Hmm…Work Done (or, more accurately, Work Doing).

Hmm…work is getting done. For a moment I was inspired by the subject I was writing but then I thought, I can’t really be inspired because my work is not done yet. Oh well…tomorrow, I will sit my butt down and really work on my multimedia project, and get lots of notes and paragraphs and stuff to throw into Tribe for another semester group project. As far as I know, I’m going solo on the project, which I don’t really mind as I haven’t really found anyone reliable in class this semester, except for a couple of the other group members in the other subject group. I am beginning to feel it though, but I’ll make it. I hope so anyway.

Thursday I woke up with a throat that was made out of sandpaper. My fear was that, and still is to a point, that I picked up strep throat from working in close proximity to a classmate that had it one day. However, now that it’s almost Monday, the uninvited visitor has moved up into my sinuses and I’m “honking” my nose often to try to get him out. I also cough occasionally. Fingers crossed that he leave, please. I hope I’m getting over this, and I hope it’s going to be gone before my very important and very big plans.

Tonight I successfully sewed one of Tux’s patches on his vest. I’m actually kind of happy about it. I couldn’t sew them on before because of the hard plastic coating that’s on the backside, but when we took a trip on public transit on Friday, it started raining and Tux and I both got soaked through (well I had on a jacket with a plastic outer covering, so I was okay) and it soaked the plastic off the patches where I could remove it with a razorblade. The other side that’s still left to do didn’t have as much plastic come off of it so I’ll be working with a razorblade tomorrow to chip some of that off so I can sew. Hopefully it all stays in decent place once I do sew it, although I’m half tempted to pack an extra piece of needle and thread with me around at my big events because it’s important to me, when I go to these large things, that Tux look professional.

In other news, imafarmgirl made it to the top 5 on LJ Idol. I really loved her posts, and I was crossing my fingers that she would get to stay in another week, but after what I saw the survivors were subjected to, I’m tempted to say it was meant to be, because I know she was kind of feeling some stress over things. I will miss seeing her posts, though.

On Friday of this past week I went up in Portland for an OHSU meeting where I got official permission to exploit Tux’s good looks at a large convention we’ll be going to (we’ll put a bandanna on Tux to promote the project at OHSU that we’re with). I also picked up imafarmgirl’s recommendation of Innova Evo Reduced Fat to strip a couple of winter pounds off my boy. We’re still in the process of transitioning him to it now, so I’ll have to keep ya’ll posted about our progress.

Locally, the Earth has been rebelling, I think. Last week we had a huge temperature spike for two days into the triple digits (Tux did not like that), then the day after those it was rainy and overcast. Now, this week, we had thunderstorms last night and we were in a flood warning as the rains hit. Tonight, things have been fairly quiet, no thunderstorms, although bursts of huge rain fall out of the sky occasionally and I stop my typing fingers to listen to them.

I hope to talk more about this later (yeah, all my friends know me…I’m so consumed with real life I don’t get an entry actually posted to my LJ except once a month or so, LOL), but this term has been really interesting in terms of college and a disability. Thankfully, my instructors have been really great about working with me, but I’ve never needed so many accommodations during the term and I’ve certainly never gyrated from each end of the spectrum almost weekly as I’ve done this term. I’m taking summer term off to work at OHSU a little, I hope, and then I’ll see if I can resume in fall term. I think I’m about ready for a break, especially after this semester. It’s been a fun and good semester, but an enlightening one in several ways, not all of them as positive as I would like.

As typical me, I hope to write some more at another time, as it is past midnight in my time zone and I really need to get to bed and get some sleep, first off, and then I need to work on my project in the morning until my butt does not exist anymore. Then I will type something up and maybe post it. I must keep my priorities straight here, laugh. No, seriously…I do need to work on the academic stuff in the morning, and then post only if I have time. So, to all my friends that are ever so understanding that I’m only an occasional poster, and rarely comment although I read every single entry that each of you write, thank you.

