More meme’s on plutogirl…

I saw this meme at The Crochet Dude’s blog… and just had to snag it… he, in turn, saw it at another blog… he mentions who it was on his blog. (For future reference, it’s the August 22, 2006 post – I don’t like linking directly to posts, I prefer linking to the home pages, because posts may magically go poof…)

Life’s to do list – Completed items are bolded – (plus my comments in parathesis)… Enjoy!

01. Bought everyone in the bar a drink
02. Swam with wild dolphins
03. Climbed a mountain
04. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive
05. Been inside the Great Pyramid
06. Held a tarantula – (not likely to ever happen… I dislike spiders, thank you very much! Grin.)
07. Taken a candlelit bath with someone
08. Said ‘I love you’ and meant it – (Mmmmm… this is the best feeling, I think…)
09. Hugged a tree
10. Bungee jumped
11. Visited Paris
12. Watched a lightning storm at sea
13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise – (Sunrises are beautiful to watch… plus it proves you ain’t a creature of the night… hehe)
14. Seen the Northern Lights
15. Gone to a huge sports game – a live football game (in Denver) and a live baseball game (in Kansas City))
16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables
18. Touched an iceberg
19. Slept under the stars – (camped a lot!)
20. Changed a baby’s diaper – (babysat a lot!)
21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon – (I’d love to do this someday!)
22. Watched a meteor shower
23. Gotten drunk on champagne – (Since I don’t like champagne, this one isn’t happening – plus I don’t get drunk, not anymore!)
24. Given more than you can afford to charity – (many times… before I learned to budget)
25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment
27. Had a food fight
28. Bet on a winning horse
29. Asked out a stranger
30. Had a snowball fight
31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly can
32. Held a lamb
33. Seen an eclipse – (this one was at my high school, my entire high school was allowed outside to watch the whole thing – it was awesome to watch!)
34. Ridden a roller coaster
35. Hit a home run
36. Danced like a fool and not cared who was looking – (I do it all the time – in fact, I did it just today at work, my coworkers laffed at me! Grin… I love making peeps laff!)
37. Adopted an accent for an entire day – How about for several months? This I did.
38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
39. Had two hard drives for your computer
40. Visited all 10 provinces or all 50 states – (Sooo close… missing the New England states, Oregon, ND, Alaska, Hawai’i – that’s it. )
41. Taken care of someone who was drunk
42. Had amazing friends – (There’s no “had” about it, I have amazing friends, no questions about it.)
43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country
44. Watched wild whales
45. Stolen a sign
46. Backpacked in Europe
47. Taken a road-trip – (Several times – and cross-crountry, too… and even once on the back of a motorcycle from D.C. to Colorado Springs in late May (that was the longest motorcycle roadtrip I’ve been on. Motorcycle, Semis, and regular cars were my mode of transportation (and no hitchhiking done here, believe it or not).)
48. Gone rock climbing
49. Midnight walk on the beach
50. Gone sky diving – (I wanna do this, too!)
51. Visited Ireland
52. Been heartbroken longer then you were actually in love
53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them
54. Visited Japan
55. Milked a cow
56. Alphabetized your cds – (all the time… and even my DVDs… and books…)
57. Pretended to be a superhero
58. Sung karaoke
59. Lounged around in bed all day
60. Posed nude in front of strangers
61. Gone scuba diving – (This won’t ever happen – I have breathing issues, so I’ll never be certified fit for scuba diving.)
62. Kissed in the rain
63. Played in the mud
64. Played in the rain
65. Gone to a drive-in theater
66. Visited the Great Wall of China
67. Started a business
68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken
69. Toured ancient sites
70. Taken a martial arts class
71. Played D&D for 6 hours straight
72. Gotten married – (on 05-05-05!!!!!! WooWoo!!!!)
73. Been in a movie – (Does feeling like a character in one movie count?)
74. Crashed a party – (I’m not THAT rude! Never gonna happen!)
75. Gotten divorced
76. Gone without food for 5 days
77. Made cookies from scratch
78. Won first prize in a costume contest
79. Ridden a gondola in Venice
80. Gotten a tattoo – (I have four and if you wanna know more, look at my Q’s and A’s page… hehe)
81. Rafted the Dead River – (I’ve rafted the Arkansas and Colorado rivers…)
82. Been on television news programs as an “expert”
83. Got flowers for no reason
84. Performed on stage
85. Been to Las Vegas – (visited Las Vegas years ago and now am living in Las Vegas… Bwah!)
86. Recorded music
87. Eaten shark
88. Had a one-night stand – (shhh)
89. Gone to Thailand
90. Bought a house – (I don’t want a house, I want a CONDO!)
91. Been in a combat zone
92. Buried one of your parents
93. Been on a cruise ship
94. Spoken more than one language fluently
95. Performed in aisles at Rocky Horror
96. Raised children.
97. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour
98. Created and named your own constellation of stars
99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country
100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over – (Several times…)
101. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge
102. Sang loudly in the car, and didn’t stop when you knew someone was looking
103. Had plastic surgery – (It was major, not a minor procedure.)
104. Survived an illness that you shouldn’t have survived
105. Wrote articles for a large publication
106. Lost over 100 pounds
107. Held someone while they were having a flashback
108. Piloted an airplane
109. Petted a stingray
110. Broken someone’s heart
111. Helped an animal give birth
112. Won money on a T.V. game show
113. Broken a bone
114. Gone on an African photo safari
115. Had a body part of yours below the neck pierced
116. Fired a rifle, shotgun, or pistol
117. Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild
118. Ridden a horse
119. Had major surgery
120. Had a snake as a pet
121. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
122. Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours
123. Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states
124. Visited all 7 continents
125. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
126. Eaten kangaroo meat
127. Eaten sushi – (And I won’t be again… not to my taste… )
128. Had your picture in the newspaper
129. Changed someone’s mind about something you care deeply about
130. Gone back to school
131. Parasailed
132. Petted a cockroach
133. Eaten fried green tomatoes
134. Read The Iliad – and the Odyssey
135. Selected one “important” author who you missed in school, and read their books.
136. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
137. Skipped all your school reunions – (didn’t have anything in common with anyone at school and am already in touch with friends from school, so why go to reunions?)
138. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language
139. Been elected to public office
140. Written your own computer language
141. Thought to yourself that you’re living your dream
142. Had to put someone you love into hospice care
143. Built your own PC from parts – (More than once – and it’s fun!)
144. Sold your own artwork to someone who didn’t know you
145. Had a booth at a street fair
146: Dyed your hair
147: Been a DJ
148: Shaved your head – (twice and won’t be occurring again… )
149: Caused a car accident
150: Saved someone’s life

