Greetings regular LNG users.
When I was making my weekly Monday Molly Musings update, I was surprised to see that my last post was August 2. I could've sworn I posted the week of August 9. When I checked my email notifications, I found out that I did create a blog entry for August 9 but it disappeared. Does anyone have any idea how my blog entry could've vanished? And how can I get it back?

Little known fact - I am slightly demophobic. As my husband, who loves words, will tell you, demos is a Greek word meaning mob. Crowds freak me out, especially when I am crammed into hostile lines with strangers. My control of my fear was put to the test on Saturday when I attended Fan Expo Canada with my daughter. Reports claim that 60 000 people attended the three day convention. Even if those figures are inaccurate, there were definitely a lot of people at the Metro Convention Centre. It took us an hour to get in (and that was with deluxe pre-purchased passes) and the place was crammed to the hilt with fans of all stripes. We checked out the sales booths and artists alley, attended two sessions (one by Stan Lee and the other by two anime voice actors) and participated in the masquerade. My daughter enjoyed the masquerade the best - it was her second time competing and the costumes there were absolutely incredible. Search for footage on YouTube and you'll see how elaborate and accurate these fashion tributes are to the source material. It was neat to talk with an illustrator from Archie Comics, who has been working with the company for 16 years, and hear about how iconic characters (like Betty & Veronica, or the X Men) came about and continue to thrive. Some characters speak to a generation of fans strongly.

This past weekend, I attended a Twilight convention. Before you roll your eyes and begin muttering "crazy fanatic" under your breath, let me reassure you. There actually was a wide range of people in attendance (from teens to much older people) and although there were definitely more women there, there were some male fans present. The majority of the people I met at the event were polite and pleasant. (I only met two women that were obnoxious and vulgar that made me ashamed - thankfully I didn't have to be near them for long.) There were people around that were primarily book fans and others who focused more on the movies, and the company that ran this convention (Creation Entertainment) did an excellent job of catering to as many different interests as possible. They had celebrity guests, trivia contests, merchandise auctions, a few panels by some devoted and delightful people (The Hillywood Show and The Twilight Lexicon), karaoke and a fancy dance. I had feared (based on past experience at another convention) that it would be chaos, but the event was well run, with short, manageable lines and clear rules.

Everything clamors for our attention. Bloggers want people to read their posts. (I confess even I glance at the number of reads each of my entries receives.) Bloggers will go to a lot of work to get people to follow them. My friend has a newish blog she started and to entice new readers, she's offering as a prize a copy of Mockingjay.
Yes, Mockingjay.
I have been anxiously anticipating the third installment of the Hunger Games series for months and months. In usual blog contests, you get points based on how you spread the word - one point if you start to follow the blog, one if you mention it on Twitter, etc. I wrote up a comment for her (yeah, because it's worth 4 points in her contest) but I thought it was school library-ish enough to post here.

Sorry I've been less-than-punctual with my posts. Last week was actually quite full with Library Camp OTF and a guest appearance at a Library AQ course. I met some absolutely delightful people while I was there, and I hope many of them take the hints I was throwing their way and consider writing some articles or volunteering on some OSLA committees. They would make a great addition to the team.

School is now over (insert sigh of relief here!) and I can catch up a bit on my sleep, my movie watching (yes, of course I've watched Eclipse already - I saw it at midnight on the opening day), and my scrap booking. The grade 8 students graduated recently and there are many individuals from that group that I will definitely miss. It's a high-spirited, close-knit group of students that make you scream or smile.

Draft of a letter you should consider sending: http://kimstymest.com/2010/06/18/lets-get-agitated-part-2/ 

KO Matters Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=135117359834638&v=wall 

www.tinyurl.com/resourceontarionews

• KO's response
  
• Emerging strategy and action
  
• What else?
  
•  Implications
  K-12 schools
  
• Colleges
  
• Universities
  
• Public libraries
  

I can't comment too specifically on this issue, because it involves individuals. In our board's online forum spaces, there's some heated discussion, often on the topic of the social web. One particular person takes a rather extremist and contrary viewpoint, but that is not my beef with the person - it is the way this person responds in derogatory, rude and insulting ways. The moderators have reminded everyone to permit dissent but write in a respectful fashion, and this has led a couple of people to post that they did not consider certain people to be crossing the line. It puzzles me how this lack of kindness is dismissed by some people. I asked my husband about it and he said there's a mistaken belief that dissent in of itself is praiseworthy and that some think a gadfly is good, regardless of the basis of their claims. I do like examining some of my strongly held opinions, but I don't like putting people down to do it.

I just returned from a great few days at the Treasure Mountain Canada think tank for school libraries and the Canadian Library Association's annual conference in Edmonton. My brain is full to bursting with new contacts, new (and not so new) thoughts, and new plans. I have lots of suggestions for the next TMC retreat, scheduled for two years from now, but in the meantime, I need to digest what I heard and the conversations I had. Helping that process involved my relatively recently created Twitter account.