Here’s your daily dose of library-oriented speed-reads to start your day!

Jedi Master Sarah Wingo
Liaison Librarian English & Theatre

TODAY IN THE LIBRARY…

To provide students with additional late night study facilities, the main Library will have extended hours beginning Monday, Dec. 7th. We’ll be open most nights until 3:00 a.m.

As always, you can use your Wildcard to swipe into the 24/7 lounge, Falvey Hall lounge and Reading Room after hours. Take advantage of our cozy and inspirational spaces for quiet study. Check the Hours link on the library homepage for a full listing of extended hours.

From everyone at Falvey, good luck on your papers and final exams!

SAVE THE DATE

NEW MEDIA NEWS

You get more than text in How to Make and Set Traps, the latest eBook release produced by Falvey’s collaboration with Distributed Proofreaders. There are trap illustrations and songs about rats & otters! According to a review by Demian Katz of Dime Novel fame, the book mixes “dense and convoluted details of trap-building with anecdotes about animal behavior, reflections on the definition of “vermin,” and a strong sense of the Victorian era.” Allow us to share a rather graphic quote that Katz highlighted in his review:

Emphatically I declare it—a weasel never relinquishes its quarry till the life’s blood has been sucked and the brain extracted and eaten.

Makes you want to download it and read it right now, doesn’t it? Uh huh. Thought so.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Today music fans remember John Lennon, half of the songwriting team that made The Beatles, well, The Beatles. As most people know, John Lennon was assassinated this day in 1980.

“If someone thinks that love and peace is a cliche that must have been left behind in the Sixties, that’s his problem. Love and peace are eternal.” – John Lennon

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

If you have ideas for inclusion in The 8:30 or to Library News in general, you’re invited to send them to joanne.quinn@villanova.edu.

Here’s your daily dose of library-oriented speed-reads to start your day!

Tasty coffee is, but a substitute for rest it is not. You can study much, Padawan, but at least 6-8 hours of sleep you require in order to concentrate during your tests. Coffee and exhaustion are of the dark side…

Jedi Master Rob LeBlanc
First Year Experience & Humanities Librarian

TODAY IN THE LIBRARY…

To provide students with additional late night study facilities, the main Library will have extended hours beginning Monday, Dec. 7th. We’ll be open most nights until 3:00 a.m.

As always, you can use your Wildcard to swipe into the 24/7 lounge, Falvey Hall lounge and Reading Room after hours. Take advantage of our cozy and inspirational spaces for quiet study. Check the Hours link on the library homepage for a full listing of extended hours.

From everyone at Falvey, good luck on your papers and final exams!

SAVE THE DATE

QUOTE OF THE DAY

On this day in 1941, Pearl Harbor was attacked. The infamous naval base assault was the impetus for the United States joining World War II. To dig deeper into Pearl Harbor and other events surrounding World War II, check out our holdings.

Image by U.S. Navy photographer, MCC David Rush. “A Sailor from the U.S. Pacific Fleet Band plays taps during a joint U.S. Navy/National Park Service ceremony commemorating the 67th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor. The theme of this year’s historic commemoration, “Pacific War Memories: The Heroic Response to Pearl Harbor,” emphasized the brave efforts of those who fought at sea, on land and in the air to turn the tide in the Pacific. More than 2,000 distinguished guests and the general public joined service members, Pearl Harbor survivors and their families and friends for the annual observance.” Image description via Wikimedia Commons.

“I think history is continuous. It doesn’t begin or end on Pearl Harbor Day or the day Lyndon Johnson withdraws from the presidency or on 9/11. You have to learn from the past but not be imprisoned by it. You need to take counsel of history but never be imprisoned by it.” – Richard Holbrooke

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

If you have ideas for inclusion in The 8:30 or to Library News in general, you’re invited to send them to joanne.quinn@villanova.edu.

Here’s your daily dose of library-oriented speed-reads to start your day!

TODAY IN THE LIBRARY…

The final Villanova Electronic Enthusiasts Club (VEEC) Meeting this semester. 2:30-4:30 p.m. in the first-floor lounge. Open to all. Come join in for games and fun. Questions? Contact: Matthew Pasquale 

ACS Writing Awards Reception. 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. in Speakers’ Corner. Questions? Contact: Sandra Suprenuk

Gender & Women’s Studies Meet & Greet. 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. in room 204. Questions? Contact: Joyce Harden

Flashback Friday

Finals gotcha feeling overwhelmed? Check out this #fbf picture from the 1980 yearbook. Looks like someone hit the books a bit too hard!

