Geez, where has the time gone?

Doesn't feel like it's been over three weeks since my last blog note... please forgive me for neglecting you stalkers, uhh fans, uhh followers, uhhhhhh readers who love me very much. (this is my Tyson-speak)

Anyhoo... I've been having some fun reading up on Starshine's daily ramblings on his time in Toronto. O'Malley. New jobs and stolen/cranky vehicles. Tub happenings. Feeling sorry for my pathetic garden after looking at super-buffed gardens elsewhere. Big nasty operations.

I just got back from a fun ride on a balance-testing chair where I was fitted with vision goggles, covered up half of the time, and being twisted every which way on the chair while having hot and cold air force-fed alternatively into my ears while having to count in 3's. I was nearly puking by the fourth repetition, with all kinds of operatic sounds ringing in my left ear in particular. I've been battling tinnitus for the past two years with sounds alternating between monkey screeches, opera musicals, static and echoes. Half of the time, I'm trying to decide if there's a dozen monkeys screeching inside of my head or if there's a revival of the Gong Show.

I'm home again!

Hello dahlings... I'm home again!

Yes, I survived a day trip to Rochester and I didn't get shot at or run off the road (sorry, that's an old joke we Can'tadians have about going into the USA -- and I will note that times are really that much better in terms of safety and getting around now, so kudos all around).

It was a great trip to Rochester Institute of Technology. My two learners are now total converts to going there - actually, one of them has already decided on going to RIT, but the other one was in a state of uncertainty about what he wanted to do with his future. After seeing there were a few dozens other kids just like him there, he was all gung-ho about wanting to go to RIT.

The problem is that in Canada, there's not a single university with a program dedicated to the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Believe it or not. By that, I mean, a college run by Deaf administrators with Deaf professors and mostly-Deaf students. There's only three colleges in North America that has such programs -- Gallaudet University in Washington DC, National Technical Institute for the Deaf at RIT, and California State University - Northridge. We do have programs for the Deaf in Canada, but they're mainstreamed with hearing classes with an interpreter and/or notetakers. Having an interpreter is simply not the same thing -- picture yourself taking a business studies class with a teacher speaking in Romanian and an interpreter doing his/her best to translate the info into English for you, then you have to take the handouts and organize them into a format that you will understand. Now multiply this by four years.

But hey, it's nice to have something out there for the Deaf, and it's nice to be able to get away from my home area and explore new areas, so I enjoyed the opportunity to explore the Rochester area and to set up new pipelines with the International admissions coordinator for future reference. Hopefully I'll get to make a few more trips to Rochester over the next few years - road trips are fun when they're on the college's dime.

*tap tap* ... Is this thing on?

I've kind of fallen out of blogging for a bit, but I'd like to get back into it again. Real life got crazy for a bit with family stuff and work issues eating up my time at home but I got a couple of gentle nudges that there's a blog out there calling my name. So, here I am!

My sister-in-law is here for a visit, spending the night. She's starting to get back into the routine of daily life now after a few months of upheaval with her husband's illness and eventual death. She'll probably be visiting with us here and there, so will have to get off my duff and put in some drywall and a door for the 5th bedroom in the basement so she can at least have some privacy. The room will also be good for whenever my father in Halifax comes for a visit. I wonder if it's too late to call Ty Pennington or Mike Holmes to come and fix up the basement? (We have an unfinished basement)

As for myself, well, I'm thinking right now that they got it ass-backwards with the time shift change -- we need an extra hour of sleep at this time of the year! In the fall, feh, what am I gonna do with the extra hour? They should allow us to bank the extra hour and put it into a savings account, maybe the interest would build it up to something like 28 or 29 hours, which I could then use at this time of the year...

Looking greatly forward to the March Break coming up next week. I still enjoy teaching and all, but it's been a stressful school year with certain learners stirring the pot. There also may be big changes happening in my department and I could be looking at a bigger role starting April 1st. We'll see what happens.

So, talk to me folks, what's happening out there?