King Midas

Hi! So I am officially finished with my summer classes! Woo.
One of my projects was the sign a version of the King Midas story. As always constructive feedback is welcomed.

Quick Update

2 things.
1) Got 100% on that quiz. :) Even though I thought the structure was all wrong and testing the wrong way, but I will still take a perfect.
2) I biked with my friend on Sunday. We went for 16 miles from her house to the DC line at Rock Creek Park. It was an awesome ride. Lots of people on biking, running, exploring. Even some fun bikes like tandems, ones with 3 wheels, recumbent.  Tada picture! It's not my picture, I found it via google. Maybe next time.

Community college ASL part 2

Currently, I think I may be losing my job due to budget cuts, so I might be looking at more time to blog. Today in ASL class we had our first quiz. The teacher that continues to surprise me passed out a paper quiz. It was two pages front and back (long for a quiz). The first section was fingerspelling. For those of you that don't know what I mean, here is a good example.

Each letter of the English alphabet has a manual version. The quiz had us watch what the teacher was spelling and write down the word in English. This part of the quiz I actually thought was useful. Fingerspelling is hard to do and to learn to read.

The second part of the quiz, I think was a cope out. Teacher signed a word and we had to write the English word down. Luckily the teacher picked lots of common words and nouns, but ASL has a lot of signs that can be made in different ways and with different meanings in context.  But I'm pretty sure I aced it.

Here is the part I think was wrong. Part 3 the teacher signed a sentence and we had to write the meaning in English. This to me is not testing anything. It's testing my receptive skills but to what end? Say I understand the  sentence but don't think there is a word that specifically works in English for it. That happens a lot. Also this ASL class is not an interpreter class. It's to learn the language. I should not be graded on my ability to convert the languages back and forth, but in my ability to understand and to produce the new language. I am sure that not everyone agrees with me but it really frustrated me. In all my other ASL classes for quizzes we have been given a prompt, asked to converse in ASL with a partner following that prompt and then graded on not only our understanding, but our production too.

In other news, I think tomorrow I'm going to ride my bike. If that happens, I'll be sure to blog about it! Hahah maybe since I have been writing my rants about ASL class, I'll sign about my bike ride. Still taking suggestions on how to add captions about the video.

-RachZ

Hearing Teacher for ASL?

I have learned a lot in the past year about ASL, Deaf Culture, and visual communication. I started taking an ASL class at the local community college this past week. Coming from the only Deaf university to a ASL classroom at a local community college was kind of a shock in itself. First off, my teacher is hearing. She is not Deaf. That's like a huge red flag in my mind. Hearing person teaching hearing students about the Deaf's language system. Seems wrong.
But after the initial distaste, I think I like the teacher. She has shown a respect for my variations and signs and I trust her knowledge of the structure of the language. I will keep you all posted about how the class is going for the next 7 weeks or whatever.

Lonely Biking :(

My mother is out of town, my training buddy was hungover and my riding partner is mad at me...so today I rode around my area by myself. While I love my alone time, I think bike riding alone is actually quite difficult. You have to be solely responsible for figuring out where you are going, you are harder to see for cars, and no one is there to tell you to go faster. But I rode anyway!

It was a beautiful day for riding. Upper 60s and sunny. Slight winds. The route I chose I would recommend. It had some hills, a good amount of downhills, some straight parts, some windy parts, some in the shade etc. Do not go around the circle multiple times. It gets confusing. For everyone to get a better understanding of what I mean, here is the route I did via runkeeper iPhone app.

Overall, it was an uneventful, buddyless and musicless ride. Maybe someone will have time to ride with me tomorrow!

Saturday before Memorial Day

Forewarning, this post is not about biking or ASL...sorry!

Over the past 10 years I have spent my summers working for a recreation company. That's about 40% of my summers, some of those years I even worked for the company indoors during the winters. I used to have a love hate relationship with this company, but now I can say I love my job. My current position is training and teaching lifeguards the skills they need in an emergency. I also track the training sessions and audit the lifeguards to make sure they are doing their jobs. It's wonderful. I get to interact with teenagers in a mentoring capacity, learn from them as well as myself, and still be apart of the neighbor community aspects of working for a city recreation company.

But why am I telling you this? What makes this job motivate me to update my blog? Good question. One, tomorrow the pools open! It marks another summer starting, swimming into action (pun intended).  The Saturday before Memorial Day has been for me something to look forward to, something to worry about, and something to conquer all at the same time. This year is slightly different. I decided today I can use this summer to grow my social work skills. One of my favorite supervisors , who is now more of a friend and colleague, shared with me his reasons for loving his job. His were completely different than mine, allowing me to see that each aspect of my life can use some social work skills. I will never know it all, no day will ever be the same, and I can always learn from others. I also can always teach others. My friend  also irritated me slightly in that way. He gives off this vibe that he can never be wrong. Yes, he is correct majority of the time when discussing troubleshooting of a pump room. No, that does not mean my method is not going to work. But what does the irritation mean? What happens if I have a student who needs more support services in school, but the parent is a teacher and disagrees with me. How is that going to make me feel. So this year I want to apply some social work perspectives into my recreational lifeguard job. I want to recognize my own bias, add some development theory to analyze my coworkers, and learn more about what drives human behavior. Wish me luck on this endeavor.  Hopefully this assessment will make me both a better social worker and a better lifeguard instructor.