GOODREADS CHOICE AWARDS 2015

Goodreads has announced their 2015 Choice Awards! These selections were chosen via Goodreads user ratings and are categorized by genre. They’re the perfect additions to your Goodreads Want to Read lists!

QUOTE OF THE DAY

National Cookie Day is the day, and cookie eating is the way… to celebrate. Why are so many “national days” food related? The answer is unclear, although perhaps it is an interesting research inquiry. But we’re not complaining for any reason that encourages the eating of chocolate chip cookies. Mmmm. Did you know the word “cookie” comes from the Dutch “koekie,” or “little cake”? Also, if you want to try your hand at some classic Italian cookie dough, check out this recipe in our digital library, straight from The Philadelphia Italian Market Cookbook out of the Celeste A. Morello Collection.

“Sometimes me think, what is friend? And then me say, friend is someone to share the last cookie with.” – Cookie Monster

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

If you have ideas for inclusion in The 8:30 or to Library News in general, you’re invited to send them to joanne.quinn@villanova.edu.

Here’s your daily dose of library-oriented speed-reads to start your day!

SAVE THE DATE…

Tomorrow! Tomorrow! The final Villanova Electronic Enthusiasts Club (VEEC) Meeting this semester. Friday, December 4 at 2:30-4:30 p.m. in the first-floor lounge. The VEEC is a social club, focused on recreation and relaxation. Participants gather to play video games in a safe and fun environment. The VEEC is always accepting new members. Open to all. Come join in for games and fun.

STUDY STRESS?

Here you go! It’ll be okay.

GOOGLE USERS

Google has implemented a starring system to save images from Google searches to personal collections. Simply star an image result and it’s yours. Compiling photos for a project or presentation has never been easier! Learn more here.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Today is #roofoveryourhead day, a day to appreciate and be thankful for things you might take for granted daily, such as the roof over your head, the food in your refrigerator, or warm clothes on your back. Want to observe this holiday? Donate a toy for Christmas or support a local shelter. Speaking of roofs over your head, our extended hours are coming up next week for finals, and you know you can always find a warm corner in the library!

Wiosna w Gościeradzu (Spring in w Gościeradz Akwarela. Muzeum Okręgowe, Bydgoszcz)

“Be true to yourself, help others, make each day your masterpiece, make friendship a fine art, drink deeply from good books – especially the Bible, build a shelter against a rainy day, give thanks for your blessings and pray for guidance every day.” – John Wooden

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

If you have ideas for inclusion in The 8:30 or to Library News in general, you’re invited to send them to joanne.quinn@villanova.edu.

Here’s your daily dose of library-oriented speed-reads to start your day!

SAVE THE DATE…

Thursday, December 10th
Library Open House
1-6 pm, First Floor
Sponsored by Falvey Memorial Library
Highlights: Free food, hot drinks (and hopefully games with VEEC and an appearance by the Wildcat- still working on this!)

Friday, December 11th
Stress Free Happy Health Hours
10 am-4 pm, Room 205
Co-Sponsored by the Office of Health Promotion, POWER and Falvey Memorial Library
Highlights: Each hour will feature a stress-relieving activity! Adult coloring books, make-your-own stress balls, game hour with board games and puzzles, snack and hydration hour, and more. And not least, there will be dogs from Comfort Caring Canines Therapy Dogs!

Contact person: Kristy Sillay (kristy.sillay@villanova.edu ), Coordinator of Peer Education Programs and Community Standards,  advisor of POWER (Peers Offering Wellness Education and Resources). FYI: POWER Peers provide health education and programs across campus.

30 YEARS AGO…

Jefferson Starship’s We Built This City was #1 on the Billboard charts. Also named #1 on the “Most Awesomely Bad Songs….Ever” list by VH-1 and now defunct magazine Blender, WBTC, shockingly, was written by Elton John’s collaborator, Bernie Taupin, who also wrote Your Song, Tiny Dancer and Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. Proving that we all have our off days! 🙂 Co-written as well by a guy named Dennis Lambert, but not the one who works here at the library.  😉

NEW MEDIA NEWS
Speaking of building cities, you may be interested in this new ebook from Springer. From the publisher: From Smart City to Smart Region: Digital Services for an Internet of Places offers a fascinating exploration of the relationship between information and communication technologies (ICTs) and spatial planning, expanding the concept of “urban smartness” from the usual scale of buildings or urban projects to the regional dimension. The book is a source of valuable insights for both scholars and local administrators and operators involved in smart city projects.

