from many shuttle astronauts, as well as photos from training, launches, space flight, and landings. Scott Kelly is one of the few widely known recent astronauts. In 2015 he spent almost a year on the International Space Station. His memoir Endurance: a Year in Space, a Lifetime of Discovery describes that experience. Leland Melvin was an engineer mission specialist after being drafted by Detroit Lions and having to leave the NFL due to injury. His memoir is Chasing Space: an Astronaut’s Story of Grit, Grace and Second Chances.

There are some wonderful children’s books written by astronauts. Buzz Aldrin’s book Look to the Stars is illustrated with beautiful paintings and provides an overview of significant events in the history of flight and American space exploration. Michael Collins’ book, Flying to the Moon and Other Strange Places, is about his early career, training for space, and the first lunar landing. To the Stars!: First American Woman to Walk in Space, by Carmella van Vleet and Kathy Sullivan is about Kathy Sullivan’s first spacewalk. Mae Jemison wrote a biography for YA audiences, Find where the Wind Goes.

Of course there are lots of children’s books about space not written by astronauts. Two about female astronauts are: Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream, by Tanya Lee Stone, and Mae among the Stars, by Roha Ahmed. Not surprisingly there are several about Apollo 11 including One Giant Leap by Robert Burleigh, and Team Moon: How 400,000 People Landed Apollo 11 on the Moon, by Catherine Thimmesh. In Race to the Moon: an Interactive History Adventure, by Allison Lassieur, readers can choose to be a scientist working on rocket technology, a reporter covering the space story, or a member of Mission Control for Apollo 11. If your child is interested in what it takes to be an astronaut, you should check out Go for Liftoff!: How to Train like an Astronaut, by Dave Williams and Loredana Cunti. Ready, Jet, Go is a PBS kids show about our solar system. Season one is available on Hoopla. There are also books about the moon, the sun, the solar system, and space.

I suspect anyone who has been to a space-themed museum with elementary or middle school age children has seen the freeze dried ice cream for sale at the gift shop. Many may have given into the pleas to purchase it. My parents did. I hated it. Turns out astronauts did too. According to The Astronaut’s Cookbook: Tales, Recipes, and More, by Charles T. Bourland and Gregory L. Vogt, it only flew on Apollo 7. This cookbook is somewhat like an Alton Brown cooking show with information about the science of food including the moisture content of various foods and how that impacts the foods’ suitability for space flight. Tortillas are better than bread because they don’t make crumbs, and it turns out food packaged for vending machines is also good for going into space.

For those who want to visit some of the places where space history happened, there are several great options. MLN collections include travel guides to the general geographic areas where these sites are located. Alan Shepard’s Mercury Spacecraft can be seen in Boston at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. Kennedy Space Center in Florida is about a one hour drive from Orlando and well worth the trip. All of the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo and Space Shuttle launches took place there. In addition to the original Mission Control, visitors can also see the Astronaut Hall of Fame, Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo spacecraft, an unused Lunar Module, and the Space Shuttle Atlantis, which made the final flight of the shuttle program. Space Center Houston, Texas, site of Mission Control since Project Gemini, is also the site of astronaut training and the Lunar Receiving Laboratory where astronauts were quarantined after going to the moon. The Virginia Air & Space Center in Hampton, Virginia, is about a half hour drive from Colonial Williamsburg. In addition to being where the women of Hidden Figures worked, the museum has Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo spacecraft on exhibit. At the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York City visitors can see the Space Shuttle Discovery. The USS Intrepid served as a recovery ship for some Mercury and Gemini missions. At the California Science Center in Los Angeles visitors can see the Space Shuttle Endeavor. The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois has Mercury and Apollo spacecraft on exhibit. The U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama is also the home of Space Camp which has programs for children, families, and adults. The Smithsonian has two aerospace museums, one on the National Mall in Washington, DC, and a newer building at Dulles Airport in Chantilly, Virginia. The Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly has the Space Shuttle prototype Enterprise on exhibit, as well as a Gemini capsule. The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC has Mercury and Gemini spacecraft, the Apollo 11 Command Module, and an unused Lunar Module on exhibit. Over the next 18 months the Apollo 11 Command Module will be traveling around the country as part of the traveling exhibit “Destination Moon: the Apollo 11 Mission.” So if your travels take you to the Saint Louis Science Center in Missouri, the Senator John Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh, or The Museum of Flight in Seattle, maybe you can see it on tour. If you have European travel plans, you can see the Apollo 10 Command Module at the Science Museum in London, England.