Baseball Caucus at SLA

I’m hanging out in the Seattle airport and the flight has been delayed for over an hour. Additionally, I am able to hijack wi-fi from the Presidents Club as SEA-TAC is under control of the evil AT&T empire, charging non-members for wi-fi.

The Baseball Caucus at SLA 2008 proved a great way to end the session. Speaking at the event were the authors of It Takes More Than Balls: The Savvy Girls’ Guide to Understanding and Enjoying Baseball and Dave Henderson former MLB player and World Series Champ. A few takeaways on the book:

• Overall, women/girls do not play baseball, not growing up to understand the rules and positions, women eventually learn of the game for different reasons: husband/ or boyfriend, interest in a pro-player, socialize, etc.
• Books content is baseball but within female voice and interest
• Didn’t want a dummies book, but a developed quick-read
• Edited out the part trash talking relief pitchers as being second-rate and the part praising Bill Buckner (not for ball-under-legs-incident but for being a good player)
• A considered title: “Is that a can of pine tar in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”

The takeaways from Dave Henderson are extensive! A blog to follow on that shortly.

SLA – Seattle 2008 mini-update

I’m in the free wi-fi zone and thought to make a little update prior to writing something more comprehensive. This is the first library conference I have attended and have found it to be enlightening, busy, exciting, and fun. There is so much challenge being tackled these days that it has been difficult to decide which events to attend.

The one event that I will mention for now is titled: Knowledge Management Staffing Structures in Law Firms. Catherine Monte with Fox Rothschild LLP gave her presentation on her organization’s KM shift. One progressive piece that struck me was the fact that instead of the traditional role of a librarian being posed with a question first and then going out to seek the answers, their research analyst will collect analogous information and compile it into digestible forms, securing information for current and future needs.