Hope on over this weekend and see how I do as the guest blogger at NashvilleIsTalking.com Hopefully you enjoy some of it.

So, I made up a little tutorial for everyone. I hope you enjoy it.

For those who are interested:

Please click on the picture and look at the notes I put on it through flickr (what a great tool).

The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations–these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit–immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of the kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously–no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption.
-C.S. Lewis The Weight of Glory

This thought fascinates me. It’s what drives me in my teaching and what keeps me up at night. I can’t say much after reading that; just silently reflect.

But I have been paying attention a little bit. I guess it’s my fascination with technology, or the possibilities of the web. I wish I could get paid to do some of the cool stuff I’d like to do, but I don’t know how to do it, and that’s probably why no one will pay me for it…

Anyways, a friend was wondering about Web 2.0 and since I’ve been reading a little and surfing a lot in relation to it I thought I’d sort of post a little something something about it.

No big details here, you’ll have to stay tuned to other individual post to find out more. The whole folksonomy thing, which I did talk about earlier is fascinating. Read my earlier post to get a taste of what I’ll get into:

del.icio.us and flickr

This Saturday is a Homeless Memorial honoring all those in Nashville who have died this past year who did not have homes. I’m excited to go and be a part of a group of people drawn together in honor of these we have lost. I don’t know anyone personally who died this year, but they are my neighbor.

I can’t help but think of the season it is right now as well. Across the world people are running around spending lot’s of money buying things for one another to celebrate the life of someone who was born and died HOMELESS. Is that ironic?

I hope a lot of people come out for this thing Saturday. Some how though, I think more people we’ll be looking at the lights at Opryland, or Trees at Cheekwood. Or sitting on Santa’s lap somewhere. I’m going to celebrate the season by recognizing those who lived homeless. That’s Christmas.

So, I got a little carried away and did a series of video tutorials. I’m not quite sure why except that I wanted to try out my screen recording software. I like it so far. So, whether you were interested or not here is your three video tutorials:

Installing Firefox

Customizing Firefox Toolbars

Why use a Xanga Comment Notifer

In honor of winning $1,000 for an office makeover (and mostly in an attempt to clean out my closet and be rid of my t-shirt business), I’m giving away some t-shirts.
You can see the shirt designs (though the wimps shirt font looks way better on the actual shirt) at http://iamnotashamed.net. I pretty much only have Wimps and Enemy shirts left.
Let me know which ones you want and where to send it. I’d appreciate a buck or two to cover shipping and packing materials.

A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.
-Napoleon Bonaparte

My mom pointed this quote out to me today when we were talking about what I could do to motivate my students to pass their classes. It struck me how true this is. I had a slight addiction to eProps on xanga a while back, enjoying accumulating as many as I could from friends. Lately it’s been the cheers I mentioned in the previous post. It’s funny how intensely driven one can get for something that physically isn’t valuable. I’ve been chasing after “cheers” on 43things, which is nothing but a integer on a webpage that almost nobody but I care about. Yet, that was a top priority in my time on the Internet… anytime I had a cheer it was of the utmost importance that I use it (sorry if you don’t use 43things and that didn’t make sense).

So, when it comes to the students I work with I started wondering if a pizza party would be a big enough motivation. What if they where only getting a slice or two each week, that just isn’t that much. And that’s when my mom mentioned this quote. Trophies, medals, ribbons, certificates, tiny gold stars, these are often motivating forces for people to do great things (Nobel Peace Prize, Olympic Gold, Congressional Medal of Honor), and maybe this sort of thing is enough for some of my students to start completing their homework and passing their classes.

The question is: How do you build into your awards the prestige and honor that should come with accomplishing the goal?