please visit

Please take the time to visit these websites for a better understanding of the autism spectrum disorders.

http://www.autismspeaks.org/navigating/aspergers.php

http://www.autismspeaks.org/navigating/pdd_nos.php

7:30 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Let me try to help you understand....

What is Autism? An Overview
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Autism is a complex neurobiological disorder that typically lasts throughout a person's lifetime. It is part of a group of disorders known as autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Today, 1 in 150 individuals is diagnosed with autism, making it more common than pediatric cancer, diabetes, and AIDS combined. It occurs in all racial, ethnic, and social groups and is four times more likely to strike boys than girls. Autism impairs a person's ability to communicate and relate to others. It is also associated with rigid routines and repetitive behaviors, such as obsessively arranging objects or following very specific routines. Symptoms can range from very mild to quite severe.

Autism was first identified in 1943 by Dr. Leo Kanner of Johns Hopkins Hospital. At the same time, a German scientist, Dr. Hans Asperger, described a milder form of the disorder that is now known as Asperger Syndrome (read more). These two disorders are listed in the DSM IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) as two of the five developmental disorders that fall under the autism spectrum disorders. The others are Rett Syndrome, PDD NOS (Pervasive Developmental Disorder), and Childhood Disintegrative Disorder. All of these disorders are characterized by varying degrees of impairment in communication skills and social abilities, and also by repetitive behaviors. For more discussion on the range of diagnoses that comprise autism spectrum disorder, click here.

Autism spectrum disorders can usually be reliably diagnosed by age 3, although new research is pushing back the age of diagnosis to as early as 6 months. Parents are usually the first to notice unusual behaviors in their child or their child's failure to reach appropriate developmental milestones. Some parents describe a child that seemed different from birth, while others describe a child who was developing normally and then lost skills. Pediatricians may initially dismiss signs of autism, thinking a child will "catch up," and may advise parents to "wait and see." New research shows that when parents suspect something is wrong with their child, they are usually correct. If you have concerns about your child's development, don't wait: speak to your pediatrician about getting your child screened for autism.

If your child is diagnosed with autism, early intervention is critical to gain maximum benefit from existing therapies. Although parents may have concerns about labeling a toddler as "autistic," the earlier the diagnosis is made, the earlier interventions can begin. Currently, there are no effective means to prevent autism, no fully effective treatments, and no cure. Research indicates, however, that early intervention in an appropriate educational setting for at least two years during the preschool years can result in significant improvements for many young children with autism spectrum disorders. As soon as autism is diagnosed, early intervention instruction should begin. Effective programs focus on developing communication, social, and cognitive skills.

7:18 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

What Am I Doing???

I think that I have way too much on my plate! I need to toss it back up in the air and catch what matters most and let the other stuff fall back behind and wait its turn to be up on my plate! This silver platter is getting a bit heavy! HELP...looking for volunteers to help lighten the load! HAHAHAHA

2:32 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

GREAT SONG

Natalie Grant - In Better Hands
From the album Relentless

Natalie Grant � In Better Hands
From the album � Relentless

It's hard to stand
On shifting sand
It's hard to shine
In the shadows of the night
You can't be free
If you don't reach for help
And you can't love
If you don't love yourself
But there is hope when my faith runs out.
Cause I'm in better hands now

Chorus:
It's like the sun is shining
When the rain is pouring down
It's like my soul is flying
Though my feet are on the ground
So take this heart of mine
There's no doubt
I'm in better hands now

I am strong
All because of you
I stand in awe of
Every mountain that you move
I am changed
Yesterday is gone
I am safe
From this moment on,
And there's no fear when the night comes around
I'm in better hands now

Chorus

It's like the sun is shining
When the rain is pouring down
It's like my soul is flying
Though my feet are on the ground
It's like the world is silent
Though I know it isn't true
It's like the breath of Jesus
Is right here in this room
So take this heart of mine
There's no doubt

You can't be saved
If you're not reaching out for help

Label: Curb Records

Lyrics may not be reproduced without permission from the publisher.

