Welcome to My World

12:05 am - CONVENTION UPDATE;;;

Yo!

I got to Florida about 6 hours ago. getting here was auite. my little sister came to get me around 8, and the flight was pretty uneventful. Of course I met <lj user="canadian_diva">
and it was awesome! but then, something possibly even more epic happened. we got int he elevator to go down to her room. In the elevator, was none other than Jennie Emery! heck yeah!!! whenever me and <lj user="canadian_diva"> would play my coundown on iTtunes I'd say I wanted to meet her, and it actually happenned!
then me and jess went and just chilled and sang some songs, and then went down to the cafe and met up with her roommate and had dinner and I had this really good burger, even though it was uber expensive.
so now a bunch of us are chillin' in jess's room, and everyone's trying to figure outt my harness. there will be more adventures to ome, I'm sure!

Current Mood: cheerful

05:46 am - last couple days

Hi all,

Now you might ask, what the heck am I doing posting an LJ this early? Well, part of it is that I was uber thirsty so I figure there's no reason to go back to sleep. The other part is the usual trying to see if Murphey's law will kick in.

I came down to my parents' right after Sherry picked Marina up. I spent most of the day Sunday watchin' football which was pretty good since alot of teams won makoing next week more interesting. Yesterday was, for the most part hecka boring. I got up really early and just listened to my iPod and the radio, and watched a lil ESPN News. I didn't get much time to hang out with Drew cuz it snowed a ton so the roads wre really bad. I did go ove to his house for a while last night and played some Wii. Yay for Wii Sports. Mario Kart wasn't that good, except I loved how the remote fit into this little thing that makes it look like a steering wheel, so you steer your player just like a real car.

My dad needs to freakin' learn some patience. We were just chillin' while he was gettin' ready to wrap a present last night, and the next minute he just went off. I agreed with why he did, but he doesn't have to blow up like that. I texted my mom to see if she could give me a rie over to Drew's since he idnt' have a car. My mom said she'd give me a ride, bugt then my dad thought I was just goin' over there cuz he was pissed. There was about 10 minutes where I felt like if I said anything, I was gonna ruin myChristmas before it even started. I have half a mind to call him on what he does, just cuz I dont' think he realizes how much that affects everyone. If I did that though, it'd just be asking for it.

That's exactly why I never bring Marina when I come down here. He may say she is just as welome as I am here, but I'm not dumb enough to risk getting ripped to pieces. When I read about other people having issues with their dog and their parentals, take that and times it by 5 and you've got mine. I wanna be able to have my dog with me all the time and work her all the time cuz that's what I got her for. I shouldn't feel like I'll get ripped to shreds if I do what I needa do. My dad would probably say something about how I have an attitude, when all I'd be doing is standing up for myself. Gah! Part of me wants to just go home already. I hate feeling like I'm walking on egg shells all the time.

Since I didn't have alot of time with Drew last night, we didn't get to do any shopping. He's gonna see if we can go sometime today, but I'm not counting on it.

Sunday when I was eating snacks and watching football, my mom was tellin' me how she was looking at my Christmas list, and she was confused about the stuff I put on there about cell phones. It sounded like she wants to get me a T-Mobile Dash or an SDA, but she didn't know if I'd be able to text with the uber small buttons they have. She showed me her crackberry ERRRRR!!!!! blackberry, and it's hot! She didn't know about just buying a phone unlocked, so she thought I'd have to just get something that T-Mobile has in their stores. She said she didn't wanna get one online, cuz of the possibility that I wouldn't like it, so she said she might take me to a T-Mobile store to see if I'd like what they have. I talked to my rehab counselor yesterday when I emailed him my grades and stuf, and he said the T-Mobile Dash is just like a blackberry useage wise. I would have to switch to Mobile Speak, but it sounds like a new phone might be in my future. Seems like every Christmas there's somethin' that everyone seems to get, and this year it seems like new cell phones are it. Kinda like how I wasn't the only one to get a laptop at the beginning of fall semester.

Marina is 5 today! I never get to see her on her birthday, though

Current Mood: okay

01:34 pm - Voice Post

VoicePost 126K 0:41

(no transcription available)

08:33 am - yesterday

Hey,

Yesterday was OK. I went into downtown Palmetto to do a route cuz I needed to find an ATM to pay the trainer back for the food they got Marina. It was OK, but man that trainer is picky. I guess the jist of it was that I don't get to go as fast asI want cuz I can't control my dog. The ATM itself was interesting cuz the trainer had never used one before, so between the two of us it took a while for me to get my money. LOL She almost forgot to grab my card.

Then the rest of the class had their puppy bios given to them, and yes, I did almost cry. We had Lazanya for lunch and some raisers from a Texas prison ate with us. That made me think of
<lj user="read2781">

Then after lunch we did routes on the nature trail. That was OK, but it was way too hot, so I didn't get to work on anything cuz I just had to keep Marina moving. It kinda felt like taking a huge step back, what with goin' to places like Tampa earlier.

Then after we fed the dogs, we hung out a while and did obedience and just worked on stuff like corrections. Hmmm...I wonder where they got that idea. Then me and another student took our dogs to play in the play area, which is new since last time I was here. It's pretty much the same as the good ol grass padduck at GDB. The other dog kinda scared Marina for a minute, but after a while they ran around and had fun together.

Then I had the trainer do some stuff with me using "trigger" which is just a stuffed dog on top of a chair that has a harness on it. She just gave me different cinarios, and had me correct appropriately. Man...I've been doin' it wrong all this time. I feel like such an idiot!

Today is puppy raiser day, so I dunno what imma be doing. I do know I gotta pack, but that won't take very long. I was hoping I could do some stuff with the hybrid car, cuz that's the only other thing I didn't get to do while I was here. So imma go talk to someone about that. I probably won't post till I get home, so I'll be back on a PC that actually works. One piece of advice. Don't ever, ever, ever, ever...how ever many times it takes you to get the message. Don't ever buy a DELL! This thing keeps rebooting in the middle of my posts, so I better go while I can.

Current Mood: thoughtful

07:12 am - the rest of the day

Hey,

Right after I posted my last entry, Chuck came and asked me if I would do an exit interview. I thought that was weird, but whatever. Am I in the class or not? Yesterday morning they were doing pictures and they asked me if I wanted to be in one of the class pictures. I was gonna say no, cuz I haven't been here the whole time and I have my own from when I got my girl, but I figured if I didn't everyone would give me a hard time about it, so I complied and went down with everyone.

Chuck asked me a bunch of questions, and I felt like I had to qualify all my answers. I was 100% honest, which might not be a good thing. I told him everything I felt, right down to the fact that the only reason I came here in the first place was cuz nowhere else would take me. GRRR 
<lj user="canadian_diva">
can I borrow Time Machine on the mac and just delete everything back to good ol class in 2002? Then I'd never have to come here. LOL

Last night was as boring as Sunday though, cuz no one was around...they must have been doin' their own thing. They usually watcha movie, but I don't do that cuz they haven't watched anything good. Now, if they had something good like sister act 2 or a good disney movie, I might change my mind.

I got on skype, but no one was on except my buddy in class right now. It was interesting skyping with someone who was maybe 50 yards away in his room. Talking to someone on MSN that is in the same room is weird enough, but skype? LOL That was definitely weird!

Then I got a ride home set up, which is good cuz I was starting to worry about that. Then I went in my room and called
<lj user="goldador2002"> 
and talked for probably too long. We talked about our rooms in class, how vegies are nasty and how it sucks when you tell them no veggies and they put them on anyway, and then I just ended up picking out random quotes from the SEGDI DVD and we laughed our heads off. It was entirely too much fun. LOL

I have no idea what is goin' on today. The class is bathing their dogs and just doin' other stuff to get ready for puppy raiser day tomorrow, and they're having a lecture about how to put the training collar on right. I highly doubt imma stick around for all that, so maybe I'll get to do some traffic checks with the hybrid car today. I do know that I have to track down an ATM so I can pay them back for the food they got for me last night. 

Current Mood: good

02:36 pm - maybe not, maybe not.

Hey,

I guess what they say about all good things coming to an end is true. But I was expecting it to last a lil longer than just a day. I thought  for sure the mall would be awesome, cuz I can just get out and feel free. Maybe that's easier said than done though, cuz that didn't exactly happen.

For starters, I didn't go down to the vet with everyone. that kinda made sense cuz I talked to the vet tech the other day. But that gave me an extra hour to kill. We got on the bus and went to the mall, but we stopped somewhere first to let the dogs relieve. When we got to the mall, everyone else wanted to eat, so we went and got food first. I recorded getting that far with the Olympus, cuz I thought it'd be cool. I went to McDonalds and got a double quarter pounder, and it was hot! But me and a couple other people spent over an hour waiting for a trainer to take us, and since we were all goin' to radio shack, I figured I'd just go with them. I would tell Marina forward and she'd start to get going, but the trainer would stop me and tell me I was going too fast. She may have had a point, but at one point she was like "do you run in the mall? no!" It felt like being scolded by a kindergarten teacher or something and it just made me mad.

Then we got to radio shack and not surprisingly, they didn't have the kind of adapter I need. So looks like at some point imma have to spend 25 bucks to buy another one from Freedom Scientific. LOL  One of the other students was buying a cell phone, and we had to wait a while to activate it. At one point the casheer said there was a customer who was there before us that was afraid of dogs and he told us to leave for a bit. It was interesting to hear the ADA card being played by a trainer. LOL

My buddy got a USB headset for his laptop, so that'll be good cuz I can skype him and keep in contact after I leave.

I just think right now I'm back to feelin' like I'm not getting as much as i need being here. I'm almost back to
<lj user="turtlechelle"> 
's idea and I might as well just leave without my girl, purely so I can go somewhere that works for me. I just don't think this place is a really good fit for me. The people are nice, but number 1, how many people from UT come here, and probably more important, how many people go somewhere they like, and then are forced to go somewhere they don't even want to, cuz nowhere "good" will take them? Try and find them, they're not there.

</rant> 
 

Current Mood: frustrated

07:36 am - stuff

Hey,

An entry just cuz I have some time.

The rest of yesterday was pretty good. Maybe it's just me, but I feel like there is just as much down time now as there was last time I was here, even with the smaller class. We'll get back around 1:20, and then not have anything till we feed the dogs at 3:00, and then have another hour to sit around till obedience at 4:00, and sometimes they don't do that, like yesterday. So then there's another hour break till dinner at 5:00, which was some pretty good potato soup and stuffed cabbage last night. I've never had stuffed cabbage till then, but it was aait.

Then I got on skype with
<lj user="canadian_diva">
and
<lj user="kolbygarrison">
It was cool talking about dog stuff, singin' Colby Caillat songs, and them tellin' me that my praise was "awesome praise". LOL that was hot, yo! Then I had to leave cuz one of the trainers that stayed last night asked me if I wanted some pizza, so she gave me some and a diet Coke cuz I said I didn't wanna spend a buck 25 to buy one. LOL

Between skype and talking to
<lj user="goldador2002">
on the phone the other night, I feel like I've gotten some good support from grads while I've been here. LOL kinda like the good ol days.

Today they're doing pictures and the vet, but in the afternoon we're goin' to the mall. Oo wee! We get to eat there, and I think imma go to radio shack and see if I can get a USB adapter for my PAC Mate. 

The trainer that stayed here last night raised Marina's brother Captain, but he didn't make it as a guide. So he's just her pet dog at home. I think I've convinced her to bring him before I leave so him and Marina can play and I can get some pics. That'd be hot, yo! 

02:13 pm - Tampa

Hey all,

I just got back from Tampa, and oh man that was cool. Never mind that it's a big city and I love working my dog in places like that, but I got my little girl back down there. I got to work with my old trainer from class, which was good cuz she could see all the bad habbits I've gotten into and nag me about them. There was a point where I realized there is no way imma leave without Marina, cuz things are gonna work out. Then a couple minutes later we crossed an intersection, made a left and headed down the next block. While I was walking down it, I realized I was going at the speed I like. It felt like meeting someone you haven't seen for a good 5-10 years. When we got to the next down curb, it was all I could do to keep from crying. I've heard stories about other people doing that with their dogs, but I never got to that point till today. It's still kinda there, even just thinkin' about it. It's still not the experience  I had in 2005, but it's the closest thing to that so far. Karen showed me some things I can do to try and get Marina to find the button in between the elevators in PT, but imma use good ol food rewards for the first lil while, but I don't think it'll take her long to get it, cuz even the few times we did it in the building in Tampa, she picked right up on it.