Web Designing…

Well, I’ve been told that I rave as a webdesigner, a blog designer, what have you.  That totally pleases me, yep yep, as that’s my goal in the future to become a groovy webdesigner. 

What had not occurred to me was blog designing for people who weren’t computer savvy enough to work with the blog software on the various blog sites out there such as Blogger, WordPress, and the like. 

I’ve been blog designing for two people, in trade for their services.  The barter system lives on.  This is something that is interesting me more and more, the idea of bartering my designing and websavvy skills in trade for something that one can provide.  What this would garner me is the recognition of my skills over time.  The person would gain a great looking blog that he or she is totally satisified with and would leave with the knowledge of how to add things such as urls, categories (in the case of WordPress, how to edit all that), how to fix up pictures so that it looks great in posts, so forth, what the owner of the blog needed to know to feel uber-satisified. 

However, don’t be thinking I’m a professional, for I’m not yet one.  Much as I would adore to be one, I’m still at the mid-level and improving.  The more I do, the more I gain in knowlege and the better I become.  I also do graphic designing, somewhat.  So with WordPress, for example, the ability to do customizable headers, I’ve done that for my clients.

Fact of the matter, I adore webdesigning. 

Blessed Be!!

how plutogirl met her soulmate…

Roughly exactly two years ago, I met a guy online on what is commonly known as IRC (Internet Relay Chat) and in just a few months, we knew we were each other’s soulmates.  We married a year and half after we met, on May 05, 2005. 

You say you want more details than just those two sentences??  Well, well… laugh, I should do that.   

First, before doing that, I want to say that I love my husband, and have loved being with him these past two years, have enjoyed the growth of our relationships, even the ups and downs.  Hey, all relationships have those ups and downs!  Even cats and their humans. 

