Return to Blogging?!?

Why after a several years hiatus have I chosen to return to blogging? This is a question I have often asked myself lately as I have contemplated reestablishing my blog. Should I blog again? I don't have to for a class at this time, but the recurring thought that goes through my head is that it would be good to have a personal record of some of the various tools, techniques and methods I use as a teacher librarian. Also, it may help me avoid disasters like the one this fall where I had access to an awesome display case at the high school I work at and had recorded via photos on my phone two different book displays that had received positive comments. More importantly, the book displays had resulted in students asking if they could check books out that they saw on display, which in my mind is what book displays are all about. Sparking that interest in a book that maybe a potential reader hasn't considered before. Getting readers to spread their reading wings and try new genres, or authors. Now, it is time to go back to the statement about photos on my phone. Shortly after taking the last set of pictures but before I had backed up the photos onto another medium my phone died. Not only did it die it was pronounced dead and sent to cell phone heaven. So, not only was I faced with the inconvenience of having to replace the piece of technology I rely on the most, I faced the lose of one particular type of files that I had not backed up. MY PHOTOS!! How could I be so neglectful. I had purchased a memory card for this phone. I had been so excited with this particular phone because it had a memory card, but low and behold I never followed up and set up the backup system for my photos to be stored on the memory drive thus negating the drive. After a few tears and digging through emails and asking friends to send me pictures that I had shared with them I was able to recapture some of my photos and videos. Needless to say, the first thing I did after I purchased my new phone was to set things up so that my pictures are automatically saved to Google Photos (TM) and the Micro SD memory card. I even check now on a regular basis to make sure that the contents of my phone are backed up. For some reason I still feel a bit sheepish about losing photos and videos through my own laziness of failing to back them up. Perhaps this is from the mantra that I have tried to instill in students since computers first began to be adopted in the field of education . .  Back up your files! Do it Often!

However, there is a somewhat happy ending to this story. Some of the displays that I had developed were still up, so I was able to do a "redo" in terms of photographing them. Unfortunately, another group had taken over the big display case at the high school Perhaps I will have the opportunity at another time to set up a book display again in that case.