We went to this delly for lunch, and I had a blue cheese burger, and it was hot, yo! We all just kinda chilled. We walked around the city a bit more, and then went into the city center to work on stairs, but since I did that yesterday with Rick, I made sure I knew how to work escalators. LOL I really miss that "ready ready? Let's go!" from back in the day. LOL

Then Karen took me around the block on my own cuz we had been doin' pairs the whole day, and she wanted to see what I could do on my own. That was cool. I was glad I brought the Olympus, cuz I was able to record alot of the stuff I asked Karen about along the route.

I realized a couple things along with the pointers I got today that make me feel like I've been an idiot all this time. I think things click with me if I get the right person talking to me. Rick is an excellent trainer and he really knows his stuff, just like
<lj user="goldador2002"> 
will tell you. I don't get as much out of him as she does though. I feel like I got alot further today working with Karen. I didn't get a chance to take the harness off and let her just say hi to the guide she trained a couple years ago. LOL Hopefully I'll get to see her one more time before I leave, cuz I wanna let her pet Marina a couple times.

While I was at lunch, I talked to Heidi and she's gonna let me do some trafic checks with the hybrid car they have here. I wanna see if the stuff I heard on dog club is as true as they say it is. LOL I might try to record that, but again, I'm not sure how I can hold the Olympus and work my dog at the same time.

07:41 pm - I'm here! go take a shower. LOL

Hey all,

This will probably be all over the place, cuz JAWS isn't letting me edit as I type and it's really annoying. I got up around 4:40 cuz I still had some packing to do. I was looking for my sun block and got some crap all over my hands and I couldn't get it offf now matter how many times I washed them. LOL But Brandon picked me up around 7 and we headed to the airport. I got someone to help me check in and do the security thing, which I think I did wrong. After that, I asked the dude if there was somewhere I could grab a bite. He took me to this cool little cafe. yes,
canadian_diva I passed up Starbucks. Anyway, I talked to these people there that were connecting on their way home from Hawaii. I got on the plane and it was pretty much uneventful. I just listened to music, played games and tried watching a movie. I started watching Dreamgirls, but since it was hard to hear I figured I'd better watch a movie I already knew instead, so I switched to the lion king. GRRR I really should've rented sister act 2 before I left.

After I landed and got help to the baggage claim, a trainer met me but not one from my class. He's a cool guy though. I got here and spent awhile trying to track down the trainer that is here so I could find my room. I talked to some guys who are in the class for a while, and then after I fed Marina I unpacked and ate left over food they had ready for me. It was ribs and potatoes and a roll.
canadian_diva since you did that I have to too. LOL I'd be lying if I didn't say that a part of me feels like I've come home being back here. Don't tell
canadian_diva I said that though. LOL
Well, I better post this cuz my JAWS demo is about to run out. LOL I'm running it off my flash drive, and I guess the version of JAWS they have here isn't authorized for that. There is WiFi here, but they won't give me access to it till Monday, so then I can post from the PAC Mate. That way I can also check my facebook. How lame is that...I can post to my LJ but I cant get on facebook? GRRR!

Current Mood: refreshed

12:22 pm - an entry from the mac

Heya,

I'm over in the computer lab using VoiceOver on the mac. I think I'm slowly figuring this thing out. LOL

It's a bit different in getting around web pages...I'll take the JAWS virtual buffer any day, but it does work. It took me awhile to figure out how, but I did check my college email and had a message from one of the professors I have to talk to next week. I hate how the webmail system for my college uses alot of frames, and those are a bit tricky to figure out. I also think some of the sounds that VO uses are a bit too similar. I know JAWS has alot of those too, but at least it doesn't force you to use them if you don't want. Is there a way to turn them off or change them?

LOL Just for the heck of it I brought my PAC Mate USB cable over and plugged in the display. It was cool that braille showed up the second I plugged it in, but I'm not gonna try and figure that out till I learn a bit more about using VoiceOver.

I tried getting into iTunes so I could play around with it, but it came up and told me that it needed a library to continue, and I figured I better not mess with that since this is a public computer. I did find some help for iTunes in the VoiceOver help, but there are still some things that Apple needs to fix.

• You need a sighted person to set up one click ordering, so you can buy a song without using the shopping cart. I don't know if that is enabled on my PC or not.


• Just like J-Tunes pre 3.2, you can only buy single songs. It appears that you can't buy albums or compilations. You can do this in J-Tunes 3.2. C'mon Apple get with it...if you can do that using JAWS, why not with your own screen reader on your own OS?

canadian_diva

04:49 pm - grades...what the heck happened?

Hi all,

So I just got my grades cuz I haven't been on my computer for awhile...stupid secure network won't work on the PAC Mate.

You know how when "it's go time on Idol" (to quote one of the hosts on one of my sports shows), and they announce the bottom 3 and one of the really good people is in it and you don't think they should be there? Like last year when Lakisha got booted? That's kinda how I feel about my grades. LOL they're totally backwards from what I thought they'd be. Let's break it down.

Media Writing A: This is the one that surprised me...I really thought it'd be my lowest grade since I didn't do too good on some of the assignments, and my last story only had one interview and not two like it should've. I thought I'd get like a B or C, but definitely not an A!

Professional/Technical Writing C+" This is the only one that makes sense, though I thought it'd be a bit higher. I guess alot of the little busy work asignments that were worth 5 or 10 points added up, and the fact that I averaged a B on most of the big assignments, and that D- I got on one of them...that killed me.

Content Management C+" I honestly can't figure this one out. I wasn't expecting an A, but I at least thought I'd get a B. I guess the beginning of the semester killed it for me. I didn't figure out how her grading system worked till after spring break, so I think when I stepped it up it was too little too late, a little ttoo wrong, and I can't wait. LOL I love that song...I suppose I could change my ring tone back to it. LOL

So over all I'm disappointed in myself. Not like I got gypped and deserved better grades, but that I know I can do better than that! LOL and I know what the DSS office is gonna say...they're gonna pull out that "C's get degrees" clechet. Not that they don't care about me and want me to do good, but sometimes it seems like they don't expect much out of me.

