The Christianville Spirit: The Politics of Sleeping

The Christianville Spirit

The Spirit that Sparkles

May 27, 2015-TCS #452

Hej, My Readers! I thought that I would try a different greeting in This Week’s Newsletter. Hej (Pronounced as “Hey” only with a Swedish Swing to It) is Swedish for “Hello”. Anyway, I have an Interesting Topic that I have to tell you about. Although, Each Time I think about it, It is a Very Odd Topic. You See, Sometimes either in My Half-Asleep Mind or My Mind when I about to go to Sleep comes up with Either Ideas that are Just Plain Genius, like Travel on a Dime Agency (called Dime Travel)? Any Takers to Help Me with This One? As My Uncle Bruce would say, “Ohhhhhhh Yeah!” or Ideas that are Just Plain Weird! How about The Politics of Sleeping? (Hmm... The Politics of Sleeping..) So, that is what I am going to tell you. Now, It seems odd to write about Sleeping when I got up at 2:45 Today, but Hey, It Flows. However, What about those people in Places like Australia that are about to go to Sleep or Elsewhere in The World, well This is for You then! I present to You, The Politics of Sleeping! So, Blame It on The Fact that I watch The News a lot or How I am interested in how Geography, History, and Politics mix together, to come up with this idea. But, that is okay. You know those Moments where A Person has a Certain Sleeping Style, One Person will wake up at the First Sound  they hear and The Other will keep on Sleeping, You wake them up and be Like “How Can You Sleep like That?!” Trying to Figure Out just how to Sleep like The Other Person. So, How do People Sleep? Well, that is an Interesting Question. So, like Normal Politics, We have the “Heavy Sleeper Party”, “The Middle Sleeper Party” and “Light Sleeper Party”. The Light Sleeper, wakes up at The Sound of Anything, Mowers, Babies Crying, Car Driving By. Meanwhile, The Heavy Sleeper can sleep through The Snoring, The Car Noises, The Road Noise, or White Noise. I am probably likely a Middle Sleeper. So, Now the Question becomes, How EXACTLY do People Sleep? Well, This is Where it gets More Broad. There are People who love to have Absolute Silence when They Sleep, Any Noise can and will disturb them. There are The White Noise Sleepers, that would be Me; They need a White Noise, a Little Road Noise, a Fan Running, a Little Music Playing (like a Lullaby or The Type of Music they use to Massage, gentle music along with The Sounds of Ocean Waves), Ocean Waves (That’s Why People love going to The Beach; My Grandma Honey would prefer to Sleep that way!), White Noise Machine (That would be Me; I like the “Waterfall” Sound, The Best). There are also People who would rather not Sleep alone and It comforts them with Someone that They love with them. There are People who have Machines like a CPAP Machine that helps them breath and preventing Snoring. Speaking of Snoring, There are Two Kinds of People, Those that can handle Snoring and It is sort of like The Other Person’s White Noise and Those of Us that Can not stand it! The Funny Thing is that We don’t realize that We are doing it. It took me to wake up half-asleep, half-awake and I heard Myself snore, Very Weird! Now, The Most Fascinating Part of The Politics of Sleeping are Dreams. Now, I have heard that Dreams are The Sub-Conscious Mind trying to communicate with You. You would probably think, “Now You want to Communicate with Me, like when I can not do anything about It.... Now?!”. It goes without mentioning that People have Good Dreams, like a Passed Loved One coming to Visit, Images of The Future, Getting Married, or What Have You. and Those who have Bad Dreams, otherwise known as “Nightmares” or “Night Terrors”. For The Sake of Those going to Sleep in a While, I won’t mention Images. Now, I should tell you that Whatever You are thinking about in The Last 5 Minutes before You go to Sleep is Most Likely What You will Dream about. Now, Here comes the Tough Part, Shutting The Brain down to GO to Sleep. There are Many Different Ways that People do it. Some just Ride It Through (that would be Me), Some get up and do Something Mind-Less, and Finally, There are People who do Meditation or People who use Soothing Music (refer to The “Massage Music” segment I mentioned before). Now, My Advice, and This One I will admit is a bit hard for Me, but Turn Off your Electronics at least an Hour before Bed. Ha! I don’t follow My Own Advice! It actually is My Mom’s Advice, but I digress. So, The Point is that Everyone sleeps in a Different Ways so You better hope that You find Someone (if You are Single like Me) who has The Same “Sleeping Party” as You do. Otherwise, Prepare to be Woken Up MANY Times! As in The Lion King, (Singing Aloud): “Beeeee Preparedddd!” All in all, If You are Reading This before You go to Sleep, Good Night and I hope You have Good Dreams! and I hope that I did not make any of You that are Awake, Sleepy.

