What could we do in a month?

A regular non-librarian reader (and author of the always interesting and sometimes controversial Butch Wonders blog) suggested some topics in a comment on my 2011 in Review post, and I thought I should try to tackle some of them.
The suggestion that has me pretty well stumped is to write about “what changes you would make to the library if you had one month and an unlimited budget”. I can think of plenty of things I would do with unlimited budget, but none of them could be done in a month.
Off the top of my head, some challenges that we might be able to solve with unlimited resources (time AND money) would be (in no particular order):

1. Develop and deploy the killer app for Federated Searching — something that would allow for search and retrieval across all the various silos of content (Library Catalog, licensed databases, e-book packages, digitized collections, etc., etc.); AND would have an awesome interface that would make sorting through the inevitable massive results lists intuitive and intelligent. (Note: I think there is tremendous potential for Linked Data to eliminate the need for federated searching; but that is a very, very, long term project.)
2. Work through our cataloging and processing backlogs, so that all the awesome resources we have acquired over the years are discoverable and available for use. Like most major libraries, we have plenty of foreign language materials, rare books, special collections, and other non-standard materials that require individual cataloging by an expert. If I had the funding, I’d hire every out-of-work cataloger I could find, and have them catalog the heck out of everything we have. Heck, if I really had unlimited funding, I’d pay for everyone else’s backlogs to get cataloged too.  (Note that the need for support for traditional metadata work is a pretty clear theme in comments about What’s Happening at Harvard.)
3. Digitize everything–especially everything that is in the public domain or that we have rights to. Add good metadata to everything we digitize and make it discoverable and accessible through our catalog and through Google and other public search engines.
4. Do a massive lobbying campaign on behalf of Copyright reform. I wonder how much moola it would take to buy the votes needed for effective Copyright reform? (I’m kidding…about buying votes, not about copyright reform).
5. Buy up all the publishers whose outrageous pricing is decimating library collections budgets, and create a new sustainable system of scholarly publishing.

Clearly, none of the above are one month projects. Perhaps I am suffering from a failure of imagination, but I just can’t come up with anything big and exciting that we could accomplish in just 1 month … except make some ground-breaking acquisitions. And adding more awesome, rare, expensive stuff to our collections just adds to the challenges listed above.

Anyone out there got some great ideas? What do you think a large academic library should/could do in 1 month’s time, with unlimited budget? You know, just in case some donor decides to give us a bundle of cash with that kind of Project Runway like restriction on it …

Speed Dating with Faculty

Amid the troubling news out of Harvard last week, it seems like a good time to share a small success story:

Last week, I was asked to give a 5 minute presentation to the faculty who are part of Stanford’s Faculty College project. The Faculty College project provides “groups of faculty the space, time and resources to create new team-taught courses, to make a major change in a department’s curriculum or to establish new cross-disciplinary teaching endeavors.” The 25 or so faculty involved meet once a quarter this year, and will start their teaching next year. Their meetings are jam-packed with presentations and discussions, so I was actually pretty pleased to finagle 5 minutes on the agenda to talk about the way the Stanford Libraries could support their projects.

After making an off-hand comment to a colleague that the 5 minute limit felt a bit like speed-dating, I decided to go with that metaphor in my actual presentation. I created a handout highlighting relevant subject librarians and other services (PDF), but decided to skip the PowerPoint since just setting up could eat up most of my 5 minutes.
I started out by telling the faculty group that 5 minutes felt like speed dating, but that I was OK with that. After all, my goal was to convince them to “date the libraries”. The two main reasons they should date us are that “We have lots of common interests”, and “We complete you”. I explained both of those briefly, and concluded with “So I hope you’ll call us”.
I finished with 40 seconds to spare, enough time for someone to ask if the librarians listed on the handout knew they might be contacted or if it would be a “blind date”?
I usually think it is way harder to give a short presentation than a long one, but in this case I think it went very well. I gave them a metaphor that will hopefully Stick, and I also made it clear that I/we really respect their time. If anything, I think some of the faculty wish I had taken up more time, which is always better than the opposite. As Walt Disney (or maybe P.T. Barnum) supposedly said, “always leave them wanting more.”

