a more silent world

I decided to do an introduction vlog now that my first year of classes are done. I took three 8-week classes at a local Deaf association. The classes met for 2 hours per week and we finished the blue "Signing Naturally" book. We are meeting once a week during the summer to "just chat" so we don't lose too much before the next class starts in September transcript: Hi, I'm Aaron! This is my first vlog. I am not Deaf, I am HoH. I am married and have two daughters, age 8 and 2. My wife is pregnant and we will have a new baby in about 3 weeks. No idea if it will be a boy or girl. I am excited! I grew up in CA, went to CSUF. I majored in chemistry, and also studied physics, math, and French. Now I know English, French, and learning sign for one year. I love movies (have huge TV), pool, darts, photography.

So not long ago, a jury ruled against Jammie Thomas, and ordered her to pay the RIAA $222,000 for a total of 24 songs that she "made available" via Kazaa. The judge had instructed the jury that "making the content available for download" did indeed construe copyright violation. The judge has since made a statement that maybe he erred in that instruction and a retrial may be in order. An interesting note, though, was that the RIAA took it from "making available" to "disseminating" by running MediaSentry, a program which downloaded the 24 songs from Jammie's computer to their own. Now, at $9250 per song, what I'm dying to know is... if the RIAA downloaded 24 songs from her computer, and did not own the copyright to even ONE of those songs, they are technically violating someone else's copyright. Why aren't they being sued for downloading content that doesn't belong to them??? I am *so* tired of this racketeering by the RIAA ...

I saw Iron Man last night on a very large DLP screen, and all I can say is if you have not seen it, you should go while it is still on the big screen! First, Robert Downey Jr gives a spectacular performance. He manages to play the slick public-figure-type guy, the get-your-hands-dirty-genius-inventor guy, and the "Jon Stewart-ish" witty comic all rolled into one. He really was the perfect fit for the role. Jeff Bridges also gives an unbelievable performance. The quality of his acting really shouldn't come as a shock to anyone, given his past roles. It's nice to see that he's never really been typecast into a certain kind of role. The video and sound quality was really staggering. The special effects were good enough that the line between real and CGI is basically invisible, and the overall physics in the movie is really lightyears beyond similar movies like Spiderman. I generally don't mind suspending my disbelief for comic book type movies when it comes ...

Something RLM said to me in another blog made me think. Some organizations/states/whatever cover the costs of CI and hearing aids while they don't cover the cost of equally useful tools for Deaf like Sidekicks, etc. This brings up a much larger point, though. I read that the worldwide demand for CI is about $200 million. And if 1 of every 10 people in HoH in the US, then the bilateral cost of providing them all hearing aids is: 300,000,000 people 30,000,000 HoH $2000 x 2 = $4000 for aids assume aids last 4 years, so $1000 per person, per year. -------------------------- so about $30 billion per year at absolute most, since many don't need bilateral, and most aids last longer than 4 years. Now, that sounds like a large sum of money, until you consider the amount we have spent per year for our precious wars in Iraq and Afganistan (hint, lots more than $30 billion per year). So instead of sitting here fighting about inequalities of coverage, why don't we all focus our sight...

So I bought a Prius earlier this year after dealing with the very frustrating people at Volkswagen who could not (or would not) fix my oil consumption problems with my 2006 Jetta 2.0T. In looking for a new car, my only criteria was something with at least as much back seat room as my Jetta for the carseats, and I definitely prefer leather or some other non-fabric that doesnt stain every time the kids spill something. The two main contenders ended up being the 2008 Prius and the 2008 Accord. Configured with leather, they are both very similar in price. There were a couple deciding factors here. First, because my Jetta was so new, I lost a bundle by trading it. Second, I cannot stand oil companies and their record profits while we all suffer, and would do nearly anything to take that from them. Some calculations showed that buying the Prius would save enough per month in gas to make my monthly car+gas cost the same as the Jetta, even though the payment would be much higher than the...

I have really enjoyed learning ASL every week for the last 8 months. It has been truly helpful, and now I can see how far I've come, and see just how far I must go. My teacher was wonderfully patient for our class, and really helpful. I think we started with about 20 people, and now we end with 9. Sad, but I believe the remaining 9 will all take the 2nd level class in September. I know I can't wait. I definitely enjoy watching vlogs more now, because I can understand a lot more than 8 months ago when I was just studying on my own from books. Thanks to all those who have been encouraging to me!

So time flies, and my current hearing aids are 4 years old when it seems like I got them yesterday. The aid from my better ear quit working well, so I sent it in yesterday. I will enroll for a 2009 flexible spending account to get a new set of ears next year. It's pretty amazing how far things have come since I got my first set in 1999. I had the Widex Senso+ CIC from 1999-2004. They had no controls, and were meant to be automatic in every way. This was only annoying when I needed more power in very quiet places where people talk very low, and in very loud places where they basically turned themselves into earplugs and I couldn't hear people talking at all. Then I got the Phonak Claro 21 dAZ ITE that I wear now. My watch controls the program and the volume. These are a huge improvement over the old ones, since I can now compensate for my environment. I miss wearing designer watches, though, because I have always loved cool watches. They also have a telecoil program (w...