Homeschool Progress Report

Following, is a copy of the report I mailed to the school district today:

Reviewing last semester’s progress report has given me both a sense of hope and a feeling of dismay. Such is the world of the Tourette’s Syndrome (TS) student.

Z’s TS has not yet reached it’s peak. Every month, we hope that THIS is the peak; only to be disappointed when one of his conditions worsens. At this time, Z has several debilitating tics. These current tics make it difficult for Z to read, write, eat, or anything else that involves small motor skills. A positive attitude and the support and encouragement of his family, friends, and medical team are the only things that keep Z striving to learn.

As parents, our biggest worry is Z’s ability to fit into the working world as an adult. Life skills are a huge part of his education. ADD, OCD, and Executive Dysfunction make everyday living extremely difficult for Z. We’ve found that extreme structure and repetition help immensely. Z’s psychologist fears that his Executive Dysfunction will probably never improve. She laughingly says his best bet, as an adult, is to marry a super-organized woman.

Z’s greatest asset is his superior intelligence. Between our research, psychological counseling, and Z’s amazing efforts; his OCD behaviors have lessened considerably.

Z learns at an accelerated pace, when we give him free rein with a subject. Unfortunately this doesn’t work with all of his subjects. This learning method resulted in Z’s greatest accomplishment this semester: building his own computer.(for pictures go to: www.homeschoolkid.blogspot.com) This is why I incorporated his math and science grades into one grade. With very little guidance, Z has learned binary code and basic electrician’s skills. On his own, Z successfully rewired an Xbox controller to work on his computer. He also programmed his computer to run both the Linux and Windows operating systems.

This semester, we are trying to channel Z’s accomplishments into his other subjects. English composition and literature have proven to be the most difficult subjects for Z, at this time. My research has found that this is quite common with ADD students. I KNOW that, together, we will find a learning method that will work for Z, in this subject.

Math/Science A
History C
English D
Phy Ed/Health C
Art/Music B

24 Hours, My ASS!!

According to the ER doctor, cornea injuries heal in 24 hrs. Maybe 36 in my case, since the injury was a bit deeper.

Well...I took the patch off last night. The eye would only open halfway and looked all milky, red, and ugly. L said this was a result of having the patch on.

I went to work this morning, hoping that the eye would look better as the day went on. WRONG!! Bright light gave me a stabbing headache. The eye continued to water. My customer's eyes were starting to water, in sympathy, when they looked at me. The film over my eye continued to whack out my depth perception, so I was tripping over everything. My boss got someone in to cover for me, and I went to the doctor.

The doctor could see the "nasty gouge" in my eye before he put dye in the eye. After he put the dye in, and looked at it with the blacklight, the doctor showed me the gouge in the mirror. YIKES, the thing covers 1/3 of my eyeball!!

Bottom line: the eye is infected, therefore it will take longer to heal. I got antibiotic drops and a tetanus shot. I also have to go to the ER tomorrow, to have a doctor check my progress. Oh goody, ANOTHER 2-3 hr trip to the ER waiting room!!

The good news is that it's raining. Now I don't feel as frustrated about not working on the house.

Thank you SO MUCH, all my friends, for joining my pity party yesterday.

It SUCKS to be Me!

Welcome to my pity party!

While working on window 2 of 4 yesterday, I took a 3 mm, rectangular chunk out of my cornea. When L got home from work last night, he took me for a lovely 2 hour trip to the ER. I thought I just had sawdust in my eye. It felt like it was moving around, from one spot to the other, in my eye. The doctor took one look and said: "This involved a power tool, didn't it?" Yeah, a table saw. I was wearing my glasses. "Projectiles have a way of finding their way around glasses." No shit!

The good news is; the cornea is the fastest healing part of our body.
The bad news is; every time I try to see out of my good eye, the bad eye moves too. This causes BOTH eyes to water. Then my nose starts running. This situation effectively prevents me from doing ANYTHING, including reading or watching TV!

The good news is; I have the day off, and it's beautiful outside.
The bad news is; I can't do a damned thing, and it's supposed to rain tomorrow and Saturday. We still have 2 more windows to fix, and we're running out of time!

The good news is; I can see just well enough to touch-type this post.
The bad news is; I can't see well enough to read your blogs.

Naturally, the damage happened to my master eye, so my depth perception is totally out of whack. I keep running into things. I think I've bruised all 10 of my toes. Swearing is my best friend today.

I get to take the patch off tomorrow morning and return to work. I can't afford any more unproductive days off!! My family may kill me before then. I am totally frustrated, pissed off, and BITCHY!!

Writing this has given me a huge headache. I'm off to pop some Tylenol, lay down, and listen to TV.

NOT a Good Thing!

The above picture is of the lower corner of our kitchen window. Up against the trim, you can see crumbling siding and caulk.

I discovered this last night, after I finished caulking the shed. I still had caulk and daylight left, so I started walking around the house to inspect the caulk on the windows. First I noticed that the caulk was crumbling away from the bottom of the window. When I poked the caulk with my finger, my finger went THROUGH the siding!

After turning the air blue with a few choice words, while jumping up and down like a madwoman, I checked out the rest of the windows. THREE other windows also had crumbling siding underneath. I stomped into the house, mixed myself a drink, sat down, and BAWLED!

Today, upon closer inspection, it looks like we'll only have to re-sheet the 48x37 inches underneath the 4 windows. The hardest part will be removing all the neatly caulked trim beneath the windows.

Z and I made a trip to Menards this afternoon, to purchase 2 sheets of preprimed siding and siding nails. It saves sooo much time now that Z is big enough to help me load the sheets!

After suffering through a summer of drought, rain is forecast for this weekend. Doesn't that just figure?! If the rain holds off, we SHOULD be able to complete this project this weekend. L and I will start tearing off trim and siding by 7:30 tomorrow morning.

On a lighter note; here is our newly refurbished shed. All we have left to do is move the ramp
back into place.

SATURDAY MORNING UPDATE: Yup, it's raining! Looks like we'll be working in the garage today, installing hurricane clips and windwash board. If it's still raining tomorrow, we'll be building our new AC cover. We're hoping that this rain isn't leaking through the bad siding.

"A BEAUTIFUL Day in the Neighborhood!"

Here's the view from our bedroom window this morning. Those beautiful fall colors are a result of our summer-long drought. We did have frost last night, which is the reason I'm blogging and not outside, painting the fascia boards of the shed in the picture. The sun just hit our roofs and the frost is pouring off our buildings.

Yesterday, after I got home from work, L and I installed the corner trim on the shed. We then measured and cut the door and bottom trim for the shed. Z managed to get the first coat of paint on all 12 pieces of trim, while L and I started prepping the house for painting. We're hoping that, today, the second coat of paint will dry in time for us to hang the rest of the trim.

The shed trim is not purely for aesthetics. If it was, we'd wait until next year to install it. We had some carpenter ant damage that we're covering with the trim. The trim will reinforce the weak areas, so we don't have to completely re-sheet the shed. We were lucky to catch the infestation in time!

I only have ONE MORE WALL of grooves on the garage to paint. Then the garage will be totally painted! Unfortunately, it's the largest wall.

In another hour, it should be warm and dry enough to tackle another day of painting, scrubbing, sanding, caulking.....

Check It Out!

"Maryam Namazie is a rights activist, and commentator and broadcaster on Iran and the Middle East, rights, cultural relativism, secularism, religion, and political Islam."

Check out her blog: http://maryamnamazie.blogspot.com/

This lady makes a LOT of sense!