Stolen (and slightly embellished) from my FB postings. This is a safer place to keep them...

The New York Times has published an article, saying that branch libraries could be our refuge from the next storm.

Of course I love this idea, as a librarian. But it makes *a lot* of sense. More disasters will come. A personal story: when a power outage wiped out a lot of houses near the Barnes & Noble where I worked in Virginia, the bookstore was teeming with people coming in from the cold. This was before wifi was something people even knew about. But we had chairs, coffee, and books, and our heat was working.

From the article: "The New York Review of Books, apropos the closing of neighborhood libraries in London, libraries are 'the only thing left on the high street that doesn’t want either your soul or your wallet.'"

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Thinking of other "power" readers as I plow through a book I never thought I'd consider reading after the disaster that was Eat Pray Love: Elizabeth Gilbert's novel is GOOD. Maybe she should stick to fiction? LAF, Babelbabe, are you/have you read it? I'm halfway through. Of course, my father and I could discuss it b/c he'd read the book review. (My father is like the character Tom in the movie "Metropolitan," who only reads book reviews.)

The title is forgettable though. I had to just google it to get the link, below:

http://www.elizabethgilbert.com/books/the-signature-of-all-things/

Oooh, but this link describes her research, which is what I'm interested in.  

And b/c I can't shut up about a book that could still disappoint me b/c I'm only halfway through, I'd like to point out that Eliz Gilbert has been publishing for 20 years!! So when she was "given" the book proposal money to go do Eat Pray Love, people in publishing knew she had the chops. If you haven't read EPL, I recommend ONLY reading the Italian part (Eat) b/c it really is lovely. 

(Which is why I hated the book in the end, b/c the Pray and Love parts were hideous, in my humble humble opinion.)