NEED A STUDY BREAK?

Find out what the top baby names were last year, or the year you were born! See where your name ranks in popularity. From this site, you can view the changes in popularity of baby names, sort popular names by decade and state (in U.S. territories), and learn the top five names over the last 100 years. Shout out to Sue Ottignon, our research support librarian (who’s always a good place to start!), for providing this link. Turns out that the year the name Susan was most popular is 1960. In that year, the number of births is 39201, which represents 1.885 percent of total female births in 1960.

WE BUILT THIS EARWORM
You have enough on your mind these days without it being colonized by the Jefferson Starship. (Sorry about that.) Fortunately, researchers at the University of Reading in the UK have come up with a easy way to eradicate those annoying earworms – you know, those songs that get stuck in your head. Just pop a stick of gum in your mouth! According to the researchers, chewing gum allows you to shift focus and get past the tune. Want to read more about the study? Here it is, straight from the horse’s mouth.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

It’s the first week of Advent, which might be hard to believe but here we are (wasn’t it just summertime!?). Advent is a period of preparation leading up to Christmas, and you can probably relate, with finals on the horizon and study guides accompanying you to breakfast, lunch and dinner. Try not to forget your inner life this December. Remember what Advent is all about – spiritually preparing for a great moment.

“The extraordinary thing that is about to happen is matched only by the extraordinary moment just before it happens. Advent is the name of that moment.”  – Frederick Buechner

23 days until Christmas!

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

If you have ideas for inclusion in The 8:30 or to Library News in general, you’re invited to send them to joanne.quinn@villanova.edu.

Here’s your daily dose of library-oriented speed-reads to start your day!

TODAY IN THE LIBRARY…

Reading Villanova: The Global and the Interdisciplinary ‘Diversity’ at 4:30 p.m. in Speakers’ Corner. Camille Burge, PhD, assistant professor, Department of Political Science; Brighid Dwyer, PhD, director, Program on Intergroup Relations, Multicultural Affairs; Katina Sawyer, PhD, assistant professor, Department of Psychology will share their thoughts with us at this event, which is the final event in the Reading Villanova series. ACS Approved!

NEW MEDIA NEWS

Did you see the play The Winter’s Tale last night at the King of Prussia stadium 16? It was captured from the live stage production by the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company at London’s Garrick Theatre and ran for one night only. If you’re a fan of Branagh or other Shakespearean actors and actresses, you might want to peruse Great Shakespeare Actors: Burbage to Branagh, a new title in the library collection.

COP21: Beginner’s guide to the UN Paris climate summit

COP 21 – the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties – will see “more than 190 nations gather in Paris to discuss a possible new global agreement on climate change, aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions to avoid the threat of dangerous warming due to human activities,” according to Matt McGrath, environmental correspondent at the BBC. Follow along with the conference on its official site, which will continue through December 11 and will involve meetings of heads of state from all over the world, including US President Barack Obama.  For a helpful beginner’s guide to the proceedings, librarian Merrill Stein has provided a very informative link from the BBC, which includes clear graphics, Q&As and and analyses.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

It’s December 1st – I repeat, December 1st! There’s probably no reason to panic. Certainly there are librarians you can contact here at Falvey before your 2 weeks are up and finals are upon you!

“How did it get so late so soon? It’s night before it’s afternoon. December is here before it’s June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?” – Dr. Seuss 

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

If you have ideas for inclusion in The 8:30 or to Library News in general, you’re invited to send them to joanne.quinn@villanova.edu.

On Thursday, November 12, Villanova University Community members and friends gathered to honor James Murphy, PhD, founder and former director of Villanova’s Irish Studies program and his wife, Kathryn Murphy.

A reception and poetry reading event was held in order to highlight the couple’s recent donation of 300 signed, first-edition Irish poetry books to Villanova University’s Falvey Memorial Library.

