RIPS Law Librarian Blog

 RIPS is the Research, Instruction, and Patron Services Special Interest Section of the American Association of Law Libraries. They have a nice little blog "Covering trends in research, instruction, and patron services within today's law libraries" according to the site.

US Federal Government Documents Initiative

More information on the US Federal Government Documents Initiative, including information about the Advisory Group, and some FrequentlyAsked Questions can be found on the HathiTrust website.

Hilariously Terrible

House Judiciary Committee Web Page Labeled "Hilariously Terrible" - neat find by Free Government Information (FGI).

Academic citation practices

Discussion of how to improve citation - worth a read.

Your Google history

From PBS - Here’s how you can see and delete your entire Google search history.

Late humor for Earth day

America the Beautiful: a collection of the nation's trashiest humor.  In 1970, EPA republished  this set of cartoons about garbage.  Sudocs no. is HE 20.1402:Am3 for govdocs experts.

Friday Cat Pix

Got  yer tail

At last!

Loretta Lynch confirmed by Senate as attorney general.

Information Literacy - Government sources

Bluebooks

State “bluebooks” are helpful for basic facts and information in each of these locations. Not all states have them, but this Blue Books list is a good summary of what is available and includes State Encyclopedias as well.  It is maintained by librarians working in State and Local documents collections.

Women's speeches

The Women’s Political Communication Archives created by the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women & Politics at Iowa State University is collecting speeches and campaign material concerning women candidates. 

LION, oh my!

The Library Information Literacy Online Network has a Youtube channel for help with instruction. Hey, it should be LIION but who's paying attention?

Magna Carta - more info

For the big anniversary this year, the British Library has launched its Magna Charta archive.

And here is a New Yorker article on the topic by the great Jill Lepore,  The Rule of History.

8 great libraries

Those "best" lists don't always impress me but what the heck - here are the Smithsonian magazine's eight most interesting and accessible collections.

David McCullough on libraries and librarians

Some may dispute the need for "library shoes" and quiet but you have to love David McCullough's comment - Never try to hide what you don't know from the librarian!

Library scenes in film

Book Riot lists their favorite scenes in movies taking place in libraries.  My personal favorites are from All The President's Men and of course Ghostbusters. 

Ilovelibraries.org

This site has NLW ideas if you haven't planned ahead.  But then you probably wouldn't be a library staffer then, would you?

National Library Week...

...Gets off to a nice start with a NLW shout out on Chris Carter's Breakfast with the Beatles!  It makes total sense that he would be a library fan with all the facts and tidbits he dispenses on this weekly show.

Friday Cat Pix

So this camelia did have flowers once.  Hmm. 

Gov mobile apps

Would you like to know about a site listing mobile apps from  government agencies? Of course you would.  Another one just has census information.  

Bill tracking options

LegiNation's BillTrack50
GovTrack.us, GovTrack States (beta)
LegiScan
The Sunlight Foundation's OpenStates
Ballotpedia

Congress.gov Spring Cleaning

Wheee!  From a few days ago, here is info posted on Congress.gov and recent improvements. Databases from THOMAS have been added, also legislation, the Congressional Record, Committee Reports, and nominations.  The latest goodie is the inclusion of treaty documents.  If you select “All Sources” you can search across all of these data sets at once, something THOMAS couldn't do.  Next to add will be Senate Executive Communications.

Oliver on Snowden

Love John Oliver, and am glad to see him still doing good stuff.  He saved Net neutrality almost single handedly, they say, and here he grills Edward Snowden better than most journalists.

Easter Egg Roll

John Dickerson describes a visit to the iconic event in his inimitable fashion. 

MoCat lives

The majority of GPO's Monthly Catalog volumes can be found in HathiTrust, as in this example. An exception will likely be the Periodicals Supplements, however.

In the Internet Archive, you can find volumes added by the University of Illinois, linked mostly in order.

If you have access to the Chadwyck-Healey database, that is another alternative to keeping the huge print collection for the occasional use.

Friday Cat Pix

Shadow

Federal Administrative Law Overview

The Legislative Research Special Interest Section of the Law Librarians’ Society of Washington, D.C. (LLSDC) has a helpful guide Federal Administrative Law: A Brief Overview. Sections cover such things as: how the system works, major players, and where to find official and related info.

Fictional librarians list

It's not my favorite holiday by any means but perhaps for April Fool's day a Fictional Librarians List would be ok. Prize goes to Paige Turner - what an awesome name.