Last-Minute Philly Prep

I leave for the National Association of the Deaf conference in Philadelphia on Tuesday—my first-ever time flying by myself!—and I’m in a bit of a panic about all that I have left to do. 

I’m almost done reading A Journey into the DEAF-WORLD, two-thirds through with my new American Sign Language Phrase Book, halfway through Everyone Here Spoke Sign Language: Hereditary Deafness on Martha's Vineyard, and just started A Place of Their Own: Creating the Deaf Community in America.  I have watched the documentary Through Deaf Eyes (it was wonderful!) and re-watched Sound and Fury (a documentary which shows the controversy of Cochlear Implants) and Mr. Holland’s Opus (one of my all-time favorite movies).  I still need to watch Music Within, a movie on the creation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (which I’ve had from Netflix for way too many months), and re-watch Children of a Lesser God, which I haven’t seen since I started learning ASL.

I also need to pack and decide which sights and museums I’m going to try to squeeze in!

Last month I found out that the CODA Brothers, my favorite YouTube performers, will be at the conference.  I’m very excited about getting to meet them; they are absolutely hilarious, and watching their videos really helps me practice my signing.  Check out their video announcing the conference (since it’s actually a commercial for ZVRS, a video relay service, they don’t have a voiceover):

After Brandt’s unfortunate experience with the shoplifting detector at Lowe’s a few weeks ago, I decided that I definitely need to attend the workshop “Interacting with Law Enforcement For Positive Outcomes.”  It will be presented by the Program Director of the Community Emergency Preparedness Information Network at the Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Inc., and the Director of Communication Services for the Deaf.  Here is the YouTube video previewing the workshop: