Wow, I have been gone a while huh?

So, I am working on my e-portfolios proposal for the USC Occupational Therapy doctorate program. I am also navigating personalities and issues related to my capstone project in the APOC program also at USC.

So one of my instructors commented that we should be sure to maintain an occupational balance between work, rest and play. It was all I could do to not laugh so hard I fell off my chair. I know that occupational balance leads to better health both physically and mentally. But, I am so bad at following my own advice.

I understand the importance of occupational balance. It comes from a ton of research that identifies how when a person participates in rest and play occupations in addition to their work ones, they are better able to function in all these areas. And doesn't that just make sense anyway? I mean really, isn't it obvious that if we don't take some time out for rest and play we burn out, get cranky, eat poorly, gain weight, have or obtain physical injuries to things like backs and necks and in my case arms and hands. But despite all this evidence and the annoying logic of it all, I am still unable to remember to find a way to balance my occupations.

I wonder why that is...

I guess I am gonna have to do some research and figure that one out. I will let you know what I find.

Well, gotta go, because despite my little rant... this is play (insert head shake here) and we can't have too much of that... it might just lead to some actual balance.

Form and Analysis

Years ago as an undergrad I majored in music. One of the classes I took was called Form and Analysis. This is one of those classes that just... well... stuck with me. Oh, I could ramble on for hours about how a I chord moves to a V chord et al, but for those of you that are not musicians it would be meaningless and more importantly - not the point.

That class taught me how to look at a topic a disassemble it mentally then reassemble it while taking note of where all the moving pieces intersect with one another and how the synergistic beauty of the whole abounds with brilliance. Music is such a wonderful metaphor for life. Even if you start from the smallest point and see that aspect just as it interacts with its nearest relative or you stop and marvel at the complexity of the solar system, the world is a truly fascinating and fantastic place.

Today we get to not only stop and stand in amazement of the natural world, but we also have the amazing virtual world where we can all join into this collaborative imagining of where we want to go, be, or do. It's that little comment on a blog or entry into wikipedia, or maybe just checking e-mail that blossoms into a vast and complex system of interrelated happenings that form worlds and universes all with in our minds.

It is just cool.

Moving Day

Well today is the day. I am moving today. The movers will be here in about 15 minutes and I thought I would take a moment to post. I am not a fan of moving. This stems from several sources. I back in my early 20's I moved five times in one year. Back then I had significantly fewer pieces of crap. You ever noticed how people who are pack rats don't call themselves pack rats but if you asked any of their friends they would (probably giggling) confirm their pack rat status.

I admit it, I am a pack rat. I know that there are folks out there that are worse but I figure that if you have to have movers over two days... you have too much crap. And thought most of it I would fight to keep, I also know that most of it is truly crap. But darn it, it is MY crap.

OK so I have this sword collection. Yes, full size swords. Only two of them are sharp, but even those that aren't could probably cause damage. They are mounted on the walls, so that means not only do they have to be packed so they don't damage anything, they also have to be "dislodged" from the walls.

I have a large DVD collection. So far, I have filled 4 banker boxes and I have not finished. Some of them are really good, some not so much. But most of them I have seen more than once. When I realized that, I was a little surprised.

OK so other crap... I have what can only be described as TONS of books. Some of them are pleasure reading, but most are text books (yes I even use them... just this week I used 3 old text books - so there!). With that many books comes the inevitable book cases.

Which brings me to furniture. For someone moving out of a dorm room, I have a surprising amount of furniture. Granted, I had my own condo before I moved here but that is only a partial excuse.

OOOh movers are hear... guess I will have to say more later

Please take my survey and give me feed back. This is not the final version of this survey, so please give me your thoughts and questions so I can make it better.

Cheers

Click Here to take survey

Magic, Food and Sleep

Sleep is a weapon.

This is a concept that has been around for generations. First time I heard this statement, it was in Robert Ludlum's The Bourne Identity (the book not the movie). I have since latched onto this concept. It speaks to me on many levels. This is never been more true than last night at the Magic Castle. As my previous blog entry mentioned, I went to the midnight showing of Wall-E (once again I mention that this is a must see). If you do the math is easy to figure out that I didn't get to sleep much before 3: 30 in the morning. So when my alarm went off at 7:30 in the morning, I woke up (against my better judgment).

So.......... sleep is a weapon.

My family was invited to go to the Magic Castle in Hollywood. It is essentially a dinner club with several Magic shows. Never enter any place called the Magic Castle on four hours of sleep. This is my little piece of advice to anyone out there who's thinking of going to some place called the Magic Castle on four hours of sleep because you too will be mystified as to how they are doing the things that they are doing. Generally, I give the place a rank of 7/10. It was fun. The food was exceptional and the entertainment was fun. And, in one of the shows they chose my brother to go up on stage. Unlike myself, my brother is rather reserved and quiet. Despite this, there he was, on stage, playing it up and playing along with the magicians. For me, that was the best part of the evening. Well, maybe the second best part of the evening, my filet was awesome (cooked to perfection).

Have I mentioned that sleep is a weapon?

This morning, I got home around 1 a.m. and despite my exhaustion, I was unable to get to sleep until after 3 a.m. I was then up again at 7:30 in the morning. This time it was an opportunity to go see Wall-E at the Disney employee screening. Since I enjoyed the movie so much, and I was seeing it for free, I, of course, went and saw it again (yes, it really is that good). For the rest of the day I've been running around taking care of little odds and ends. And now it is 11:30 p.m.. I'm so tired it hurts, but I promised my friend I would blog more often.

So here it is, my sleep deprived blog. If I hadn't been lacking sleep, I might have had the weapon I needed to make a profound statement about blogging under the influence of exhaustion. As it stands, I'm going to bed!

Wall-E Totally rocks

Last night I saw Wall-E at the midnight showing. It was funny, poignant, a little sad, and visually AMAZING. I will avoid spoilers in this because you just have to go see it.

We went to the El Capitan theatre in Hollywood and if you have never been there it is worth the price of admission. Because we had to be there early to stand in line to get seats, they had pre-show entertainment.

There was a radio station there giving out t-shirts, blankets and other toys (all Wall-E of course). They had the audience yelling and screaming. It was fun and a reminder of the level of stupidity people will stoop to in order to get a stupid t-shirt. We had a blast. I was glad for the external stimulus because I am not really a night person.

The theatre was built in the thirty's and was refurbished several years ago by Disney. It has a stage as part of its construction and when they refurbished it, they restored it to its former glory. Theatre is amazing. There are all these ornate touches on the sconces, pillars, and ceiling. It is a gilded wonder.

Before the movie began they had a stage show that is a Disney character review. They guys next to me were just as enthusiastic about singing along as I was. This really made me happy. We happily sang along at the top of our lungs and giggled like little kids. It was great fun.

I was really worried that the movie would not stand up to the hype or that I had seen all the good parts in the previews and commercials. I had nothing to worry about. The movie was amazing, and they manage to keep the best bits in the movie rather than in the commercials. And I really liked the commercials too. So if the commercials and previews have you thinking that you might want to see this movie, I recommend that you do.

Sex talk and Occupational Therapy

I learned in class last night about creating online surveys. These are trickier to design than you might think. Take the simple act of requesting demographic information. Researchers really benefit from getting demo info. (Nielson makes a ton of money on demo's alone) Anyway, in my pursuit of developing the best Occupational Therapy focused website, I will need to know about the demographics of my constituency (my prof keeps insisting I call it the frame, but that is just confusing to me... so I am sticking with constituency).

So we were sitting in class discussing the development of an online survey that includes demographic information. So, the first think we talk about is sex (ahem, gender). This one should be easy right... wrong (mind you we were getting a bit punchy) but he said there are only two genders so the type of question should be nominal (where you just name stuff) and have a setting where you can only choose one. Someone then pointed out (correctly so) that there are some people who are both sexes. Then another person said, 'oh like cross dressers'. The conversation shifted to discussing how there is a difference between gender and sex. (um... yeah, one is way more fun than the other... ---oops must maintain G rating... anyway I digress) The conversation explored how people are born with a sex and they choose a gender. That is all well and good until you recognize that some people are born with all the mm... 'parts'. The class continued to banter on this distinction and I lost interest in what they were saying.

My mind started to wonder and I found myself having an internal discussion about how people focus much of their lives around how they define themselves. We are sexual beings and anyone who denies this is just not thinking in broad enough terms. As an occupational therapy student, we had a class session devoted to the discussion of how we can help our clients with needs that arise around sex.