Current Mood: disappointed

03:39 pm - random goings on

Hey,

I haven't posted since about two weeks before the semester ended, so it's time for an all over the place entry. LOL

Finals were pretty good. OK...so I didn't have any actual tests. I had an article to write for Media Writing, which I wrote on the Utah Jazz and why my friend thinks they can win it all. That turned out to be the hardest one. I also had a presentation in Tehc Writing, which all I did was recycle the guide dog presentation I did for the dog club earlier in the year, except that this time it went better cuz I actually got to do the whole thing and didn't have anyone interupting me. I ended upgetting a B on it, which is pretty good...but it could've been a bit better. Then I just had to finish up my project for Content Management, which I rightly predicted to be too easy. I got an A on it which I was thrilled about. That class was my hardest class, but was also my favorite for the semester. It was the first class where almost everything was totally "acessible" meaning that I got everything via email, including grades and comments on assignments. It was cool when I realized that I could sync the PAC Mate and just get my own grade right there in braille in an easy to read message. No more having to stay after class to get the prof to read his or her comments to me, or have someone else do it.

I was done with two of my classes before finals week even started, and probably should've been done with all three, except that I had issues getting parts of my project done, so I finished it on the last day to do it. So the semester feels like it's been over for longer than it really has. Almost everyone has moved out now, so the bordum has slowly started setting in for about a week and a half. I think part of that is cuz I have no set thing to keep me busy in the summer. I really need to find something to do, at least till the middle of July.

...because that's when I'm getting outa here! Yep...my idea of going back to SEGD for a refresher is actually gonna happen! I'll be there for a week, from July 19-26. When I emailed about it I didn't get anything back, so I called and left a message about it, and 10 minutes later they called me back and asked me when would work best for me...July or August. I do have to give them credit for how fast they got back to me...I was impressed. They also asked me if I wanted to come for one week or two. I thought for a second and decided to just do the one, cuz if I can fix what is going on relatively quickly, there'd be no point in sticking around another week. LOL It's gonna be really weird being back in class again, but already having a dog! And add to that that I'll be showing up right smack in the middle. LOL I wonder what everyone there will think of me. I hope I don't give out a bad impression cuz I've had my dog for as long as I have and am back. I bet everyone will wonder what is up with that. I'm pretty excited though, if nothing else I'll get to see people I know again, and probably meet some new people too. I'll probably go to dinner with Marina's raiser while I'm there. That way I'll get to see her new puppy too.

Not much else goin' on though. Over the last couple weeks I found anew "flavor of the week" band. Paramore. LOL..I dunno why, I just like all their songs that I've listened to so far...I've got both their albums, though I haven't listened to all of them yet. They sorta remind me of Avril Lavigne's first album, but better.

I got a new battery for my phone, so I'm hoping that works, cuz I really don't have the money to buy a new phone, cuz then I'd have to buy Talks again or another mobile screen reader depending on the phone. And I really can't afford that right now. My phone was getting annoying though, only lasting for about 10 minutes of talking before it'd die, even though it'd tell me I still had 7 bars.

My buddy Dave got engaged this week. That is awesome, but it came out of nowhere! We went to the arcade on Monday to hang out one more time before he went home to Florida, and afterwards we went and grabbed some Tocco Bell. Since he was talking on his phone to the girl he's been dating alot and he was always hanging out with her or talking about her, I called my shot and said he'd be engaged by early 2009 at the latest. LOL He said "we shall see", and I think I should've picked up that something was in the pipeline by the way he said it. The next morning I was downstairs online via the PAC Mate, and he came and started talking to me. He got the package he'd been complaining about not getting the day before, but he wouldn't tell me what it was. LOL he just said "it's a secret." I figured that maybe he got a ring and was gonna propose that night or something. I was right. LOL me and another one of our friends were eating some Denny's later that night, and he called and told us. I thought it was really cool, but kinda shocking at the same time. LOL

I'm debating on whether or not I should buy DVD Audio Extractor cuz my DVD player doesn't work. Not to mention that my computer is much better for watching DVD's on, at least with that program, cuz you can turn off the video. If I try to play a DVD with something like Windows Media Player, it is really choppy. My computer also has good speakers, so I get stereo...something my TV does not have. I haven't figured out how to listen to the commentary on the computer yet, though. LOL I'm a sucker for those making of documentaries and extra features.

Well, time to catch up on yesterday's PTI and Around the Horn.

Current Mood: okay

05:35 pm - possible summer trip!!

Hi all,

LOL I've been bad at updating this so I'm gonna combine two entries into one, and I hope to get some feedback on some stuff.

Let's start with the good...

This weekend was rather uneventful, aside from me going up to my friend Sherry's to let Marina play with her dogs. That was kinda boring since Marina doesn't like to play with them very much. Yesterday I just hung around and finished up some homework, and watched the Masters and Sunday night baseball on ESPN. It was one of those weekends that I knew was going to go by real quick.

This afternoon after I got out of classes I went over to the DSS office to see if my friend was there so I could show him some tips I learned on the Olympus. While I was over there my dad called me. That surprised me cuz he hardly ever does that. Well, he told me my family is going on a cruise next month, and he asked me if I want to go. My first reaction was heck yes!! That has been one of the things I have really wanted to do for a while, and sometime last year I decided it'd be one of my goals to go on one sometime. Well, looks like it may be soonner than later!! One of my friends from the dorm was telling me about them one time, and how they are a "24 hour party" as he put it. LOL So, that is what I call him sometimes. LOL I wonder what he will say when I tell him I might be going on one. My family has been on 3 or 4 of them, but I have never been able to go cuz they have always been in the middle of the semester. From everything they have told me though, they sound hecka awesome!! My dad says I would probably like the days on the ship more than the actual places it stops at, though. In this case that will be the caribbean. *insert random Jack Sparo quote here* LOL

Oddly enough, my dad calling me like he did was exactly how I found out about the last trip we went on, where we went to Denver to watch some NFL football. LOL Of course I got sick so it really sucked for me, but I thought that was weird. Anyone care to give me a little tease of what to expect if I do decide to go with them this time? LOL

Now I know you're all thinking, "of course you should go...especially if they are paying for it!" or something similar. Well, that is what people in broadcast media call a segue...