On to more details…

We met in person two months later, at my place.  One of the things that struck me the most about that first meeting was the way I felt and thought the minute, no, the second, I locked eyes with him through the window of the Greyhound bus station as he walked towards the entrance from the bus. 

It was as if I had been struck down by lightning.  Everything around me just seemed to fade out and all I could see was his beautiful delighted eyes meeting mine.  I could feel my heart expanding to encompass this guy already, and I knew that I would not be shy with him, not a single trance of shyness.  It was the first time I had ever felt that way with anyone and I have never felt that way with anyone else.  That’s when I knew he was my soulmate, my everything. 

The following month, I visited his place and met his family. 

Four days after the New Year’s, he proposed to me online and I accepted!  He decided to propose online because that was where we had met, and he wanted to complete the circle, as it were.    He’s a very sweet romantic guy.   Here’s the proposal, blush. 

Paul (8:20:39 PM): I thought that since we met online… that’s where it all began for us, it would be appropriate to… 
Paul (8:20:46 PM): Simona, would you marry me?  
Simona (8:20:55 PM): ohhh 
Simona (8:21:06 PM): yes, i will, Paul  
Paul (8:21:12 PM): See how easy that was?

Then just a couple weeks after the new year had begun, I moved down to his town and lived there, visited each other frequently.  And practically exactly five months after the proposal, we married on May 5, 2005 (05-05-05).  Neat date to have married on, isn’t it? Plus… if you want pictures… there’s some simple pictures in my newly formed gallery.  Just follow your nose, or rather, more accurately, your mouse to the pictures. 

So that’s my story of how I met my soulmate.  And I guess I should change the title from “Roughly Two Years Ago…” to “how plutogirl met her soulmate”… laugh… I really get distracted and way off track very easily! 

Blessed Be!!

An excited plutogirl! Watch out!! Grin!

My goodness!!!

plutogirl’s gonna be working in a library on Earth! 

I am so lucky to have gotten the most perfect job in the universe!  Working in a library, amongst books!  What more could I ask for? 

YAY!!!!

• Being married to my loving soulmate.
• A home in the best city in the United States.
• Awesome doctors.
• A job.
• Lots of buses that run 24/7.
• Great friends online.

Indeed, what more could I ask for?  More would simply be icing on the cake, to be honest.

Thank you, the Fates, for providing this humble but delighted plutogirl what she has received! 

Blessed Be!!

Media and the Deaf

Quote from: Questioner Three on August 4, 2006 

What’s your take on references to deafness in popular culture?  (For instance, when Gil Grissom was going deaf on CSI.)  Do you see it as being informative for the hearing public, or as pandering to the deaf community, or even exploitive?  What would you say are the best and worst portrayals of deafness in pop culture?

Whoa, excellent question!  First of all, let’s define “pandering” here.  It basically means “to make happy”.   I don’t see that happening.  Secondly, are the “references” in media regarding deafness/hard of hearing accurate and thus informative?  I have yet to see anything that was accurate or informative.  So that’s another nay.  Then thirdly, you ask about “exploitive”.  That’s a mighty word to use.  However, considering the popular culture is what currently shapes people’s perspective on many things, if not most things, I would say yes.  Why yes?  Well, look at how your perspective on lipreading was before reading this topic.  Then think about where did you get that perspective from?  Many people have thought that most (if not all) deaf people should be able to lipread them perfectly and easily.  That they should be able to voice fairly clearly (as in being understandable).  They’re shocked when this turns out to not be true.  That perspective is usually pushed by the media. Cultural expectations and views of the deaf are very out of track of what they should be, thanks to many things, but I believe most thanks can be attributed to popular media. 

So thus, there are no best or worst portrayals of the deaf.  They all suck, period. One thing I want to stop in tracks here before anybody wants to think about it.  A popular deaf actress, Marlee Matlin – what about her?  This is a question that may be thought by people.  Well, my response, along with my friend’s:  She’s the representative of the deaf people, just like G.W.Bush is the representative (I really should say, embodiment, as he is the representative, heh) of the American people.  Makes sense, eh?

Blessed Be!!

More deafieisms!! (not as long! lucky you!)

Or should I say unlucky you? 