Update on What’s happening at Harvard

First, the meta stuff. My blog post summarizing What’s happening at Harvard was originally intended as an email to a colleague who missed all the hoopla because she was on a plane heading to ALA MidWinter in Dallas. On a whim, I decided to post it on the blog as well. Apparently, the interwebs love a good summary–that post got more hits (and more comments) in a few hours than the entire blog usually gets in a month. A similar thing happened when I wrote a Round-up on Authors Guild vs. HathiTrust.

(Note to self #1: Don’t be shy about posting something that is “just a summary”. Note to self #2: Whenever you wonder whether to share something with a broader audience than originally intended, just do it.)

Since Thursday, lots of additional summaries, information, and analyses have hit the internet.
Perhaps the most important thing published was The Transcript of the actual Town Hall Meetings.
The transcript contains the actual remarks made by Mary Lee Kennedy, Senior Associate Provost, and Helen Shenton, Executive Director. It does not include any of the Q & A after the remarks. Much has been made of the fact that very little new information was actually shared at these Town Hall meetings, and the transcript seems to confirm that. As far as I can tell, Harvard Library staff have known since 2009 that downsizing of various distributed technical services operations was coming. The first recommendation of the Report of the Task Force on University Libraries was to “Establish and implement a shared administrative structure”. It seems to me that the town hall meetings served to make official that “the Library workforce will be smaller than it is now.” I suspect that the frustration and anxiety felt by many Harvard staff after the Town Hall meetings was the lack of new details. They have known for 2 years that something was coming, so an official reminder that “the ax is still hanging over their heads” was not particularly well-recieved by many. In addition, Shenton’s announcement that “all Library staff are invited to state job preferences, to articulate skills and to provide a resume by creating and submitting an Employee Profile” was interpreted by some to mean that all staff would have to effectively re-apply for employment with the Harvard Libraries. It is clear from subsequent information that is not accurate, but I can see how staff who are already stressed and hungry for some detailed information might interpret it that way.

Let me pause here to say that it is not my intent in any way to second-guess Kennedy or Shenton. They are in an incredibly difficult position. It would be easy for me to speculate on how I might have handled this differently, but the truth is that I do not have all of the information about the constraints, pressures, and mandates they are likely facing. At any rate, I do applaud them for posting the transcripts of their remarks, and encourage all of us who are following along at home to read them.

Equally important were insights from those who were actually at the town hall meetings including:

• The Great Librarian Massacre (and Other Episodes in Harvard Cultural History)*: Tom Bruno, Head of Resource Sharing at Widener Library, Harvard, provides an excellent first-hand account and reaction to the Town Hall Meetings. Tom writes “So while a lot of what’s been said on the Internet has bordered on hysteria, I hope you’ll at least forgive those of us Twittering from the epicenter of yesterday’s announcements for our gut reactions to the endgame of a very long and painful reorganization process.” No need to ask forgiveness, Tom — I hope the outpouring of on-line support for you and your colleagues is evidence enough that we are with you in spirit and with as much empathy as we can muster.
• The Crimson Thursday: Michael Bradford, cataloger with the Harvard Divinity School, provides another first-hand account and reaction. Most telling was his admission that although “we all knew that with a massive reorganization like the one taking place, that there were going to be reductions. It was still a shock to see the words on the screen and coming out of Helen Shenton’s mouth.” The words he refers to were “the library workforce will smaller than it is now.” Bradford echoes others who indicate that the town hall meetings served only to “ratchet up the anxiety, fears, and trepidation amongst the library staff”‘ without providing any new details.

Other blog posts tackling the story include:

