Okay, I’m About To Get All ‘Captcha’ On Your Ass
The comment spam I’ve been having to manage is getting ridiculous. I hate to do it, but I think I’m gonna have to go “Captcha” on ya’ll. (Why “captcha” makes me want to type in slang is beyond me, but whuddeva….)
Also, pay no attention to the weirdness that is going on on the navigation bar (that column on the left). I’m wanting to get a bit more stylized, so I’m trying to learn to work with widgets and such.
Of course, I have to do it myself and not use template or cookie cutters, so it’s gonna look weird until I figure it out. I did use “spiffy” for the rounded corners thing on the bottom though. I always use “spiffy” for rounded corners. ‘Cause that is just tedium to do it all yourself.
I love “Spiffy.” I’ll post a link later, but right now I gotta run. I think it’s actually hit 40 degrees outside! If so, that’s the first time that’s happened since sometime in November. Love it!
(I’m Not Your) Freak-On-A-Leash
A lot of the web design business I get is from people seeking web design on Craig’s List. And a lot of them say something similar, but that drives me completely bat-shit. And that is this:
“I’ve already thought this all out, and I know what I want it to look like, so most of the work is done - thus it shouldn’t take too long to put together.”
aye-gudda-aye-gudda-WHAT?????
Did you really think it all out? You know what you want and how you want it to look? How unusual. And thus that solves all of the puzzle about how to make it do/look the way you want?
You’ve thought about how PHP and MySQL work together? And how they fit into html and xhtml? And CSS? And how CSS demands STRICT xhtml? And how the javascript and Flash and dHTML you want in there affects the CSS, xhtml, html, PHP and MySQL, not to mention your SEO endeavors and the layout?
No? You didn’t think all of that through and solve for that? I DIDN’T THINK SO! That is the HARD part. Duh. Web designers/developers are not simply TYPING MONKEYS.
We do the architecture and construction, we are the one’s who make it work - who make it happen. And that requires a tremendous amount of thought, skill, research, coding, design work, and (at times) trial and error.
It most definitely takes TIME. And it is most definitely NOT EASY. (And that is why we get the big bucks…)
Knowing how you want it to look and what you want it to do is not the hard part.
MAKING it look how you want it to look and DO what you want it to do - that is the hard part.
I might be a freak. But I’m not your typing-monkey-freak-on-a-leash. Get a clue.
By the way, I won’t touch jobs like this with a ten-foot-pole. It’s only a Pandora’s box of conflict and heartache and probably very little compensation.
Oy, what we freelancers go through…..
Narcalepto
Increasingly as I get older, periods of extreme physical and emotional distress will wipe me out to the point of plunging me into sleep, on the spot, literally.
It started when I was in labor. The epidural only worked on one half of my body, and I was in horrific pain during contractions. The moment the contraction was over, I would pass out cold, only to awake when the next one started, until I finally gave birth. Then I was fine, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
The next time that happened was when my hernia got constricted or whatever it’s called. My body would go through phases of trying to move my intestines, as bodies do, and this horrific pain (very near to child birth pain) would wash over me. When my body gave up that attempt, boom - pass out into oblivion until the next one started. That was until they put the nasopharangeal tube down my nose to my stomach and started vacumming out the contents, and wham! I was asleep for about the next 3 hours.
Then last year, while driving to Iowa, I went through a horrific snowstorm in Wyoming with blowing snow over the interstate. I couldn’t see more than 3 feet in front of me, but I couldn’t slow down below 55 or I’d be hit from behind by these semi trucks that were just blasting on through. This was in the mountains, so I had the added stress of worry that I was going to plunge over the side of the mountain at any moment. It wouldn’t have been so bad, but I had my 4-year-old in the car with me, sound asleep - was scared to death of crashing and hurting him.
And I nearly passed out from the stress every time the snow would let up just a little. That happened once when I got to Des Moines, too, and I was driving on the freeway in a pretty bad snowstorm (have made sure that doesn’t happen again), and it was all I could do to keep from plunging into a deep sleep.
I understand this to be narcolepsy, but fortunately I seem to be not as much susceptible to it if I know I am needed at full faculty. It does scare me a bit. Hopefully it’s not something that gets worse as you get older. I never did experience it even once until I was 35 and was giving birth.
Crazy.
ADDENDUM: Oh, and the thing that made me think of this, I had a root canal at a dental college about 3 or 4 weeks ago that was horribly painful - they couldn’t get the anesthesia right, and I finally just told them it was fine. Every time they clipped away at the pulp/nerve endings, I could feel every bit of it. And when they would stop, I would immediately zonk out. And on the way home I could barely keep my eyes open on the road. I guess my body just shuts down after periods of extreme intensity.