Wednesday I took Marina to the vet in the hopes of figuring out what is going on with her. That vet visit could be an entry all on its own, but I'll spare everyone the long version of it. I do have a recording of it sitting on my computer though. Basically, he told me that since Marina chews her feet alot, and given her history of ear infections, that he thinks she has developed a food alergy. It's beyond me that that would show up now as opposed to about a year ago, but what do I know. So, he told me to switch her to a hypo alergenic diet. They had two choices there..and I picked the Salmon and potato one. LOL...how's that for a weird combo? I dunno why I picked that, but it was either that or something with deer in it. I don't remember what brand it is, but I didn't recognize it.

Anyway, it's supposed to take two months of feeding her this new food to test their theory. Thing is, I don't know if I can wait that long. Her work is really up and down, but even when it's up...it's not how It used to be. I went to grab some Subway Friday night, and that was not good at all. I just wanted to quit cuz she wasn't pulling at all, and at one point was walking behind me for a good 10 seconds or so, which isn't good! None of the times I've gone anywhere since has been quite that bad, but it's still been up and down. I dunno how much longer I should play that game...then again, I don't want to give it up if something can be done about it. I talked quite a bit to one of my friends over the last few days, and that has helped, but it didn't make it any easier.

So what does this have to do with partying with my family, you ask? Well...since I'm not set up to take any classes in the summer right now, ideally I would like to go back down to Southeastern to see if they can figure anything out. Looks like that is my best option. I would feel much better having a professional oppinion. I don't know how feasable that would be to do, but I have a feeling I can't do both.

LOL gotta go now...MSN calls!

Current Mood: excited

06:25 pm - happenings

Hey all,

And now it's time for an update.

First off, I can't figure out why semagic won't save my setting to use the tab order from a file so I can fill in all the fields. Every time I open it to post, I have to go into the options and change it. GRRR!! It never use to do that.

On the plus side though, finding text on a web page works again. LOL

Any who, It hasn't been a very eventful week. I'm still playing catch up with some of my classes, cuz I can't figure out how to do some of the stuff I have to do. The other day in one of my classes we were in the computer lab, and one of the assignments we had to do was create a table in Word, and then in some other program, which I figure will be inaccessible, but hey, I could be wrong. The prof spent most of the class talking to me wondering how I was going to do things like that. I explained to him, for what felt like the billionth time, that I couldn't do things like that in class because the IT people formatted the computers and forgot I had JAWS on a couple of them. So a tech came in and I tried to explain to him how I can run JAWS off my flash drive, although it is 7.0. Yoo hoo FS, make a flash drive version of JAWS 9!! Anyway so he logged on as an admin so I could install the video intercept, and then got this weird look when it said it needed to reboot to complete the installation. The way they have the computers on campus set up, is that whenever they are rebooted, anything that has been installed gets deleted. I can see why they do that, but that makes it almost impossible to use any assistive technology on them. The DSS office has one computer with Window-Eyes. That's all grand and wonderful, but I'm sorry, JAWS is just better for me. I took a test earlier on Friday, and was trying to spell check my document since it was an essay test, and it took probably 10 minutes to do, whereas it would've been less than half that if I would've had JAWS. Again, I say, if you're gonna force people to use a screen reader that they don't like, get rid of all the PC's and force everyone to use macs, or vice versa.

My prof did have a good point though, he said I can't just say that I can't access any computers and use that as a reason not to do work that I have to do. But the other part of that is that I don't know how to do alot of the stuff some of these classes require, and it's frustrating. They have these basic computer classes that all students have to take, but I didn't learn a dang thing in them, cuz they're visual. I pretty much had someone helping me and telling me what she was clicking on, so she was pretty much doing all the work. It was stuff like using MS Office programs, which I figured I would need to know sooner or later, and here I am not really knowing how to do some of the advanced stuff cuz I haven't had anyone really teach it to me. GRRR the stuff you have to go through trying to learn computer stuff with a screen reader.

Friday after my class one of my friends came up from Salt Lake to hang out cuz we hadn't seen each other for a while. We were both hungry so we went over to Burger King cuz she hadn't had it since the last time she was up here. That was a bad idea. I guess they went off on her when she went to get our food and said they were concerned about me and Marina not eating enough. Yep..you heard that right! I think the reason they did that is cuz some lady there chewed me out a couple weeks ago when I went there, and I guess they view my friend like she's supposed to be a care taker for me. GRRR!! It's not like I'm any different than anyone else that goes there. If they're so concerned about me, they otta give me a huuuuuge discount or something like that. Come on!!

Then we went over to the mall to look around. I was in a mood to spend money for some reason. We went to a DVD store, but they didn't have any Full House or any Disney movies I wanted. Then we grabbed a Pretzel Maker and went over to Staples, cuz I wanted to see about getting a bigger CompactFlash card for my PAC Mate. They didn't have anything over 2 gig though. I also looked at antivirus software but it's freakin' expensive. I figured I might as well learn to use the version of McAfee that Weber State lets students download.

After that we went over to a book store, and I bought a CD I've been wanting for a couple weeks. It's pretty good. It's one of those inspirational ones, though the first song sounds like something right out of the finale of Idol. I could see someone like that singing it and having it be their first single, like they've done every year. LOL

General conference was good this time, but not as good as some of the recent ones I've heard.

So now it's back to the daily grind.

Current Mood: okay

10:53 pm - I'm back!

Heya,

I had a weird weekend. I came back from class Wednesday night and talked on MSN as usual, and then shut my computer down before I went to bed. When I turned it on Thursday morning though, it wouldn't boot up. I called my buddy Dave to see if he could come see what was goin' on, and he did after class. He said there was some weird message on the screen, which he thinks might have been caused by a virus. Maybe it was and maybe it wasn't, but...either way it wasn't good. It meant I was gonna have to reinstall Windows. Dave said he really didn't have time to do that, cuz he's running for student senate, so he was really busy with his campaign.

