Well, I’m back at school as of last Friday and I am glad to be here there’s a lot to be said about organizing one’s schedule and directing one’s own care. Not that I’m not extremely grateful for my parents but they are after all my parents. Overall, the move-in process went smoothly and I enjoyed my time with my mom and dad. My PCA’s (which are the same as last year) are great and I am looking forward to a good year with them. My classes however, are the thing which I am most excited about. I am taking craft and theory of prose and poetry, early American history, Greek myth and lit, and fiction workshop. All of these classes will be very challenging but I think it will also be extremely enjoyable my schedule is nice because I don’t have any class on Friday and a majority of my classes on Tuesday and Thursday which means I am free during the times my scribes are available. If you think about it pray for me because I haven’t been able to get all of my books on audio yet hopefully that will be remedied quickly. Thank you all for your continued support.
a new Hope for this blog
First off let me apologize for not posting more often, as most of you know this blog was originally started as a way for me to practice Dragon NaturallySpeaking. According to the Lords will my endeavors with Dragon NaturallySpeaking nine fell through however, this summer I was able to be updated to the latest version and it seems to be working much better. If the Lord lets this successes continue I will begin to post on my blog more often my original goal is once a month if I can find the time every week and this program continues to work I will try to post a weekly. I feel like this program working is the capstone on what has been one of the hardest and simultaneously more award-winning summers I’ve ever had in the early summer as you know my parents and I visited our relatives down south that was enjoyable but very exhausting it was hard to see one grandfather deal with stage four throat cancer while the other grandfather is fighting the Lou Gehrig’s disease. The Monday after we returned from our trip I started summer school I struggled in the lecture portion of the class only earning a C but was able to make up for it in the lab portion of the class. during this time I was also having to train two new personal care attendants to give my parents a break no matter how good these P. C. A’s end up being there always hard to train in the beginning class I was having to learn to depend on God instead of my family for my care, after that obstacle was overcome I got the “wonderful” news from the vet that Zeus might have to have surgery due to his severe ear allergies thankfully however this was averted by a simple change in diet. The last big struggle for me this summer was when my parents went away for the anniversary I was happy to let them go but the reality was I would have to use somebody else to take care of me but the Lord worked that out in the end as well.
Now that you’ve heard about my struggles let me tell you about some of the good things about this summer in brief. First off it was nice to see my extended family during our vacation. (It was also nice to get a little spoiled by grandma 
) Zeus and I were also able to pass a one-year exam that means we are a full team now. I would like to thank the Stenmarks for all the work they put into raising such a special dog. After I finish number school the next big thing that happened to me was that I met with the people at Gillette lifetime and they got me started in the processes both of looking for new seating and applying for a stander which will help me lose weight and school by giving me a place to exercise. I have already lost 10 pounds this summer and hope to keep up the trend throughout the school year my goal is to be able to travel somewhere in Europe by next summer which means I would have to be at or under 150 pounds which means I have a year to lose 50 pounds. I thank everybody who reads this blog entry is for me.
Should one require a break from a vacation
Well, School is over and praise the Lord I finished my first year with a 3.61 GPA. The Lord was gratious and gave me an overall good year of experiences at SMSU. I would have posted this sooner but what with everything going on in May, this is the first time I have been able to sit down and think about what I am going to say. Overall, However, there have been a lot of thing that have happened since the last time i posted. I will cover the four main events in breef.
1. The birth of my nephew. As most of you know the day after my brother graduated from semenary His wife gave birth to there first son Simon Paul Straub. And also, as most of you know, small children are not my favorite kind of company to have around, but I am getting used to it. The best part is that he is a very well behaved little boy and his parrents understand how I feel and are not offended that I don’t want to hold him. Now, this attitude for most of my readers may need a little bit of explaining. It is not that I do not like small children, it is that they make me nervouse. I have large blind spots in my periferal vision around my chair, and I am allways affraid that I am going to run over them. This concern has led me to a possition not unlike the one C.S. Lewis puts forth in The Abbolition of Man. A possition where Lewis appreciates children and loves them without enjoying their company. Whith taht said I can not wait until Simon gets old enough for me to start showing him the wonders of sutch places as Narnia and Middle Earth. Either from reading to him directly or through my colletion of audio books.
