Birmingham Public Library Blog

Is it time to upgrade your PC?   " As of April 8, 2014, support and updates for Windows XP are no longer available."- windows.microsoft.com .  Does it take forever for programs to load on your machine?   Is it hard for you to find a PC that has the specific components you want?   How about building your own? I know you may think it’s too complicated to build your own PC, but every PC has a few basic components: Motherboard Processor Power Supply Memory (RAM) Hard Drive Optical Drive (CD, DVD drive) Operating System (e.g. Windows 8) Video card (may be optional) Case (Duh, unless you want dust on everything) Online retailers such as Newegg.com and TigerDirect.com actually sell PC combos that come with everything you need to build a desktop PC, except the operating system.   Newegg.com even features a video series which shows you step-by-step how to build a computer.   It is very straightforward and extremely helpful....

The month of May is National Stroke Awareness Month. According to the National Stroke Association ( www.stroke.org ) ,“A stroke or 'brain attack' occurs when a blood clot blocks an artery (a blood vessel that carries blood from the heart to the body) or a blood vessel (a tube through which the blood moves through the body) breaks, interrupting blood flow to an area of the brain. When either of these things happen, brain cells begin to die and brain damage occurs.” Strokes can happen to anyone, regardless of their age, race, or sex. Risk factors that increase the chances of a person having a stroke include high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, and alcohol and tobacco use. The best way to recognize the symptoms of a stroke are by using the FAST technique endorsed by the National Stroke Association. FAST is broken down as follows: FACE: Ask the person to smile. Does one side of the face droop? ARMS: Ask the person to raise both arms. Does one arm drift dow...

Starting Tuesday, May 6, the free monthly adult poetry workshop that is usually held at the downtown Birmingham Public Library will be held at the Homewood Public Library until the Birmingham location's air conditioning unit can be fixed. This week, the Birmingham location reduced its hours to close at 5 p.m. The move was necessary because of rising spring temperatures and a broken unit. As a result, the evening poetry workshop known as Gifts of a Wordsmith had to be moved. Homewood agreed to host the event until repairs can made. Gifts of a Wordsmith will be held on the first Tuesday of the month from 6 to 8 p.m. It is free and open to the public. The Homewood Public Library is located at 1721 Oxmoor Road in Homewood. Real Life Poets partners with the Birmingham Public Library to offer the workshop. Gifts of a Wordsmith will return to the Birmingham location after repairs are made. The downtown location could have reduced hours for up to seven weeks. Parts have been order...

Central Library's Youth Department will distribute free children's comic books on Saturday, May 3, 1:00-5:00 p.m. , as part of Free Comic Book Day . The American Library Association is providing the comic books, courtesy of Diamond Comic Distributors . One comic book per child. Supplies available while they last. For more information call 226-3655. "This event is another way to make reading fun, especially for children having trouble with words. Through comic books, children can get information from the pictures. The pictures can help them understand the words. This is just one more way we can encourage reading," says Barbara Hutto, a librarian in the Youth Department.

The Graduate Charles Webb More favorite movies. More novels they were based on. An ongoing pastime. It dawned on me: I’ve never read The Graduate, the book the movie of the same name sprang from. Copyright 1963. If we knew then what we know now, we could’ve read it and seen the Fifties dying and the Sixties coming into view. But we couldn’t have, and that’s why it’s interesting. This is a novel, and novels don’t signal change the way, say, manifestos do. But The Graduate did get good critical notices and it sold extremely well, so people were paying attention to it, just not the way they would have in, maybe, 1966. Most readers probably liked it chiefly because it reads very easy. Ben Braddock comes home to L.A. after a stellar college tour back east. He’s achieved as much as anyone his age probably can, but it means nothing to him. His parents try to persuade him he’s at the top and that he should go to grad school, but Ben sees that as more of the same rut. Mrs. Robinson, ...

Night of the Hunter  Film noir is a subgenre of American cinema that emerged during the Second World War and peaked during the late forties and early fifties.  French critics bestowed this label upon this subgenre when hundreds of American films flooded European theaters after the war.   The French were unable to see American films during their occupation by Germany and were clearly taken aback by the transformation they saw in Hollywood. Hollywood’s happy-go-lucky westerns and musicals were seemingly replaced overnight by a steady supply of dark films in which down-on-their-luck men and women struggled for their lives, loves, and the pursuit of happiness.   Perhaps the most striking difference between pre- and post-war American cinema was that these struggles often ended in failure. Film noir can be translated as ‘dark cinema’ though it literally means ‘black cinema.’  These films are distinguished visually by a strong reliance upon chiaroscuro lighting...

Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures   Kate DiCamillo Flora, a born cynic and comic book aficionado, takes part in some truly amazing events. The first of which is rescuing a squirrel from the maw her neighbor’s rogue Ulysses Super-Suction, Multi-Terrain 2000X vacuum cleaner. She resuscitates the squirrel and names him Ulysses. From the moment she brings him back to life, she is certain that the bizarre circumstances of his accident will imbue Ulysses with superpowers and she is not disappointed. Ulysses proves to be super-powerful indeed as he writes poetry, wields heavy objects, and flies! She can’t believe her luck, to foster a budding superhero! But, as Flora well knows, every hero must have a villain in their story and Ulysses is no exception. But real trouble brews when they find that his arch-nemesis is Flora’s own mother. That’s a big problem. Flora teams up with an unlikely crew of friends to keep Ulysses safe until he can realize his full potential and learn ...

On Wednesday, April 23, 2014, I had the privilege of participating for the second time as a Book Giver for World Book Night. After having done this last year and having had so much fun spreading the love of reading, I knew I would apply to do it again this year . . . and got my wish. As the Department Head of the Fiction Department of the Birmingham Public Library, I was delighted when a fellow staff member in the department cheerfully volunteered to assist. Bruce Seals and I set out mid-day (After all, on any given day it is nighttime somewhere in the world!) on Wednesday, April 23, to a relatively new park in downtown Birmingham— Railroad Park . We had the best time giving out 20 copies of Bobcat and Other Storie s by Rebecca Lee. The crowd there was diverse and seemed quite happy to be enjoying a beautiful day with the city center skyline on the nearby horizon. Their joy doubled when they found themselves to be part of an amazing world-wide event, and a free book only added to ...