So I was pretty much screwed. I had no way to do any school work, or at least not near enough, cuz while the Internet and Office Mobile on the PAC Mate are great, you really need a computer to get the full use out of the PM. I had an assignment to turn in in my content management class, and I didn't know how to email it from the web email system for my college cuz I never use that. I just use Outlook. On top of that, I had to do the assignment in excel on the PAC Mate, and it would only let me save it as an Excel 2007 file. GRRR! So when I figured I couldn't email it, someone in the DSS office told me I should probably just go talk to the prof about my situation in person since she was in her office at the same time I didn't have class. So I went over and bugged her. For the most part she was understanding of my situation, but she kinda went into lecture mode cuz she said "you need to get your course work done." I thought yeah? tell me something I don't know. She said she couldn't believe that the DSS office doesn't have laptops people can use, but her saying something like that is different from some of the other profs that just kinda act like they don't wanna help, so they just send me to the DSS office. This prof couldn't help me at all in my situation. LOL I don't think she liked it either when I kinda went off about being forced to use Window-Eyes on the one computer that has a screen reader in the DSS office. I guess it's OK, but JAWS is so much easier for me. Not only that, but sometimes they use that room for tests so I can't always use that computer.

After I got back Friday afternoon I decided to call the place I usually take my computer to when stuff happens even though it would probably take forever to get it back. At least it'd be free. So the dude answered the phone and I asked about the lifetime guarantee my computer is supposed to have, and then told him I might have to bring it in and that I needed it for school. He asked me how old my computer is, and I told him I got it in 2001. That was probably a bad idea cuz he goes "you need a new one man!" He said I should get a new one every 5 years. Then he started telling me about their lifetime service and parts guarantee that they've been advertising for their desktops, and I could finance it if I wanted. He said I could get one from a couple years ago that just didn't sell, and it'd still be better than what I have. He said they could get me set up with a new computer within a day, with all my data on it. That all sounded great, except that I just didn't have the money, even for one from a couple years ago. I also told him that I didn't want Vista. He said he thinks XP is gonna be discontinued in a couple years, so I might as well get it and start learning it. That's all well and good, except that I'd rather be concentrating on getting school work done, not on having to learn a new operating system.

I sort of gave myself a taste of my own medicine. LOL Okay, that probably doesn't sound good, but I'm not sure what other figure of speech would fit. I spent all day Saturday online doing research on different computers, like Dell and EMachine. I've heard mixed things about Dell. I ran across one site that had all these negative reviews of Dell, and a few of them that said not to do their financing, which I thought about. I guess some people really like them though. It made me really want to write a how to buy a computer guide for my group project I am working on in my tech writing class with
vmprlvr0724
but I thing that might've been too easy, so we're doing how to make a podcast instead.

Wow...I'm getting way off track here. Anyway, the thing that I really wanted in a computer was to know that I could take it for service if something happened, and that has happened to me with these computers. I've heard about alot of the big companies like Dell have all their tech support over in India, and I really didn't want to deal with that. I watched a clip about how they do that in a sociology class once and it made me really mad. LOL I didn't want to have to send my computer to "chumbawumba" as the commercials for
PC Laptops
say. It's exactly how I think of guide dog schools...follow up is important to me. My friend Dave is one of those people that thinks it doesn't matter where I get my computer from, cuz it's just a computer. That's exactly the trap I fell into when I went to SEGD, and I didn't want to fall into that again if I did have to buy a new computer. Dave tried convincing me to go down to Best Buy, cuz he said they have EMachine computers for $349, which I suppose I could afford and that is what his computer is. But what if something happened to it and he wasn't around to fix it, or another pair of eyes that was also knowledgeable about computer hardware.

I finally convinced him to just fix my computer after I told him that if I got a new one I would have to finance it. One of his other friends got in trouble with that a couple months ago by buying a laptop he couldn't afford. It took all night Saturday night and all day yesterday to get everything reinstalled, but I have everything back up and running, except my Olympus DSS player software, and that's cuz I don't have the product key written down on the PM yet. I almost lost my iTunes JAWS scripts authorization file, which would've pissed me off. I told Dave I needed everything that was in my old my documents folder, which included all my music. I had a special folder in there that had my iTunes script file, and my iTunes library database in it in case something happened. He was going through my my documents folder and he goes "you have alot of crap in here you know that?" So he just started deleting stuff that he didnt think was important, and I guess he didn't think that folder qualified. I was able to get my scrit file back by enabling hidden files and digging through where JAWS keeps all its files to find it. Good thing he didn't reformat my other drive,otherwise I would've been screwed. Although, I did want to do that and now that I have everything I need, I have a friend bringing her external hard drive over tomorrow so I can back everything up to it, and wipe my 250 gig hard drive clean.

That brings up a question though. does anyone know any good free anti virus software? That is one thing I don't know how to use,but ned to have. My college has a version of Macafee that is free for student use on their home computers, but I couldn't figure out how it works.

Current Mood: tired

10:24 am - reflections

Hi all,

Last night I realized that today I met Marina two years ago. I don't count that as our two year anniversary...I save that for the day we graduated, but it's still amazing to think about.

I really love Marina and can't imagine life without her. I seriously dunno what I'm gonna do when I lose her. I've had days where I knew everything just clicked, but then again I've had alot of days where I just wanna start over. Alot of times it seems like she knows campus better than I do...cuz sometimes I'll wonder where she's taking me and she ends up going right where I need to. I think she's one of those dogs that likes a set routine, cuz whenever we try going somewhere different than we usually do at a certain time of the day, she doesn't like it.

My experience with Marina is like the Zune. Good hardware, bad software. Or...at least that seems to be the general perception. At least part of why the iPod is so popular is because iTunes is so easy to use. The Zune and its software works very well for some people, but I have read comments that if it were compadible with iTunes the person would snatch it up in a second. Similarly, I feel like I got a great dog, but I really miss the support I used to get. If I could keep Marina and just transfer to GDB that'd be freakin' awesome. Hey, you can take college credits with you to another university, so can't I do the same thing? LOL

This week is gonna be busy. I'm supposed to be going to lunch with my buddy Drew today so we can catch up. LOL We're both busy with school so we dont' get to see each other much. Then tomorrow I have an interview with my bishop and a date. That should be fun. I've also somehow gotta come up with someone to interview so I can write a story for journalism class. I have no idea how I'm gonna do that, but hey if
canadian_diva
can do it, so can I. Then there's the rest of my classes, and I'm gonna try and squeeze in a play day or two with my new raiser friend Kristin. I love taking Marina over there...reminds me of old times! And I get the added benefit of unrestricted WiFi on the PAC Mate. LOL

Current Mood: good but hungry

09:08 am - dog show recap

Hi all,

What a crazy last couple days. Three dog shows over two days was nuts some times. Like the NFL playoffs, it was one and done for me...I dont' think I'll be doing anymore of those. It was fun trying something new, though.

