Visit CheerLights for the details. And, if you don’t have a strand of the CheerLights (like me), then get the Android App! (I will soon)

Maybe I need to learn how to build one of the actual strands…..

This set of predictions from JWT Intelligence is much more widespread covering fashion, art, food, travel, business, technology and more. It was fascinating.

Some of the predictions were right up the T-F mindset like:

33 – alternative social networking sites to Facebook. Like Diaspora, which I helped fund in its Kickstarter campaign.

59 – the Life in A Day user generated documentary. I participated in that as well. Doubt my footage will be selected but I find the whole idea of collaborative art projects really interesting and a nice mix of the technical with the psychological

83 – Social Objects which will allow folks to scan or otherwise interact with objects merging the digital and the physical. My pals Brandon and Lia are all over this trend with their materialmashup site.

and, of course

93 – tube free toilet paper!! What????? Where will all of those kids find raw materials for their art projects?

Or even the professional artists might have problems with this one…

What do you find most interesting?

Enjoy.

It reminds me of the other science related media that I have loved like:

The Element Song by Tom Leher

And, of course, any Schoolhouse Rock like Electricity (although their science entries were weaker than the math, politics and grammar ones). I was privileged to hear the creators of the series at a conference a few years ago. They related that the idea came from observing that one of their sons could not learn the multiplication tables but could memorize the lyrics for every Jimi Hendrix song.

And, the wonderful tunes from They Might Be Giants:

Presenting my faves for the end of 2009 and the end of the first decade of the 2000s (naughties? noughties? oughts? aughts? What did we call them?)

DJ Earworm – United States of Pop 2009

NPR All Songs Considered Best Music of 2009
I always find new music via NPR’s All Songs Considered

Lifehacker’s Most Popular Hive Five Topics of 2009
Crowdsourcing has grown in popularity, easy and usefulness. And why not? It usually works!

Entertainment Weekly’s Best of 2009 (highs and lows)
Since this is my guilty pleasure reading at the gym, I felt that I must put it in here

The Top 10 Everything of 2009  and the Best Movies, TV, Books and Theater of the Decade from Time Magazine
well, they said everything…

Top 10 Internet Moments of the Decade from ABC News

And, for good measure, I just had to use the “My Year in Status” application in Facebook to build a status collage for 2009.

I also had to go visit Wordle and do something there with my blog posts from 2009. And, here it is.

Part of the official parts of my job is to be technical support for the faculty and staff at my school. In all of my previous jobs, I have always been the unofficial technical support mostly because I was one of the first to use it and one of the first who understood it enough to explain it to others. Beyond my work life, I have also become the “go to” girl for tech support for many of my friends as well. You don’t get the nickname “Computer Girl” (as I was christened by one friend) without some geek cred, I would think.

It has been rare when I find myself on the other side of a technical support issue. By the time I actually break down and call a tech support line, I have exhausted all other possibilities. I have done the obvious (and sometimes the ridiculous) testing, rebooting, Google research, etc. It’s a pride thing, I suppose.

So, when my Twitter account suddenly was no longer “findable” via search or when I used hashtags (those phrases that begin with # that are often used to tag a tweet about an event like a conference), I was concerned. Since I am supposed to be coordinating the “twitterverse” for two upcoming conferences, I was getting more and more worried about my account being broken. I searched for suggestions and looked through the FAQ at the support site for Twitter and, of course, opened a support ticket with them. Nothing seemed to be working.

Then, I found a Twitter support person on Twitter. I started following him and then sent a direct plea his way. He became my “go to guy” and shortly after that, he send me a message back telling me all was well. And, it was!

I am grateful that he fixed the issue. Even more, I am grateful to be reminded of what it is like to feel out of control and unable to solve a technical problem and what it feels like to find someone who can, who does and does it well. I will use that as a reminder to keep doing what I do for my friends and co-workers and try to do it well, quickly and without complaint.

Thanks @lukester for that!

Of course, I am only playing the one song I know right now (I’m Yours by Jason Mraz) but the more I play it, the easier it gets. Practice makes perfect.

All of this leads up to something that I have been thinking about for a while but never got down to writing about it until now. We went to hear Steve Martin play his banjo this weekend at the lovely Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. Yes, the home of the Grand Ole Opry! It was my first show there and I hope it won’t be my last as it was a great performance space. Wonderful acoustics, fun pews (not TOO hard) and a top-notch show to boot. Steve Martin was a pro with the banjo and his band was phenomenal.

Add in the fact that his opening act was the multi-talented John McEuen of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and that he had guest vocals from Dan Tyminski and Rhonda Vincent as well as closed the show with Earle Scruggs playing Foggy Mountain Breakdown and you get the gist that it was a truly wonderful night of music.

But, what I have been thinking about was how easy they all made it look. McEuen went from guitar to banjo to fiddle without even taking a breath it seemed. If I put down the uke and sit at the piano, I have to fidget and think and get all set up to get going. It is amazing how at ease he seemed with all of the instruments and just being on stage. And, I know it comes from practice.

To take it from music to techy – I can sit down at a Mac and then move to a PC and then to an iPhone with the same ease. I have been told many times during training “you make it seem so easy”. And, that is my goal – to make it seem easy but to also really just make it easy. But, there does take some practice. Some time with the “instrument” whether it is an operating system or a software application or a new peripheral. You have to spend some time with it and learn how to work it, where things are and so on. Then, moving between all of these things gets to be much smoother. And, just like how a guitar player can probably pick up a uke and make some decent noises – the more tech you play with the easier it is to pick up something new just because of all of the practice you did before.