2. Vacation to Georgia. The weekend after Simon was born My mother, father, and I went on a two-week long trip down to Georgia and back. Since most of my readers were involved in this trip in one way or another, I will probably spend the least amout of time on this event. After driving to Rockford, IL. where my dad spoke at a pastors conferance and mom and I spent theday in Chicago, we drove to Indiana where we ate lunch with some family friends and then continued on to Nashville where we spent 4 days visiting with one of my sets of grandparents before my grandfather had to start radiation for his stage 4 throut cancer. During this leg of the trip, my cousin Jonathan indeared himself to me by helping me try on what must of been 30 pares of cowboy boot, and in general, just being my showfer. After the we went to Georgia where we first visited my dad’s family in Blue Ridge then we whent on to my other set of grandparents in Cartersville GA. It was here that the Lord really spoiled me. He allowed me to go to the Georgia Renesance Festival where I have many fond memories whith my grandma and mom, and in most cases one or both of my aunts. I also got a chance to go to the new Coke musium which was a pleasant surprise since I did not hting that the first one was mutch to look at. This one would deffinatley be worth going to. By the end of this leg of the trip dad was beginning to get very sick so we ended up going pretty much strait home except for spending the night in the Wisconsin Dells. Even though it was hecktic, it was a good trip overall.
3. Summerschoo starting. I enrolled in 8 credtits of summerschool this year, however, after one week the Lord made it clear that it was better for me to only take 4 credits and take the other 4 at a nother time. I am ok with this because I would rather get good grades and take it a little slower then take it all at once and get bad grades.
4. RETURN OF A BANE. O NO, she’s back!! My sister came back from Korea on Friday and I am looking forward to a summer full of snide remarks and impailing jabs with her 3inch long fingerrnails, that are now painted and orange so bright I could not get to sleep last night because the light from when she was painting them was coming through the floorboards into my room.
So you can see why I would require a break from my summer vacation and thesee are just some of the events. Next week I have my one year certification test with Zeus after which I will post my update on how Zeus and I are doing.
THank you for your continued encouragement,
Josh Straub
Just an Update
Hi y’all. Sorry I haven’t blogged in a while. Had a hard time linning up scribes and dragonspeak is very unreliable on my laptop. Christmas break went very well. I had a nice visit with Joanna and some nice face to face time with Ben and Amy. I also had an productive Christmas Break. I was able to write an essay for a magazine scholarship. If I won, I would receive 10,000 dollars towards my bill. The objective of this essay was to explain why I deserve to win. I will post it on my writings page as soon as I’m done with this post. Other than that, there haven’t been any major events this semester. I was sick at the beginning. As a result my eardrum ruptured (ouch!). However, on the bright side, I love all my classes. My Critical Thinking teacher is clearly invested in all her students and knows her field of study and the craft of teaching really well. My Health teacher is a little more detached, but her teaching style and the subject matter of her class make it very interesting and worthwhile. My History teacher is the same as last semester, and his class is both hilarious and extremely educational. On Thursdays, I have the pleasure of taking what is quickly becomming one of the best and worst classes I have ever taken. In Writer’s Workshop, we critique eachother’s writing which is very helpful to me becuase I now know where I need to improve; however, I am also required to read other people’s writing. This can be hard sometimes when the author insists on putting either erotic content or heavy profanity into their work. Zeus is doing well, and I am excited about the prospect of taking internet couses this summer so I can be a sophmore on time. Thank you for your continued prayer and support.
I’m baaack!!!
No, I am not dead and I have not moved to a cave or departed to Mars!!!! I have just been SUPER busy and somewhat unable to post, but now that I am able to post, I will try to update you as best as I can. The first thing I would like to say is thank you to all those who attended my reception. The Lord blessed me with enough money to meet my needs as I moved into my dorm. After that, most of my extended family and I went down to SMSU to set up my dorm, ah yes it was fun trying to put together a desk with multiple sets of instruction readers and supervisor, but I digress. Of course the next big hurdle to get over was MOVE IN WEEKEND!!! That was when I realized how deeply I was emersed in the world. It was bit of shock that we were required to go to a vulgar comedy sketch show to basically educated the students how to properly read the “sex signals.” Needless to say, I was conspicuously absent. The next big thing was the start of school. I felt that it would be beneficial if I slowed down to a part time student schedule for the first semester to prevent being overwhelmed by the amount of work, so I switched from 16 credits to 10. Then, as you might all have heard, I had a little bit of an adventure. There was a lightning strike that caused a cascade that blew the transformer of my dorm out. I had already gotten in bed when the alarm went off. They evacuated the building, but forgot about Zeus and I, even to the point that noone told us what was going on. After I had been laying in my bed for two hours with the fire alarm blaring right outside my door, they