Taking the plunge into Facebook Timeline

I took the plunge recently and converted my Facebook profile to the new timeline feature.  I read two excellent articles/guides that helped me out through this process. The links to these guides are at the end of this post.
What I Found Out
The Facebook timeline, when you create it, gives you 7 days to fix any problems before being published.  You have the options before the 7 days to publish earlier or to cancel conversion to the timeline.  Once your profile is converted and published into the timeline, it becomes permanent.  Well, as permanent as things are inside Facebook.
So, what types of things need to be fixed?  Facebook may convert posts that were limited in sharing; for example, a post that was only shared to family, to be made public viewable.  Everyone should take the time and comb through the timeline to make sure any limited postings are still limited.  If you published everything to all friends, all of the time, then this may be less of an issue.  Facebook in the conversion may not publish important things on the timeline; for example, the year of your graduation from college; or you may want to hide that information.  You can add life events to the timeline to correct these types of mistakes from the conversion.
Photo albums are by default made public.  So, my suggestion is to go to your photos and check each album.  Photos uploaded by mobile devices have to be individually assessed.  So, if you uploaded a lot of mobile photos—good luck.
Timeline uses a cover photo in addition to your profile photo.  The cover photo is public; there is no changing the cover photo setting. So, I have followed the advice of others and used a scenery image for my cover photo and not something personal or identifiable to someone on another continent.
Good for Teenagers
If you have teenagers or young adults in college on Facebook, encourage them to convert to the Timeline feature.  If Facebook eventually forces the timeline conversion, these young people are already prepared and know how to remove stuff out of the timeline before their potential employers see it.  Also, the timeline features allows for them to reflect by year what each one was thinking or what each one was doing at the time.
The Two Guides I Used
I can’t say enough about these two guides.  Just read them to be as prepared as I was when converting to the timeline.
Your Guide to the New Facebook Timeline Privacy Settings:
http://internet-safety.yoursphere.com/2011/12/new-facebook-timeline-privacy-settings.html
Everything you want to know about the Facebook Timeline
http://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/everything-you-want-to-know-about-the-facebook-timeline/
After reading these two guides, I was prepared to have my profile converted, and confident in what I was doing. 

Three 2011 Highlights

2011 was a blessed year.  A lot of good things happened to me and to my family.  So, I decided to narrow those good things down to three categories and to choose one highlight for each category: Hamilton County Council of PTAs, Tennessee PTA, and work.
HCCPTA: At the Principal Dinner, I was installed as the president-elect of the council and was presented with my National PTA lifetime achievement award certificate.
TNPTA: This was tough--so many good things to choose among.  The successful planning, designing, and creating the new website was a huge accomplishment.
Work: Another tough one to choose only one thing, but this is my top one in this space -- co-authoring an article in the peer-reviewed Journal of Library & Information Services In Distance Learning (See the ERIC entry here)

Don't go back to fill-in-the-blank and waste another year

A Facebook friend recently had a newsfeed item of liking a YouTube video from REM of the song "Don't go back to Rockville."  That video rekindled some memories from the eighties for me.  I remember driving the two hours from Cincy to Indy to catch a REM concert.

This song is about love in the wrong places/spaces.  One partner goes back to Rockville to work at a factory to make more money rather than staying in the relationship back where nothing is happening for jobs.  Over 25 years later, not a whole has changed it seems.

The hook line in this song has been going through my head and for some reason I started substituting Rockville for other cities.

Don't go back to Knoxville, and waste another year, or
Don't go back to Nashville, and waste another year, or
Don't go back to Anyville, and waste another year.

Even though this is a REM song, Natalie Merchant in a 10,000 Maniacs cover did a soulful, emotive cover. Reminds me of an alternative country-rock cover. The embedded video below doesn't show anything but it gives you a chance to listen to Merchant's delivery of song full of sadness wrapped around a hope for a better life.