Craig Bailey, PhD, associate professor of history and interim director of the Irish Studies program, planned the reception along with the help of Joyce Harden, administrative/events assistant for interdisciplinary and area studies programs, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

(From left to right) Dr. Craig Bailey, Dr. James Murphy and Kathryn Murphy were all smiles at the event.

The reception opened with a festive set of live tunes from musicians (from left to right) Darin Kelly, Siobhan Murray, and Tomás O Cathail.

Award-winning poet and former 2011 Heimbold Chair, Moya Cannon, reads selections of poetry.

The crowd listens attentively as Moya Cannon reads poetry selections. It was a packed house!

At the event’s close, Dr. Murphy acknowledged the crowd and thanked his wife Kathy for her support.

In addition to the generous donation of books, the Murphy’s have contributed greatly to the Irish Studies program since its inception in 1979. See here for a timeline of noteworthy dates for the Irish Studies Program.

Ah, the perpetual challenge of leftover turkey. Each year as I watch the bird brown in the oven, I’m already thinking of ways to dress it up in different ways after the holiday. Don’t get me wrong, that childhood food memory of thinly sliced turkey on white bread with mayo still thrills me. It’s right up there with all the other Thanksgiving weekend traditions, like shopping, football, playing board games with cousins and talking about our favorite holiday shows or movies.

What follows is my turkey and TV gameplan for the first day between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Just like Ralphie’s “old man” in A Christmas Story, I am a “turkey junky, a bonafide golly turkacanis freak.” Leftovers for breakfast consist of pan fried cornbread, apple and sausage stuffing, moistened with turkey gravy with an egg a la mode. It’s enough food to fuel a shopping trip to the local mall.

Although shopping can sometimes leave me knowing just why and How the Grinch Stole Christmas, I manage to avoid the sensation of greed and avarice and return home to cheerfully prepare sandwiches with leftover turkey, whole wheat dinner rolls, Brie and baby lettuces. I add a little avocado too.

After a long day of post-Thanksgiving household cleaning, I look forward to a marathon of Christmas-themed television episodes, starting with Doctor Who: The Christmas Invasion, where David Tennant makes his first appearance as the 10th doctor. I march into the kitchen and whip up a dinner of doctored-up green bean casserole, to which I add chopped turkey, Alfredo sauce, top with (more) French fried onions and bake at 350° for 15-20 minutes.

Writing this is making me hungry so I’m off to make an old-school turkey sandwich that I can eat while I get caught up on work email and finish the book I’ve been reading. Not all students returning to campus will have leftover turkey or fixings, but I’m sure there are plenty of other excellent sandwiches available on campus!

(The links above take you to library media holdings. Ask a librarian to help you find more resources on the history of Thanksgiving, sandwiches, turkey, and more!)

Food blog by Luisa Cywinski, writer on the Communication & Service Promotion team and team leader of Access Services.

The ‘Cats who worked on The Villanovan newspaper filled the November 1916 issue primarily with their Thanksgiving-themed original stories and poetry, including the hymn below by Gerard F. Hart, class of 1919. Their works were especially poignant as one of the worst moments of World War I, the Battle of the Somme, took place that year.

May all Villanovans enjoy Thanksgiving with their family and friends. Amen.

Images from the Villanova University Digital Library.

‘Caturday post by Luisa Cywinski, writer for the Communication and Service Promotion team and team leader of Access Services.

Thanksgiving hasn’t changed much in the last hundred years. As shown on the cover of Comfort magazine, a journal “devoted to art, literature, science and the home circle,” the turkey takes center stage as families gather together. (‘Cats have to wait for scraps.) Go a little further in and you’ll find recipes on page 5 that will have your mouth watering, especially the cinnamon rolls. Thinking of raising turkeys? Check out the fact-filled article, Poultry Farming for Women (p. 14). In the mood to make Christmas gifts? Go directly to page 40! This journal isn’t just tips and tricks, there are stories too. Find out the truth of the Van Alvords’ Thanksgiving!

This issue is just packed with old-timey holiday goodness! Read it today and you’ll be ready for Thanksgiving and beyond!

Images of Comfort magazine and Cat and Mouse from the Villanova University Digital Library.

‘Caturday post by Luisa Cywinski, writer for Communication & Service Promotion team and team leader of Access Services.