The S Word Blog: A mostly 100% sort-of-semi-technical blog by Thin Guy. Mostly.

Due to my blog being stale I've gotten a few inquiries as whether or not I'm still with Sun.  Since you're reading this, the answer is yes.  It's not that I don't have a lot to talk about, I just have been doing it in much shorter bursts.

♫ I feel happy. I feel happy. ♫

Welcome to Fabulous Frozen Las Vegas!

And a few more from my camera phone as the weather unfolded throughout the day.

Sometimes you think you know what beauty is.

And then sometimes you add a new definition.  

Beauty:  When at the sound of a school bell you see young mentally challenged boy dash fifty yards in an awkward gait into the waiting arms of his mother and you can feel the love in their embrace across the distance of a parking lot.

Kids have school off tomorrow for Nevada Day, so today was costume day.  No face makeup allowed according to the school district though, so not as fun as they will be tomorrow.  I prefer cute to scary anyways.

Here's Laney as a Scary Fairy

Mags as a Ghost Bride

Cami as a Pretty Witch

And Bellamy as her favorite thing in the whole world.  A strawberry!

Cute!

This has been a heated election.  Both the right and left, including their respective media outlets of choice, have done their best to get the average voter spun up, angry even.  Inspiring people is good, making them get angry is bad.  I've found myself getting angry a lot lately, what's more I haven't made up my mind as to who I'm voting for.  Yes folks, I'm undecided. 

Today however, I learned to relax about it all.  I won't let blogs, or snarky twitter comments upset me.  Nor will I make comments that are bound to upset others (I know I have upset a few friends).  I'll do my best not to watch any political pundits on the news.  What I will watch is how much each candidate shows their humanity in the next few weeks.  And what made me relax?  This video showing both McCain and Obama and their human side.  They both made me laugh.  I think I laughed more at Obama not being able to keep a straight face after his jokes than anything else.  But again, most importantly it reminded me that 1) these two are human and 2) they are proud Americans.

Sure they had (extremely talented and funny) speech writers, but I do hope they meant every word.  I do believe that every little thing is gonna be alright.

Bellamy starts school today, a little more than a week after she turned 3 years old.  This is a picture of me saying goodbye as we have a bit (read "a lot") of separation anxiety even when I leave the room, so we felt it best for Mom to take her alone.   Bellamy is entering the program for kids with Autism in the Clark County School District.  She'll be going from 9 AM until 3 PM, 5 days a week.  My wife talked to the mother of a child that went through the program and now he's a "typical" kid (by standardized tests) that is actually in my 7 year old daughters class.  You'd never guess that when he started the program he was diagnosed with Autism and had zero speech.  We will also continue with the private occupational, behavioral, and speech therapies that we've been doing since about March.  She's going to be one busy 3 year old.

We are hopeful, excited, and scared all at the same time.  We've seen great progress over the last 6 month, and can't wait to see how she will grow.  Maybe in a couple years you'll be reading this blog and the topic will be about coaching her soccer team and how she scored her first goal.  Fingers crossed!

Less than a week after getting my wife an iPhone 3G, it was stolen.  Here's what I've learned.  Neither AT&T nor Apple care that your phone was stolen.  AT&T will not black list the IMEI or SIM, meaning that whoever stole the phone can go right down to AT&T and get the phone switched over to their account with ZERO questions asked.

Apple will not black list the serial number and will allow it to be registered with iTunes, just by plugging it into the computer.

Even if you deactivate your phone service, the iPhone (either model) basically becomes a fully functional iPod Touch.

Condoning theft is a strong accusation, but it would be simple for either AT&T or Apple to brick the phone.   Furthermore they refuse to offer insurance on the iPhone (far more expensive phones are insurable) which begs the question why?  I'll tell you why, because AT&T get a new customer with the stolen phone locked into a two year contract, the theft victim has to continue paying for two years with no option but to pay full market price ($499 USD) to replace their phone AND get locked into another two year contract.  Luckily you can drop the 3G data plan at will, and luckily we still have her old Motorola RAZR.  Otherwise, we'd be out of luck and spending at least $150 USD on the most basic of phones.

The rotten cherry on top of this crap cake story is that I bought the phone with my Corporate American Express Card since that's the card I have on file with AT&T to pay my bill with.  American Express offers a great service called Buyers Protection that covers you from damage or theft in the first 90 days.  It's complimentary service available on every American Express Card...EXCEPT the Corporate Card.  Nice.

I've given both Apple and AT&T a lot of my hard earned money and they flat out don't care.  I honestly think "iPhone Theft" is viewed as another revenue stream for them.

What the hell NBC?  Hasn't our language been butchered enough?  It's not even like you were saving characters.  Are 3rd graders editing NBC web pages?  Thx 4 da LOL tho!

An hour and a quarter later, they fix it. 

via Kevin Chu

Boring conference call?  Make "YearBook" photos of yourself from the 1950's to 2000 on Yearbook Yourself.  Just remember to hit mute as you'll be laughing.

Mother nature put on a really impressive show this evening.  The photos (well the photographer really) just don't capture how beautiful these cloud formations were.

Yesterday was my one year "anniversary" of my renewed commitment to fitness.  Here's the tweet right before hitting the gym a year ago.

Let's recap, shall we? 

Last Year

Today

I've still got a ways to go, but I look at it this way:  I hate pictures of myself, and I can actually handle looking at these so I must be on the right path.

Chances are if you stayed in a hotel in the last few years you've seen the water conservation efforts of reducing towel and linen washings.  Typically there is a placard on in the bathroom that says something like "A towel on the floor means please replace, a towel on the rack means I'll use it again".

On a recent trip to NYC, Brad and I were laughing about other meanings towels could have...such as:

• Food stained towel on my room service tray means "More napkins next time"
• Towels missing from room means "Your towels are nicer than mine at home"
• Towels are all used & wet means "Your towels are too small"
• Crunchy towel between the bed & nightstand means "Movie titles do not appear on hotel bill"

It's been said that adversity does not build character, rather it reveals character.

All I can say is that our adventures in autism have made me a different person.  Hopefully for the better.

Happy Fathers Day! 

Just a few random thoughts I've had, but twitter has been down a lot lately including now.

• Sometimes I wish I had a van.  A cool 1970's van with a window in the back that looked like a club or a spade.
• It's 101F out right now and wind is about 25 mph.  We call that the hair dryer effect in Las Vegas
• Kids shorts with tags on the sides are of no help.  Front and back look exactly the same.

Now tell me you don't understand twitter.

 

It's been a while since our last update on Bellamy.

Bellamy has slowly progressed with the help of Nevada Early Intervention Services.  She has started attempting words, and seems to understand much more than she did even several months ago.  However, with her non-eating issues and sensory integration disorder needs, we thought it was time to do some private therapy on our own.

A friend gave us the name of a great occupational therapist, who has taken Bellamy under her wings.  Tania who runs the Achievement Therapy Center has become an angel to us, as well as her assistants, Jodi and Julie.  They are going to work on waking her nerves up, stimulating her vestibular sense, as well as her feeding skills.  We are taking baby steps with this process, but we can see little changes with every session.

We also went to see a DAN! (Defeat Autism Now) doctor.  DAN! doctors take a biomedical approach to autism.  It is the belief the too many antibiotics can destroy the gut, then add vaccines on top of this issue, and you have severe problems.  We share the belief with the DAN! approach that vaccine injury results in autism.  As a baby she had far too many ear infections and antibiotics to keep track of.  Then, right before Christmas in 2006, she had a shot while starting to get sick.  We really debated taking her to the ER on Christmas day.  The day after she was diagnosed with pneumonia.  She never really was the same.  She lost all her words, became less engaged and we truly feel that is when we lost her.