4:16 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

UNDO....Rush of Fools

UNDO
Rush of Fools


I've been here before, now here I am again
Standing at the door, praying You'll let me back in
To label me a prodigal would be
Only scratching the surface of who I've been known to be

[Chorus]
Turn me around pick me up
Undo what I've become
Bring me back to the place
Of forgiveness and grace
I need You, need Your help
I can't do this myself
You're the only one who can undo
What I've become

I focused on the score, but I could never win
Trying to ignore, a life of hiding my sin
To label me a hypocrite would be
Only scratching the surface of who I've been known to be

[Chorus]
Turn me around pick me up
Undo what I've become
Bring me back to the place
Of forgiveness and grace
I need You, need Your help
I can't do this myself
You're the only one who can undo
What I've become

Make every step lead me back to
The sovereign way that You

[Chorus]
Turn me around pick me up
Undo what I've become
Bring me back to the place
Of forgiveness and grace
I need You, need Your help
I can't do this myself
You're the only one who can undo
What I've become

10:45 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

My Commentary On The Bachelor

With a show of hands, how many of you tuned into the first show of the new Bachelor season? Come on...don’t be ashamed, raise them high! okay, so i was one of them, sadly enough that there wasn’t anything even remotely more interesting on prime time television on a monday evening.  what’s even sadder is that no matter how hard i tried to make myself turn the channel i couldn’t! i can’t even find the words to describe my emotions while watching the show....and yeah, the new guy is quite attractive, i’m not sure if its his accent that makes him so attractive or his stupid humor and contagious smile that boils my butter.  anyways, back to the matter at hand, and why i am writing on this subject i’ll never know, cause its not like anyone of my friend’s are avid readers of my blogs....but i wanted to jot this down somewhere and this as easy of a place as any. 

my question to all of the public viewers out there is...

1. is it possible that ABC was able to go out and find the most katty, trashy, uneducated, blondest, well blessed "up-top" women in the United States?

2. are these the kind of women that men are looking for? uh, hello? only one of them held a what i would call a "professional sophisticated career"...yeah and her attorney ass was struttin’ and shakin’ all over the place! yeah, way to show so class..and what about the youth minister? the church marketer from oklahoma? WOW!

3. does america really need to watch women fall all over a british man? ummm, we already have american idol and simon!

4. why would any woman act so foolish and stupid just to get a guy’s attention? come on! i suppose its okay if you do it in private or at a local club....admit it! YOU KNOW YOU DO IT! hanging all over him with you tongue hanging out, your sweaty chest all pushed up in his face so that he can’t breathe anything but you nasty, stanky beer breath....then OOPS! you fall on him in a delicate manner that strikes you as..."dang, he ain’t all that!!!"

5. haven’t american women figured it out by now by watching the track record of the past bachelors? NEWSFLASH!!! none of them are still with the woman that they chose, except one...and they STILL aren’t married.  the only successful story out of the bachelor/bachelorette saga is that Trista/Ryan get-up....mmmm, cause maybe the woman picked the man! she looked for more that just the outside appearance i guess

okay, that’s all i have to say.  i’m sure that even though i keep telling myself to "look away...look away"....i’ll continue to watch in horror and complete abandoned embarrassment for these women as the prey upon this equally foolish blind young man...who and i quote..."most people think that at 27 i’m to young to settle down"....welcome to america Matt, the first international bachelor...in america it is on average a common practice to be pregnant before or just after one has finished high school and or college....married by 21, pop a few more out before the age of 25....then divorced by no later than 27-30.  and for those who have beat the average? good luck...or maybe your scared shitless that it might happen to you!

12:38 AM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Ode to my sooners

well, booo on the sooners!
i'm so depressed,
but at least there's one state team that's still the best.

oh, my sooners,
you were on a roll...
but you just stood there
as time took its toll

you stood and watched as the other team ran by
13 penalties later,
the score still wasn't tied

rah, rah, sooners
give me a reason,
to put this shame to rest....
at least there's basketball season,
please prove that your still the best

7:56 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Starbucks article

Don't Fear Starbucks
Why the franchise actually helps mom and pop coffeehouses.
By Taylor Clark
Posted Friday, Dec. 28, 2007, at 7:35 AM ET


The first time Herb Hyman spoke with the rep from Starbucks, in 1991, the life of his small business flashed before his eyes. For three decades, Hyman's handful of Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf stores had been filling the caffeine needs of Los Angeles locals and the Hollywood elite: Johnny Carson had his own blend there; Jacques Cousteau arranged to have Hyman's coffee care packages meet his ship at ports around the world; and Dirty Dozen leading man Lee Marvin often worked behind the counter with Hyman for fun. But when the word came down that the rising Seattle coffee juggernaut was plotting its raid on Los Angeles, Hyman feared his life's work would be trampled underfoot. Starbucks even promised as much. "They just flat-out said, 'If you don't sell out to us, we're going to surround your stores,' " Hyman recalled. "And lo and behold, that's what happened—and it was the best thing that ever happened to us."