• The Harvard Libraries Reorg: What’s the Takeaway?: “Harvard’s radical reorganization is not akin to the day the music died, but it is a harbinger of things to come for many libraries of all stripes.” I beg to differ. My sense is actually that what Harvard is doing now (in terms of downsizing and centralizing) is actually what many of us have already done. I think this is a case of Harvard emulating its peers, rather than a case of the rest of us eventually following in Harvard’s footsteps.
• Reformat and reinstall approach to organizational change rarely works: Edward Bilodeau, a librarian at McGill University, claims that “it is clear that they (Harvard Library Administrators) have decided to bring about the needed organizational change in a short amount of time, and the impact on their people, their careers, and their personal lives is not very high on the list of priorities.” I think that is a particularly harsh and cynical interpretation of the situation, without much (if any) evidence to support it. In my opinion, those directly affected get to grumble, speculate, and engage in as much hyperbole as is useful to them. I would like to see the rest of us avoid speculating on motives and casting aspersions.
• Harvard U. Libraries, Reorganization, and Transparency: A Note for Leadership: Colleen, academic librarian and author of this blog, notes “I still cannot decide what about transparency frustrates leaders so much that they will not engage in its practice.” We don’t know exactly why the Harvard Library leaders have not revealed more details about the reorganization at this time, so I’m not sure it is fair to speculate that they are deliberately avoiding transparency. We do know that the lack of more detailed information right now has caused some significant anxiety for staff, and (thanks to social media) for the wider library world. I do think the issue of transparency and leadership is really important. Frankly, it is one of the top struggles I have had since moving into an AUL position in 2009. As a colleague recently said to me “the higher up you move in an organization, the more secrets you have to keep.” Sometimes you have to keep secrets to protect individual privacy, sometimes to protect financial information, sometimes because your boss asks you to, and sometimes for any variety of other reasons. I have given quite a bit of thought to how to be as transparent as possible in a leadership position — I actually have a draft blog post on the topic. Guess it is time to dust it off, flesh it out, and get it posted soon.
• The Library Loon on Restructuring: The Loon essentially says she saw this coming, it is coming to other libraries, it is needed, and research librarians better be ready for it. Being the Loon, she says it with eloquence and a delicious level of snark.
• Of Anxiety and Reorgs – Harvard Libraries Today
• …What it is ain’t exactly clear…

And, some straight-up press accounts:

• Harvard Magazine
• The Harvard Crimson
• The Chronicle of Higher Education
• Library Journal

This story is far from over. Stay tuned.

What’s happening at Harvard?

The twitterspere (at least my corner of it) was all abuzz today about the Harvard Library Town Hall meetings (hashtag #hlth). Harvard Libraries have been in a “transition” for some time now, and it appears that the meetings today were intended to provide library staff with some updated information on the transition. Judging from the tweets, it was not particularly effective — more questions than answers apparently.

I have absolutely no insider knowledge at all, but as far as I can tell from trying to keep up with the tweets all day:

• An initial tweet claiming “All of Harvard Library staff have just effectively been fired” was re-tweeted often, as was a Google+ post written by a former Harvard University Library staff member.
• Later tweets clarified that no staff were laid off … today. Layoffs are imminent, however, and more details will be available next month.
• The layoffs will be in areas that are “Shared Services” — such as technical services, preservation, and access services; not collection development, research librarians, or special collections.
• Some jobs will be eliminated, some restructured, some new jobs created.
• For restructured and new jobs, internal candidates will be solicited first.
• All library staff are being encouraged to fill out employee profiles (with skills, interests and a CV/resume), which will factor into decisions about restructuring (and presumably who stays and who goes, and where the stayers go …). It looks like the deadline for completing profiles is only 1 month away, and workshops on how to do so are already full.
• The general sentiment on twitter is that the senior administrators at Harvard Libraries handled this very poorly — that the town hall meetings produced more questions than answers. Rather than serving to keep staff informed, they served primarily to create significant anxiety.
• Plenty of folks are worried that as Harvard goes, so go other academic libraries – in other words, if massive layoffs can happen at Harvard (with its huge endowments), then no academic library is safe.
• An official Harvard Library Transition Update was posted publicly on January 17. More official Harvard Library Transition stuff on the Harvard University News site.
• Excellent first-hand accounts and analyses from @mpeachy8 and @oodja.

I know a least a few folks who actually work at Harvard occasionally read here, so I do hope they will correct anything I have wrong, and chime in with any additional information. I hope they also know that I wish them well in what is obviously a super difficult and stressful time.

A concierge by any other name

In November, we kicked off our plan to introduce a Concierge Model for library services here at Stanford Libraries (SULAIR). The general idea is to emphasize “concierge-like” service to scholars, focusing on serving as a single point of contact for the full range of needs a scholar might have. The bulk of our work will be on equipping and empowering our staff to provide that kind of service — which will require a series of cross-training activities. For example, we want the Subject Specialist for Economics to be knowledgeable enough about the range of services we offer that they can be the “concierge” for a faculty project involving numeric data, digitization of government documents, maps, GIS applications, and maybe some visualization software. SULAIR provides all of those services, but spread across many parts of the organization. In our new service model, the faculty member gets access to all those services and resources through the single point of contact instead of having to figure out where each of those services lives in our 400+ person organization.

