Wombats unite!

From Sarah Houghton, the Librarian in Black, I learned that Stumpers List = Project Wombat. I subscribed to the Stumpers List, an email discussion list for reference questions that stump librarians, while I was taking my Reference class but unsubscribed because the number of posts was overwhelming. Project Wombat replaces Stumpers which apparently lost its email list service recently.

In its new format, there is a kind of Stumpers-lite available called Project Wombat FM. This will only send out the questions and the answers without all the chit-chat that this long running group generates. With a lite version and my relatively new adoption of gmail for email lists, I think this will be very useful to me as I slowly move toward offering reference assistance at my library.

Speaking of real librarian work, yesterday I spent nearly my whole day doing library research. What fun! And surprisingly rare.

I'm teaching one of the one-shot sessions for freshmen next week. We get to see their research preparation assignments with their topics and initial attempts at research. That allows me to offer some specific suggestions and to tailor my presentation to address any problems the class is having. Yesterday, I found sources for sign language, magazine cover art, Hudson River School paintings, video games, soccer, and the colonization of Mars. I was somewhat stumped by Paleolithic Venus figurines, but I have colleagues to ask about that before I send a message to Stumpers.     #

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