Not only to we as OT's have to be sensitive and responsive to our client's needs we need to also recognize that as an OT we might need to help someone say for example a transvestite re-learn dressing. This population may have a few very different needs than a traditional male/female dressing components. I don't know much about this, as I don't have any friends who are transvestites. But if I did, I might ask them about the challenges they might face if they were hurt in such a way that would make dressing difficult. I see the topic of transvestitism occasionally on TV, but that is my only experience and we all know you can't blindly trust what you see on TV. Regardless, I think that there are other sex/gender issues that may be at issue for a client/patient of an OT. We as OT's need to be aware that these are real issues that real people face.

As for my class... we then moved on to culture/ethnicity... you guessed it... we then had a half hour discussion (where some very good points were made) about defining culture vs. ethnicity…

And I was already tired and a little sad from the sex (or is it gender... I am still confused) talk.

This is my first blog in a while. I am sorry to those who have let me know they were waiting for a post with baited breath. To those I say... BREATH

It is funny. There was a day several years ago when I was preparing to take my first karate test. I was very nervous because I had no idea what to expect. A friend who was a brown belt at the time, came to me and asked if I wanted some advice for the test. I was eager to obtain his words of wisdom. He then quietly leaned over and whispered very seriously into my ear, "When everything seems to be hard and everything is all confused and you can't remember which way is up, remember to breathe! Just BREATH!"

I've remember those words and applied them to my life on more than one occasion. Now for instance, as I quickly tried to finish my paper before it's due tonight, I keep telling myself to just breathe. It's funny how something so simple can be so meaningful. This little tidbit of advice is useful in lighthearted situations as well as very serious situations.

As occupational therapist. I hope to apply this little gem to my practice both in reminding myself, as well as helping my clients. as is true of a lot of occupational therapy, it's reminding people of the obvious things that are so difficult to see.

So I send you for with this little piece of advice, "when everything seems to be hard and everything is all confused and you can't remember which way is up, Remember to breathe! Just Breath!"

Wendy on Netvibes

Well I have succumbed to the pressure and I now have a Netvibes.

http://www.netvibes.com/wendykeller

note that it is full of all kinds of crazy stuff. I have my private one too. But this is a fun place to have all your community inputs aggregated. Take a look at it and if you like, you can try it out yourself. It also helps if you have accounts in some of the more popular online communities like facebook and myspace.

Enjoy.

Online bill payments

OK, you know you have spent to much time online when you are willing to transfer money through a bunch of accounts just so you don't have to drive the 3 minutes to the bank.

It is an interesting phenomena, this online banking. I have been using it for years and I am at the point that I will not hold a credit card or open a bank account unless I can access the information online and download it into Quicken. For that matter, I will not even write a check unless I can print it out from Quicken. Financially I am a slave to technology. And yet, for the most part I am alright with this fact.

I have a copy of the program safe and sound in the pile of computer software that I would need WHEN not if my computer crashes. I have a copy of the data on a flash drive that I keep in my fireproof safe. Which means that anyone who is devious enough could find out pretty much everything about me financially if they can get through the layers of passwords and encryption I have added beyond what is offered by Quicken.

The biggest problem is that I have to remember about 20 different passwords. That can get a bit frustrating when I can't remember one of them. I am so paranoid that I won't write them down. Sure, most banks will let you rest the password but often they want you to wait for the new temp password to arrive via snail mail. Ahg. So I guess that is incentive not to forget the passwords.

All in all, online banking ROCKS! I am never past due, I know exactly how much money I don't have, and I can tell you exactly where I spent that last $100.00 because Quicken will be happy to create a report, build grafts, and even scold me for going over budget.

So, who needs those debt consolidation/repair people. Just get Quicken and put in all your numbers. It will be happy to make you feel stupid for over-spending.

Cheers.

New Priorities

I've often thought of writing blog entries as a form of torture. It's not so much that I can't write a cohesive message in a short entry. But rather it is because I find it to be physically painful. One would think that it would be easy to just use voice recognition software. However, I have found that it is not as easy to use voice recognition software as it sounds like it would be in theory. As a result I have been very resistant to online blogging.

A funny thing happened last night. I found myself finally understanding why it is that blogging is so very important. A friend of mine called me on the phone and told me that she was worried about me because she hadn't heard anything in a while. I assumed that this was because we hadn't spoken on the phone. But then she commented, “You haven't written any blogs lately”. This is true because I haven't written a blog since my birthday and ever since that time, I have been in significant pain.