Or Maybe He’s Not…
This is my last post on the “whether” and the “why” when it comes to Charlie. I will still write about him and our challenges and what we’re doing to work on them. But I’m going to stop wasting time and energy on finding a label and a definitive answer. For some, maybe there just is no specific label and set of “rules.”
Since this is my last post on the subject, it will be a semi-long post. Feel free to skip it if it doesn’t interest you!
The reason I’ve changed my mind, yet again, is because of the parent-teacher conferences I had today with Charlie’s teachers. When I brought up the Fragile X test and autism to Charlie’s special ed teacher, she said, “I don’t see that.” And she is a person who has earned my very high opinion of her. She said she does see most of the behaviors I am talking about, but the “social” portion just doesn’t fit someone who is autistic. And that is the part I had doubts about myself.
It has been, and still is, so unbelievably frustrating trying to figure out what is afflicting my poor child and trying to help him. So I have decided just to stop worrying about “what” it is and just put all my energy and time into treating the symptoms. Autism, Fragile X, and “Pervasive Developmental Delay Not Otherwise Specified” are not curable, anyway. All you can do is treat the symptoms. So my thinking now is that I don’t need to worry about a label. My time and energy is better spent treating his symptoms, so that is what I’m going to do. I have a plan and a re-newed vigor and excitement about things I can do to help him, which I plan to write about in a separate post.
So, back to the parent-teacher conferences… (He is in kindergarten in the morning, with a Special Ed helper just for him, then a PATHs class [social development], and ECSE [Early Childhood Special Education - or special ed pre-school, to put it another way] in the afternoon, along with a speech therapist, so there were lot’s of people to meet with today!)
His Special Ed pre-school teacher said that he is doing great and has met all the goals she made for him, as written, for the entire YEAR. Everything from here on out as far as her work with him is “over and above.” So that was really great to hear.
His speech and language specialist said that he had met his goals for this tri-mester and was on track to meet them for the year.
His PATHs (social development) teacher said that he is doing better but still struggling. He has a hard time in his interactions with other kids and a very hard time dealing with his frustration-which leads to anger-which leads to tantrums and yelling. He is not meeting his goals there. She is wonderful and patient, fortunately. I believe he will continue to progress, but his problems in this area may lead to some big problems in the next school year. I’ll elaborate about that a bit later.
His kindergarten teacher showed me his work and had some good things to say, but this is where he is clearly way behind all the other kids. In comparing his letters and his attempts at writing words and sentences and things, he has improved since the beginning of the year. But he is nowhere near where the other kids are. Nearly everything on his report card is “needs work,” though he got a few “progressing,” and a couple of “meets goal.” And every single area was asterisked with “With help” or “With modifications.” He doesn’t do any of his work alone and on his own. And all the other kids do.
I know I shouldn’t compare, but just to illustrate, there were little stories on the wall that the kids in his class had written about a picture of a snowman. Most were faily neatly-written and spelled right for the most part and had several sentences. His was a bit scrawled, with a couple of backwards letters and was only two sentences - basically describing the snowman - saying that he was wearing a hat and was a snowman.
So anyway, he is sure to be in kindergarten again next year. And he is a July birthday (he is now 5-1/2), so he will be the same age as many of the other kids in that class anyway. But there is another wrinkle, and I haven’t decided just what to do about that yet.
The school he goes to now mainstreams Special Ed kids with a helper in the classroom for them. They don’t even have facilities or a system for segregating the Special Ed kids. So before I told them that we were returning to Seattle in June, they started priming me for the idea of sending him to another school.
They were telling me about other schools in the area with Special Ed classes that were just Special Ed kids, segregated from the rest of the students. Due to his difficulty in progressing in the social development area, they feel he might “do better” in a different setting.
For the most part, I like his school and the teachers. But this little bit is just b.s. to me, for two reasons. First, they have pushed very hard for trying Ritalin for him. Second, his kindergarten teacher. I don’t want to say for certain, but I got the idea from the very first day that she didn’t like Special Ed kids in her class. I feel she is against mainstreaming and doesn’t like anything that is out of the ordinary or the least bit of a challenge. I do not get that vibe from anyone but her. But I do get the vibe from other teachers that they get feel the same way, but can’t really say anything.