Thanks for Reading The Christianville Spirit. Sweet Dreams to All, No Matter How You Sleep.

The Christianville Spirit: Lynee Day Newsletter

Photo Credit to The Watson Family 

The Christianville Spirit

The Sprit that Sparkles

May 20, 2015-TCS # 451

So, My Readers, In A Few Days will be a Bittersweet Remembrance Time for Me.  You See, Back in 2008, A Friend from Childhood named Lynee Watson passed away. Newsletters in The Past have mentioned how she passed but, I think I should use a Lighter Way of Saying It. It was a Very Sad Time for All. I knew Lynee back in Elementary School, like back in 4th Grade and Part of the 5th Grade. Then, I met back up with Her in 10th Grade. We instantly recognized each other and It was an Awesome Reunion! Lynee and I were actually very good friends even though I was not as Social as I am now. Funny Enough, She understood what I was saying to Her. I had the Biggest Crush on Her, so much so that I would blush when Her Name was mentioned. So, I am sure You are asking as well as I often wonder about, Why are You celebrating Someone’s Life that You JUST had a Crush on? Well, Actually, I believe that It was not JUST a Crush, I think that We had a Connection, an Understanding of Each Other. That and When I found out, 2 Years too Late, Just How Much She meant to Me. After I found out that She passed away, I had first thought it was a Joke. People do that sometimes, as Crazy as it sounds. But, I found out it was Legit. So, After a Year of Digesting It, I made a Day in Her Honor, I called It “Lynee Day”. With that, I should announce that I came up with a More Official Name, Lynee Remembrance Day along with an Observance at 2:22PM Central/3:33PM Eastern. Anyway, Every now and then, I think back to The Day She past wondering what was I doing during That Time and Also, What was I writing about in My Newsletter when it happened and That is What I am about to Show You. Before I do, A Little Background. Shortly before My Mom’s Dad, My Grandpa “Popi” passed away in April 2008, I had started a “Playlist of Your Life” Series in My Newsletter and The One I wrote on The First “Lynee Day” was about Me. In My Life, Personally, I was working at the Frisco Roughriders as a “Playball Attendant” (Someone who hands out Programs) and as well as Me and Madison were dating on and off at The Time. One More Note, At This Time in My Life, I was still into Disney Channel. So, as Part Celebration of The Christianville Spirit’s 10th Year and Lynee Remembrance Day, Here is My “Playlist of Your Life” Newsletter which was written on May 21st, 2008 (Reference Newsletter 102). Happy Lynee Remembrance Day, Everyone!

“Welcome back, everyone. It’s time for another installment of The Christianville Spirit Series, “Playlist of Your Life”. For this installment, we’re going to venture into someone’s life that has been a shine on others with Potocki-Lupski Syndrome. This person is the writer of The Christianville Spirit and if you haven’t guessed who it is, it’s me. So, let’s see my life from the beginning. I was born on August 11, 1987 at Methodist Hospital in San Antonio, Texas and according to My Mom, which was the most wonderful day of her life. For this we’ll play, “Walk of Life” by Dire Straits. Later, My Mom, Michael and, I moved to Plano, TX. For this we’ll play “Life is a Highway” by Rascal Flatts. When I was 9 or so, I was diagnosed with a Duplication of Chromosome 17(which is now Potocki-Lupski Syndrome) which My Mom was happy about it because she didn’t want to settle for a special need like autism which I was pretty close to being diagnosed that. When I was in a repeat of 10th Grade which my friend Steven called 10.5 Grade I had my first girlfriend who was Ali. She was the first girl I had really loved and everyone knew it too because everyday I would look for her name in everything like Signs, Cities, and More. For we’ll play “True to Your Heart” by Raven; In my senior year of high school, I went to the homecoming dance with my friend, Madison and I stayed to the whole time. Which back in middle school, I went to a social and I thought it was too much for me. And, on May 29, 2007 I graduated from Plano Senior High School. And, for this we’ll play “Graduation (Friends Forever)” by Vitamin C. but, all in all I know that I am and will be the best role model for parents and children with Potocki-Lupski Syndrome and leave a legacy never to be forgotten.

