I Resolve To...

Happy New Year everyone. The stroke of midnight means it's time to sing that New Year Classic "Auld Lang Syne." A little research tells me this is a Scottish song translating to "times gone by." You can enjoy a few different renditions of this classic New Year song online with our Smithsonian Global Sound subscription.

Of course, the New Year isn't just a time to look back, but a time to make plans for the year ahead. I have no idea what my New Year's resolution should be. I see too many possibilities every time I walk through the library. Should I resolve to keep up on the world better with our collection of newspapers and magazines? Or I could resolve to watch a foreign film each month (an easy task if you come to World Wide Cinema). How about resolving to revisit some of my favorite childhood books?

Choosing a resolution is serious business. It can determine the course of your entire new year! Luckily, I found some help on ehow.com. According to them, there are some very simple factors to keep in mind - make your resolution realistic, be specific, break a large goal into smaller ones.

So what's your New Year's resolution? I'm looking for suggestions - something creative & fun. Send in your ideas by adding a comment here.

"How To" Do the New Year

January 1st is lurking around the corner waiting for you to resolve to be a better human being. There are countless books designed to help all who participate in the tradition of making resolutions to quit smoking, lose weight, exercise more, de-stress, etc., but why go with the same-old, same old? This year, why not resolve to do something unexpected?!

To assist you in your New Year resolution quest, I've compiled the following list of "how to" books:

How to Cheat a Dragon's Curse by Cressida Cowell
J COWELL

How to be Popular by Meg Cabot
Y CABOT

How Not to be Popular by Jennifer Ziegler
Y ZIEGLER

How to Find Flower Fairies by Cecily Mary Barker
JE BARKER

How to Get Kids to Help at Home by Elva Anson
649.1 ANSON

How to Get on Reality TV by Matthew Robinson
791.456 ROBINSO

How to Hunt Ghosts: a practical guide by Joshua Warren
133.1 WARREN

How to Murder Your Mother-In-Law by Dorothy Cannell
CANNELL

How to Disappear Completely and Never Be Found by Sara Nickerson
Y NICKERS

How to Drive an Indy Race Car by David Rubel
J 796.76 RUBEL

How to Cook Everything by Mark Bittman
641.5 BITTMAN

How to Get Your Point Across in 30 Seconds or Less by Milo Frank
658.45 FRANK

How to Grow World Record Tomatoes by Charles Wilber
635.6425 WILBER

How to Hold a Crocodile /Diagram Group
Y 031.02 HOW

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2009! We'll be closed today to celebrate the first day in the year of the ox, but we'll be open again tomorrow at 10 as usual. Is your New Year's resolution to get all your books back on time, or something else? Let us know in the comments. Our resolution is to get our construction done and get back to a semblance of quiet in the library.

(Photo by Flickr user Mykl Roventine. Some Rights Reserved.)

New Year's Resolutions

The topic of New Year's Resolutions came up at work today. A co-worker asked me if I had chosen a resolution for 2008, yet. I like the idea of resolutions, but rarely, if ever, stick to them; I like the idea of a new year, a new start. According to Wikipedia, New Year's Resolutions can be traced back to the Babylonians, where it's said that the most common resolution was "to return the borrowed farm equipment". As for Americans, we tend to be a little more body-conscious with our resolutions, and the most common resolutions are to exercise more and eat better. How often do we actually stick to these resolutions, though? Mine usually peters out sometime around March.

I like the idea of resolutions that work to improve society or who we are as individuals. Making a resolution to volunteer once a month or to be more environmentally conscious positively affects society and the world, as well as improving our own self-image. Maybe it would be easier to stick to a resolution that affected more people than just ourselves.

The New Yorker recently published an article by Caleb Crain entitled, Twilight of the Books: What Will Life be Like if People Stop Reading?. This is a topic that frequents the thoughts and conversations of librarians. According to the research presented in this article, Americans are choosing to read less and less. If you feel like you don't read as much as you would like to, the library can help you with this resolution! We have all sorts of reading activities going on at the library. We have book discussion groups for adults, Storytime for preschoolers, and Tiny Tales for babies and toddlers. These programs provide great opportunities to expose yourself and your family to reading and literacy. You can visit our website for a detailed schedule of events going on at the library. Just click on the Newsletter link. We can help you keep your New Year's resolution of improving you and your family's reading.