I copied this directly from Leah’s blog. Leah is the mother of Angela, who has Down Syndrome. Leah titled her blog post: If you love my kid, you won’t go! And although I probably wouldn’t have gone to this movie anyway, I do love Angela so I put this up on my blog as well.

I bet you’ve seen the trailers for the new movie opening this week “Tropic Thunder”, the new Ben Stiller movie. I’ll bet you thought the trailers were hilarious. I’ll bet you DON’T know what’s really in this movie!

Ben Stiller and his team put a lot of thought into this movie, trying to be very careful to not cross the lines on racial humor. They wouldn’t want to offend anyone of color or other nationalities in fear of loosing a lot of money in the movie.

But people who are intellectually disabled are fair game in the world of Hollywood. The word “retard” is the whole sub-plot for the movie. The term “Going full retard” has been coined and it’s been announced there will soon be a line of t-shirts appearing in your local stores with the term plastered across the front. If you take every time the word “retard” is used in the movie and replace it with the “n” word, or any other racial slur, the movie would be banned in the U.S!

And that, my friends and family, is what Angela has to look forward to when school starts. (Last year it was Napolean Dynamite pens that talked, with one of the phrases being “you retard!” which, after complaints, were quickly pulled off the shelves and banned by schools across the country.)

Yes, the movie is rated R, so young kids shouldn’t be seeing it. But they will. And their teen siblings and parents who DO see it will be coming home repeating what they think is a funny phrase, and kids will be coming to school with it. They’ll love the t-shirts as well.

I don’t understand how in the world it’s ok to to belittle this population of people, but if they were using the “N” word, or any other racial slur, it would be all over the news! Our countries schools have a zero tolerance policy against racial harassment, and you won’t hear certain words thrown around the hallways of your child’s school. But you WILL hear “retard” on a regular basis.

I know there are plenty of you who feel I’m overreacting. Well, apparently I’m with the 3 million other families in the country who are FURIOUS this film has been allowed to be produced the way it has. You can expect to see national and local protests about this film, as those of us who are overreacting demand that our children, brothers, sisters, cousins, and loved ones get the same respect that everyone else in the country gets, including illegal immigrants. That they aren’t set up for yet MORE harassment by teens who think it’s funny to mock our children because Hollywood has encouraged them to do so.

I hear the word by friends and family members all the time. I hear the “short bus” jokes. Most of the time I’ll call someone on the carpet about it, but sometimes I won’t. Sometimes I just get tired of constantly having to defend my child against the people who are supposed to care. Their lame responses of “I wasn’t meaning HER, it was just a joke!” Well, HELLO!!! Who do you MEAN then? Who are you comparing yourself or others to when you toss those words around? And my personal favorite “It just slipped out”. Funny…words that aren’t part of my every day vocabulary don’t “just slip out”!

My child, and millions like her, are intellectually disabled (that’s the proper term, by the way…”retarded” is going out the window because it’s become such a hateful slang term. School districts aren’t even putting it on their paperwork anymore!) Just as people of color don’t have a choice of what color skin they were born with, children with intellectual disabilities don’t have a choice but to ride “the short bus”, and so they become the brunt of your jokes. I’ve watched people who’s own children ride “the short bus” make the same jokes, without even realizing (or caring) that it’s at the expense of his/her own children. “Oh, but they think it’s funny too!” Do they really? Or are they laughing along while inside they squirm with discomfort?

These people don’t have a choice to have the medical term “Mental retardation” plastered all over their medical records. Those with syndromes such as Down Syndrome can’t even hide behind a “normal” appearance. It’s plastered on their face, leaving them open to hateful ridicule by their peers, and yes, even their family members.

So, if you’ve seen the trailers, and thought, “That looks like a fun movie to see!” Please don’t. My child…your grandchild, your niece, your cousin, your friend…. and those like her, deserve the respect more then Ben Stiller and his team deserve a few bucks!

Lexi is a big fan of our friend, Josh. Which is interesting because (including today) I think Lexi has seen Josh in person about 3 times. She’s seen lots of pictures of him and his family. And he’s made it to the top of her “people to pray for” list. At dinner we usually have to pray for our food and for Josh. It always goes something like this, “Dear God, Pray for Josh. Amen.”

Anyway, today we spent the day at their new house (Yay for friends moving back to Minnesota!) helping move boxes and put together IKEA bookshelves. Needless to say, Lexi was thrilled. She jabbered the whole way there about seeing Josh and Stephanie and Caleb. And while we were there, she would wander around, look for Josh and give us the play by play on what Josh was doing or where he was.

When we were eating dinner, Lexi decided that she should pray for Josh. Very thoughtful of her.

The ride home was also fun. Lexi sang the whole way. Mostly her version of ABC (it goes something like “ABC HIJ Sing with me QUST, WXYZ Now I know next triangle with me.”) But there was also the Wheels on the Bus/This Little Light of Mine/Bob, Larry & Mr. Nezzar/ABC medley.

Last September I counted up all of the friends having kids in the near future and (surprise, surprise, the list just keeps growing) I thought I should do a quick update.

Here’s the current list:
Rachel and Jonathan had Hannah back in April.
Harriet and Ben had Lucy in July.
Andy and Anna had Peter in August.
Steph and Josh had Caleb in September.
Kelly and Milo have a boy coming any day now. Peyton arrived in September.
Christy and Imad are expecting a boy in October. They named him Justin.
Amy and her husband are adopting a boy who is due in October. Joseph came home at the beginning of October.
Lance and Tara’s baby is due in November. They named him Malachi.
Brick and Rhiannon are due in January. Milo now has a little sister named Emma.
Laura and Brad are due in January. Another Emma in the world.
Aimee and her husband are due in January. Jack arrived just after the New Year.
Becky is due in January. Wyatt - totally in love with the name.
Mandy is due in February. Jackson showed up on his due date (I think).
Jenny and Matt are due in Febuary (I think). I can’t remember if Isaac was born in February or January.
And we are adopting but we haven’t been matched with a baby yet so it’ll probably be another year - we still don’t have a referral but we do have a time line - it’s about a 3-6 month wait for a referral.

We have 2 pieces of paper left to complete for our dossier. One is a reference letter from a friend and the other is a letter to the Ministry of Women’s Affairs in Ethiopia that Kevin and I have to write, explaining our intentions to adopt an Ethiopian child. After we have those 2 documents we get everything notarized, write a huge check and send it in. Honestly, we should be done in the next week. My goal is to have it sent off before Christmas vacation starts (in 9 days).

Oh and here’s a cool twist in our adoption journey. I recently found a friend from college on facebook who is wanting to adopt a boy, from Ethiopia. She and her husband have just started the process but it’s nice to know that I am already friends with someone who will have a family that looks like ours.

This list is mostly for me because I keep forgetting who’s expecting and when.

Rachel and Jonathan had Hannah back in April.
Harriet and Ben had Lucy in July.
Andy and Anna had Peter in August.
Steph and Josh had Caleb in September.
Kelly and Milo have a boy coming any day now.
Christy and Imad are expecting a boy in October.
Amy and her husband are adopting a boy who is due in October.
Lance and Tara’s baby is due in November.
Brick and Rhiannon are due in January.
Laura and Brad are due in January.
Aimee and her husband are due in January.
Becky is due in January.
Mandy is due in February.
Jenny and Matt are due in Febuary (I think).
And we are adopting but we haven’t been matched with a baby yet so it’ll probably be another year.

Wow.

It seems everyone is doing lists on their blogs lately. (It’s a good think nobody tried to peer pressure me in high school or I would have been screwed.)

So here is a little of me, in list form.
1. I was born in MIlwaukee
2. I moved to Green Bay with 3 weeks left of 8th grade.
3. It was tramatic.
4. I met a kid named Josh.
5. He loaned me a pen.
6. He was the only other person from my high school who went to Bethel.
7. He and Kevin were roommates freshman year.
8. I married Kevin.
9. I lived in Green Bay.
10. This does not make me a Packer fan.
11. It doesn’t even make me a football fan.
12. Although I enjoyed the day off of school when they won the Superbowl.
13. I like hockey.
14. Specifically the Detroit Redwings.
15. Kevin is from Detroit.
16. He likes hockey as much as I do.
17. I liked the Wings before I met Kevin.
18.I’m a teacher.
19. I like to teach in places most people don’t.
20. Right now I’m teaching kindergarten.
21. My kindergarteners have taught me how to speak Somali.
22. I can count to 20 and say about 10 words in Somali.
23. I have a daughter.
24. Her name is Madeleine.
25. We spelled her name the same way Madeleine L’Engle spells her name.
26.We call her Lexi.
27. I own almost all of L’Engle’s books.
28. I own a lot of books.
29. Really, it’s a lot.
30. I own a book signed by Ceasar Millan.
31. I waited in line for 2 hours to have it autographed.
32. He made it out to Speak and Maize.
33. It’s supposed to say Speak and Mazie.
34. I train dogs part time so it was cool to meet Ceasar.
35. He’s really short.
36. If I hadn’t married Kevin I’d probably be a crazy dog lady.
37. If I had my way, I’d have at least 5 dogs.
38. I’m lucky I have 2.
39.I’m re-reading all 6 Harry Potter books before #7 gets delivered to my house.
40.I’m only on book 1.
41. Book 7 will arrive July 21.

More lists to come.
Thanks for playing.

Quizzes are fun. Really, they are.

Create your own friendquiz here

Yesterday we went to the Minnesota Zoo . For those of you not living in MN this is the “big zoo”. There is also Como Zoo which is a smaller zoo near our house. Como Zoo is also free (well, free as in donations strongly suggested by the little old lady vlounteer who sits next to the donation box at the entrance.) The Minnesota Zoo is a pretty impressive place. Their outdoor habitats are pretty amazing. Some of them are so big it’s hard to spot the animals. This summer’s big event is the African Savanah. They brought in 5 different animals that co-exsist on the savanah and housed them all in one habitat so people can see how they interact (all though yesterday’s interactions mostly involved sleeping or wandering aimlessly). In the one exhibit there are giraffes, ostrich, wildebeasts, gazelle and zebras. At certain times of the day you can also buy crackers to feed to the giraffes, but we missed that part. The indoor stuff is also very cool. They have coral reefs, dolphins, sharks, tanks holding starfish and small sharks that you can pet, crazy looking sea horses and a whole Tropics Trail which has cool animals like tapir, tree kangaroos, otters, sunbears, lemurs (which we found out are extremely loud when they all start barking/howling at the same time), gibbons, tortoises, slothes, leopards, and other fun rainforest type animals.

So, Tim, Nicole, Kevin and I loaded Amana, Caleb and Lexi (and their strollers, snacks, lunches, waterbottles, diaper bags, and a few random toys) into the mini van and headed down there for the day. The kids seemed to enjoy the day. Lexi liked her stroller ride, Caleb liked people watching and Amana had fun looking at all the animals. Going to the zoo with a three-year old is always fun. There was a never ending stream of questions: why did the animals look like this?, why were they making that noise?, what is this called?, what is that called? but it was fun answer the questions and watch her run from animal to animal. Although I think the highlight of the day for her was running back and forth through a bamboo curtain.

You can see a few pictures of our day here.

Almost a month ago a friend of mine got married. And then he and his new wife apparently joined the witness relocation program because as of this entry, his blog has gone blank and hers has not been updated since May 15. Mutual friends have not heard from them either.

I have several theories on what has happened to them;
1. They are taking the world’s longest honeymoon.
2. While waiting for their plane at the airport to come home from the honeymoon they started chatting with one of those guys who stands outside of airports and hands out flowers and are now also standing around airports handing out flowers.
3. They have moved to a remote island with no phone, internet or mail service.
4. They are contestants on Survivor and are still stuck wherever the plane dropped them off.
5. They started moving into their new apartment, a huge pile of boxes fell on them and they are now trapped.
6. They were abducted by aliens.

Now I am going to see about placing one of those ads on the side of a milk carton.

I’ve always liked playing games. When I was younger board games were a highlight of almost every family gathering. I remember being at my grandparents’ house at Christmas time and playing pictionary or trivial pursuit. My grandparents never played but my parents, aunts and uncles, my cousin and I (we were the oldest cousins, all the younger ones either were rollerskating in the basement or sleeping) sat around the dining room table playing games. Grandma and Grandpa usually sat in their respective arm chairs reading and watching the news - or watching us.

Pictionary was always my favorite. It was fast, loud, and I kicked butt at it. Trivial pursuit was harder to play until I got to high school, then I knew more about history to be able to answer some questions. Although my family had so many expansion decks that you could almost always find a topic you knew a lot about. When we played you could pick from the original edition questions, the baby boomers edition, M.A.S.H. edition, baseball, rock and roll, television, Jr. edition, and about eight others that I can’t remember.

At my house, we have piles of games. There’s Life, Sorry, Clue, Scrabble, Super-Scrabble, Rummikub, Phase-10, Cranium, Trivial Pursuit, Jenga, Taboo, Yatzee, Monopoly (which nobody will play with me), Scattegories, Simpson’s Trivia, Pit, Soloman’s Temple (don’t ask), Carcassone, KIller Bunnies (and all of it’s available expansion packs), and Settlers of Catan.

Although, out of all of those, there are only a few that we play on a regular basis. Killer Bunnies is one of my favorites because it’s easy to learn and there is a rule in the rule book that basically says you can do whatever it takes to win just shy of out-right cheating. Any game that allows bribing, bartering and black-mailing is a fun game to play.

Settlers gets played a lot in our house - I like this one because the board changes every time you set it up - you can have a great game one night and nothing the next.

Tim and Nicole got a new game the other day called Ticket to Ride. You basically build trains from city to city across Europe. It’s quickly becoming one of my favorites.

So if you are looking for some new games to play, here’s what I recommend:

Two player - Carcassone, Phase-10, Rummikub, Ticket to Ride

Three - Four players - Settlers, Ticket to Ride, Sequence, Trivial Pursuit

Four or more players - Killer Bunnies, Scattegories, Pictionary, Trivial Pursuit, Taboo, Monopoly