Thanks for reading The Christianville Spirit.”

I Hope that You enjoyed that! The Point here is that, No Matter how You feel about Someone, whether You Love or Hate them. You should always Spread Love because Hate will get you Nowhere. All in all, Don’t Forget to tell those that You Love that You Love Them as a Standard Rule because You don’t know if It is The Last Chance that You see them. This applies to Friends and Family. In Case I haven’t said it in a while, I Love You Guys, My Readers. You Guys mean The World to Me, whether You are a PTLS Family Member, Friend, or Curious Reader. 

Thanks for Reading The Christianville Spirit. Spread Love to Everyone and The World will be a Better Place!

The Christianville Spirit: Review of PTLS Questions

The Christianville Spirit

The Spirit that Sparkles

May 13, 2015-TCS # 450

Buonasera, My Readers. By The Way, “Buonasera” is Italian for “Good Evening”. Thought that I would try a Different Greeting than what I normally do. So, as Joan Rivers would say, “Let’s Talk” and This is a “Let’s Talk” Newsletter indeed. As My Veterans know, I often cover the Same Thing about PTLS In Introduction but, As I say, There are always New PTLS Family Members that are “Admitted into The Union” per se. But, I am sure that There are Those who have been reading a while, or Started Reading, and are Curious about PTLS. You See, When A New PTLS Member is Admitted into The PTLS Family, To be fair, They are a Bit Scared when They come in and See what PTLS has to offer. They worry about Many Simple Things that Most People would not; PTLS is Unique! Haven’t You Heard? (breaking out in Song) The, The, The Bird, Bird, Bird, Bird Is The Word! Just Kidding about The Bird, It is Family Guy Reference. Aaaannnnnyway, So I, The Caring Guy that I am, is going to try and Help both New Members and Refresh for The Standing PTLS Members. So, I’m going to take this in sort of a Political Candidate/Interview kind of Way. So, Here We Go.

First Off, I would to like Welcome You to The PTLS Family! My Name is Christian Smith-Centeno (also known as “Christian Centeno”) I am currently 27 Years Old and I have PTLS. I have had PTLS my Whole Life, Diagnosed at 3 Years Old. So, now that We have done the Introduction, Time to go for The Deep Stuff!

So, With New Members, They have Different Priorities when It comes to The First Question, The Leap of Faith, We’ll call it. Are You Okay?/Is My Child Going to be Okay?/ Are You at Least “Close to Typical”?: To Answer That Question. Yes, I am Okay. I am a Happy Person and Most PTLSers are Generally Happy. In Fact, They say that PTLSers have “The Happy Gene”. Second Question, This and VERY Important! Yes, Your Child Will Be Okay (Capitalized for Emphasis). Am I at least “Close to Typical”, As Good as I can be. I see Myself as “Unique”, In Other Words, I am Me, Simply Put.

What on Earth is PTLS?!

