- Sometime this week, I'm signing up for my first semester of classes in the zoo. Hallelujah! Finally!
- Kirby has informed me that A.) Sugar Heart's coma is going to last a while; and B.) if she dies, I'm out of the game.
- "Shadows of the Republic" was supposed to be on Wednesday. I was running late so I headed directly to the library instead of meeting in the Batcave first. Bad idea. Zach canceled the session cause no one showed up at the Batcave.
- The Doctor Who premiere was last Saturday and I don't know how to feel about it. I was excited for Clara cause she was going to be a computer geek, but to get her geekiness from an outside source was, in my opinion, disingenuous. Thanks a lot, Moffat!
- I got an email from the Huffington Post STEM group and they should be assigning new pairs soon. I think I have a 1/20 change to get assigned this round, wich is awesome, but I'm probably remembering the figures wrong. Oh well.
- Neil deGrasse Tyson was speaking at UF last night. like half the game night group headed over to see if we could grab tickets, but they were all gone. Since we were in the area, I swung by the Aquarium shop. THEY ARE HIRING! I might have a chance to get in. *squee* that would be so cool to work there.
Thursday, April 4, 2013
More Updates...
Monday, April 1, 2013
Friday, March 8, 2013
I love my friends
I have been thinking about my roleplaying again. I love it and I think I can finally articulate why: I have friends through them that don't give a shit about my neurology.
Throughout my required schooling, I have always been labeled the weird one. I'm the one who couldn't understand a joke, the one who had the entire "Bryant Compendium of Useless World Knowledge" stuck in her head. I'm the one who stayed awake almost a full twenty-four hours to learn HTML just because I was bored one day.
The guys don't care that I'm memorizing the 3.5 MM. I'm not even the one with the most memorized; Dan has that covered.
Now that I've been hanging out with them, I feel great.
Throughout my required schooling, I have always been labeled the weird one. I'm the one who couldn't understand a joke, the one who had the entire "Bryant Compendium of Useless World Knowledge" stuck in her head. I'm the one who stayed awake almost a full twenty-four hours to learn HTML just because I was bored one day.
The guys don't care that I'm memorizing the 3.5 MM. I'm not even the one with the most memorized; Dan has that covered.
Now that I've been hanging out with them, I feel great.
Monday, February 11, 2013
Dealing...
[TW: ableist language]
Santa Fe has been getting both better and worse for me.
I hate the "Standards of Academic Progress" class they are making me take. I passed all of my bloody classes so they force me to take the "you stink at school" class. I have a C average; at least a bloody 2.0. If anyone ever bothered to look at when most of the crap grades were given, it's from the week I was barely concious. It's a little hard for me to write and turn in 2 projects and a paper when I could barely function.
And the class is nothing! We watched a movie one day and have been talking about dreams of our future the others. I, for the most part, know my dreams. I'm starting the main bulk of the program that leads to almost all of them in three months. I don't need some professor constantly asking me what I want to be when I grow up. I'm frakking 21!
Every class he says something that sets me off. I can barely speak at the end of it. And if the girl assigned to sit next to me would stop talking about "'tards," that would be lovely. I have asked her to stop and she doesn't. I have asked the professor to intervene and he did. Once. I'm dealing with all of them and trying to do everything I'm supposed to. It's not working. I have to survive this three hour class on my own, twice a week. When I was forcibly assigned to it, I asked if there was a full Spring version instead of a Spring A only one. There wasn't any available, so I have to deal with almost 8 hours of class every week.
Except, I'm not dealing. Most of the class is verbal, and when I can't talk, I get no participation points. That's almost the entire class. I've taken to using up my entire store of verbosity for the day in the first hour so I can definitely get the points. But after that, it's like I don't exist. Last week, in that class we were talking about causes and how to be happy. I stood up on my soapbox and told everyone what it was like to be on the spectrum. I wanted them to understand how it felt. How it feels. There hasn't been any change.
I see what's happening in that class and compare it to my Pathfinder group and there is a world of difference. Our GM knows I can't talk sometimes. The other players know that. And when I get nonverbal, they still include me and communicate with me, I just don't speak back to them. I'm rolling my dice and signing a bit, but they don't care. I'm still hanging with them. And I'm participating for seven and eight hours at a time. Do you know what my Mom would give if I could do that in real-world applications? It's because of simple accommodations.
The entire Society for Nerds group is like that and I am so lucky to have them. If people would just follow their example, that would be lovely. It's not that hard. There are multiple people who have disabilities in the group. We changed it so if anyone has an accommodation they want, we just have to ask. The online component to the group is big: I don't have to talk verbally. If I'm having a really bad day, I don't even have to go there in person. The best part is, when things are overwhelming, they are still there.