Friday they only had one show, which I didn't show in cuz I wanted to see what it was like. That day was really boring! I just had to hang around while everyone got their dogs ready, and then I had to stash Marina in a crate so I could go help move dogs over to the ring when their turn came up. My friend's friend brought 6 dogs that she was showing, and then another one that just needed to come be aroundsome other dogs so she just watched. For some reason that show seemed to drag on forever, and then my friend did really good with her dogs. That is cool, but that meant they had to stay and get pictures. I was glad I brought my DS with me. It gave me something to do while I was waiting around. I thought we were gonna go up to her house afterwards so I could bathe Marina so she'd be ready for the next day. That didn't happen cuz we ran out of time, so I made it bakc here by 9. I had to get up really early so I'd have time to groom Marina before my friend came to get me. Ye4sterday wasn't as boring as Friday, but in some ways it was just as stressful. They had two shows going at once, so we had to run back and forth at the end. I had alot of fun when I was actually in the ring, and I was surprised how cooperative Marina was. If only I could've just used my regular leash though...I hate those show leashes. But oh no...you can't have any tags on your dog in the ring. GRRRR!!! I got a ribbin to show for it, but that's just cuz Marina was the only spayed lab there, much less the only lab. That meant I could go back at the end and go for best in show since they have a whole other class for altered dogs. We did have some competition for the best in show though, cuz there were two other altered dogs there. We didn't win, but again, second place is respectable. We got beat by some dog I'd never heard of till Friday that sounded like something out of Harry Potter. LOL While I was doing that, the other show was getting ready for my friend's dogs' group, so we had a balancing act going on and it was really stressful. That's why I think i'm not gonna do anymore...too stressful. You can't show 9 dogs with 3 people, much less have other ones there just to watch. I was glad I tried it and it was kinda fun, but I think I'll stick to raisers after that. We now return you to Weber State classes already in progress.

08:58 am - last few days.

Hey,

So to pick up where I left off. I went to my friend's house on Sunday and stayed there all afternoon. We had dinner and then I showed them the SEGD DVD and then my GDB graduation. I got some interesting takes on the SEGD DVD out of them, some of which seemed like the DVD was contradicting itself. It was hard to sit through my whole GDB graduation though, especially when I watched myself. All I could think was "if only I had a crystal ball back then..." Oh well, at least I got to eat the best brownies I've ever had while I watched. I dunno what kind of chocolate she put in them, but man...those would go good with some peppermint hot chocolate or something. LOL

When I went over to the union building on Tuesday they were promoting a career fair thing that's supposed to be going on today, and I may or may not go...we'll see. Anyway, they were doing a karaoke contest to win an iPod Shuffle. I thought "Hey, I can take 'em," so I went over and watched. The lady doing it kept sayinghow they needed some women to sing, cuz at the beginning it was all guys that were doing it and IMO none of them were that good. OK...so it's not like it was supposed to be Idol or anything, but then again Jim Rome calls AI "American Caraoke" cuz he hates it. LOL Most of the songs they had were oldies, or stuff that I don't listen to, much less know all the words to. It was just your standard Caraoke stuff, stuff like "Twist and Shout" and "I Will Survive" although I like that one. A girl sang "My Funny Valentine" which I have never heard, but judging by her singing it it's not bad and she did really good. I thought she had it in the bag until a couple minutes later another girl got up and sang "It Had to Be You", another song I have never heard. Again, judging by her singing it, she nailed it. I think she could've possibly made it to Hollywood on Idol, but what do I know.

I wanted to sing something, cuz I figured if there weren't that many good ones that I'd have a good shot to win. It took me a while to get someone to read me the songs they had so I could find something I wanted. They didn't have hardly any 80's or 90's stuff, and the few 80's songs I could find were rock songs, so I didn't know all of them. I was gonna do "Pour Some Sugar On Me", by Def Leppard cuz it was the only one I knew most of the words to, but I found a beter one that was more my style. I sang "All I Have to Give" by the Backstreet Boys. Yeah I know
canadian_diva
that's a sin, but I was running out of time and I didn't even think to see if they had any NSYNC until after it was over. I gave it all I had, and I didn't care how stupid I looked or sounded. I actually think I did pretty good! Even the lady running the contest thought I put up a pretty good challenge to that other girl. After I was done she goes "What a set of pipes," and I think she at least partially meant it. Shedid say she was gonna have that song stuck in her head the rest of the day. I also think I got the biggest reaction from the crowd, but I think that was partially cuz alot of people know me, and partially cuz I'm blind, which kinda bugs me, but I always have to assume that's at least part of why people compliment me. Speaking of compliments though, I had several people come up to me in the dorm later and tell me how good I did. The girl that did "It Had to Be You" won, but second place is respectable...I guess. I will say that I was a bit disappointed while I was walking back after it was over. It's not like I need a Shuffle, but for a few minutes I actually thought I was gonna win it. LOL

Yesterday afternoon when I left campus it was snowing, and it snuck up on me. It got worse as the afternoon went on, and my date texted me and told me we would have to go another night, cuz she didn't wanna drive in the snow. She did stop by on her way home and chat for a bit though. I was also not surprised that my content management prof cancelled class. That's 3 classes we've missed so far, and the class is only once a week. Wow

I went downstairs to chill, and I almost lost my keys! I discovered they were missing when I came back up here to drop Marina off while I went to the little store to grab a snack. A guy on my floor helped me look for them, but I found them on my own. Somehow they fell out of my pocketwhen I was in the bathroom downstairs. I have no idea how that happened! LOL While I was looking for them, my friend Sherry called and talked my ear off about the dog shows this weekend. GRRR sometimes she just wont' shut up. LOL I still haven't decided if I'm gonna do the shows or not.

Current Mood: happy

04:01 pm - um...stuff.