PTLS is shorthand of “Potocki-Lupski Syndrome”. Potocki-Lupski Syndrome is named after Two Doctors in Houston named Doctor Potocki and Doctor Lupski. and While we are at it, PTLS is NOT a Disease, It just happens. It is also worth Mentioning that Potocki-Lupski Syndrome has Autism-like Behaviors. Oh My Lord, What do I do about Potty Training?! Okay, now This is My Bias Story, So it may or may not work for You. One Day, It was Raining and My Mom had a Frustrating Moment and Told Me that “The Baby down the Street needed My Diapers and I could not go in My Pants” Long Story, Short. I looked at Her like She had Two Heads and I eventually went to The Bathroom, by My Self. Needless to Say, Us PTLSers are Very Stubborn! By The Way, New Members, Please Take Your Time reading this, You don’t have to Digest It at all at Once! Important Stuff, The Stuff I feel that You should know about us. We are Detail Oriented, Routine Oriented ( as in Getting Up at Same Time and Going to Bed at The Same Time, Predictability at life helps us focus!), We do get Overwhelmed at Too Much Noise or Activity. In Other Words, VERY Sensitive Hearing when We are Young, It does go down as We get Older. We are a bit OCD and Obsessive about Things. and, Most Importantly, We are Rule Followers, If You tell us a Rule that We will Follow It and Expect Others to Follow It. We (or at least, Myself) have an Issue with Gooey Textures or Things that Look like that. Eating, That They will do at Their Own Time. I personally Ate nothing but Macaroni and Cheese, Yogurt, Apple Sauce, and Pasta most of My Childhood. PTLSers these Days, Love Fruit and Veggies. More so Fruit. So, The Next Part gets a bit split in The PTLS Family. Walking and Talking (Plain and Simple) Usually, Anywhere around 3 Years Old, They start Walking (some earlier) and, around 4 to 5 Years Old is when PTLSers start trying to Talk(Some Earlier, Some Later, and Some Non-Verbal). It should have a Disclaimer here that, PTLSers have a range, so Those Stats are Give or Take. But, One Thing that I want you to Know in This Segment is that PTLSers are Smarter than You realize. They soak in Everything and In Turn, They end up Mimicking What They are around. Schooling. Oh The Complication: So, This is My View, so Do with It What You Will. Throughout School, My Mom made sure that I had a Good Mix of Special Ed and Regular Classrooms. The Special Ed was more for The Subjects that I needed extra help in, like Math, Writing (With an Aide), English (With An Aide), and finally Reading. Now I should mention that We are Very Literal. So, Spacial Learning is The Best Way to Go. Now, I did Regular Classrooms like Geography(With An Aide), Environmental Science (With An Aide), Aqua Science, and Art (Both Regular and Sculpture Art, without an Aide). I Will mention that Back in High School, I did a little “Job Crew” Class and I got to do something, I referred to as “Parking Lot Duty”. My Job was to Check the Big Staff Parking Lot (about 100 or so Cars) and Make Sure that Everyone was parked in the right place. I had to write The License Plate Number if They weren’t. I had 100% Compliance that Year. College, So This One is a bit hard for Me. I really don’t like People who are Not Understanding asking Me if I go to College. Disclaimer Here, Your Child CAN go to College if They are Ready or Want to. Me, Personally, I did not go to College because My Math and Writing Levels were not at College Level. However, In A Way, I attempted a College Class. See, I tried to take one Online. I took a “Globalization Class” because after all, I am interested in how Geography, History, and Politics all mix together. As Crazy as it sounds, I used to think that History was boring, It had Nothing to do with Geography. But, Anyway, in Said Class, I had Read from a Text Book (on The Computer), Checked out Websites They told me to Check Out, Watch The Video Lecture, and then A Knowledge Check Test. I tried One Week of It and It was a Bit Overwhelming in learning about Things that I probably should not. I did pass Two Knowledge Checks without Reading the Whole Chapter It told me to read. Dating. Oh Boy! Okay, Those of You are wondering if I have Ever Dated, The Answer is Yes. I have had Two Girlfriends and I have been to a Homecoming Dance. By The Way, Homecoming in Texas is The Autumn Equivalent to Prom. Now, as For Future Dating, I plan on Finding The Woman of My Dreams and Dating Her, and Eventually, Marrying Her. Do I Plan on Getting Married?! Now, This is Not a Common Question of New PTLS Members, but I know it is One of Those Curious Questions that People are a bit afraid to ask. The Answer to This Question is Yes. Well, I think I pretty much answered that one at The End of The Last Question I answered, funny how that happens. Now, Although I do plan on Getting Married, I pray that it is goes off really well. The Thought of It, I have to say, makes me Anxious. As For The Other Stuff, I do plan on that too and I hope that My Texture Issues will not flip on me. And, Final Question, The Future, Hard to Answer but, I know I plan on Getting Married, I plan on a Job that has Structure and Predictability in a Field that I Love, and Probably Most of All, I plan on Traveling The World to see It’s Great Beauty. All in all, With all The Questions I answered, I want you to know Most Importantly that with All The Craziness of Figuring Out PTLS along “The PTLS Highway”, I Want You to know that Your Child WILL be Okay!