So, not to wax on about that - because it would be a waste of energy - I’m just a bit worried about the recommendation they will make for Charlie for the 2008-2009 school year. I agree with the recommendation that he should repeat kindergarten. But I do not necessarily agree he should be segregated.
I am going to have to think about that one a lot. In the meantime, there is a whole ‘nother tri-mester of school left for him to make progress in, and they do recommend him for summer services, so there is that. Then there is the plan I have to pro-actively treat his symptoms and try any and every alternative method I can to teach him, and just throw away normal thinking on how to teach a kid to develop their language and read and write and figure things out. He needs a lot of help with emotions and with his fine-motor skills, too. So we will work with those.
He is great at drawing and figuring things out in video games. He does really well with visual cues. He has great spatial ability and is extremely imaginitive. He carries on extended conversations with imaginary friends (not just one) making up little stories to tell them, etc. He remembers everything, even from years ago. He has a lot of positives to work with. He has an amazing personality, is very charming, very funny, likes to make people laugh (there’s the social stuff that does not seem autistic), and is the cutest kid ever.
Here are some of the many reasons I thought he might be autistic:
He was diagnosed with “Sensory Processing Disorder” in 2006, which is almost always seen in people with Autism (He was diagnosed and declared as “Learning Disabled” at that same time, and I was told that he is protected under the ADA - Americans with Disabilities Act)
He does “stimming” (making on-going, loud, humming-like noise to zone out after being over stimulated) for a long time a few times a day
Hand-flapping
Spinning obsessively while watching his hands
Notices every little noise and movement - and is overly-distracted by it
Obsessed with lining things up (putting all his toys in a line instead of playing with them) - he has rarely ever played with toys the way they were meant to be played with - he just uses them for props - mainly to be lined up!
Severe tantrums beyond the usual age (he still has them)
Needs routine or goes “ballistic” (changing routine results in one of the following: tantrums or an extended period lining things up - and they have to be perfect or a tantrum will still happen)
Echolalia - Saw speech as ritual to be repeated and not as communication. He would simply repeat back to you what you just said, “What did you do at the park?” “The park.” “No, what did you DO at the park?” “DO at the park!” That was up until about 10 months ago….
Severe speech delay - resulting from - what? That is the biggest mystery. Is it the echolalia? The impaired sensory processing? He could not communicate conversationally until about 10 months ago. And has only really recently started having what I would call a semi-complete, satisfying short conversation.
Many other developmental delays and all the “red flag” hallmarks of autism, including hand-flapping; extreme fascination with ceiling fans, door latches and hinges, light switches, etc.; not able to pedal a tricycle until about 9 months ago; extremely poor fine and gross motor skills; avoidant eye contact when much younger….
The list goes on, but it was significant. And I wouldn’t even care about all those little quirks, which I consider endearing, actually, if there hadn’t been the significant delays behind them that made me concerned that he would never fully develop speech and be able to learn new things.
The speech and language-comprehension delay causes SO many problems. He was still in diapers at the beginning of this school year. He only became fully potty-trained about 2 months ago. It has prevented, or created a huge challenge with, my teaching him anything new at all.
But now that the speech has kicked in, and is actually developing, I am encouraged quite a bit.
So, no matter whether it is autism or PDD-NOS (Pervasive Developmental Delay-Not Otherwise Specified, which is what they call someone with a lot of autistic traits and developmental delay who does not meet all the criteria for autism), it really doesn’t matter to me anymore.
He is his own little unique Charlie, and he has his own special challenges. And that’s all there is to the “whether and the why.”
End of that chapter!
I Was Doing It Wrong - He Is Autistic
I got Charlie tested for Fragile X because he had many autistic behaviors/problems and some physical features of Fragile X. Fragile X often causes a lot of autistic behaviors but is not the whole story so I thought would have him tested for that.
I found out today that he does not have Fragile X syndrome, so I started researching autism again. I have researched it a lot over the last two years, because that has seemed to be what is going on with him.
I kept thinking that Charlie had all the criteria for autism except the non-social part, but I never bothered to read the directions for the DSM-IVR, which tell how many critera need to be met for a diagnosis. I thought they ALL had to be met, when actually it is just 6 - With at least two being from group A and and at least one each being from groups B and C.
Charlie meets plenty of the criteria and then some. His doctor diagnosed him with “Autistic Features” in January, but I think a specialist is required for a full diagnosis. I will do that when we get back to Seattle this summer and find out about any and all help available for him.