Chronic pain is not like acute pain. It acts in a completely different way. Chronic pain comes with a bunch of baggage such as; bemoaning the fact that it hurts or compromising what things get done and what things don't get done. I had chosen to focus on research for papers, and coordinating and presenting findings for my fieldwork presentations. As a result, I simply didn't have enough energy or pain tolerance left over to use for writing a blog.

It's never easy to make choices about what you're going to do and what you're going to let slide, especially at the graduate school level. Unfortunately, there is only so much time and there is only so much pain I can tolerate. As a result, I had to make a difficult choice. I chose not to focus on blogging. So this is my makeup blog. I don't expect for it to make up for missing entries, but since I actually have readers, I offer you my apologies for my absence.

All that being said, with one phone call I was reminded about how online communities function on an emotional level. My friend was concerned for my well-being, because she hadn't heard from me. Although we also know each other in real life, it was my absence online that led to her concern. This emotional umbilical that occurs between community members through online entries is powerful. Without a steady stream of entries it is impossible for community members to maintain an online connection. That may be very obvious, in theory, but this was an occasion where it became very real to me.

So I thank my muse, Liz, for calling me and reminding me how my missing blogs were noticed by someone. Not just any someone, but rather a member of my community.

Socialized Gambling?

There is this nifty new product I just found out about called ShuffleUp Cards where you shuffle the cards in a candy dish. Sounds a little wacky when put like this, but I really think this is genius. My hat goes off to the inventor.

Why? you might ask do I think so highly of this product. Well, let me tell you. As an occupational therapist I work with kids that do not have great socialization skills. I have also worked with 85 year old vets that just want to remember the good old days. A friend of mine works with people with recent brain injuries. These cool little chip like cards are fun for the kids, easy to get a hold of for arthritic or hands that need a little extra coaxing from the brain. Not only do they not need shuffling, it would defeat the purpose. I have just ordered a set so I will have to get back to you whether or not they perform as advertised. I will also give my 7-10 year old clients an opportunity to destroy them. I figure if they are hardy enough to take it this will be a permanent addition to my OT bag of tricks.

Media connections

Yesterday Jim Cramer focused his show Mad Money on how to invest: the basics. Something he said that resonated with me and both Comm classes, was the idea of how to identify a top or bottom of the market for a particular stock i.e., company. My understanding of his theory was that if everybody is in agreement then the tide is about to change. So, I guess that means I should buy a house because everyone seems to agree that the housing market sucks.

'When everybody agrees' is a really scary idea. It would be one thing to say that most people agree but how do you actually get everybody to agree. I bet you could still find someone that would argue the earth is flat and the sun is a chariot. I know that Cramer was not talking about everybody literally but it is an interesting idea. If everybody agreed then there would be no change, no movement, no life left in anything.

So if the market has consensus then there is no reason for the price to change. We all agree. That is the price. That is the answer. Done. Over. Life would suck all the way around if we all agreed. The worst part is that we would all agree that it sucked.

Invention, creation, motivation comes from the friction caused by disagreement. In fact what Cramer is really saying is cause friction, be disagreeable, move counter-intuitively so the market will continue to move.

The point is... be the leader and change directions despite what EVERYBODY says.

Masquerade paper faces on parade…

In the musical the Phantom of the Opera the first song in the second half is called Masquerade. This song comes at a point in the musical where the opera company has been closed for the off season and they are having a party to bring in the new season.

That being said… the song itself is a wonderful song about how people are walking around pretending to be something they are most certainly not. The title of this blog is the first line of the lyrics. Masquerade Paper faces on parade Masquerade, take a look there’s another mask behind you…

This struck me as so closely related to our classes. I say classes because both classes have discussed the topic of user identities and how they relate to the person on the other side of the keyboard. In Dmitri’s class we discussed how the users are able to take on a user identity. This identity is like that paper mask. If you already know someone, then you are not likely to be fooled by a paper mask. You see past it, beyond the paper and fill in the person’s features that are obscured.

I think this happens online with user ID’s as well. When you know the person on the other side of the keyboard you are able to fill in and see around the obscured information. You can see how that person really is, but someone who doesn’t know this person, would be prevented from really knowing them at least initially because of the paper mask. The mask creates a step of removal that can at least give the person the illusion of anonymity if not actual anonymity. I know this issue of actual vs. imagined anonymity could be debated but to do so would be beyond the scope of this blog.