Thanks for Reading The Christianville Spirit. Give Us Opportunity and We will Meet Those Expectations

The Christianville Spirit: The Conversion of Google Maps' Street View

The Christianville Spirit

The Spirit that Sparkles

May 6, 2015-TCS # 449

So, My Readers! I Am Very Happy to say to You, Happy May! If I have not gotten the Chance to Thank You for all Your Responses to Last Week’s Newsletter about April and The God Cafe; From The Bottom of My Heart, I thank you for All Your Input as well as Being Open and Telling Me when Your “Bad Luck Month” is. Before I Move On, Please Remember that when “Ordering” from God, Remember that it is Not An Order that You yell at Him, as in, “I ORDER YOU TO DO XYZ!” and It goes without saying that Sometimes God’s 10-Star Meal ends up not necessarily what you ordered per se, but The Meal that You have is actually Bigger and Better than What You ordered Off The Menu. Anyway, Moving On. So, I’m going to throw a little Joan Rivers quote in here, “Let’s Talk” She would say. Not that I watched Fashion Police but, I know that was One of Her Trademark sayings as well as One She Said when She messed up, (Look that one up, I would rather not repeat it but It is Funny!) So, Let’s Talk. About Changes. Now, Okay, In Life, there are bound to be Changes, it is a Fact. But, I’m not talking about Life Changes, I am talking about Changes to things on Computers. Now, Before I sound like a Computer Nerd, which in The Context of This Newsletter, I am; There are Certain Things in Everyday Life on the Computer that You do not change. I call them My Lifelines. Over The Past Few Years, Websites like YouTube, Facebook, and Email change a lot. Facebook adds this Feature, YouTube and Google Plus merged (No Biggie! For Some It is a Biggie, still). It goes without mentioning Mapquest updated too and that took some adjusting. More Recently, My Favorite Site, AARoads revamped it’s site for The 15th Anniversary and State-Ends.com ended too (that one was a Little Hard to Deal with!) So, What are My Lifelines You ask? Email, This Newsletter, Facebook, Maps on The Web, and Of Course, The Major One, Google Maps’ Street View. So, With all that Said, of All the Changes and Conversions all the sites listed above did, It was Okay with Me; It flies over My Head, Make a Note, It was Five Minutes Ago (quoting Grandma Honey here) but, The Conversion of Google Street View is not really sitting well with Me. See, Google Maps’ Street View, unlike Facebook, I can not deal without. Now, as Overly Attached to My Computer as This Sounds, Google Maps with Street View for Traveling helps me learn! It helps me learn Positive Things, like How to Say a City’s Name in Said Country’s Native Language. like Roma (Rome) or Göteburg (Gothenburg) Italy and Sweden, respectively. So, What did Google Maps do? Well, See back in 2013 They, in Computer Terms, rolled out a “New Google Maps Total Program” that runs on a Different Type of Server. It used to run on Flash Player and New Maps runs on JavaScript. Anyway, One Day I got on Google Maps’ Street View like I normally do and It was a New Google Maps. I thought, “Wait, What happened to The Old Street View?!” The New One had a Full Screen Map instead of a White Search Bar, Logo, and Google Plus stuff. Now, Okay, I did check it out and gave it the once-over, it does have cool features like “PhotoSpheres” anywhere in The World, Street View was Full Screen (Hard to get used to) BUT, It did have a Feature where You can see Past Street Views, all the way back to The First Time they drove through Each Place. Okay, Now how do We get back? After Freaking Out trying to figure out How to get back, I click on the little “Help” Marker and at The Bottom it said “Return to Classic Maps?” YES! Click It, It asked Me Why I wanted to re-convert to “Classic Google Maps” and I found the option “Prefer Classic Google Maps” and Then, re-converted and asked me I