From this point forward, I know I know what I’m dealing with - He is autistic. I know “why” - because he is Charlie and that was the cross he was given to bear. I don’t know exactly how to help him or whether he’ll ever be “thoroughly ok,” but knowing what I am dealing with gives me a good start.
It has been a real nightmare not knowing what’s wrong, then thinking I knew, then not, then thinking I did - back and forth ad nauseum. But now I know and I can put all my energy on how to help him as opposed to just wondering and worrying all the time.
YouTube Videos In WordPress Blogs Disappear if You Edit the Post
I was having the hardest time trying to insert YouTube videos into my blog up until recently. I would type the post, and then switch over to the “Code” tab and insert the YouTube code, then save the post and all was fine. But if I wanted to edit the text of my post, as I almost always do, the video would always disappear from the post after making my changes. I knew I had put it there; I remember inserting the code! But where did it go?
Then I remembered that, for some reason, WordPress tends to think it “knows better” than you do when it comes to code! I was fighting with it a few weeks ago because it kept removing the line breaks I was adding in the “Code” section! And what I had figured out was that, if you add or change something to the “Visual” tab AFTER changing or inserting something in the “Code” tab, you are likely to lose some of the Code changes.
Why does it do this? I don’t really know. WordPress is genius, I do admit that. And what it knows about code could blow me out of the water any day, I am sure. But sometimes I DO want to be able to add an extra line break here and there or insert a YouTube video or something. I do believe this is a true glitch that needs to be fixed.
Anyway, while I don’t know why it does this, I did figure out a workaround for it. Just make your code changes the very last thing you do before you hit “publish.” This sounds simple, but it can be kind of a pain sometimes.
The greatest difficulty I’ve come across in working around this glitch is mainly one of inconvenience. Say you made a blog post yesterday and inserted a video. Then today you notice a typo in your post and want to fix it. Unless you saved the embed code from YouTube in a text file on your hard drive or something, you’re going to have to go back to YouTube and get the code again and come back to WordPress so that you can add the code to the Code tab again after making your editorial changes on the Visual tab.
If you have any questions about inserting a YouTube video into a WordPress blog entry, just use the contact form (link is over on the left) to contact me. I’ll help as much as I can!
A Video of Part of the Lunar Eclipse February 20, 2008
I didn’t get to see the lunar eclipse last night, but I did find a video that a couple of funny guys from California taped and put up on YouTube. It’s rather amusing, as well as really interesting to see the moon emerge (eventually) from it’s eclipsilization.
Mother’s Against Nature
They did not cancel school today, despite a wind chill, when I woke up, of 37 DEGREES BELOW ZERO. Whatever. Whatever you have to do to keep your little school district going.
But as a MOTHER, I could not, would not, will not, do not send MY CHILD out into the world when it is 37 DEGREES BELOW ZERO. Never ever. No apologies. Nope, will NOT do it. Nothing is worth that.
I can NOT imagine the parent that thinks it is ok to subject a child to that for 2 hours’ worth of kindergarten on a shortened day. Nope.
This Mother kept her child home, warm, safe, and happy on this day, February 20, 2008, when the wind chill reached an official 41 below zero.
Send my five-year-old out in that? You have to be fucking KIDDING ME. He wins. You lose. Go away.
Isn’t the Snow Pretty?
The Beauty of Iowa
It’s Cheaper* to Live in Iowa**
I moved to West Des Moines, Iowa, from Redmond, Washington one year ago and have not found it to be a less expensive place to live than where I came from.
Therefore there is no trade-off for the horrificly hot summer last year and un-ending hell of a winter that we’re going through now, or the fact that there is virtually no natural beauty and almost nothing to do outside of the pedestrian.
* Not including hats, gloves, mittens for the kids, winter coats, snowpants for the kids (required for school), boots for the kids (required for school), boots or sturdy shoes with traction for adults, huge heating bills, extra money for gas for letting your car warm up in the winter, special windshield wiper fluid that won’t freeze on the windows, ice scrapers, opportunity hours lost scraping ice and otherwise dealing with snow and ice, salt, snow shovel, wear and tear on your car, house prices that don’t go up so you actually lose money on your home any time you have to replace something like a water heater, etc. - thus you don’t get back your investment, rent in a comparable neighborhood is no cheaper than in the Seattle Metro area, state Income tax (the state I moved from had none), quality food like decent cheeses and wines cost nearly double here, and common food is marginally cheaper but health and beauty products are just high or higher so it evens out (and explains a few things)
** By “Iowa” I am referring to my experience in Iowa in the Des Moines Metro area.