Hi,

LOL I know, not a creative subject line at all, but I'm just not in a creative mood right now. Classes are still truckin' along, but I'm starting to feel the work load getting tighter. My stress management class gets the least attention, probably cuz it's not important for what I'm doing degree wise. The lectures in that class though...they really put me on a guilt trip because I can totally see myself reacting to situations in exactly the way the prof says we shouldn't react. LOL in a way it almost feels like church. I have a quiz in that class tomorrow, but we'll see about that cuz I never got the notes and the homework assignment one of my friends said she would email me. I think something might've happened with my college email, or...maybe she just hasn't gotten to it yet. Speaking of that friend though...we were working on an assignment last week, and I wanted some music so I opened up iTunes. We got talking and realized we both like some of the same kind of music. We decided we're gonna sing a duet in her church sometime soon, cuz we thought it'd be fun and she said I have a good voice. Every time I walk into class, she asks me if I've picked a song yet, and I'm still looking...it's hard to find a song that we can both sing that'll be in both of our ranges. It seems like all the really good ones are sung by girls. Now...there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but we'll need to figure out a way to adapt it so I can sing it, and then divide it up into parts. Maybe I'm weird, but I think it's weird that some of the time I can match the singer's range on songs that are sung by girls. I thought guys weren't supposed to do that. Either way, I think that'd kinda be weird singing something like that in public. My friend is gonna have her roommate accompany us since she is really good on the piano. She sounds like one of those people who you can just hand sheet music to, and she can just play it. I really wish I could do that! LOL

My media writing class got cancelled today because the prof slid off the road and was waiting for a toe truck when I got to class. He said we are going to start writing now since we have all the ground work laid. Speaking of writing, I whipped up my business letter for tech writing and sent it to one of my friends on MSN to proof rred. I just told her to read it as if she were an SEGD trainer, or...the director of training since that's who I wrote it to and is the guy I always end up talking to anyway. I read my friend's review of it this morning, and...wow! Looks like I have alot of revising to do, and I haven't even gotten a review from a classmate yet. When my friend emailed it back to me, she said it was good, and then in our MsN window, she pointed out some things she liked about it. But the review...she sort of switched off between her own thoughts, and the role play she was supposed to be doing. It was kinda funny. She shotdown one of my favorite parts of it though and said it was an insult. I'll have to ask her what she meant by it when she gets online, because it doesn't make sense.

I sat down to eat breakfast on Monday, and a lady came up to me and said "sorry for interupting, but how old is your dog?" I was more than happy to talk to her about my dog since she didn't just randomly bombard me with questions, like alot of people do. LOL there are days where if I hear "what's your dog's name?" one more time I might scream. But wait...I cant' be thinking thoughts like that since they lead to anger according to that stress management class, and there is probably alot of truth in that. Anyway, I found out the lady I was talking to was...another raiser! Finally, someone that gets it! What's more, she has raised for three schools, so it was very interesting getting her take as a raiser on different schools since I've been there as a guide dog user. I asked her if I could bring Marina over to play with her dogs sometime, and she said I'm more than welcome to. We set it up for today, and she showed up to pick me up on campus right on time, which I was glad about. Our dogs had fun together, but we had to cut it short because she had a study group to go to that she forgot about. But I'm going back there tomorrow, and I get the feeling I'll be over there alot now. Yay! Just like 2003 before it went down the drain. I doubt this raiser will let me drive her car around a parking lot though. LOL If only I had the Olympus back then.

She told me she is doing a presentation to a group about puppy raising. She asked if she could borrow Marina for it, and I just asked if I could go. I'd much rather go to that than to a obedience class to work on dog show stuff. Hmmm, I might go work on that at Petco on Saturday after I watch Gordon B. Hinkley's funeral, if I decide to go up to my friends' house. Right now I dont' really want to, though.

Oh yeah, some dude in California bought my iPod. The weird thing was, he was the only one that bid on it, and he took my minimum offer...150 bucks. I guess that's not bad, but I have to subtract what it cost to list it and give that to my buddy because he used his account to ssell it. It'll be interesting to see what kind of feedback the guy leaves. Of course, afterward I found out that one of my friends said she would've bought it if she knew I was selling it for $150. Oh well, either way I get some dough out of it.

Current Mood: bouncy

10:46 pm - update

Hi all,

General update...

Hmmm, let's see. Not much note worthy going on here right now. I had an embarrasing experience on my way to class on Thursday. As happens almost everytime on the way to my Stress Management class, I got turned around. Using some of the info from that class, I noticed my stress meter going up. Someone walking by asked me if I was heading to that class, and I said "I don't know, maybe". I thought it was just another student in the class, but no...it was the prof! I was soooo embarrassed because he saw the very thing that stresses me out the most! LOL Kinda ironic since the class is supposed to teach you how to reduce stress.

I pretty much just spent this weekend hanging out and doing a bunch of nothing. I had homework to do, but I couldn't do it because the prof for my media writing class didnt' email me the assignment even though he said he was going to email it once he got back to his office, which he was going to after class.

In my tech writing class, I have to write a business letter. I know that doesn't sound too hard, but the prof put a little twist to it. He wants it to be for something real, or something we would actually need to send the letter for. He even told a couple people that what they were thinking of writing their letters on wasn't "real" enough. I'm thinking of writing one to SEGD to try and plead my case for getting a trainer out here. Hey, I figured I might as well get a grade for it if I need to bug them anyway, and this gives me an excuse to. That logic has worked well for me in the past, we'll see if it does again if I decide to do it. LOL

Yesterday was a pretty warm day, so I thought I'd try and go grab a bite to eat and I wanted to go for a walk. Well, as has been the case for the last who knows how long, that was easier said than done. On my way though, I ran into the campus shuttle giving someone a ride to the gym. The guy stopped and picked me up, and told me if I needed to go anywhere on the weekends to just give him a buz. I told him I was just going to gragb a bite to eat, so I figured as long as I had a ride, I'd go somewhere different. So I headed over to Karl's Jr. which I haven't had for a long time. It was pretty good. It was one of those things where an adventure turned out better than you thought it would, and now I know I have a way to get places, at least during the day on Saturday if I need it. Yay!

I came back to my room a while ago and got some sad news. Gordon B. Hinkley, president of the LDS church died earlier tonight. I found out via my friend that shows dogs. This was pretty shocking news to me since I am LDS. With all the nonstop coverage they are doing of it on the news, I bet my media writing prof will have a field day in class tomorrow. It's a good example of how quickly a story can get coverage, which is kind of up the alley of the class, except that this class is supposed to focus more on the print side.

I did the call and ask the parentals for money thing tonight as well. Gotta love being a college student. I was surprised the other day when I found out how little money I have in my account, but that'll be fixed soon. I'll also be getting some money from selling my iPod on Ebay.

Current Mood: shocked