Author Archives: Will
What Polar Vortex?
After the craziness of the recent weeks of blizzards and snow days, it’s 70 in Fredericksburg, with a tornado warning (!!!!!!!) and a solid thunderstorm almost worthy of July. Although it’s supposed to get cold again next week, no one … Continue reading
Books Reunited
Back in January, I had the opportunity to tour the gorgeous new Fred W. Smith National Library at Mt. Vernon, as part of a reception that they hosted for SHEAR. It’s truly a gorgeous facility, with lots of resources to … Continue reading
Posted in Historian in the World
2 Comments
Crowdsoucing Project: Bad Historical Websites
On Wednesday, I will be leading a discussion in my undergraduate History Practicum seminar about learning to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources on the wide-open Internet. The students have been assigned to bring in an example of a good … Continue reading
Analog Day, Digital Day
This week’s assignment to explore “personal learning networks” through social media came at an auspicious time. Unlike Jason and Dave, last week’s snow days freed up some time for me, because of the particular moment I was in for each of … Continue reading
Posted in Digital Life, The Aspiring Handyman
Tagged Analog Humanities, architecture, Brian, Digital Humanities, fi, Fredericksburg, historic district, PLN, TTRSS, twitter
1 Comment
Wait It Out
Back in 2010, when Brian and I moved Virginia, one of my biggest reservations was moving from New York, a state with relatively good legal protections for our relationship, to Virginia, which not only had a spectacularly vindictive anti-gay constitutional … Continue reading
Snow Day
Disappointing those who expected to be disappointed, last night’s snowstorm delivered on its promise of real, if icy, accumulation. (Myself, I was expecting real snow, mostly because I was taking the word of Chris White, fredericksburg.com’s weather blogger, who I … Continue reading
Back off, Fredericksburg
I clicked on this Free Lance-Star article about Erin Hamlin, the American who just won the bronze in luge in Sochi, expecting to find a feel-good human-interest story about a local athlete made good. Which is exactly what I found. … Continue reading
In Which I Enjoyed City Bureaucracy
This evening Brian and I attended the monthly meeting of the City if Fredericksburg’s Architectural Review Board. We had a proposal before the board, seeking their approval to replace the entry door and add some signage to Skin+Touch Therapy‘s new … Continue reading
Making a Collaborative Reading Notes Wiki
This semester I am experimenting with using MediaWiki as a platform for the students in my History of Manhood in the US course to build a collaborative set of reading notes. After being less than completely satisfied with my Twitter … Continue reading
Twitter as an Academic Tool
This week’s assignment for the Domain of One’s Own Faculty Initiative is to explore online scholarly communities. I spent some time racking my brain trying to think up Early Americanist communities online, until I realized that I have been an … Continue reading
