BSL!

So now that I have a job I can afford to buy books. Among the first six books I've bought two of them are about British Sign Language. Another is about sensory defensiveness and APD.

These should be very englightening.

So that one thing

I say tongue-in-cheek that bacon is the one thing that would make me ever reconsider atheism. There's one thing that would also, in the same way, make me reconsider bringing deafness upon myself: a cat's meow.

As I was walking home today from the job centre interview for a NI # one of the neighbourhood cats let me pet it and it meowed at me. I thought: "I'm going to miss that." Strange how it's not "I shouldn't do this!" but "I'm going to miss that."

I was having a slightly crummy day, fighting with my employer's VPN and the stress of the interview (I was out for 90 minutes in total!) and the kitty made my day! I love cats and believe them to be a higher form of life (no, I'm not kidding).

In fact I think top mounted ears like a cat's would be... the cat's meow! But I wonder how BTEs would be fitted to them... ;-)

(edit: Negated a key part of the 2nd paragraph for clarity. Thanks K. for pointing it out!)

It's a trans-trans day

That's "Transabled" day... not of the good kind where all of one's wishes come true.

Just been focusing on this stuff more than usual. Casey's typing (as well as my own) has driven me mad. I've come to the end of my tolerance for masking music and podcasts. Since Casey is home I can't really put oiled cotton into my ears to have a more effective means of sound blocking.

Le sigh... sleep soon anyways.

Shhh

Yesterday Casey and I went to visit some friends in another city (Which I think is interesting because one of said friends has 'BIID' listed in her LJ profile! I didn't know and still don't know if it is simply an interest or if she suffers from it.). We did the usual things: walking, talking and being cold.

Towards the end of our visit we stopped ino a pub for drinks and to rest our feet and to warm up. The pub was small and noisy and it came to a point where I was theatricall ignoring the other three and put my fingers in my ears. I was really surprised at how quiet it was. For just a few seconds (If I sat there like that for much longer it would have looked odd!) it was bliss. I didn't notice just how noisy it had become.

I find that the more that I'm out of the flat due to my job the more annoyed with sounds I'm becoming: cars, tapping pens, people talking and laughing, train stations, pidgeons walking (yes I can actually hear their claws on the flagstones. *sigh*), children and so on.

I have mentioned to a few of my coworkers that my hearing "isn't all that good" since one 'A', gave me and 'L' a ride into Leeds and I couldn't clearly hear them talking. I haven't mentioned it to my project manager or small 'team' yet but I'm close. D's accent/dialect is really hard to understand! I sometimes wonder if he has a speech problem or if it is just his accent being so broad. I'm happy at work (although the commute is killing me) and I'm glad I work there; I enjoy the work and the people.

It's just the noise that is irritating.

Clarity

I seem to have an issue with vocal clarity at work. I believe that some of it is due to the accents of my coworkers but I (hope) don't think it's limited to just that. I am usually very good with accents. In fact I was able to watch Trainspotting with no subtitles and was able to understand most (if not all) of what everyone was saying. Anyways, accents don't usually throw me off.

However the two guys I deal with daily seem to talk gibberish!! On first pass they don't make any sense but when I stop and piece together what they've said and what I've understood into a complete thought it then begins to make sense.

That's what is annoying me.

Why do I have to hear every other pathetic noise (like pidgeon claws on flagstones! Fucks sake that's REALLY quiet!) but struggle with voices.

It's annoying to strugle so much with one thing but hear another thing so clearly.

Work

The people I work with are really cool. Most of them are my age. But there's a few problems (TA-wise):

They all seem to

1) be soft talkers
2) prefer talking over IM or Email

Getting to work requires a lot of speaking: train ticket type, bus ticket type, and talking to a taxi driver if I take a taxi. (Taxis seem to talk to their fares a lot here.)

I love the work that I do but I hope it doesn't drive me mad! I think I'll send a note to my group (did I mention that I'm a 'team leader'?) and say that I prefer typing when possible. Obviously (and this is a practicality thing, alas), some topics are time sensitive and require a verbal explanation. Or, talking to a group...

Many issues, they'll all be fixed soon, one way or another!

Hrmm... work!

So yesterday I was made an offer for a role in Leeds doing website programming. I accepted it!

At the interview they gave me the dime tour and I noticed that a lot of the coders were using ipods and other headphones. This gives me hope! :) I can get away with listening to music all the time to drown out noise.

I liked talking with the interviewers: they seem genuinely geeky like me and it was fun to talk to them about a pet project of mine. The people that work there seem really cool and I think it'll be a great place to work!

We'll see what happens DW-wise with this job...