The kick-off of our new “Concierge” model included a formal presentation, discussion, and interactive use-cases at our annual managers’ retreat; a shorter presentation at our quarterly All Staff meeting; and a follow-up at our monthly managers’ meeting. The best part of all of these presentations and discussions has been learning that librarians and other staff really, really, really dislike the Concierge metaphor.

I have never been so happy to have gotten something wrong. The fact that the term Concierge struck such a nerve with folks has resulted in tons of feedback and engagement, and spurred a spirited and collaborative attempt to come up with a better metaphor. The primary objection to the term Concierge is that it implies a much more subservient relationship to the client/guest/scholar than the kind of collaborative and collegial relationships that we foster within our community.

Some of the alternate labels staff have suggested for our Single-Point-of-Contact model of library services are:

• Ambassador
• Sherpa
• Docent
• (River) Guide
• Steward
• Advocate
• Champion
• Ally
• Match-Maker

In my opinion, each of these suggestions works best if you add Information before the label — i.e. Information Ambassador, Information Sherpa, etc. Which led to someone (my boss, I think) suggesting “Informationist” as the right label. I’m skeptical that we would get buy-in from scholars for a completely new term that sounds very library jargony. And, of course, more than one person has wondered why we can’t simply use the term “librarian”? My answer to that is that very few students, and perhaps even fewer faculty, think of a “librarian” as someone who can help them with statistical analysis, data visualization, multi-media production or any of the other not-typical-library-services we provide in support of research and teaching. And the whole “Concierge” plan is intended in part to address our image and marketing challenge.

At this point, we haven’t settled on the right term, but the debate over labels has helped us to distill some of the key elements of a good “Concierge/Ambassador/Information Sherpa/Whatever”:

1. They are active and pro-active in identifying a full range of Library resources and services that would support a scholar’s research and teaching needs.
2. They have expertise and “insider knowledge” of our organization and of our business — from trends in scholarly communication, to internal and external digitization efforts, to developments in e-book publishing, etc.
3. They work collaboratively with scholars, contributing their particular expertise to a project as a colleague.
4. They provide seamless and efficient access to the very broad array of services and resources offered by the libraries.
5. When acting as the “Champion” for a particular project, they assume responsibility and leadership for the project.

Now if we can just figure out what to call them (us) …

My 2011 in Music

Inspired by Ed Sommers post on 2011 Musics, here is my summary of new (to me) music in 2011.

I got 30 new albums in 2011, 22 were digital downloads (direct from iTunes store), and 8 were actual physical CD’s. (I’m not counting CDs burned for me by friends, only CDs I paid money for). All of the physical CDs were uploaded immediately to my iTunes library, and about half of the digital albums were burned to physical CDs (so I can play them at home for all to enjoy). The truth is, I love the listening convenience of digital music, but am clearly not ready to make a wholesale transition to all-digital. One thing that is stopping me is storage — I haven’t yet invested in iCloud or any other cloud-based storage solution — and I don’t have a device with enough memory (other than laptop and back-up hard drive) to hold all my music. The other thing stopping me is an old CD player at home, with no input for an iPod or iPhone — so if I want to listen to music through my half-decent speakers at home, I need actual CDs. These are probably not the only reasons I have not gone all digital though, since my book consumption patterns reveal the same indecisive mix of print and digital. Clearly I have some lingering emotional attachment to physical CDs and physical books. I’m OK with that.

My top 10 CDs, in order based on number of plays, for 2011 are:

1. Crosby, Stills and Nash: Greatest Hits
   At some point in 2011, I realized I did not have enough CSN in my collection. In less than 5 minutes, iTunes took care of that. I love that digital music means I can get old music easily and quickly. I still keep a running list of old music I want/need, and enjoy hunting through used CD stores for gems; but sometimes you need some CSN right away!
2. The Decemberists: The King is Dead
   This is one of the physical CDs, and was a birthday present.It is an excellent collection of tunes, and will make you forget the horribleness of their 2009 The Hazards of Love.
3. Gregg Allman: Low Country Blues
   Another CD I own in physical form — picked this up at a Best Buy because I had a store credit. I love the Allman Brothers Band, so took a chance on this without reading any reviews. This CD is flat out AWESOME. Buy it now! Check out I Can’t be Satisfied.


