I just can’t seem to get enough of TED videos these days. Here is a talk by Temple Grandin where she shares how her mind works; specifically – that autistic persons think in pictures, not words so we need to recognize and cultivate that aspect. As a mother to two stepsons who have been diagnosed along the spectrum, this is of particular interest as I’m continually reading & learning.
I’ve been watching TED videos for the past hour and love this one from Bobby McFerrin. The video is from the World Science Festival and he’s demonstrating our mental connection w/ music. Cool stuff.
I was raised in Greensboro, North Carolina, our family having moved there in 1978 when I was 3 years old. There’s been a lot of publicity for Greensboro this week with the opening of the International Civil Rights Museum. The museum pays tribute to the sit-ins in the 1960’s at the downtown Woolworth’s by four students at NC A & T. Growing up in Greensboro, that was a history I was always fully aware of as a child.
However, my mother brought to my attention this week another incident in Greensboro that I’d never heard of until now- a massacre of 4 people in 1979. Five demonstration marchers were shot and killed by Ku Klux Klan and American Nazi Party members. More can be found out about it at Wikipedia and I’ve already ordered the book Through Survivor’s Eyes: From the Sixties to the Greensboro Massacre, so that I can learn more.
As I was reading about the massacre, I also learned that the band Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark, whom I’m familiar with for their song from Pretty in Pink, If You Leave – did a song in tribute to the massacre. The open fire on the marchers lasted 88 seconds.
Merry Christmas everyone. Hope you are enjoying your holidays. Let me go back in time by sharing this video of Kaleya during her first Christmas season when she was 2 months old. My camera at the time only did video w/o sound and the quality is not the best, but it is too cute!
OMG! I love it! Wu-Tang acted out by legos! For those that don’t know – I am HUGE Wu-Tang fan. The very first CD I ever bought was Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers).
Yesterday was a very exciting July 4th! I took the kids downtown to join friends outside of the football stadium. Fireworks were scheduled to begin at 9pm. I’d not been to this before and was very much looking forward to it. Our friends set up a a tent outside the stadium and have food, games, fun, all kinds of stuff, for several hours before the show. The tent we were in was pretty large, here is a view of just one side of it. There was room underneath for about 15 of us.
When we arrived at about 6pm, it was raining some, so we couldn’t sit out on the grass, but it did clear up for awhile. The kids all got goodies bags with things to keep them entertained, silly string, bubbles, confetti – they really enjoyed it. Here, Jihad checks out his goody bag.
At some point in between the rain, the fireworks crew set off some – our guess was to test the equipment but it was a fun teaser. I was talking through it in order to keep Kaleya excited; I didn’t want her to get too scared and she fortunately didn’t.
Then, after it was dark, it really started to rain again, so they started the fireworks early. It was so much fun! The finale was just crazy and I managed to get a clip of that:
We are all excited about going back next year. Then, today, we went to the movies to see Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian. That was entertaining, though, I don’t think it was as good as the first one.
Hope everyone also had a good weekend! The rest of our pictures are here.
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