I Speak of Dreams

BarCamp in Palo Alto August 18-19; BlogFest West August 18.

TWO blogesque activities on the same day. 

#1: BarCamp:

This year's BarCamp anniversary will take place full circle back in the same place it started: SocialText's offices... and spilling out into the streets! Yep. We will be working with SocialText to get this puppy off the ground with the goal of having a multi-office party starting SocialText's offices... and maybe looping in nearby neighbors like Facebook, iMeem, IDEO, Edgeio and so on.

#2: Blog Fest West

A meeting of West Coast bloggers and friends of West Coast bloggers.

Meet fellow bloggers. Get out of the house. Get out of the heat. Network. Find out how to increase traffic. Eat, drink and be merry.

WHEN:  August 18, 2007, 6:30 PM, someplace in San Francisco

I'm not sure about my own participation in either event--depends on how progress is going with Jumper Girl's departure.

Stephanie Huffer Kay, 21, Alcohol Overdose

Mrs. Kay was a junior at North Carolina State University, studying to become a veterinary technician. 

Stephanie Huffer Kay passed away last Saturday [April 14, 2007] due to alcohol poisoning after celebrating her 21st birthday with her husband and friends.

According to Jim Sughrue of Raleigh Police, emergency units transported Kay to Rex Hospital, where she was immediately pronounced deceased.

Her parents, Jason and Janice Huffer,  have established a scholarship in her memory.  The conditions of the scholarship require that

recipients must abstain from alcohol or illegal drug use, per university policy.

"Maybe it will spare some other parents from going through what we are going through right now," Janice Huffer said.

My deepest condolences to her family and friends.

Inflammatory Breast Cancer Strikes a Blogger

Why Mommy is

a scientist turned stay-at-home-mom, always looking for something fun and exciting to do with the kids. Widget was born August 2004; Little Bear in January 2007. Dad and the dog round out our busy house of boys.

She was diagnosed with inflammatory breast cancer in June 2007  and she wrote about the diagnostic process  and what chemo is like.  Below the fold, her story.

Cri de Coeur

Jumper Girl and I are getting on a plane in 20 days to take her to college.

She was out bopping around with friends all afternoon, and so I spent the afternoon being weepy.

On the one hand, I want her to go and thrive.

On the second hand, I am looking forward to some new opportunities for me.

But on the gripping hand, I will miss her terribly.

Jumper Girl Competes At A Lower Level Than This

The fences in this video are set about 1.5 meters.  Jumper Girl's competing at about  1 meter plus,  or about 66% to 70% of the height and spread.

Here's another link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOXlaxCCkOE

The Spring Creek Lodge Experience

Link: The Spring Creek Lodge Experience.

This is the story of my stay at Spring Creek Lodge in Montana. It is a subsidiary school of WWASP, the World Wide Association of Specialty Programs. The seminars are run by a company called Resource Realizations, who appears to be expanding their market into the public arena. These types of programs are not therapy, they are not treatment, they are intensive behavior modification. This is my experience...

Testimony from An Academy at Ivy Ridge Graduate

This eloquent comment on the Ivy Ridge post deserves to be heard by all parents thinking of sending their teen to a "therapeutic boarding school", especially one with ties to the Lichfield enterprises or WWASPS.

Here is a brief timeline of events at Ivy Ridge.

The commenter wrote:

I attended the Academy at Ivy Ridge (AIR)  from July 2003 to April 2005. I am 20 years old now and a junior in college and I still have nightmares about this place. 2 years later, I still am dealing with what I experienced and witnessed.

The writer was there when AIR was fraudulently claiming to be accredited, and left just before the riot.

Horse Show Happiness

Jumper Girl's been having a great show.  Not so much the ribbons but the riding.  Today she had two great rides, finishing about 12th to 15th in classes of 25+ -- out of the ribbons but still a good showing. 

Every ride, she is improving her horse.  This afternoon I looked at all the videos I have of her since we got this horse and the improvement in the horse and rider is plain to see.

Taking pleasure in your kid's increasing mastery is the name of the game for parents, if you ask me.

Press Release on Carolina Springs and Other WWASPS programs

Link: WebWire | Carolina Springs Academy Rebuttals Slanderous Websites.

After this is when she begins to explain about the anti-wwasps websites on the internet. "These sites are designed to denigrate schools such as ours," Davis says. Many of the sites often attempt to dissuade parents from taking any action regarding the troubles their child is in. Some of them also specifically target WWASPS Schools while they praise another company’s.

After some extensive research, Davis has determined that there are three (3) general types of these sites:

1. Competitors: The site uses misinformation and distorted facts to create confusion in an attempt to direct the parent to a school or admission company that they themselves control. These sites are designed to look legitimate and are often persuasive, but lack honesty, integrity and are hiding their conflict of interest.

2. Anti Parental Rights Advocate: These sites are hosted and maintained by those who feel parents should not have the right to decide the learning environment for their children. The children should be free to do as they choose while the parents remain legally responsible for their actions. The same type of individuals that drive the current controversy regarding parents rights to be notified of their own childs abortion are often those who also foster these types of sites against us.

3. Poor personal experience: Occasionally, the hosters of some of these negative sites are from individuals who were in a boarding facility when they were themselves a child, and had a bad experience. Even though they have often not visited our school, they dislike the entire idea of a disciplined, structured learning evnironment. Such people have consequently transferred their own experience to all such boarding facilities, and have made it a mission to denigrate all such schools.

How about #4: Me.  I believe that institutions such as those associated with WWASPS (including Carolina Springs) are ineffective and destructive to the children involved.  I also believe that they are money machines for the proprietors.