wanted to go back to New Maps or Stay Comfy here on Classic. Yep! Got It! On My Cybertrips that I was too lazy to Cyber-Fly from Said Country back to My “Headquarters” in Atlanta, In My Mind, I made a Headquarters there. So, I would go to Google Maps’ Street View using the National Domain Code, .no (Norway);.au (Australia); .se (Sweden); .ca (Canada), and .mx (Mexico). Now, You will think This is Funny, but, I taught Myself how to read “Return to Classic Maps?” and “Prefer Classic Maps” in different Languages. I have to say, Swedish and Norwegian Ones were hard to Translate at First. I just learned to Find where it says “Google Maps” twice in said Language. A Bit of Advice, Thank God for Words that Translate from Each Language into English. In Other Words, It is sounds like a bunch of words I don’t understand and then a Word that I do understand thrown in there. Okay I can try to figure out what You are saying with those English Words in there. Anyway, so on The Last Day of April, I couldn’t re-convert back to Classic Google Maps, I even tried the Trick that I taught Myself. Of Course, I did have warning that The Maps that I had saved on Google Maps were Converting, Okay, that’s fine, The Maps I have saved are actually cooler on The New Maps. Another Warning Email comes a Couple Weeks Ago, “Google Maps (The Whole Thing. Street View and Everything) is fully converting to New Google Maps, You will not be able to Access The Classic Maps anymore”. I thought, “I will find my way around that!” on April 30th, That was that, There was No Re-Convertion to Classic Maps!”, So I looked it up and It gave me the same trick only with the Link to The Classic, It worked for A Day, Literally. Okay, This is It, I Guess, We have to get used to The New Maps, I told Myself. On May 1st, I tried it and I got increasingly Frustrated noticing Small Things that are Missing or that is Different. The New Maps is Slower, I can’t skip across Several Miles. Before, I took a Cybertrip from Atlanta to Grand Isle, Louisiana and I was able to see The Parts of Alabama and Mississippi that I wanted to see along the way, I could make it across Alabama in An Hour and Across Mississippi in about an Hour. I made it almost to Grand Isle before It was Bed Time. With The New Street View, It would take me much Longer! So, What do We Do Now?! Well, I looked up the same site that gave me the Link that worked for a Day. It was at a Site called “Tech for Luddites”, The Host of The Site posted a Blog about The Google Maps Program Conversion and It was a Hit on that site. Well, The Leader of The Site decided to take action the way we do now, a Change.org Petition, now I have to say, I normally don’t sign petitions unless It is something that Is absolutely necessary. But, At The Time, I was so frustrated that I just went ahead and Signed It. Said Leader (Her Name is Elizabeth) says that Google does accept feedback but, She says that Google does not listen to it’s Fan Base, if You will. Now, I am just a CyberTraveler, with a Very Interested, Curious Mind. However, I was shocked to find that Everyday Americans (and, I am sure, those Around The World as well) are effected by This New Convertion as well. Now, If I was in control, I would keep The New Maps for those that want it or need it, But I would absolutely not Kill the Classic Google Maps like They are doing. Change is Good, People will say; It is Part of Growth but, This Change is NOT a Good Change because It has Affected More than Just One Person. All in All, Let People choose Whether They want to use Classic Maps or The New Maps. If They want to use just Classic, that’s fine; Just New, That’s Fine too; If You want to use both, like I would, then I believe that is Fair. By The Way, The Petition has been signed by 3 Thousand People so far. I invite you all the Sign it!

Thanks for Reading The Christianville Spirit. Change can be Painful, But It can also be Good