The song continues and in true operatic style there are many little side ‘conversations’ that occur to clue the audience as to what has happened while they were out having a cocktail at intermission. This seems to also relate to the behaviors that people display online. In most chat formats, there is a way for people to converse outside the group so they can have private conversations. This behavior provides a more intimate knowledge about the person and creates additional emotional links therefore further investing the person into the website. By the way, in the musical this also creates an emotional hook for the audience to help them to reengage into the story line… the cocktail doesn’t hurt either.

Then there is the Troll, who messes up the whole party. This person comes in to the party and disrupts all the activity that has been going on and redirects all attention onto him… please tell me you know who this is in the musical. Through the use of a much more elaborate disguise, the Phantom is able insinuate himself into the conversations without fear of discovery of his true nature underneath. In the online world this also occurs and it usually takes significant effort to alleviate the original participants of the troll’s interference.

I think this analogy is very interesting and I could probably delve deeper into the psycho-social implications that it raises… but I am out of time and the show must continue on!

…and the lucky shrimp goes straight through to the Sheller…

That was what he said… really!

These were my brother’s words when I was eavesdropping on his conversation with his classmates.

My brother is working toward an MBA from the University of Florida via an on-line program. He was utilizing a couple of programs to have a group session with his classmates, who happen to live in different parts of the country. His emphatic declaration that it would be that shrimp’s lucky fate to end up getting to the Sheller first that highlighted the fact that it is easy to forget about all the technology that is being utilized and focus on the task at hand – shelling that lucky shrimp.

The group session occurred on a Sunday afternoon. They were using Elluminate and Scype to show each other parts of their assignment and talk as if they were in the same room. My brother was working with his classmates on a distribution problem and he was emphatic that his analysis of the problem was correct. He was vehemently defending his argument because one of his cohorts did not understand why some shrimp were ‘luckier’ than others.

I had been curious about how his classes worked with the technology the school had given them, as well as, how the lectures worked and felt. He told me that the navigation of the technology was easier than he had expected. I must qualify this with a comment that he is VERY tech savvy. I asked him what it was like taking classes online. He said that it was different to view an online lecture and then do the homework before meeting with his classmates to discuss the answers and then return a finished product to his instructor. He indicated that it wasn’t any more difficult than a normal class, just different.

I was also interested in how he felt about developing working relationships with his classmates. He said that he is not as close has he has been with other classmate settings. This is consistent with what we discussed in class with Dmitri about how 1:1 contact is always likely to be the best form of communication. That being said, it would seem that being able to hear the emphasis in my brother’s voice impacted the other participants. This would not have been possible in a setting such as just text base communication such as IM. It is also possible that seeing the calculations in tandem with the vocal inflection was the persuasive mitigating factor.

For me, it was the fact that the shrimp was going to be scampi sooner. (P.S. I was hungry)

OT Stories

Last year I took a class for my MA in OT called Story Making. The general idea behind the whole class was to recognize that all stories have certain elements with the purpose of getting an idea from one person to another. We focused mostly on how to understand and interpret both spoken and unspoken language to understand our patient’s need. In hindsight, I find it funny that there would seem to be a whole school centered on this idea.

Maybe it seems like an “err, duh,” but I had not linked the idea of communications with therapeutic story making, until now.

In class, we spoke about how drama is comprised of peripeteia and resolution. We focused on how to translate the actions and minimal words of a 4-year-old autistic child into an understandable need. We focused on helping an older adult who struggled with the idea of never living alone again. We focused on how to tell a mother how to feed her preemie child after the child is having trouble eating. These are all roles of occupational therapists. My focus going into this program was to help OT’s communicate amongst themselves and with those outside the field.

What I had not thought about was how vast and impactful communication is in our lives. It had not occurred to me that the mere positioning of houses on a street would influence how the community would interact. I had not thought about how I was going to communicate the design of my on-line community to programmers, or how to design it so it would accomplish the vision I have in my head.

So, I am sitting here, reading and writing about communication and some of its facets, trying to get my head around the fact that the basic function and design of the space right down to the font kerneling can have far reaching affects on my community’s ability to perform the lofty goals I have set out to accomplish. I am in awe of those who have already done this for their niche communities.

Nevertheless, for now, I have to take it one-step at a time and focus on understanding the successes and failures of those who have gone before me, and try to learn from their choices. I will find the resolution to this peripeteia, I assure you. I might die in the process. And yet, as many of my friends will attest, I am far too stubborn and I have come too far in my life for a mere website to take me down.