Andrew Duhon, photo credit Flickr user dsb nola

4. Andrew Duhon & the Lonesome Crows: Dreaming When you leave
   While in New Orleans for ALA in June, I heard Andrew Duhon live — he just happened to be playing on the night I decided to go listen to music on Frenchmen Street. I loved his sound, so downloaded 2 of his CDs as soon as I got home. Really good singer/songwriter stuff, with a sorta folksy flavor, and some pretty good harmonica on some of the tunes (I’m a sucker for harmonica). Here he is playing Crosstown Southern Blues (my personal favorite)
5. Lucinda Williams: Blessed
   I love Lucinda, and will buy everything she puts out. This CD does not disappoint. The title cut is a personal favorite, and I love the accompanying videos on her youtube channel.
6. Pete Yorn: Music for the Morning After
   I “discovered” Pete Yorn through Pandora – can’t remember what station I created that led me to Pete, but probably The Jayhawks, or Ryan Adams, or maybe Golden Smog.
7. Andrew Duhon: Songs I wrote before I knew you
   See story for #4 above for example of how live music is supposed to work.
8. Traveling Wilburys: Volume 3
   I don’t remember how I decided to buy this; but I added Volume 1 to my collection this Christmas. There is no Volume 2.
9. Big Head Todd & the Monsters: Sister Sweetly
   I distinctly remember buying this one based on responses to my request for new (to me) music recommendations on Facebook. I specifically asked for something in the bluesy rock – rocking blues spectrum, and this definitely hit the spot. Again – title cut is especially good.
10. Justin Townes Earle: Harlem River Blues
    I was on a bit of a Steve Earle kick for awhile, and someone (I think on Facebook) suggested I give this CD by his son a shot. I love the simple alt-country, bluesy sound of this CD. Christchurch Woman is a favorite. Am still not sure whether Steve and Justin beat out Bob and Jakob (Dylan) as best father-son musicians ever, so I’ll just keep listening to all 4 of them.

Clearly, social media play a big role in alerting me to new music and old music that I want in my collection. In fact, I complained on Facebook that none of my “friends” had ever mentioned Pete Yorn’s music, leaving me to discover him by chance on Pandora.

Some concluding advice:

1. Buy Gregg Allman’s Low Country Blues, and play it immediately and often.
2. If you don’t have any Lucinda Williams in your collection, get Car Wheels on a Gravel Road. It is the closest thing I have ever heard to a perfect album – music, lyrics, Lucinda’s amazingly distinct voice. Trust me on this.
3. If you want to support a very good young musician, and you like Bon Iver or early Ryan Adams, give Andrew Duhon a try.
4. If you like learning about new (to you) music, share the music you like with your social networks, and ask for recommendations. Things like Spotify that show me what a friend is listening to are OK, but I get more out of actual comments, mini-reviews, etc. I much prefer a “Mike thinks AC/DC is a great way to jumpstart the budget proposal process” over a “Mike is listening to Back in Black on Spotify”.

2011 in review at Feral Librarian, courtesy of WordPress

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 11,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 4 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

WordPress provides a pretty cool summary report, complete with fireworks. I’m happy to see that my 2 most popular posts for the year are actually library related (Suit up: Some free advice on interviewing for library jobs, and Our Library Facebook Page); but I think the many folks who got here through searches for steroids, copyright symbol, and wooden gate may have been a little disappointed.
I’m not making any New Year’s resolutions, but will try to post more often. I will also try to post more about some of the projects going on her at Stanford Libraries.

Concierge Model for Librarians

At our annual leadership retreat yesterday (~50 department/unit managers), we kicked off our Concierge Model plan. I gave a Concierge for Librarians Presentation (w/ gratuitous cute doggie photo) to set the context.

