Suzanne Calling

When a class topic is something I can use with my kids. Tonight, we talked about motivation theories, and what to do with students with performance avoidance behaviors. Much like Chef has been displaying since the beginning of the school year. He's gone from being an A/B student to avoiding homework, saying he's stupid, and me getting emails from the teachers that he hasn't done the work. Who knew that my studies would give me some ideas to help him?

Suzanne, you've finished one huge project, wrote a paper and are about to do someone else's taxes and five assignments for one class. What are you going to do for a blog post? Shuffle my iPod and see how disparate the ten selections may be and add brief commentary. Yes, I've done it before. Shoot me. Mother Nature's Son -The Beatles, White Album. It reminds me a little bit of several other McCartney songs, like Venus and Mars and a little bit of chord progression like Mamunia. Who Can it Be Now? -Men At Work, Business As Usual. Good song, good album and a good song to play on a sunny day like today. Magic -Stimulator, Ella Enchanted. This Jeff Lynne penned, Olivia Newton-John sung hit from Xanadu got the Justin Bieber treatment for another movie soundtrack. Hooks in You -Marillion, Six of One, Half Dozen of the Other. The first Hogarth song I heard from Marillion and I wasn't sure I liked this vocalist. That was in the early 90's and I think this song w...

Four thousand frames later, I think I can indulge in a little bombastic Queen right now. Never mind that every time the professor says Flash, in my head, I say aaah AHHHHHHHHH.

I spent six hours yesterday with Flash drawing objects to make this: I used the wrong drawing mode, and I couldn't 'union' the components. Heck, it doesn't even show the fill color unless I deselect everything. Frustrated, I packed it in about 2am, vowing to start fresh in the morning. Then, my concept for this assignment changed completely. Funny how that seems to happen a lot with this class-I struggle with an idea for a while, then right down to crunch time, another idea comes along that makes a ton more sense. Tonight, the project is due, so I decided to look at the uploads of my classmates. Not one utilized a drawing object at all. Instead, the new concept I have seems to fit right in with their submissions. Even better, it's a heck of a lot easier. Plus, the new idea is something that the school's website can use more than the original plan. Guess I should get back to work, but the stress level on this thing dropped dramatically-all because of th...

Puzzle Pieces. I'm sure you've seen the ribbons for Autism Awareness, with the many colored pieces all fitting together. It's an apt description for what life is like with a person on the autism spectrum, because you're always trying to figure out what makes them tick, what helps them get through the day to day, and what helps them to navigate this world of 'neurotypicals,' because the rest of the world is just so darn illogical . Yes, my friends, my child resembles Spock in some ways. Last year, I wrote about the way I barely had heard of anyone with Autism when I was a teen and now it touches not only my house, but those of friends, too. What I am learning, through my own educational journey, is that it is more than likely we're getting better at diagnosing those who used to be called quirky, odd, strange, weird, or even mental. Last year, I was hoping that a new school placement would be the right 'fit' (yet another puzzle piece) for Game Tee...

Whoever said that March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb should have spent the last couple of days in Florida. We've had winds and torrential downpours. Heck, in driving Gameteen to school, I was not that far away from where a tornado touched down . I didn't know about the tornado warnings, but that's because there weren't any for my county at that time! Instead, I drove in rain that made it impossible to see, rivaling the rains that preceded a couple of the hurricanes we had in '04 and '05. Poor Chef had early release from school at 3pm, and didn't arrive home until 4:30, about five minutes earlier than he would have on a regular day. The camera stayed tucked in my bag in my travels today. Once home, I took a look at our pool. Yesterday, Ed and I agreed that perhaps we should drain it a bit with all the rain that we've had. It didn't get done. Around 5pm, I looked at it and saw this: The water is supposed to be about three inch...

I iz the ruler of dis house. The hoomans, they think they run the place, but it is MY house. They put silly things on me and take my picture. I ask "Why ME?" Oh, right. They shower me with the love and adoration I deserve. I guess I will put up with teh silly hoomans and do what they want. For today.