Roller coaster Enthusiasts

Roller coaster Enthusiasts! Enjoy! {smirk}









And for something that is different but really cute!



Admit it - Chad's got talent! You go Bro!

This and that... a bit of rambling - Enjoy!

Well, hmmm. What do I say this week! Well, I sat down and perused some very interesting sites. Unfortunately, my second-life avatar is still flying around in circles. I am sure this is easy to rectify if I would, say… click the stop flying button. However, what fun would it be to say, “I can’t get off the stupid island?” It is reminiscent of ABC’s LOST. Just about the time you figure out how to get off the island… they go and renew you for another season and ya have to go back, the audacity!
Anyway, I am at a loss for words. So many of my classmates are accomplished writers and I barely passed English 101. Granted, I have spent some time writing papers since then, but I am quite intimidated at the idea of writing papers, even now. I find it funny that I am in a communications program and I struggle to communicate. It is interesting how life takes you in directions you would never have guessed at, or for that matter designed.
The general tie I saw in this week’s assignments was the creation (or is it recreation?) of self. In these games or environments, we create our ‘self’ within the parameters of the site. I am a fan of Stargate (a sci-fi TV show for those who care). In the related fan site, I am known as DrKeller, Oh, I know what you are thinking – how uncreative. In my defense, there is a character on the show named “Dr. Keller” and better still, she is a girl. So, I figure since I aspire to become Dr. Keller and they went to all the trouble of creating a character named after me… I should honor the irony of the situation, and choose DrKeller as my handle. It seems logical to me. My point being, no matter how far or bazaar the setting is, wherever we find ourselves we are all still human, even in… scratch that… especially in cyber space.
I know this is not a revelation, in fact, I believe in one (or maybe more) of these classes we spoke about this idea. I have been thinking about it, and I think the point of the conversation was to focus on how we are what we pretend to be… even if we do not want to believe it ourselves.
Last week I was playing with Kingdom of Loathing having a wonderful time beating the crap out of bunnies. What can I say…? I like beating the crap out of things, thugs, or heavy bags… whatever is available and in need of a good beating. What does that say about me? Well, I am not sure…but you might not want to be holding a bunny and following me in a dark alley… I know Karate!

The OT Extravaganza

On Saturday, I was a presenter at the USC Occupational Therapy first annual OT Extravaganza. {Honest that is what they called it…} I was talked into this by my roommate who was on the hosting committee. She assured me that all I had to do was show up and talk about my project.
What project, you might ask? Well allow me to jump up on my soapbox and give you the flare of what I presented.
It was for my Occupational Therapy Doctoral (OTD) project. I presented it to my instructors, fellow classmates and friends and family members that attended the event, so they can get the idea of what I am doing. I explained that for my OTD project I would create an online community for occupational therapy and occupational science. This community would serve the needs of the occupational therapy and science profession.
Since I was there anyway, and I really do want input from my intended audience, I took the opportunity to survey members of this community for input regarding the look and feel as well as the content that they would like to have in their community.
They had many questions and I was really quite pleased with myself for knowing many of the answers. Most of the questions I fielded related to explaining how this was different from the large number of list-serves that are available through the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) web site. I addressed this by explaining that there were many differences between the two. I explained to the best of my knowledge and gave some examples of how an online community can offer so much more than a list-serve.
They also wanted to know what an avatar is since I had listed it on my questionnaire. I just wanted to get a sense of where the current OT community was at regarding the look and feel of a setting that would utilize avatars. Repeatedly they asked what an avatar was. I found this surprising since I thought it was fairly common knowledge what an avatar is. Even some of my friends that are often on their computers, were asking me about avatars.
It was an interesting and significant piece of information about the members of the OT community. It is not important if the online community utilizes an avatar, but it is important to keep in mind the readiness and willingness to learn a new way of interacting. When I design my site, it is of the utmost importance that it is not intimidating to my OT cohorts who are not accustomed to using the internet in this capacity.
In the end, though it took all day Saturday and I had to prepare the presentation for most of Friday, it was worth the time because it gave me a significant insight plus several dozen completed surveys that I can utilize in the creation of this online community.

Is there anybody out there?

Just nod if you can hear me. Is there anyone at home?" - Pink Floyd