Our Concierge concept has much in common with Corey Seeman’s Hospitality focus at the University of Michigan’s Kresge Business Administration Library, and I very much benefitted from his presentation and our conversations in Charleston (Yay for conferences and networking!).
In a nutshell, our Conciege approach consists of:

• An explicit focus on exceptional customer service
• A committment to providing a single point of contact (a “champion”) for scholars whose needs span several parts of the organization
• A committment to providing a series of ongoing training events for our own staff to make sure we all stay informed of what services and resources are provided throughout our big, complex organization

After introducing the idea, we then asked folks (in groups) to do some improv skits of good and bad public service interactions. This turned out to be a great warm-up activity that allowed us to pull out some themes about what constitutes “exceptional customer service.”
After lunch, we had groups work on some Concierge Use Cases (PDF) and present them. Each group represented a cross-section of the organization, which meant that some Concierge cross-training began happening just in the small group discussions as staff had different levels of knowledge about services and resources related to their use case example. The discussion of the Use Cases really highlighted the value of the Concierge model and the need for staff training. A big challenge for us will be the growing list of topics folks added to the training agenda. Although, whenever staff are asking for more meetings, I figure we must have tapped into a real need.
I’ll certainly be sharing more as we implement, so stay tuned and wish us luck.

Thoughts from Charleston Conference

This was my second Charleston Conference, and I have some thoughts, in no particular order:

Publisher presence: One obvious strength of the Charleston Conference is the integration of vendors and publishers as collaborators with librarians, rather than merely as sales folks in a huge exhibit hall. Hearing publishers give substantive talks and engage in thoughtful dialogue with us about the current and future state of libraries, publishing and higher education is refreshing.

I stayed at a lovely Inn, but was a little unnerved by the painting of doleful bunnies in the bathroom

Diversity of libraries present: I really, really want to count this as a strength of the conference, but I’m not so sure. It seems to me that the differences between large research libraries and smaller libraries are becoming more pronounced. This parallels the well-established trend that the gap between rich and poor increases in times of economic scarcity. I just wonder if our shared challenges and opportunities are maybe not so shared after all. Frankly, sessions on Speed Weeding, Serials Gone Wild, and all kinds of patron-driven and/or just-in-time instead of just-in-case acquisition models are just not that relevant for the Stanford Libraries. Sure, we are selecting items for off-campus storage, but we aren’t de-accessioning anything, and we aren’t really cutting back on our commitment to deep and wide collection building. I wonder if the plenary talks on the need for Linked Open Data, collecting and preserving Data Papers, and exposing Hidden Collections (all of which require significant resources) seemed just as irrelevant to my colleagues at smaller institutions. I fear this all sounds really elitist, and I certainly don’t mean it that way. I was just really struck by the very different perspectives across kinds and sizes of libraries. I guess I don’t see it as much at conferences like ALA, because I tend to self-select into sessions and meetings focused on large research libraries.

Long Arm of the Law: I loved it last year, and am very glad it got an encore this year. What I would love to see next year is a panel with both University Counsel and Library administrators. Let’s have a dialogue about what librarians need to know about copyright. Let’s find out how University administrators, especially University Librarians, make decisions about when to play it safe, and when to move ahead with projects that put their institutions at risk of being sued.
Tweeting Charleston: The Charleston twittersphere got awfully lonely at times! Despite having a pre-designated hashtag, the percentage of active tweeters seemed pretty low to me. Clearly there were plenty of lurkers though, as several folks either DM’d me or told me in the hallway (apparently my avatar photo actually looks like me) that they enjoyed my tweets. Actually, some people just said they were reading my tweets, without noting whether they liked them or not … I think I might be too snarky for some tastes. Several of the speakers mentioned things they saw on the tweet stream, and I overheard conference organizers talking about what they saw there. As one of the more active tweeters at the conference, I have to say I wish the lurkers had chimed in. I really enjoyed the online dialogue with those who did engage, and would have enjoyed it more if more folks shared their thoughts, questions, lunch recommendations, style critiques, etc.

Size and identity: The Charleston Conference strikes me as a medium-to-large sized conference that still thinks of itself as a small, intimate gathering. I think it’s cool that there is a cadre of folks who have been to Charleston every year for 31 years. I have to assume that it is those bonds that inspire all the inside jokes, personal references, singing and skits. But, those same things which make Charleston feel personal for some, can feel cliquish and alienating to newbies. And some of us just aren’t that into skits and sing-alongs.

Jiffy has 2 moms

My wife and I adopted a dog recently, so naturally we started a blog about our adventures as first-time dog owners. I get to post about it here, because I gave the blog a literary inspired name.
So, if you are interested in stories and pictures of the most adorable doggie on the planet, check out Jiffy has 2 moms.