Thing #22: Cocktail Builder, Farecast, GoogleMaps

Oh, man.

One of the harder things for me to do is just "go play" when I'm told to "go play". For this assignment, we were supposed to go and play with the Web 2.0 award winners, and I really had a hard time with this. Several of the winners I either already use, or we have covered in the previous 21 Things. So here's a couple that I tried:

Cocktail Builder: This site allowed me to mix my own drinks based on the ingredients I might have on hand, scroll through a list of cocktails by name (some will make you blush), create a drink menu for your guests, and even shop for cocktail accessories. I found the following delight from their random offerings:

Girl Scout Cookie (4 ingredients)

1 oz of peppermint schnapps
1/4 oz of creme de cacao (or other chocolate liqueur)
4 oz of cream (or other milk)
club soda

shake and serve on the rocks.

What use this might have in the library? *giggles* Well...ok, maybe not much, other than looking up drink recipes should we be asked something like "What's in a Tic Tac?" (Rumple Minze and Ouzo, in case you're wondering.)

Farecast: UGH. Totally frustrating. I was so excited to see this, to see that they make airfare predictions, but I found the site difficult to navigate and the results cryptic. I was looking for something a little more straight-forward, like airfare to Dallas should be cheaper in May rather than March, or sign up here to receive updates on your selected destinations. Furthermore, in my case I'm looking for the best time to go to England, and they give very little in the way of predictions, and only seem to have flights with stopovers in US cities. It was totally unhelpful for me, and I'm shocked it was an award-winner, to tell you the truth. I've used Expedia, Hotwire, Travelocity, Priceline, and others before, and I found Farecast to be the worst of the bunch. Big thumbs down. As for library application? I'd suggest any of the others above before this one.

Finally, there's Google Maps. Too much fun! I've zoomed-in on satellite images of my home, friends near and far, Downtown St. Paul, and even Central Library. I like the level of detail some of these get down to, and the stalker curious part of me wants to see even closer. It's a bit like having an all-seeing eye/omnipotent power kind of thing going on.

I think maybe I'm just nosy.

Psst! ONE MORE TO GO!!!! W00T!