A friend of mine showed me a feature about The Sims 2, which looks really awesome. It makes me wonder if we’ll ever see disabled Sims. I’d love to have a deaf Sim, or a Sim in a wheelchair. Yes, you can build a giant mansion all on one floor, but are the doorframes wide enough? What about two-story lots in Downtown or Vacation Island? Deaf Sims would need flashing lights to alert them to a phone ringing or the doorbell. How about blind Sims? How would they manage? It’s an interesting idea, and while I’m sure I’m not the first to think of it, I haven’t found anything online about it.

I haven’t been posting much lately because I have been pretty tired. I check my e-mail, I read some journals and blogs, I edit at ODP, and I play Neopets (oh hush), that’s about it lately. I will have some free time tomorrow and Friday, though, because the county I usually work for will be closed because of Hurricane Isabel. I figured they’d close at least one day, but not both! I’m kind of relieved because while I don’t mind driving in most weather conditions, wind is one that does bother me. I don’t like when it feels like my car is being pushed by a giant hand into the next lane. They really are expecting this area to be affected, too, unlike when school closed when I was eight years old because of Hurricane Hugo - that turned out to be a bright sunny day. (They can’t ever really predict a hurricane’s path, anyway.) So anyway, I’ll be home tomorrow (except for my 2pm dental appointment), and probably won’t get paid. But at least I get to sleep in!

A year and a half after posting an entry about Ellicott City’s old Enchanted Forest amusement park, I continue to get comments on the entry. People routinely ask me to keep them updated with more information about efforts to restore the park, and until now I had no way to do that. But I’ve just created the EnchantedForestMD group at Yahoo Groups, which will hopefully be a resource and maybe even a catalyst for getting the park back to life.

This past weekend, some of my new friends from my interpreting classes attended the conference of VRID, the state affiliate chapter of RID. I wonder if any of them saw the performance of ASL poet Peter Cook, which was reported on in the Staunton News Leader. Here’s the first three paragraphs of that story:

Peter Cook’s performance Saturday night at the Virginia School for the Deaf and the Blind came through loud and clear.

Forget the fact that not a word was spoken during the hour-long show.

Cook, a world-renowned deaf poet, combines American Sign Language, pantomime, improvisation, a host of facial expressions and a powerful presence to create a performance that’s appreciated — and understood — by both deaf and hearing audiences alike, even without the spoken-word translation.

I have to disagree with the middle paragraph of that quote. You see, Peter Cook was speaking. He was speaking ASL, just as the reporter noted. And although the reporter didn’t hear anything, Cook was still speaking. Why do I say this? Because American Sign Language is a language. Ever since Bill Stokoe did pioneering research in the 1950s on the signed language used by deaf Americans, ASL has been recognized by linguists as a true language, with grammar, syntax, markers, and every other hallmark of a language. Just as Jackie Chan speaks English and Chinese, so does Marlee Matlin speak English and ASL.

I realize that most people are unaware of this. I know the Staunton reporter was creating a mental image for those of us who weren’t there, and I don’t fault him for it: he was following current practices. But if ASL is to be accepted as a true language by everyone who doesn’t know that it is, we need to start educating people on how to refer to it. We need to start emphasizing that I speak ASL!

For more information on ASL’s status as a true language, visit Boston University’s ASL Linguistic Research Project.

In a vaguely six-degrees-like project, Sarah of Tomato Nation is trying to find a man named Don who helped her on September 11th. It’s not as easy as the Small World project, but it’s still an awesome endeavor. I hope she finds him. [Via Ryan.]

Well, my e-mail’s all gone again, but this time it’s entirely my fault. (Last time it might have been Yahoo’s fault.) I was using Horde and I accidentally selected all messages, hit delete, and then hit purge deleted without thinking. This all happened in a couple of seconds, obviously. Damn! There was only one I really needed, though, and I think I can get the person to e-mail it to me again. Maybe I’ll go back to using Neomail. Sigh!

I knew I’d been nominated for Cutest Editor because I begged for that nomination, but I didn’t expect to be leading the results! It’s bound to change, but right now I have 22 votes which is 17.5% (there are fourteen of us in the running). I do hope I win that one, it would be a self-esteem boost if nothing else. (After all, you don’t have to be a good editor to be the cutest.)

I was surprised to see that I was nominated for Hardest Editor Name to Pronouce…there are others much more confusing than mine! I only have 3 votes (1.7%), but how can I compete against fertighausfachberater, icxcnika, rfgdxm and rd400d77?

I wish I could find my photo ID card for the community college so I could get into the computer labs there. I managed to find the Marina Sirtis signed pictures - well, A found them for me, in a bag she’d been carrying around at the convention - but now I can’t find the ID card. As far as I know it’s required to get into the labs. There are signs saying that, and I don’t have the courage to test whether or not the students serving as lab monitors will enforce it. I haven’t done my homework for class tonight, but as far as I know it’s not actually due…it’s just to prepare for tonight’s discussion, and I’m pretty good at winging that.

I’m tired.

No, it’s not a way to hack into Blogger Pro - it’s just that the pay features will be available to free users starting very soon. Pyra Labs initially created the Blogger Pro service because they needed money to keep the free version running, but now that Blogger is owned by Google, they don’t need that extra funding anymore. I’m not so sure I’d be happy with the refund they’re giving to those who were paying $35/year for Blogger Pro, though - they get a Blogger sweatshirt. There’s no indication it’s an exclusive shirt, though - it’s probably just the Blogger hoodie which costs $25 for anybody who wants one.

I finally saw my first Segway. If I hadn’t left Baskin-Robbins right when I did - I’d been sitting in the parking lot for a few minutes, eating my ice cream - I wouldn’t have seen it. The guy was going right down the main drag of town, on the sidewalk, much slower than I had expected. I don’t remember if he was wearing a helmet or not. When I first saw him I thought he was on a motorized scooter, but when I glanced again (I was in the middle of moderate traffic) I saw the two big wheels and realized what it was. I’d never seen one before, though I’d still love the opportunity to try one out. I only wish I could have gotten a better look today.

I’ve had a pretty bad headache most of the day, so I’m trying to take it easy. Tomorrow is A’s birthday and I’ve made up a little coupon book to give as a present because we don’t have a lot of money right now. Some of the items cost money - dinner out, a movie, etc. - but I know she’ll save those coupons for when we have a bit more cash. I’m spending money for her birthday anyway, though, because the cake from Baskin-Robbins is going to cost close to $30. It’s going to be a Freeze Frame Cake, and I’ll be sure to take a picture of it. It’s been in planning for about a year and it took me a couple of weeks to design the picture.