Rockin’ My World: Fall Edition

• The summer weather that doesn’t seem to want to leave DC! It’s been in the high 80’s this past week.
• I’ve finally gotten back into my groove with school. I’m currently seeing 20 elementary school children at my clinic site, as well as 5 classes and a research project which is gearing up for data collection soon! I feel clinic has been more about application and detective work and it’s taking a different dynamic now because more is expected of me as a 2nd year!
• This lady named Laura Mvula. Her music Makes me lovely. (Also check out song: Unbelievable Dream) Thanks to my music supplier for this one! (*winks*) Any new artists you care to share?

• I feel better about my room because I’m sleeping in the closet area. Let me explain, the room is naturally dark with a window in the back. I set up an inflatable bed in front of the closet because the light of the sun shines in. And the sun makes me feel better. The End.
• Took my first midterm, and was second in my class to finish it!
• Watched the Hot Water! episode of Family Guy. Father Stan buys a singing hot tub, which in turns makes him choose between his family or the tub– you can’t have both! You should recognize the singer behind the song. The whole episode is full of original songs. (on Netflix- it’s Season 7, Ep 1).
• My grandmother and mother are in New York from Costa Rica and Florida, respectively. The possibility of seeing them next weekend is making me very happy since I’m not sure I’ll be seeing them during the holidays this year!!
• The Gladiators are back on TV (#Scandal). I saw the premiere episode last night, but am still feeling like the premise is loosing some of its initial appeal. No spoilers here, but I wonder if it’ll keep my attention this season. What do ya’ll think?
• I FINISHED ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK, begrudgingly. (SPOILER ALERT) Now I have to wait until Spring of 2014 or summer? That’s cray. Here was my reaction to the ending: NOOOOOOOOOOO PIPER WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?!! I had a premonition something bad was going to happen. It was a build up with the holiday and all that. They broke Vanilla. I mean, everyone has their breaking point. Easily my new favorite character is Poussey. I was glad to see Taystee again, but Poussey is so natural. She’s so darn cute, and I especially liked her tough exterior/sweet interior dichotomy. Believe it or not, Pennsyltucky was another character I hated to love. She’s so damn trashy! I promise I Googled her just to make sure her teeth weren’t really that jacked up. Them things are what nightmares are made of. I liked her flashback story, but I would have liked them to show how she personally negotiated her “salvation” with killing 5 babies. You don’t let that kind of guilt go and become so gung-ho for Jesus overnight. I’m really looking into reading the book, I think I may just do that to hold me over until Season 2.  DO SHARE! Have you read the book? What were your thoughts on Season 1? Fave characters, least favorite characters?

• I am on a self-imposed Twitter break. For a month. I am in midterm season, and I have a feeling this semester is going to pass me by. Twitter was getting to be too much, I even find myself thinking in 140 characters now. So blogging is my only online platform, make sure you say hi once in a while. 🙂
• I MISS DANCE in my life. I’m thinking about paying to take some Contemporary African dance classes when I get some down time on the weekend. Before it starts getting too cold and I will be hibernating at home.

LEAVE ME A COMMENT! What’s rocking your world right now?

Meet My Friend, Amir: Video

Amir is Arabic for prince, ruler or prosperous.

My first question to him is What is your name?

AFTER YOU WATCH:

The SLP growing in me wants to point out that Amir, at 3 years old, did exhibit a little bit of stuttering which is quite common at this age. Since I wrote a whole research paper about stuttering you should know that childhood stuttering is the most common form of stuttering and some children eventually grow out of it, while others don’t (for reasons not quite known, only speculated.) Stuttering is considered a fluency disorder, because it disrupts the “fluency and timing patterns” of speech and is characterized by 3 features: prolongations (draggggging out a sound longer than is necessary), blocks (airflow and movement/sound is completely stopped) and repetitions. You may be most familiar with repetitions, as it’s one of the most obvious signs that someone stutters. Repetitions is when “a sound, syllable or word is repeated several times to the point that it interrupts the flow of speech.” We hear Amir saying ‘and, and, and I‘ when he’s telling me about his family, he’s obviously a big talker who wants to share this information with me so I can say his excitement is probably what is causing him to repeat the word “and.” His repetitions occur in a short moment in time and don’t prevent him from getting his point across so I don’t think his parents have anything to worry about at this point. But I would tell his parents to be mindful about it as he gets older, since the longer-term stuttering occurs more in males than females (the last I read the ratio was about 4:1, male to female). [All quotes in this text are from Justice, 2010]

Not like I have the power to go around diagnosing people anyways (just yet), just observing the world around me with more critical/clinical eyes now. Grad School, go easy on meeeeee!!

Another critique I have about myself is that I’m very controlling around children (and in most relationships, as a matter of fact). The video sounded more like an interview than a conversation; I like to be the director. Sometimes certain therapy techniques require we let the children lead and initiate by allowing them time to show us their interests. I wonder if I will have a hard time with this, since I’m always thinking about what to say/ask next, how to lead the child or focus his attention on a specific task…it’s something I’ve been thinking about.

If you’re an #SLPeep, do you find it hard to not go around making assumptions about speech and language difficulties with kids in your family or complete strangers’ speech? How do you keep yourself from not jumping to conclusions?

Feedback welcomed.

Thoughts During Zumba

Click Image for Credit

I should warm up.

 This is mah song!

I should’ve bought some water.

That’s such a cute outfit.

I should get a cute outfit.

I can’t believe I got that wrong on the test.

Only 15 minutes in?!

I wonder how my butt looks.

Who sweats there?

Smile!

Who shimmies in real life?

I need to shave.

This is the white-girl ‘go to’ move.

I should get some bright sneakers, too.

That’s not the way this song goes.

Why does my face look like that?

Is she wearing a thong? That must be so uncomfortable.

I need some water.

She’s got that move down way too fast. She probably goes home & practices.

Don’t look at her butt.

I can’t see any {straight} guy taking this class.

If I hear ‘Gasolina’ one more time…

Aoowww!!

20 more minutes.

And now for the Cool Down,

Zumba Lluvia