I see the difference between those two ways and it is like night and day. At the end of last semester,
we had a couple parties going on a the same time. There was the one with the pounding bass and the copious amounts of alcohol and the one with some of us eating dinner together and playing board games. It didn't matter which one I went to, because they were both available to anyone that wanted to go.
That night, me only having 2 meltdowns during the semester was celebrated with the same vigor as a different member making the Dean's list. It's not hard to accommodate. But not many people seem to be able to see that. I wish they could.
Santa Fe has been getting both better and worse for me.
I hate the "Standards of Academic Progress" class they are making me take. I passed all of my bloody classes so they force me to take the "you stink at school" class. I have a C average; at least a bloody 2.0. If anyone ever bothered to look at when most of the crap grades were given, it's from the week I was barely concious. It's a little hard for me to write and turn in 2 projects and a paper when I could barely function.
And the class is nothing! We watched a movie one day and have been talking about dreams of our future the others. I, for the most part, know my dreams. I'm starting the main bulk of the program that leads to almost all of them in three months. I don't need some professor constantly asking me what I want to be when I grow up. I'm frakking 21!
Every class he says something that sets me off. I can barely speak at the end of it. And if the girl assigned to sit next to me would stop talking about "'tards," that would be lovely. I have asked her to stop and she doesn't. I have asked the professor to intervene and he did. Once. I'm dealing with all of them and trying to do everything I'm supposed to. It's not working. I have to survive this three hour class on my own, twice a week. When I was forcibly assigned to it, I asked if there was a full Spring version instead of a Spring A only one. There wasn't any available, so I have to deal with almost 8 hours of class every week.
Except, I'm not dealing. Most of the class is verbal, and when I can't talk, I get no participation points. That's almost the entire class. I've taken to using up my entire store of verbosity for the day in the first hour so I can definitely get the points. But after that, it's like I don't exist. Last week, in that class we were talking about causes and how to be happy. I stood up on my soapbox and told everyone what it was like to be on the spectrum. I wanted them to understand how it felt. How it feels. There hasn't been any change.
I see what's happening in that class and compare it to my Pathfinder group and there is a world of difference. Our GM knows I can't talk sometimes. The other players know that. And when I get nonverbal, they still include me and communicate with me, I just don't speak back to them. I'm rolling my dice and signing a bit, but they don't care. I'm still hanging with them. And I'm participating for seven and eight hours at a time. Do you know what my Mom would give if I could do that in real-world applications? It's because of simple accommodations.
The entire Society for Nerds group is like that and I am so lucky to have them. If people would just follow their example, that would be lovely. It's not that hard. There are multiple people who have disabilities in the group. We changed it so if anyone has an accommodation they want, we just have to ask. The online component to the group is big: I don't have to talk verbally. If I'm having a really bad day, I don't even have to go there in person. The best part is, when things are overwhelming, they are still there.
I see the difference between those two ways and it is like night and day. At the end of last semester,
we had a couple parties going on a the same time. There was the one with the pounding bass and the copious amounts of alcohol and the one with some of us eating dinner together and playing board games. It didn't matter which one I went to, because they were both available to anyone that wanted to go.
That night, me only having 2 meltdowns during the semester was celebrated with the same vigor as a different member making the Dean's list. It's not hard to accommodate. But not many people seem to be able to see that. I wish they could.
Friday, February 1, 2013
Updates...
- The deadline for the HuffPo STEM mentoring program has passed in my time zone. I know others still can apply, but I'm being impatient. I want to talk to my mentor NAO.
- I'm joining a new PnP group. Our first meeting is next week. Zach is running a D20 Star Wars game and I am going to be a Kaminoan Scoundrel. Should be interesting since I've almost always been the chick with a stick.
- W&E is tonight and the family only has one car. Dad needs it to go pick up his check, Ma needs to go to work and I have pathfinder. Good news is, Dad may be getting a replacement truck soon.
- SLS is killing me. I am on the verge of a meltdown after almost every class. I don't know what's up with it. Today was okay; we had "career assessments." Number 3 on my list was archaeology. We all know how well that worked out.
- I don't know what I want to do for a career anymore. I had been fairly certain that I wanted to be an aquarist, but looking at the different jobs today, aquatic vet caught my eye. That job can earn so much more money and I hate being poor.
- Everything just seems so ferhudled.
Monday, January 28, 2013
HuffPo mentorship program
I just applied to the Huffington Post mentoring program. It pairs up applicants with women in STEM fields. If I get in, this would be so cool. I would have someone who understands my geekyness.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Job Search update
Did another round of looking for a job today. I think the place I applied has some possibility. The manager I spoke to told me to call back in 2 weeks if I hadn't called them.
This is the same place I got an actual interview with a year ago and that interview went well. Perhaps my luck is finally changing.
I hope so.
This is the same place I got an actual interview with a year ago and that interview went well. Perhaps my luck is finally changing.
I hope so.
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