go with the flow in more ways than one

The plumbing issue continues to plague us; we have misaligned pipes. With a little lip of pipe for things to catch upon it’s no wonder we keep having trouble. I think we’re going to see about buying our own power auger.

Sean had a second interview today at the same joint he was at earlier. The intervening days have given me time to get used to the idea and I’m now 90% excited and 10% anxious, and officially hoping he gets the job. I reckon we’ll find out next week. He said the interview went well.

Tonight we had a simple potato soup and homemade bread. One of those delightful plain meals that get overlooked for more sophisticated fare. Potatoes, onions, milk, butter, salt. Honestly, what’s not to love? I made enough to feed our army with a bit left over and then some – I had planned to feed my niece and her boyfriend as well as the Gleesons, and he was unable to make it. So there’s enough for lunch tomorrow as well! Yum. It’s especially good with grated cheddar in it.

Bede had another rough day. He seems to be ’stuck’ more than he has been in the recent past, and gets more and more agitated as the perseveration goes on. I find that it’s very difficult to break him out of it once he gets started, and even if I do he’ll return to it later with renewed insistence and frustration. Whenever possible we have been trying to avoid situations where we have to bluntly say “no” and instead we are smoothing the way beforehand – keeping things he will become agitated about out of sight, attempting to compromise in the early stages of a ‘moment’ and so forth.

I am not unconditionally saying okaysure! i getchoo whatever it is you want! because I don’t like the precedent it sets in his mind: if I am insistent enough, loud enough, physical enough, I will get what I want. Sometimes there are just “no” moments: you cannot sit on your siblings or assault their persons; you cannot eat food, chew it to a pulp and spit it on the stairs; you cannot do many things. And so on. So when they occur I try to Just Be with him, consistent and kind and empathetic.

The hardest part about these times, beyond the episodes themselves, is the uncertainty of the peace when everything is calm. Knowing that the calm can be shattered any moment by an upset seventy pound autistic boy is more than a little nervewracking. I am on edge and jumpy, which makes things even more tense, and Bede more likely to react in kind.

All the more reason to keep the peaceful, easy feelings in the fore…

Do they dare?

Today I rediscovered (as in, found it behind a bookcase) one of my favorite books as a child, The Berenstain Bears and the Spooky Old Tree. I loved it as a kid and remembered lingering over the illustrations. My kids love it just as much as I did, and Gloria is quite put out that I’m not reading it to her for the ninth time.

Amazon is currently running a sale on Dr. Seuss books – buy two get one free. Some other Extreme Favorites here at the Gleeson abode are Go, Dog. Go!, Big Dog…Little Dog, and Fox in Socks. I love these books!

There Are Cats In This Book

That’s the name of Bede’s favorite book. Have I discussed this before? I don’t think I have. It’s a REALLY GREAT BOOK. Did you like The Monster at the End of This Book? Then you’ll love this book. Bede acts it out constantly, redraws it with other beasts and beings (There Are PIXAR Lamps In This Book, etc) and it has given us a whole new world of bridging scripts upon which to drape deeper meaning. Abby has drawn several semi-sequels and derivative works. Faith still chuckles at it, at age nine. Trixie and Gilbert love it too.

Go buy it immediately. If you hurry, you can get it hardcover at bargain book price – $6.80. Go on, go!

Gloria tells us how it is

Gloria was awake very late and was chatty due to falling asleep for an hour at 9PM.

I videoed her.

Here you go.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/feebeeglee/4052451590/

Sky Walker competency trial

On January 29th, Sky Walker was arrested for assaulting his mother. She died about a week later, and he was charged with her murder. Sky is 18 years old and profoundly autistic. His competency trial was this week.

The whole thing is heartbreaking.

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2009/09/kent_state_university_professo_1.html

Where is Sky’s dad?

Sharing is Caring day 4

Sharing is Caring:
for one week, recommend / share
Day 1: a song
Day 2: a picture
Day 3: a book/ebook/fanfic
Day 4: a site
Day 5: a youtube clip
Day 6: a quote
Day 7: whatever tickles your fancy

Today is a Site. I’m going to send you all to The Baldwin Project. It’s a fantastic collection of public domain children’s literature, all formatted nicely and so forth. It’s an invaluable resource. We use it for read-alouds all the time.

Sharing is Caring day 3

Sharing is Caring:
for one week, recommend / share
Day 1: a song
Day 2: a picture
Day 3: a book/ebook/fanfic
Day 4: a site
Day 5: a youtube clip
Day 6: a quote
Day 7: whatever tickles your fancy

Today I’m doing all three, lucky reader!

Book: Old Man’s War by John Scalzi. I sat back just now and tried to think of the one book I’ve read in the last few years that really surprised me, really stayed with me, and that was it. Heinleinesque first person military mindbender.

eBook: Little Brother (available as a free download at that link, courtesy of the author, Cory Doctorow.) This one’s near-future dystopia.

Fanfic: The Chaosverse, by earlgreytea68. Of course it’s Doctor Who, what else would it be? “And then there came a day when Rose said she was having a baby.”

PBS shirts

Bede draws the PBS logo a lot. He changes it around and makes a whole family of P-heads. He gives the P-head a different look, like a PIXAR lamp P-head, or a Scrat P-head.

I think he would really, really like this shirt. They don’t come in kid sizes, but he’s a pretty big kid, and he likes his clothes loose. An adult small will be too big but not unwearably so. And all he’s doing is growing… This is going on his Christmas list for sure.

Sharing is Caring Meme Day 1

via earlgreytea68

Sharing is Caring:
for one week, recommend / share
Day 1: a song
Day 2: a picture
Day 3: a book/ebook/fanfic
Day 4: a site
Day 5: a youtube clip
Day 6: a quote
Day 7: whatever tickles your fancy

The Decemberists: The Engine Driver has been haunting me lately. It’s such an autumnal song.

I hope you enjoy it. Here are the lyrics:

I’m an engine driver
on a long run,
on a long run.
Would I were beside her:
she’s a long one,
such a long one.

And if you don’t love me, let me go.
And if you don’t love me, let me go.

I’m a county lineman
on the high line,
on the high line.
So will be my grandson:
there are powerlines
in our bloodlines.

And if you don’t love me, let me go.
And if you don’t love me, let me go.

And I am a writer,
writer of fictions,
I am the heart that you call home.
And I’ve written pages upon pages
trying to rid you from my bones,
my bones, my bones.

I’m a money-lender:
I have fortunes
upon fortunes.
Take my hand for tender.
I am tortured,
ever tortured.

And if you don’t love me, let me go.
And if you don’t love me, let me go.

And I am a writer,
writer of fictions,
I am the heart that you call home.
And I’ve written pages upon pages
trying to rid you from my bones.
I am writer,
I am all that you have hoped of.
And I’ve written pages upon pages
trying to rid you from my bones,
my bones, my bones.

And if you don’t love me, let me go.
And if you don’t love me, let me go.

midsummer, math musings

I love midsummer. The cicadas are crooning in their robotic way, the air is viscous with heat, the days are long.

I don’t like my electric bill, which was obscenely high. I mean, it was bad. I have not been as good about hanging laundry as I could be – mostly days where it “looked cloudy” – but even accounting for that it was awful. I’ve renewed my dedication to not using the dryer and we’ll see if August’s bill is less than July’s. Dude.

In other news I’ve been geeking out over Doctor Who, listening to indie rock, and planning our school year. I’m leaning toward Teaching Textbooks for math since it’s self-taught and on the computer, both things Faith and Abby appreciate. It is a bit pricey though.

We’ve become sort of Charlotte Mason unschoolers. I coined the term “nudgeschooling” and it seems to fit. As always, it’s a journey.

How are you?

Police arrest mother for dropping her kids at the mall

There’s an essay in Brain, Child this issue about a Montana mom who left two seventh graders in charge of an 8 year old, a 7 year old and a 3 year old in a stroller, at the mall in Bozeman, for 2 hours. She was charged with child endangerment and forced to pay massive legal fees and to attend parenting classes.

The full essay is here.

As usual, I remain far more frightened of government child abduction than I am of stranger danger. What a world we live in.

interesting forum

This natural health forum is the latest place I’ve discovered for ahem, “alternative” medicine. I originally wrote a paid review of it for mturk and I’ve since given it a deeper perusal. It’s not too busy, but it has a dedicated bunch of regular posters. Sometimes I don’t want to go to Mothering.com’s boards, or I want another viewpoint. Sometimes I like to rubberneck the biomed autism cure crowd – they have a different perspective than I do, to be sure, but we all have autistic kids who will become autistic adults, and it’s my experience (very limited) that most parents come around to accepting autism.

I like the Nutrition subforum. I’m not as crunchy woo as some of my friends but I try to avoid GMOs in my food (no Roundup Ready for me, thanks!) and high fructose corn syrup when possible. It’s kind of nice to go to a forum where I am absolutely not the weirdest. Although, again, the Mothering.com nutrition forum, esp. Traditional Foods, has this one beat by a mile.

So that’s one of the places I’ve found. Any interesting places y’all have discovered?

Stop the R Word

My son is developmentally disabled.

Every time I hear the word “retard” or see it, or hear someone flippantly refer to something they dislike as “retarded” I wince inside because it stabs me. I have some younger relatives who use it as a default insult word, and I guess this is my passive-aggressive way to ask them to stop.

Stop saying retard.

Stop saying “ur so retarded!” in Facebook comments.

Eliminate the word as an insult from your vocabulary.

Please.

Stop using the r-word.

Have yourself a gloomy little Christmas

I found these dolls looking for “organic doll” on Amazon: Planet Pixies!

They’re cute little Groovy Girl-esque soft dolls, and I was thinking of suggesting them for out of town relations as gifts for the kids. Then I read the description:

All over the planet, Pixies are losing their homes due to pollution, deforestation, and global warming. Now these Pixies need good homes and friends that will care for them and for the environment. Together you & your Pixie can learn about the environment & what you can do to protect it to ensure no more Pixies lose their homes! Planet Pixies are made with all natural and organic cotton. Each adorable Pixie provides information about a specific endangered region of the world from which they’re from, along with tips on what you can do to help.

I get that we need to teach children to be good stewards of the Earth. I’m all for it. But I think the effect of all this crud is going to be DEAF EARS and a strong sense of futility.

Can’t we just have little chemical free pixie dolls without the guilt? Please?

The Mom Song

Shout out to all my mom homies, but most especially The Mom at Shoved To Them.

more about “The Mom Song“, posted with vodpod

Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffin’ glue.

My friend Tabitha quit all milk and milk products this week, and she’s had possibly the worst week ever. Tabitha darlin this one’s for you.

more about “Looks like I picked the wrong week to…“, posted with vodpod

Lloyd Bridges as McCroskey, in Airplane!

Please. Use. Fewer. Words. Slower, Too.

Autistic brains process sound slower than nonautistic ones.

…researchers discovered what they believe are “signatures of autism” that show a delay in processing individual sounds.

That delay is only a fraction of a second, but when it’s for every sound, the lag time can cascade into a major obstacle in speaking and understanding people, the researchers said.

Imagine if it took a tiny bit longer than normal to understand each syllable. By the end of a whole sentence, you’d be pretty confused.

Researchers at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia had 64 autistic children ages 6 to 15 listen through headphones to a series of rapid beeps while under the helmet-like device, which recorded the brain’s response to the sounds. Those brain waves, shown as highlighted areas on an imaging screen, were compared with responses in a group of non-autistic children.

In autistic children, response to each sound was delayed by one-fiftieth of a second.

Yet another reminder to speak slowly and clearly, and to wait for a response. I tend to pile more and more words on, when I don’t think I’m being understood, and in this case it likely just makes it worse!

Buy Sale Stuff You’d Buy Anyway Day

I confess, I don’t quite get Buy Nothing Day. It seems to me that the day to buy things would be the day when they are priced the least, rather than some other day when they are priced higher. I think I must be missing something.

The general notion of voluntary simplicity is one I can get behind though, and do.

PSA: Plymouth Pilgrims, not Boston Puritans

The Pilgrims that sailed on the Mayflower did not wear the stereotypical black accented with buckles.

Pilgrim adults and children wore bright solid colors since their religion did not object to colorful clothing. They had many dyes so that red, green, beige, burgundy, blue, violet, as well as brown and black were worn.

from Pilgrim Clothing.

This blog post brought to you by someone who would be a right stickler if she ever got to make SCA garb again.

I think it’s time to watch Colonial House, haven’t seen it in several years.

take a bow

My friend Kelley has an assortment of really beautiful hair accessories in her Etsy shop. She had her first daughter after three sons and I tell you she has been positively BURSTING with girly beribboned flowery goodness.

I plan on a few for Faith and Abby for Christmas. You must go look, I insist!