Ever since Starbucks blanketed every functioning community in America with its cafes, the one effect of its expansion that has steamed people the most has been the widely assumed dying-off of mom and pop coffeehouses. Our cities once overflowed with charming independent coffee shops, the popular thinking goes, until the corporate steamroller known as Starbucks came through and crushed them all, perhaps tossing the victims a complimentary Alanis Morrisette CD to ease the psychic pain. In a world where Starbucks operates nearly 15,000 stores, with six new ones opening each day, isn't this a reasonable assumption? How could momma and poppa coffee hope to survive? But Hyman didn't misspeak—and neither did the dozens of other coffeehouse owners I've interviewed. Strange as it sounds, the best way to boost sales at your independently owned coffeehouse may just be to have Starbucks move in next-door.

That's certainly how it worked out for Hyman. Soon after declining Starbucks's buyout offer, Hyman received the expected news that the company was opening up next to one of his stores. But instead of panicking, he decided to call his friend Jim Stewart, founder of the Seattle's Best Coffee chain, to find out what really happens when a Starbucks opens nearby. "You're going to love it," Stewart reported. "They'll do all of your marketing for you, and your sales will soar." The prediction came true: Each new Starbucks store created a local buzz, drawing new converts to the latte-drinking fold. When the lines at Starbucks grew beyond the point of reason, these converts started venturing out—and, Look! There was another coffeehouse right next-door! Hyman's new neighbor boosted his sales so much that he decided to turn the tactic around and start targeting Starbucks. "We bought a Chinese restaurant right next to one of their stores and converted it, and by God, it was doing $1 million a year right away," he said.




Hyman isn't the only one who has experienced this Starbucks reverse jinx. Orange County, Calif., coffeehouse owner Martin Diedrich started hyperventilating when he first heard a Starbucks was opening "within a stone's throw" of his cafe, yet he reported similar results: "I didn't suffer whatsoever. Ultimately I prospered, in no small part because of it." Ward Barbee, the recently passed founder of the coffee trade magazine Fresh Cup, saw this happen scores of times. "Anyone who complains about having a Starbucks put in next to you is crazy," he told me. "You want to welcome the manager, give them flowers. It should be the best news that any local coffeehouse ever had."

Now, lest we get carried away with the happy civic results of Starbucks' global expansion, I hasten to point out that the company isn't exactly thrilled to have this effect on its local competitors' sales. Starbucks is actually trying to be ruthless in its store placements; it wants those independents out of the way, and it frequently succeeds at displacing them through other means, such as buying a mom and pop's lease or intimidating them into selling out. Beyond the frothy drinks and the touchy-feely decor, Starbucks runs on considerable competitive fire. Consider Tracy Cornell, a former Starbucks real-estate dealmaker who found and locked up a staggering 900 North American retail sites for the company in her decade-plus career. "It was sort of piranha-like," Cornell told me of her work for Starbucks. "It was just talking to landlords, seeing who was behind on their rent. All I needed was an opening like that, where the landlord wanted out. I was looking for tenants who were weak."

As much as independent coffeehouse owners generally enjoy having a Starbucks close at hand, most of them seem to have a story or two of someone from the company trying to undercut them. And occasionally a new Starbucks will hurt a mom and pop—even drive them out of business. For example, in 2006, cafe owner Penny Stafford filed a federal antitrust suit against the company, alleging a nearby Starbucks illegally sank her Bellevue, Wash., coffeehouse. Starbucks employees were passing out samples right outside her front door, Stafford claims, even though the company's nearest outlet was over 300 feet away.

But closures like this have been the exception, not the rule. In its predatory store placement strategy, Starbucks has been about as lethal a killer as a fluffy bunny rabbit. Business for independently owned coffee shops has been nothing less than exceptional as of late. Here's a statistic that might be surprising, given the omnipresence of the Starbucks empire: According to recent figures from the Specialty Coffee Association of America, 57 percent of the nation's coffeehouses are still mom and pops. Just over the five-year period from 2000 to 2005—long after Starbucks supposedly obliterated indie cafes—the number of mom and pops grew 40 percent, from 9,800 to nearly 14,000 coffeehouses. (Starbucks, I might add, tripled in size over that same time period. Good times all around.) So much for the sharp decline in locally owned coffee shops. And prepare yourself for some bona fide solid investment advice: The failure rate for new coffeehouses is a mere 10 percent, according to the market research firm Mintel, which means the vast majority of cafes stay afloat no matter where Starbucks drops its stores. Compare that to the restaurant business, where failure is the norm.

