On to ASL as summer moves along...

  After running my last race of the summer and settling in for the heat and dog days ahead, I've taken another turn within the linguistics and communication realm. French is taking a back seat for now while I turn attention toward American Sign Language . My wife and I had started lessons in ASL back in 1993 but discontinued after getting married and moving. Now, years later, I have new friends that are either hearing impaired or deaf. This makes it much more necessary and a very useable form of communication. As we had very few to practice with back then, things have changed and we do so now. My hope is to learn at least one word in sign per day. I'm now at the point of having memorized the alphabet and numbers as well as five words. Not only is this a valuable language to learn but it is very rewarding.

      
       Give me time and I can learn almost anything. What I NEED is practice,practice,practice. This is a living and growing language that changes daily as new words are added,just like any other form of communication. I'm fortunate that Ann and Liberty are joining me in this endeavor. :-)  This book is my starting point and I've found it wonderful in addition to DVD's and applications for the tablet and phone.

  On the running front...


                With some hamstring issues plaguing me, I finally did some cross-training yesterday to keep fit until I run again,perhaps this Friday. Went biking to Portland and the Columbia River-Jantzen Beach area. Very enjoyable albeit hot ride.

   And finally, all four of us went down to Vancouver's Pride day called "Saturday in the Park" this last weekend. Smaller event that was a slight disappointment though with more church booths than LGBT related ones. Not that they are bad but they certainly out numbered anything else. Here are a few photos of us on that sunny day!

A busy but very rewarding weekend with our family and friends!!!


This weekend, the 20th of July, we will be attending the Portland Highland Games!!!! This is something I've been looking forward to all year long and a chance to wear the Ross tartan kilt! Should have a blog post by Sunday night! Stay tuned!