Thing 15 - my pimped out google homepage

So, I went to my parents' house in North Dakota a couple of weeks ago. My kids were ransacking the house. My mom was at work. The guys were trying to hang a TV on the wall without breaking it. I sat down and did my Q6month homepage tweaking session. My life if on Google, it seems. So I started a personalized homepage a long, long time ago. I have links to everything. I access my to-do list, email, calendar, quotes of the day, the weather, my favorite blog, etc, etc.

To bad I never have time to sit at a computer and look at it.

Why did I pick this one? Obvious - I've already done all the work on it. I spent about 2 hours futzing that day on the farm.

Check it out here.

Dislikes - can get overwhelming and busy, I just keep finding more things I want to follow...but can't.
Likes - it's all right there.

Thing 13 - Presentation Tools

I'm spending less time on this one since I already made a Prezi. Please see my prior post. There's a link to the Prezi I made in that post. I've done a number of presentations on Google docs. But I keep finding myself going to PowerPoint. Often I can't (or choose not to) just the internet connection when I'm talking.

Zoho Show seems easier to use than Google docs. You can log in via your google account.

Slideshare - don't know about using this one. Technically, everything I do belongs to HealthPartners. I'm sort of afraid to share anything.

Love the links to the image galleries - I'll be looking more at those for future presentations.

Thing 12 - Online Project Management Tools

As I continually race between spinning platters in the performance that is my job, I had interest in this thing. It certainly seems that the Web 2.0 flavor of this process is miles ahead of the old-fashioned way. That may be my naivete showing however. I have very little experience in project management.

What challenges do you face right now that could possibly be improved by using a project management tool?

Hmmm...tough question. I have a number of projects but I'm not really in charge of any of them. I don't feel like I'm in a position to ask others to use an unfamiliar program. I also struggle with the idea of spending time learning a new program.

Which two project management tools did you investigate? What were your impressions? Compare the two.

I looked at a few. Goplan, DeskAway, Central Desktop, OnStage. I chose the ones that had free plan options, since I'm one of those people that jumps on new technology quickly (often prematurely). I like DeskAway the most. I has an iPhone app (hopefully later an Android). Seems an easy-to-use interface as well. Central Desktop tour seemed to assume I understand project management (which I don't).

For tools/plans that are not free, do you think they are worth the cost?

For my personal uses, nope. Now if I was an actual manager, maybe. But it seems like many of the functions (wiki, etc.) can be done on programs that don't have fees.

Why did you choose this thing?

It was next in line.

How long did this thing take you?

about an hour

Trivia Question from Thing 11

Quick: Who knows the tune the guy was playing on the Ocarina app on his iPhone? Has anyone ever heard the word Ocarina before seeing this video?

Ugg...I'm a geek.

That was the theme from Legend of Zelda, a video game series. Ocarina of Time was released in 1998 for the Nintendo 64. Yes, I've played it.

I was an early epocrates user. It rocked. Yeah, it tracks what we click on and sends it to drug companies...so what. Sometimes when I'm bored I'll click on random meds I've never heard of just to screw with them. I still have it on my phone (need it at Hudson). The web site is fine but I have to sign up. At Regions, it's now in Epic and I'm on that more than my phone.

I spent a long time on the Twitter thing (~2hours), so I made up for it on this Thing (20 minutes, tops). I'd already read all the articles referenced when I was shopping. I own a Droid, on the android platform. I have a few medical apps, but I rarely used them. Epic does most of what I need.

Why did a pick a droid? I have verizon and like it. It has coverage in important areas for me. When I was shopping, there was no talk of any iPhone other than AT&T, so iPhone was a nonstarter. Also, I have a iPod, and find iTunes slow and annoying. My husband just got a Palm Pre and loves it. It definitely has a nice form factor. My 3 month old droid looks big and clumsy next to it.

I am rarely more than 3 feet from my droid. I track expenses, shop, play games, manage email, IM's, calendars and to-do lists. I have apps that entertain my children. I web browse. It's my alarm clock. And I just figured out how to make the Imperial Death March from Star Wars my ring tone. Ahhh...mobile technology.

Twits and Tweets

Well, I think I'm starting to grasp twitter. Many of the links and info seem to be focused on Twitter for Business. I'm more interested in Twitter for education. I think there's some interest in using twitter for our conferences. I'm brainstorming ways to use Twitter to help me teach my core content area to residents. Maybe use if for discussions before the lectures. Send out trivia questions to "get the juices flowing". Survey questions during lectures. Hmmm...so many vague ideas, so little time.

My FB page is mostly personal (and rarely used since I'm a paranoid introvert). I think I'm going to try to keep my twitter account (@drjelson, by the way) a little more work focused.

I have a Motorola Droid (yep, geeky - did you know there's are Star Trek tricorder app that measures actual acoustic waves, local electromagnetic waves and solar flares?) and am using Seesmic to follow my twitter on the road. So far, twitter is more of an afterthought since I have so many reminders and notifications for To-dos, calendar appointments, emails, IMs, facebook junk, etc.

Searching has been a little useless, interestingly. I listen to a lot of podcasts since I have the attention span of an emergency physician. I know darn well that all have twitter accounts (they ask me to follow at the end of every podcast). I type in "The Public Speaker" (FYI it's quick and dirty tips on communication) and ... nada. However, going to websites and clicking on the little Twitter badges is slick.

Love or hate microblogging? Don't know yet. Still figuring out what I want to say before I can really figure out how to say it.