So now that we know Starbucks isn't slaughtering mom and pop, the thorny question remains: Why is Starbucks amplifying their business? It's actually pretty simple. In contrast to so-called "downtown killers" like Home Depot or Wal-Mart, Starbucks doesn't enjoy the kinds of competitive advantages that cut down its local rivals' sales. Look at Wal-Mart. It offers lower prices and a wider array of goods than its small-town rivals, so it acts like a black hole on local consumers, sucking in virtually all of their business. Starbucks, on the other hand, is often more expensive than the local coffeehouse, and it offers a very limited menu; you'll never see discounts or punch cards at Starbucks, nor will you see unique, localized fare (or—let's be honest—fare that doesn't make your tongue feel like it's dying). In other words, a new Starbucks doesn't prevent customers from visiting independents in the same way Wal-Mart does—especially since coffee addicts need a fix every day, yet they don't always need to hit the same place for it. When Starbucks opens a store next to a mom and pop, it creates a sort of coffee nexus where people can go whenever they think "coffee." Local consumers might have a formative experience with a Java Chip Frappuccino, but chances are they'll branch out to the cheaper, less crowded, and often higher-quality independent cafe later on. So when Starbucks blitzed Omaha with six new stores in 2002, for instance, business at all coffeehouses in town immediately went up as much as 25 percent.

The key for independent coffeehouse owners who want to thrive with a Starbucks next-door is that they don't try to imitate Starbucks. (As many failed coffee chains can attest, there's no way to beat Starbucks at being Starbucks.) The locally owned cafes that offer their own unique spin on the coffeehouse experience—and, crucially, a quality brew—are the ones that give the Seattle behemoth fits. Serve an appetizing enough cappuccino, and you can even follow Hyman's lead and take aim at almighty Starbucks, where automated espresso machines now pull consistently middling shots at the touch of a button—no employee craftsmanship required.

After all, if Starbucks can make a profit by putting its stores right across the street from each other, as it so often does, why couldn't a unique, well-run mom and pop do even better next-door? And given America's continuing thirst for exorbitantly priced gourmet coffee drinks, there's a lot of cash out there for the taking. As coffee consultant Dan Cox explained, "You can't do better than a cup of coffee for profit. It's insanity. A cup of coffee costs 16 cents. Once you add in labor and overhead, you're still charging a 400 percent markup—not bad! Where else can you do that?" Until Americans decide they need to pay four bucks a pop every morning for a custom-baked, designer-toast experience, probably nowhere.

5:08 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

single mother soapbox

i'm so sick of people telling me how to raise my kids. yeah, so what, i'm a single mom of TWO....yes TWO beautiful kids and guess what! I'M DOING THE BEST THAT I CAN AND THAT IS ALL I KNOW HOW TO DO! so quit calling my kid a kleptomaniac....its not my parenting skills or my single motherhood that is reason for her affinity for shiny sparkly things. perhaps they are so pretty that she keeps them as "treasures" because she IS a PRINCESS! don't compare me to family members and tell me that i have to do what they do because their child is an "angel". AND....the fact that my girls are both "divas" and my oldest is a "bit to much to handle" and my youngest is a "super picturesque display" of true separation anxiety....these are not a direct result of the fact that i am on this endeavor of motherhood alone.

its not like i woke up one day and decided....mmm, hey i think i want to take on the challenge of being a single mother. its not like i've always dreamed of being in this situation since i was a little girl. this is not were i intended to end up at 29yrs old. i had other plans for myself. but these are the cards that i am dealt and i intend to handle it in the most responsible fashion. i am tired of hearing excuses from other married mothers who won't let their children hang out with mine or they themselves won't hang out with me...no worries world, my singleness will not rub off on you like some violent gut wrenching virus. i'm tired of hearing the accusations that it is all my fault that i ended up as a single mother...KEEP YOUR MOUTHS SHUT! YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED IN MY LIFE FOR ME TO REACH THIS POINT.

and last, but not least i am so completely tired of hearing married women rub it in my face (at church of all places) that they are so glad that they are not in my situation. well, good for you! i'm glad you aren't in my shoes. because these are very difficult shoes to fill. and no, it doesn't make me feel good to hear that your "perfect husband does everything so perfectly"...mmm, yes, you just keep telling yourself that as you watch him sit on the couch in front of the tv with his hands down his pants scratching himself to make sure it is all still there. yeah, you married prince charming there buddy.

in fact, it takes a very confident and strong woman to be a single mom...and i'd like to think that my girls are watching me raise them and will learn that even a single mom can be successful. even a single mom can go on to further their education in order to provide a better life for their family....which is what i intend to do. i have a 6yr plan that if everything goes according to plan i will be a very happy, successful 35yr old epitimy of success....on my way to finishing up residency of course.

so there you have it....i'm done on my soapbox, i'll let the next in line step up

9:26 PM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Who am I destined to date?

10:02 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment