I'm back for another week, and it's been an interesting one. I've actually been fighting some nasty cold/flu thing since Saturday afternoon. It was odd too, because I felt great when I got up that morning, but midway through the day, I just started to feel sick. I was rather out of it for the next few days. Yesterday was the first day I actually started feeling human again.

I've still gotten quite a bit of work done this past week. I'm really working on outreach for the library. I just put together a newsletter article/press release about the assistive tech and training we have at the library. My plan is to get it posted in area and disability related publications, as well as a few websites.

I also attended a presentation on Dragon Naturally Speaking at MCIL (Metro Center for Independant Living) last Thursday. It was actually very interesting, and I learned a lot. I'm still new to using Dragon, so I got some good tips, commands, and suggestions to help make Dragon work better. I also met the tech person at MCIL, and he was very cool. We had a good talk about technology in general, assistive technology, and what we had at the library. When I get my article approved, I will be sending it to MCIL so it can be put on their website. I also did a couple minute presentation to everyone at the demonstration on the different technology and services we had at the library for free. I handed out some business cards and fliers, and people seemed pretty interested. I hope something comes from it.

I've also been working a bit more on the whole future job search thing. I've applied for a couple jobs, and posted my resume on some good job websites. I'm still really thinking about doing another year of AmeriCorps, but I'm looking at other options too.

Between all of this, I've been checking in with a couple of websites on a little event going on down in L.A. this week, that I really wish I were at right now. The Electronic Entertainment Expo or E3 is going on this week. It's basically a huge press event focused on all the newest and coolest tech toys and video games that will be coming out in the next year or so. There's actually a lot of very cool stuff to look forward to. I'm especially excited about Nintendo's new system that will totally change the way people play video games. The DS was a great start, but their new home console is completely different than anything else. I can't wait!

It's rather hard to explain in words. It's something you just have to see. You basically don't have to worry about complicated controllers with lots of buttons. You have two separate pieces to the controller, one which is like a TV remote, and the other has an analog stick. Both of these pieces have motion sensors, so you just do the actions in a game rather than pressing a button. Swing the controller like a baseball bat or golf club. Flick it forward and pull back to fish. Aim a gun in a shooting game by pointing on the screen, or perform actual slash movements to use a sword in-game. The cool thing is, you can do the actual motions, or simply do small gestures with your wrist. I can't wait to see all the new possibilities of this new controller. So what's the system called? It's actually the Wii, pronounced "we." I know, I was rather confused too. I still don't know if I like the name, but everything else looks extremely cool, so I'm getting it anyway.

That's about all for this week. Next week I'll be working more on library outreach, training, the AU committee video project, and who knows what else. I'ts just great to be feeling well again.