And, good night.

Courageous Heart & Tux

Public Transit Fun and Other Updates

I spent the last two or three nights of this past week, except for last night with insomnia – getting about 5 hours of sleep and awake for some really long days. I’m not sure what it was caused by. Last night, Friday night, I slept well and woke up later, so today’s public transit trip was a little delayed.

Next week, I am working a convention for OHSU that is hosted at a Portland motel. I originally wasn’t going to go, because I have to work (actually, supervise) a track meet on Friday night of the convention, but then I was told that OHSU needed some people to work an outreach booth at this convention so I signed up for Saturday.

Because the motel is in the heart of developed, crowded Portland, parking is in high rise complexes and they charge you $20 a day. Originally, this was part of the reason I was hesitant to go to the convention, because my parents freaked out when they heard I was going to choose to be carless for a weekend. They have some fears about public transit, and while I realize them to a degree, I think Tux and I are capable of wisely using public transit (and getting around carless for a few days) if it’s going to avoid $60 in fees and severe driving in tight spaces headaches.

Now that I signed up for the convention on Saturday, I needed to check things out by public transit because I didn’t exactly want to get lost or arrive late on the day that I was supposed to work. And I also wanted to check things out on Tux’s behalf and figure out if I needed to tweak anything before the convention.

So, I slept in this morning, and didn’t load onto a bus until noon. Tux was slightly afraid of the driver, because the driver fit the general profile of a man who used to harass Tux on my school campus, but as Tux watched me feed the money eater he grew more confident and slowly worked his way up to the driver and sniffed his scent on the air and watched him. I did have to give one tiny correction to make sure Tux didn’t sniff the driver once he got confident, but I was thrilled that Tux was finally able to overcome his fear. We loaded the bus and settled in. Tux had the typical adjustment / floor arrangement / size relationship difficulties, but that’s just because he’s huge and also wearing a large pack now. Oh well, I kept pretty well on the paw adjustment when I needed to, I think.

As the bus loaded even more along the route, Tux was very good. Several passengers sat beside me for times, and threw their stuff (sometimes roughly) under the seat without looking – the seat Tux was stretched out under. He handled it well and I was pleased. He also got kicked in the head once, but didn’t care. I do similar things to him (inadvertently) myself, the way my balance is and stuff, and my left foot when I forget to supervise it…but he’s a trooper though it.

We deboarded the bus and found the MAX station. We could see the MAX we needed, open and loading, but the crossing signals weren’t saying it was safe to cross and because the MAX and traffic signals and stuff are all choreographed in perfect harmony so nothing hits anything, I opted to wait. I also didn’t want to try to cross and find out as I’m trying to run across the MAX is shocking my dog – that would add a little time I didn’t have to risk.

The MAX, and the bus lines I was riding on today, are all “frequent service” so I wasn’t worried about missing the MAX I needed. I believe they come about every 15 or 20 minutes on weekends and because this was a Cinco de Mayo celebration weekend (I didn’t realize that when I left the house, but things worked fine) the MAX came on 10 minute intervals among its lines (routes).

So, after I missed the first MAX because of the crossing signals, I waited for the next MAX. My schedule said I needed to catch what we’ll call line one of the MAX, so I waited for another train to appear with that destination. In the meantime, another woman and a dog showed up, so I opted to stand in the location where the first car would pull up and she was remaining in the area for the second car. This would make things much easier on both handlers in my experience. 

Interesting Things Happening

I haven’t updated my LJ in over a month, and I’m sorry about that. Actually, I’ve done a few attempts, and a couple private entries, but other than that, I’ve kind of been consumed with real life for awhile, and not able to write.

I figured I’d just check in today, and ask a couple of questions/note a couple of things. It’s going to be part rant so I’m sorry that it’s not more encouraging, but I will write some of the good stuff at the bottom I think.