As part of the initial DAN! work up, we had several labs drawn, including a urinalysis for heavy metals.  We recently received this back, and found that she is both moderately toxic with mercury as well as xenobiotic toxic (most likely from antibiotics).  We are still feeling sick about this.  We have a plan of attack with the DAN! approach.  We started her on MB12 injections to try to stimulate some more language (she has been attempting many more words since we started).  We are also treating her internally for yeast that was caused by antibiotics and has seeped through her gut into her blood.  Once we can try to heal her gut, we will then try to pull some of the toxins out.  A long process, but it must be done one step at a time.  For those that believe that Thimerosal (aka mercury) was removed from all vaccinations, that is bad information.  Starting in 1999/2000 it was starting to be removed, but it is still present in some vaccinations, including infant flu shots.  If you want to watch a story that nearly mirrors ours, watch the story of the Hannah Poling.  Ask your doctor if there is any thimerosal in the shots.  If they don't know, wait until you can get a 100% sure answer.  Demand proof.  We are huge believers in changing the vaccination schedule.  Do one shot at a time.  There is no reason whatsoever that a child should be subjected to 5 or more vaccines at one time.

Just this last week, we finally got into the best doctors in Las Vegas for diagnosing kids.  They have private practices, but the cost is upwards of $2000 per doctor.  Fortunately they team up for a nonprofit organization called the Lili Claire Foundation, and do the clinics for free.  The only problem is an extensive waiting list.  After 9 months of waiting, we got in last Tuesday.  The doctors spent about 3.5 hours interviewing us and observing her.  We got the words that no parent should ever have to hear: Autism.  In a way we are actually relieved, because we really have known this in our hearts for some time.  There were no tears on Tuesday, just an energy that lit a fire under us that will propel us to do anything and everything possible to help her.  We do not know yet exactly where she fits on the spectrum, this is something we will find this out during our feedback appointment within the upcoming weeks.  We have hope that it will be on the milder end, as the doctors noted that she had some promising skills already going for her.  They also noted that possibly with six months of ABA (applied behavioral analysis) therapy, that she will most likely be unrecognizable from where she is today. We are  now starting the process of searching for hidden funding programs, and trying to qualify, as professional ABA therapy usually starts at about $60,000 per year.  No, it's not covered by insurance.  At least not in most states, including Nevada.  Yet.

We are doing fine despite of it all as we knew an autism diagnosis was already a real possibility.  It's stressful and our lives have changed in ways we could have never imagined, but we are coping.  Her sisters are a wonderful support for her, and have more love and patience than we could have ever imagined.  Every little new word out of Bellamy's mouth is like a party for all of us.  We are working on balancing out time for each of them, finding that balance is tough, as Bellamy needs constant guidance.  We are taking one day, one word, one little piece of progress at a time.  Our hope is that within the next few years she is indistinguishable from her peers, and she will be lucky enough to lose her diagnosis (which many kids have with early intervention and good therapy).

Where Have You Gone?  This song is written and performed by Richard Femenella, the GM of the Las Vegas Charlie Palmer Steakhouse about his son Joey affected by Autism.  Our connection with Richard is we both strongly feel our children were affected by vaccination injury.   This song played during a "presentation" of children affected by autism in Southern Nevada.  It was heart breaking for so many reasons (I'll admit I cried), but one of the biggest was the fact that so many of the pictures of the children showed direct eye contact.  It's hard to understand just how hard, direct eye contact that is, for children who are on the spectrum of autism.   I think that fact was lost on the all the rich people that attended (read donors).  But for a fundraiser, that's what you want...Rich people. 

Please have a listen.

 My wife and I were proud "donor" recipients of tickets to the $1000 per person "Autism's Angels Gala" hosted by F.E.A.T. (Families of Effective Autism Treatment) of Southern Nevada.  Yes, I wore a suit.  Pictures here.

Note:  All Rights/Credits to the song: Richard Femenella and David Vella

(No copyright info on the CD that was given in the Swag bag.  But I felt it would be a better "good" for more people to hear this song than not)

If you're into the whole themed avatar movement, consider supporting Autism by creating an avatar with a puzzle piece in it.  April is Autism Awareness Month.

 

Just an observation if you are always hungry.  I see candles that smell like sugar cookies, shaving cream that smells like tropical fruits, and lotions that smell of chocolate.  Something to think about if you are having trouble sticking to your nutritional goals.

w00t!  Our very own Linda Skrocki (Not one to brag, but a personal friend of mine!) is being called one of the "New Scobles" by TheReadWriteWeb. Congrats Linda!

Via Linda on Twitter. 

General Motors is donating money to Autism Speaks if you watch a commercial for the new Chevrolet Malibu.  Please watch, every penny counts!  (Yes, I've found my cause).