Fairy helped me some with the answering.  Some of the answers are her own wording, but I haven’t pointed out exactly where or what, because all the below is from a post in a forum that I go to.  And no, I won’t be saying what forum.    I removed the questioners’ names for privacy’s sake. 

These two questioners had questions that had answers that I and Fairy felt were worthwhile putting up on the blog for all to see. 

So here goes.  Enjoy reading and learning…

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Quote from: Questioner One on August 02, 2006

I’m a minorly linguistically-obsessed type of person, and this conversation also brings out a few questions of my own. “Typical” communication between people is done via a variety of senses, so when you take one (especially one as present as hearing) out of the equation, the changes and alternate methods a deaf person uses in order to attain the same “functionality” as a non-deaf person is most interesting.

From a neurolinguistical perspective, I wonder how one who was born deaf views the letters of the English alphabet in their mind.

And finally, a last question, but something I’m equally curious about. For someone who lost their hearing, the answer is predictable, but for someone who never had it – if there was a way (via cybernetics, for instance, or even through some other sort of surgery) for you to have hearing, and there was no negative risk associated with it, would you take it? That might be a stupid question, but I have seen other people in situations (born in a manner that is not “typical”) who live just fine as they are and have no desire to “correct,” or in their perhaps more accurate perspective, alter their situation.

Sorry if that was way too long, I get very wordy/rambley with linguistics *giggles*

That’s like asking uh, a Chinese or Russian person how they think.  It’s just misleading, a red herring, really.  You should really be asking, “How does everybody learn?”  That’s a whole lot more accurate.  There are three basic learning styles.  Visual, audio, and tactile.  Everybody has a main style, with some sprinkles of the others.  I’m mainly tactile with some visual.  I suck at audio (and not because I’m deaf).  Audio does not mean hearing, in this case.  It means listening to somebody tell you all about something, taking in information orally, verbally, so forth.  Many different methods that are done in the audio style.  There’s a lot of deafies who excel at learning via the audio style and suck majorly at the tactile style.  The same is true for hearies, sucking majorly at audio style but excelling at learning via the tactile style.  So never be it said that being deaf or blind or hearing or whatever makes a difference in how one learns.  What matters is the person’s brain’s dominance in things, their preference in how to do things, so forth.  This also is a factor in why some people just cannot learn to lipread, no matter what.

As for the surgery question, most people who have been deaf since birth or toddler age – they are unlikely to want to have surgery to regain hearing unless they do not accept their deafness for whatever reason.  The late-deafened people are much more likely to have surgery, the parents of newly discovered deaf babies are more likely to have them receive the surgery when they are old enough. 

Even if such surgeries had “no negative risks” – the deaf adults would still unlikely want the surgery.  That’s equal to asking a black person if he wanted to have an operation “with no negative risks” to become a white person. 

And not just that. You know no one. No one. You have to rebuild EVERY relationship in life. You start from zero. Every single person will treat you differently, in both positive and negative ways. Your entire way of life is gone. Every interaction in public is changed.  It’s like moving to Russia tomorrow and everyone in your life now speaks Russian but your mind is still in English.  And they’re all wondering why Russian is so hard, what’s the big freaking deal?

The desire to conform is in the minds of hearing people.

They don’t understand why we, deaf people, culturally deaf people, don’t feel like we must conform, don’t have this inner drive to conform. To be like hearing people.

It’s because, of course, we know we are not.  And will not be.  They assume this knowledge is negative.  That it’s a sad fact.  That is a misunderstanding based on ethnocentricism.  People born canadian are never going to be born american. They manage to get on with their lives pretty well all the same. It’s like that, more like that than anything else.

Quote from: Questioner Two on August 02, 2006

I dated a deaf girl (very) briefly. She was nice, but she lived in a house resembling a beehive with a bunch of other deaf people who got on her case for seeing someone who wasn’t deaf.

Is this normal?

Oh, definitely.  Think of it as the pureblood Wizards who want their children to marry only other pureblood Wizards.  Be friends with only other purebloods.  That’s the mindset of a lot of deaf people which is very unfortunate and I, personally, dislike this mindset.  I consider it hypocritical. 

I am married to a non-deaf person, after all.  A lot of deaf people would pretty much refuse to be friends with me,  others wouldn’t give a shit.  So it all depends on who you associate with!!

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Hope that was enlightening!!

Blessed Be!!