Okay, here’s the rant part. One: I have started a cooperative work experience course (where you get credit for working in the workplace) and I’ve encountered several hurdles. I’m working through them now but it’s a stress…then to top it off, I have an online course that, while on Blackboard, isn’t accessible to me. Now granted I suppose it is accessible, to a point, but it’s very discouraging. The professor has kind of set it up in a mind-map manner, if anyone has ever seen a mind map (looks like a spiderweb; you can start anywhere) and my mind does not do well with them (I think this is because of my Non Verbal Learning Disability). It is now the third week of the term, and I have just found her syllabus, which says if you wanted accommodations for a disability, you had to ask for them in the first week of the term and you had to clear it through the Counseling Dept. too. When I saw those words I was completely crushed…see the counseling dept and I do not get along. Part of it is because of Tux’s presence, part of it is the person I am, and part of it is things I don’t understand. To make it worse the professor only works from home. I do have her home phone number, which means I *could* call her, but I’m about to go to Disability Services instead and just have a chat with them about the course and to see what can be done. I’m getting everything from a mind-map to a linear, numbered organization slowly, but it’s taking time and I’m having to be careful to make sure I get things right and understand them.

Part of the issue here also is because Blackboard is supposed to be accessible, and I suppose it is, but my learning disability makes the way she organized the course the hurdle. I haven’t confided that to anyone, and I know I have to in order to get accommodations. I also know that her little thing about the first week of the term is wrong, you can discuss accommodations anytime in the term, you just have to realize that things that have already happened won’t be allowed the accommodations. Therefore, that means that I need to talk with her as soon as possible, but at the same time, I’d like to take it to Disability Services and see what they think of the statement, and especially the part about having to get your disability seemingly approved through the counseling center. I doubt, since I have so much conflict with them, they’ll do that for me, *rolls eyes*.

On the science lab course front things are looking a little better, although my special chair disappeared on Wednesday and I had to sit in one of the “normal” ones that cause such a problem for me. I also didn’t have Tux with me due to a bruised paw, so while the chair did stay in one place without really tipping from side to side, which was good since Tux wasn’t there to hold it in place (I want it again if my special chair is still gone on Monday, it was the least of the evils) – I was still running into the issue of the chair not having arms which is a problem, and a large one at that. By the chair not having arms I must be very careful of my position so I don’t tip off, and I also can’t lean back in the chair (against the backrest) because I will fall off the sides of the chair when I do so. I plan to look for it Monday if it doesn’t show up.

I am listening to Joan Jett tonight which is a really happy thing and brings back lots of memories when I was younger and wrote many works of fiction and what’s now called creative nonfiction. The current stories I’m reading from back then don’t really fit with the Joan Jett CD, because that’s not what I wrote them to, but I may go back into the stories I did write to the Joan Jett CD, and read them, even though they’re only two pages long apiece and I’ll be opening/closing documents all the time. Oh well, that’s okay, I love all my characters and I need to spend time with them. (Okay, I apologize for the sappy writer comment, I’ll try to refrain so I don’t get a “crazy” diagnosis).

I picked up a Sharpie marker in the field at track practice today (I volunteer at my old high school). It’s purple, and “my coach” (who I get all my orders from LOL) let me keep it. Yay! Purple is my favorite color; I’m half tempted to fix up my LJ with some “Sharpie purple” shades, laughing. On another note I also solved the mystery of last week’s issue of “going down” (I managed to get myself heat exhaustion by accident, ho hum…) – I’m pretty sure it has to do with my school schedule at college, because when I’m in my science class, I don’t have access to water for three hours unless I pack up my stuff, go outside the room, decontaminate according to lab rules, get a drink, and go back in the lab, all on a break of course. And the break time is not consistent, so I can’t plan my water intake as well as I should. As a result, I’m getting dehydrated, and that shows up at track as I’m out in the sun and trying to do everything I’m needed to do. It’s not nice to feel dizzy, get headaches, and wonder about whether or not I’m going to go down again and get lectured by my coaches. It’s quite eye opening (last week), when I get a lecture as strong as the ones I give to athletes that forget gear and come to me as the team bus is about to pull out to the competing school!

Perhaps I should/could set a goal of trying to write one LJ entry a week. Two months without a public entry (or a friends entry) is too long.

Courageous Heart & Tux

Things are looking good

 

I haven’t updated in awhile, so I think one of those is in order. Basically, things are looking good / very positive, and my work at school is decreasing.

 

So, in relatively chronological order, here are the events.

 

I finished my science mid-term. I finally got it back today, and got a score of 89/100. I have a chance to re-write the essay questions (which, come to think of it, I didn’t receive with my test – I’ll have to ask RT about that) for a maximum of three more points apiece (9 points total) and I’m considering doing that, but I’m not certain if I will. Honestly I feel like I did pretty good and I wonder if it’s really worth it to go through all that hassle to maybe get something, especially not knowing what my weak points were at this time. However, I am wondering if it might be worth a try to at least attempt to get one point and turn it into a real A. I don’t know.

 

I finished my persuasive essay for science class. Again, I haven’t received that back yet, but perhaps I’ll know more later. For the first time in my life, I stayed within page requirements. That in itself is a miracle and ought to receive an award, laugh, but I doubt it will. That’s okay though – I don’t really mind. A good grade and a comment from RT about it would be good enough probably, smile.

 

I turned in all my assignments for the Excel unit in my business class. I’m working on the Access unit, disliking it as I tend to dislike Access, but moving through swiftly as long as the computer doesn’t glitch and wipe my files away (yes, even if they’re saved – it will wipe away the saved file, too). I’m supposed to be working on PowerPoint at the same time, but I haven’t gotten around to it yet. Perhaps this weekend.

 

My assignment about a disease is in progress for my science class. If anyone is interested, I’m using a social networking site called http://www.tribe.net/ that’s (I think) a cross between MySpace and Live Journal, a lot like I remember the old website host Bravenet looking several years ago. Signup was easy and no captchas! At RT’s advice, even though I was fine using my Yahoo! email address, I then tried to create a Gmail account and gave up – I was almost through, encountered a captcha that was readable after some studying (twisted letters with a plain white background), tried to read it and hit the “audio” image so that I could hear it and make sure I was right. This refreshed the page, gave me a new picture and a different, but still applicable for signup, captcha, and wiped all my personal information away, so by the time I typed in this captcha, I had to go fix my now blank personal information, then had to turn around and (almost) fix my captcha again…but closed things and just re-typed my Yahoo! email address back into Tribe, and got started on my assignment. I really don’t think there will be that many problems with things, to be honest, and probably in a couple of weeks, I might close out my Tribe anyway. Or, perhaps I’ll fix it back up (or make a new one) linking to my blog here – nothing like applying the knowledge I learned in that one night website course to feed the spiders! LOL.

 

Speaking of Tribe, I really need to work on things and get them in there, so I can just fix things up cosmetically when we have a few minutes to work on it on Wednesday, but I’m just not feeling it. Tomorrow, even though I wish almost equally to get it done now, seems like a good day to do some research on my big computer and put some info blocks together, darn it. Oh well…I’ll get it done – I just wanted to go do things tomorrow without anything hanging over my head.

 

Other things hanging over my head include the business class PowerPoint and presentation I am supposed to do about why you should make your business both architecturally and attitudinally accessible to people with disabilities, the lab report for science, next week’s learning objectives for science, and of course my Tribe presentation, as already mentioned. I’m certain I’m forgetting a couple of things in that list, but I’m not really that concerned about it right now.

 

This weekend was a pretty positive weekend for me; oddly relaxing which doesn’t happen often during the term. I got all of the things I needed to do to a stopping point and basically took the rest of the weekend off, and amazingly, I’m not that far behind. I actually feel like I’m ahead, but I’m certain that’s not completely true.

 

Well, I think that’s enough for now because my eyes are drooping and I have to keep consciously opening them to ensure that I don’t delete my document that I just spent a length of time typing out.

 

Happy to be blogging,

Courageous Heart

Today had a trying morning, where I woke up late, was getting the only good sleep of the night since I couldn’t get to sleep until 11:00p.m. with my throat as bad as it was, tried to go back to sleep, rolled out of bed only to find my sister had climbed in the shower and locked the door behind her, and finally got out of the house a half hour late from my “late” leave time. Groan.

I managed to get up to the college with only a few minutes to spare and rush around gearing Tux up etc. (since he only wears his pack in the car, but needs a leash and boots when we get to the college, plus a drink of water and a bush). We ran to our building, about to make class on time – in fact, two minutes early – only to discover that class had been cancelled! I even had to look several times to ensure it was my class, but it was, and honestly, while I was okay with it, I would have appreciated knowing at an earlier hour so I could sleep in and get over the sore throat I think I obtained from that class in addition to an in-progress business education. Oh well.

With two hours to kill on my hands, I visited RT’s office several times to see if she would be an early creature like me. I believe she is an early creature, but not an early-at-work creature. I enjoyed visiting with other professors though, and several mentioned that they’d like to see more of my writing about Tux. We’ll see what we can do.

About 9:30, I was about done walking around campus (since that is about the only activity available). I fed and watered Tux, and then stopped by RT’s office because I knew she’d be in and one of the emails we exchanged last night meant I needed to talk with her in person. I took care of that, walked Tux around just a bit more, and settled in my usual spot in the science building to wait for my 11:00a.m. class. I hoped with two and a half hours of walking around Tux would be tired enough to sleep through not only this 10:00 to 11:00 hour, but the 11:00 to 2:00 hour as well, and I was right.

Science class was informational, and I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the mid-term on Wednesday. I, as the rest of the class, have the essay questions, but I can only take my brain into the test, not pre-written responses. That’s not too bad; RT was right that seeing the essay questions beforehand helps take a lot of the stress off of things and hound studying efforts. There’s supposed to be about 20 multiple choice science-y questions on the midterm, from the science professor, and I’ve been doing well on the in class PowerPoint polls, so that makes me feel good. Hopefully I’ll be able to do well with the questions on the mid-term. I’m worried about those for knowledge and the essay questions for their inexact answer-ness. Sounds about like me LOL.

Because I have extended testing, and class will have a lecture after the mid-term, I need to start my extended testing early, at 10:00 instead of 11:00. Assuming that we will have my business class as expected on Wednesday, meaning it won’t be cancelled again which I wouldn’t mind in this instance, simply because of the timing – I will feed Tux in the early morning before I leave, go to school, offer Tux water, get out of my business class at 9:50, rush over to the testing center while giving Tux a chance for a bush, try to take an exam and hope that the puppy doesn’t get hungry or need to go out and whine to tell me, or even tag me quietly because they won’t let me out of the exam for any reason and I can’t take food into the exam (although that would work out well), and then stop by my car for Tux to get water and have one chance for a bush, and then go to class. The puppy won’t be able to be fed until at least 2:00, because I think his body will want to work in such a manner that if I feed him after my exam but before class, and then go directly to class, he’ll start to whine mid-way through class needing to go outside. I could be wrong, of course, but I think that’s typically how his body works, especially with the level of activity we’ll be doing running around on mid-term day.

Overall, though, I feel pretty positive about the mid-term. Now all I have to do is email my business professor to find out what I’m supposed to do with an assignment since there was no class today, and try to maybe study for my mid-term if I can and check out what I don’t know.

I’ll be happy when it’s over, and overjoyed when I will be able to type up my final draft for my persuasive essay and turn it in.



Trembling in fear of how she's going to find enough time to do all this work,
Courageous Heart

Our First Day Back

Today was our first day back to school, and the start of a new semester. I got up at 5:45 a.m., grudgingly, believing that even though the roads were icy, I would have no problem getting to school well before my 8:00 a.m. class time. I defrosted my car, warmed it up, packed a few last minute things, loaded the puppy and headed out the driveway. Tux was actually quite happy; seemed to know where he was going and excited to be in the car again and maybe back in the swing of things. However, as I began to smile at the 20 minute drive I would have over to the next towns and halfway through my commute, the car in front of me slowed down to 30 miles per hour (mph) in a 55 mph zone. That was the first sign that things were going to be quite an adventure on our first day back to school.

I won’t elaborate, but the car in front of me noticeably slowed down at 6:22. By the time I had worked the approximate three miles up to the accident scene and gotten through it, it was 6:57. Tux spent a lot of time looking up at me from the backseat, like, “Wait, we shouldn’t be stopping. What is going on?” Honestly, it’s amazing how much he knows and recognizes. How much, he, as a dog, thinks.

By 7:30, when I was more than fifteen miles from school and the speed zone was less than 60 mph (one mile per minute), I decided that it was about time to make phone calls to the professor that was teaching my 8:00 a.m. class. Since I didn’t have a phone extension for him, I had to call the operator at the college. However, in calls placed both before and after 7:30, the switchboard was closed. (What good is a switchboard if it doesn’t open until 8:00 a.m. or later?) I finally pulled over a last time, called my mother at home, directed her to an phone extension list on the college’s website, and had her provide me with the number. I left a message, stating my first and last name, the fact I was in the class that met on day and time, explained that I would be late due to traffic but I would show up, and hung up the phone. I didn’t leave him a callback number, or spell my name, but honestly I didn’t think it would hurt that much. Besides, how am I supposed to answer the darn phone without pulling over first? I know some people do it, yes, but Oregon law just increased the penalties for doing it. And I’d rather not experience those, thank you very much.

I arrived at my parking space at the college at 7:58. In some respects, I would have been on time if I’d been the average person that can walk/run quickly and that possibly is able to park closer. However, I’m not an average person, and I also travel with a dog. A dog that needed boots on his feet because of the ice-melting chemical the college lays down on days like this. A dog that needed a sip of water and a bush quickly as we ran to class. He’d have to be a real good dog because I didn’t have time to feed him, and he hadn’t eaten breakfast before we left. But, I had to cross my fingers.

Regardless of that long agenda, we were trying to fly discreetly into class at 8:08. The professor asked me if I was in such and such a class (the technical name for the class), and I said yes. He handed me a syllabus and everything was fine. I had a little catching up to do mentally, but it was very simple and nice. The instructor was also nice (I talked with him after class) and is open to students sharing knowledge with him and open to dogs. The one issue that I had to reassure him about – he was trying to be helpful – was when I mentioned that Tux is a mobility and medical alert dog (that way if Tux alerted me in class the professor wouldn’t think it was misbehavior), the professor wanted to know more (that was fine, because he didn’t pressure me about it or anything) and then the professor says, “Well, if he medically alerts you, what do I do? Do I call someone for you? Do I call you the paramedics?” I immediately tried to assure him that he wouldn’t have to do anything beyond being okay with the dog alerting me verbally, and to ensure my dislike of bothering the paramedics with muscle spasms stuck with the professor, I said in humor, “I’ve lived like this for 19 years, and not once have the paramedics had to be called. I don’t intend for them to be called this time, but thank you for your offer. Again, everything will be fine.”

So, I hope I got out of that one. I don’t need or want paramedics (except possibly at Bi-Mart), so I hope that they don’t show up. At least now, if they do, my service dog medical alert necklace came today, and I’ll consider getting it engraved tomorrow, or maybe Thursday. If the paramedics ever do get called, at least I’ll have that to talk for me if I can’t.

After chatting with the instructor, I left to a) go to the business office to ask a question and b) go to the bookstore. However, on the way there as we were walking down the hall, Tux ran into me really hard and almost knocked me over. Now I checked the scene and my surroundings and there was nothing even remotely around us, and nothing on the floor or otherwise to make him do that. So I gave him a swift and sharp correction, to which he promptly dived to the floor like the world was falling in and/or I was the meanest dog handler in the world.

And, on my right (again, not cause for Tux to run into me) was the professor from my class that I’d just talked with. He saw the correction, but actually never made a comment. We’ll see on Wednesday if he says anything…but honestly, if I don’t know what caused my dog to do that, and there was nothing around to justify Tux’s reaction, part of me knows I have to give a correction, if nothing else than for him to realize, “Whoops, I just about knocked Courageous Heart over!” That way, when it matters, he won’t mess up. Now, did I wish he had perhaps not dived to the floor like the world was falling in and/or I was the meanest handler in the world? Especially in front of my professor? Yeah. But we’ll take that if it comes. All I have to explain is the truth – I give corrections so that situations won’t occur later, a possibly dangerous situation did occur, and Tux is extremely sensitive to corrections especially when he realizes he just about goofed me up. I just have to mark the behavior with that correction for both his safety and my safety so that he learns what he did wrong.

After that experience, I went to the science lab/professors and asked a couple of questions. It turns out that mostly the chemicals used in that room are disinfectants, 10% bleach primarily, so during science class today (which met a few minutes later) I opted to not crate Tux and I also opted to not put a blanket down for him. I felt a little uncomfortable though with it, so Wednesday I’ll probably put a blanket down, but I don’t find the crate necessary at the moment.

RT taught the course, or part of the course, which was really cool. Tux got to see her outside of the room while we were waiting on another class to finish up, and I think that helped him get his I-love-RT affections down to a “working” level. Then we went and settled at the front of the room off the side, but I had to fight a bit with the chair because I can’t physically get into it safely without it being lower. I hope it’s the same height on Wednesday, but I don’t know if that will happen.

One thing here I think deserves asking: why in the world does handicapped seating end up at the back of a room? Sometimes people who need to use that seating also have other issues, where seating toward the front or the middle of the room is desirable. There’s also the “integration” factor seen with seating in the middle or front of the room, versus the back of the room. For anyone interested in commenting on this, please do.

Back on topic…I survived sitting at the something like 42 inch high table. The chair, thankfully, has a metal ring I can rest my feet on to add a bit of security and stableness to my body, although I spent most of the class slumped sideways because my body felt safer with a foot on the ground. Stupid messed up head and inner ear…

Having a disability is a lot like having a significant other. –Mine

I’m going to have to work on this issue and probably, as my housemates suggest, approach it with RT and ask her what suggestions she has or if I need to go to disability services and discuss the issue. It’s not very comfortable to have to “cling” to the table for three hours, although it can be done. The other issue that I am experiencing is that due to some sort of refrigerator or incubation unit in the room, I cannot understand what my professors are saying half the time. RT tries, and so did the other professor…but I just can’t. I lose half of it, and I know they would help me if I asked, but it’s not right (in my mind) to force them to go to all the extra work of repeating things. I do have a recorder, and I took some notes today, but the recorder didn’t pick up very well. I’m also unable to take good notes because of my handwriting issues, and due to the bacteria used in the room and the risk of cross-contamination when things aren’t disinfected when they leave the room, I don’t want to use my laptop. I do have a note taker as part of my accommodations and I will be asking RT if she can recommend someone.

However, on a happier note – when the other professor was presenting, RT came over to me, and she gently touched me to get my attention (good job! Thank you!) and she quietly asked me if they could use Tux as a prop today for an activity. Of course, I gave my happy permission, and a little later, following my request to tell me when, RT let me know when they needed him and I brought him out from under the table and to the front of the room.