Excuses and Biking

Sorry I have not posted in a while. School decided to get way harder, I started working hours at both my jobs and it rained a lot. Lots of rain means that I did not get out much on my bike.
But this morning, I rode my bike! Again, I love that bicycle. One of my friends asked me after my previous post about why I loved my bike, here is a list:
Great value
Brand with a good repetition
Fits me as a short woman with still having 700cc tires
Support from my local bike store
Light frame
Triple Crank

That's all the reasons I can think of right now. This morning my mother and I rode. We went only 11 miles because Mom had to go to work, but it was windy, hilly, sunny, and difficult. I don't know how I rode so many miles last year. I am needing to practice more. Motivation to continue riding.

I am thinking about joining the Potomac Pedalers (http://www.potomacpedalers.org/). I have done some of their previous rides and they are well planned. Will keep you posted.

San Angeles :)

San Diego and Los Angeles! What a great spring break.

Here is a quick video. I will be posting more about the conference when I get the time. Maybe tomorrow evening.

Thanks for viewing! (Again, sorry for the english structure)

Also any tips for more fluidity, please let me know.

-Rach

Rock'n'Roll comes to DC!

I am a wonderful daughter :P But really, this morning (6:30am blah) my mother participated in the Rock'n'Roll 1/2 Marathon in DC. This reminded me yet again of how I do not want to do a marathon. The race itself seemed fine. The course was beautifully labelled, police at every intersection, took the runners through some really cool areas of my city, and finished at RFK stadium. But boy were there lots of people. over 30,000 is what I was told. My sister and I tried to see my mother at mile 10, 11, 12.5 and the finish. Course Map All of which were on my side of the city. We even practiced walking between the points to know how long it was going to take us. How wrong we were! We could not cross the street to cut across. I attempted it once and almost got plowed over by a runner. She bitched at me and believe me I know how it feels to be cut off by a spectator. It's annoying! Back to my point, I think I am too competitive for races of that size and distance. Here is why:
1) Running is hard
2) There is always someone in front of you, so you try to pass them, but then they try to pass you
3) Dodging people adds distance
4) I have no desire to wait for my stuff for hours after I finish

Running to keep in shape is just so different.

On a related note and why I chose to blog right now, I love biking. This past summer I bought a Trek Lexa SLX Triple. Best Bike :) Its a wonderful piece of metal and biking is the BEST way to get thorough this city. Hands down. If it is above 40 degrees and not raining (sometimes even when it is raining), take a bicycle. Bike racks are easy to find and you don't have to stop at stop signs. You get exercise instead of sitting in traffic and lately the city has been adding more and more bike lanes. Don't get me wrong, you still have to be careful, but it's awesome. I rode my bike around the different points of the 1/2 marathon and than to the finish line. After congratulating my mother, we decided to get out of the race area and get a cup of coffee closer to my side of town. She took the metro and I rode my bike back to NE DC. I not only beat her back, but by 25 minutes. How amazing is that? It costed her probably like $3 and me pretty much nothing and I gained some cardio strength.

Moral of the store, biking around DC, especially when you know were you are going, the best thing ever.

One last messing with my new blog, here is a cool picture of the thousands of runners and the Capitol Building.

-RachZ

A trip down memory lane

I graduated from undergraduate this past spring, but sometimes I do not feel like I have fully disconnected. I am dating someone who still goes to my alma mater, I have an internship based out of there, and I really am not that fair away. But today I went and visited my sorority to help them initiate new members. It was awesome and weird at the same time. I was participating in something that means so much to me, yet I didn't know all the girls around me. I didn't even know their names, but less what major they are, what they want to be when they graduate etc. Unsure if this is making any sense, but it was a weird sensation.

While discussing sensations, you know that feeling when something happens that you immediately go OH CRAP? Well yesterday that happened to me. I had been thinking earlier this week that I was proud of myself for always remembering to bring my swipe and room key when I leave the building. Not always an easy task for me. Especially when you add in changes between backpack, work, purse, going out, etc. So I walked out of my room, running late to class, and immediately realized that I forgot my swipe and keys. It was an awful feeling, but luckily, my roommate saved me a few hours later. Thanks roommate for your continuous ASL support, blogging advice, and now rescuing me from the computer lab and allowing me back into the room.

Note to the wise- don't try to ride the stationary bike, highlight a journal article, and have a signed conversation all at the same time. Ends up that none of the above gets done.

I think that's all for now. I'll keep working on my humor and hopefully my video posting abilities!

Attempt One at a Vlog Post

I apologize for the very English structure of this video and for the awkward camera angle. It will get better (I hope). I am attempting this for the first time and I don't do well with new things at night. Basically what I am trying to say is that I rode my bike yesterday from  Washington DC to College Park MD on the road. It was awful. The cars were trying to hit me. Next time I want to use the trails.
I tried to take the audio out; my roommate talking to her best friend. Hope that worked!

Welcome! +Briana Kichaven has had a blog for over a year now and I have habitually felt left out. Today my roommate created a blog and that was the last straw. So welcome! I am hoping to blog about my adventures at Gallaudet University as a new signer,  my wishy-washy triathlon training, working at a new fast casual restaurant, motorcycles and more. I hopefully will post some videos in ASL as well as some written english pieces. Thanks so much and here we go!