finally came and got me and moved me to the common area of another building where the rest of my dorm had already assembled. After waiting there for another 20 minutes or so, theyh moved us to a conference room in the school where we waited for another two hours. They finally told us that we could not go back into our dorms that morning, for by this time it was about 2:00am, but they moved all the disabled kids into a motel for the rest of the night, but allowed us to go back the following evening. It was an interesting inaugruation to the school year, but I had Zeus with me so I was okay. The next few weeks, in fact, even up to this last week, were plauged by computers and lifts and the like breaking. But I pulled through. It was also a bit of a shock to see how worldly was the environment that I had been emersed into. There is a very strong homosexual community on campus, extending even to some of the faculty and most of the rest of my professors are content to swear like sailors. The major blessings have been: I have Zeus to keep me company through these trying times and I have the support of friends to help me get my assignments accomplished. Thank you for your ongoing prayer and support. –Josh Straub
A reunion with my family and my readers
First off and let me apologize for not posting recently my microphone broke a week ago and before that there was nothing to talk about. (Unlike my sister my life isn’t filled with adventure every day to enthrall my readers with) However now that I have a working microphone I can amuse ”y’all” with stories of my family reunion. We left on Thursday last week to drive to Podunk Ville Indiana a.k.a. Nashville Indiana although the reunion itself was held in a beautiful skate park. We stayed in the Abe Martin Lodge, a sort of hotel in the middle of the park named after an obscure cartoon strip character from the 1920s. The best part of the reunion was the night before the event itself about 30 my cousins, aunts, great aunts, uncles, and other obscure relatives then I would know outside of this one event those around playing games well into the night. It’s really fun playing taboo like to hear other people when you’re the only one between the ages of 10 and 30 because you smoke everybody else without question. The reunion itself was just a big meal followed by some rather funny stories. Which time I learned something MY MOM IS A REDNECK!!!!!! But at the time was had by all especially Zeus because when I wasn’t looking some of the more rebellious family members snuck a pet. Of all the family reunions I can remember this was the best.
Putting Penguins on ice
Well we did it for the fourth time in 11 years the Detroit Red Wings won the oldest trophy in sports history the Stanley Cup. This time it was against the Pittsburgh Penguins and their so-called “superstar” Sidney Crosby personal opinions aside he played well but in the end the Red Wings won three goals to two. I do feel bad, however, for the Penguins goalie and must be disheartening to realize that you scored the goal against yourself that play your team out in the finals. But then again maybe I should let my readers watch and decide for themselves. My only regret about this hockey season is that my wings could not have won on Tuesday night when I had my party with all of my hockey friends. I hope someone out there enjoy the playoffs as much as I did.
This and that
Hi everybody, the following is just a brief list of things I have already learned from the esteemed Zeus the fourth in his short time with me so far.
- It is best to go to bed early because you will be at minimum kept up for half an hour because of Zeus’ rather prodigious snore. (Seriously he snores louder than my dad and for those of you live in my family I am not exaggerating)
- They should invent safety equipment for dogs to wear while playing fetch indoors I’m not sure how many times Zeus went after the ball, over shot it, and because of my hard wood floors. went skidding into the fireplace.
- No matter how big you are your always smaller than the moody, elderly, cat. (Or at least the cat thinks so) my cat Thunder seems to have been able to communicate to Zeus that Zeus may be more useful but he, Thunder, was in charge.
- I’m sure there will be more to learn but this is a good start.
Dog Boot Camp – Graduation Day
On Saturday, we had the privilege of attending CCI ‘s graduation ceremony for myself and the other graduates. It started out in the morning with a brunch with the puppy raisers. The people who raised Zeus are a sweet family from Illinois who brought me an album of his puppy pictures. We all enjoyed the morning greatly. They had driven in from the Chicago area for the graduation ceremony. Zeus is the first puppy they raised and he went all the way through the training, which is rare — only 40% of the puppies that are turned in to CCI complete the training and are placed.
Then came a quick graduation rehearsal followed by the hour long ceremony. The ceremony itself started out with a greeting and a tribuite to a former CCI graduate and employee that passed away in February. Then followed the presentation of a new batch of puppies being turned in for training. There were something like 27 dogs on stage. Following a short video dedicated to the puppy raisers, they introduced the graduates and gave us each a mock award patterned after the Academic Awards. I got “Best Able to Communicate” probably because I was continually picking on the trainers and asking superfluous questions.
After a short summary of our experience by our class speaker, they presented us with our public certification and our new service dogs! Zeus is now an offical member of the family.
We left Columbus about 1 PM and headed for home, arriving at 4 AM Minneapolis time. We stopped for supper in IN to introduced Zeus to the Gauglers, long time friends of ours.
