August 25, 2010
Washington’s ninth inning rally came up short as the Nationals lost their third straight game, 5-4 to the Chicago Cubs on a rare cool August evening Tuesday at Nationals Park.
With temperatures in the 60s, starter John Lannan (5-6) gave up two home runs to the bottom half of the Cubs’ lineup.
Meanwhile, Cubs starter Carlos Zambrano (5-6) pitched seven innings, striking out eight, and giving up just one run.
In the second inning, former Nat Alfonso Soriano hit a high three-run homer to left field, his 20th, off a Lannan breaking ball.
To read the rest of my article on Examiner.com, please click here.
Tags: Alfonso Soriano, Carlos Zambrano, Cubs, John Lannan, Nationals
Posted in Baseball, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
August 24, 2010
I’ve decided to retire my “Statement to responding to email” (mikefrandsen.org/2009/01/05/no-reply-at-all/) from my email signature. Since I put it up there it hasn’t increased the percentage of people who respond to emails that require a response. Luckily most people respond when a question is asked or an important email is sent. As for the rest, I guess I’ll just have to guess whether a non-response means the person was just busy and overlooked responding, or whether I am supposed to read between the lines and figure out that when people don’t respond it means they disagree with the email or something. Also see mikefrandsen.org/2010/05/14/responding-to-email.
Tags: no reply, read between the lines, respond, statement to responding to email
Posted in Computers, Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
August 21, 2010
Educational DVDs may help children with autism over the age of two learn basic concepts, but parents should check with their physicians for guidance on what age is best to allow their children to begin watching TV. Consulting with other parents, teachers, and therapists can also contribute to an informed decision.
Parents should note that TV should be limited or not shown at all to children under the age of two, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. Several studies, including one published in the February 2010 American Journal of Epidemiology, have concluded that hyperactivity and inattention are associated with TV exposure before the age of two.
Picture books and books on emotions can be used to introduce reading to children too young to watch TV.
To read the rest of my article on Examiner.com, click here.
Tags: age of two, autism, children, educational DVDs, TV, what age is best
Posted in Autism, Disabilities, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
August 17, 2010
Stephen Strasburg struck out seven batters in five innings and the Nationals came back from a 3-1 deficit to overtake the Arizona Diamondbacks, 5-3.
Strasburg pitched well after his first bad performance of the season five days ago when he gave up six runs to Florida, and Josh Willingham and Ryan Zimmerman homered for Washington.
Strasburg didn’t get the victory, though, because of an error he committed in the second inning.
After giving up a solo home run to Adam LaRoche, Strasburg took a lightly hit ball by Stephen Drew and threw it over the outstretched arm of the 6-6 Adam Dunn. That allowed Mark Reynolds to score from first while Drew made it all the way to third. Gerardo Parra hit a sacrifice fly to drive in Drew, and the Diamondbacks led 3-0.
To read the rest of my article on Examiner.com, click here.
Tags: Adam Dunn, Arizona Diamondbacks, Josh Willingham, Ryan Zimmerman, Stephen Strasburg, Washington Nationals
Posted in Baseball, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
August 15, 2010
Sometimes as I’m writing on my laptop, I’ll have a movie on TV on in the background for inspiration. When there aren’t any good movies on, which is about 98 percent of the time, I’ll switch the TV to a series of channels next to each other including the Discovery, Science, and History channels. There are a few more in that area too. There are some really good shows. Sort of reality but dealing with nature. I rank the best of them with a couple of notes below.
- Man vs. Wild – On a recent show, Bear Grylls killed an Octopus by biting between its eyes, then ate it while it was still twitching. He gets dropped off in places like the Arctic, Northern Africa, and tropical islands and has to live off the land and make it out. That’s versatile.
- Monsters Inside Me – This is a great show about parasites. People go to the doctor, they dismiss their problems, and later it’s found that they have some kind of parasites. It makes you wonder how often people have them and they go undiagnosed.
- Rivermonsters – Jeremy Wade goes fishing for giant fish. It always helps to have a dramatic British accent.
- Deadliest Catch – The camera follows several fishing boats who go off the coast of Alaska to catch crabs.
- MonsterQuest – It has jumped the shark a bit because so many of the stories are about Bigfoot, but it’s still pretty cool.
- Through the Wormhole – With Morgan Freeman, they discuss space, time travel, and other interesting stuff.
- Pawn Stars – Maybe this doesn’t belong here, but it’s a great show. A pawn shop owner works with his father and his son to buy stuff people bring in. Only in real life I never find old junk that I can sell for a lot of money.
- Mythbusters
- Dog the Bounty Hunter
- Intervention
- Ax Men
- How the Earth was Made
- Ice Road Truckers
Tags: Animal Planet, Deadliest Catch, Discovery Channel, history, Man vs. Wild, MonsterQuest, Monsters Inside Me, Rivermonsters, science, Through the Wormhole
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »
August 15, 2010
Examiner.com is going through an “upgrade.” Unfortunately, and hopefully not for long, there are a lot of formatting problems with the articles. They’re working on fixing them. Hopefully everything gets back to normal soon, but I wanted to say that I’m not responsible for the problems if you look at my autism and sports articles. If you commented on the articles, those comments should reappear soon.
Tags: articles, comments, Examiner.com, fixing, problems, upgrade
Posted in Autism, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
August 10, 2010
Children with autism are often notoriously poor at identifying, understanding, expressing, and handling their emotions. Meltdowns and tantrums can be common, and the ability to recover from these outbursts can be elusive. Emotion coaching is therefore a crucial component of any autism therapy program.
Helping children with autism deal with feelings should be accomplished not only during play dates and social skills practice, but also during more traditional cognitive and academic behavioral teaching. In fact, an argument can be made that the ability to handle emotions is more important than the ability to excel academically.
Dr. Stanley Greenspan, who emphasized the importance of learning emotions and social skills for children with autism, discussed the need to teach those skills together with academics in “Engaging Autism.”
To read the rest of my article on Examiner.com, click here.
Tags: autism, emotions, meltdown, outburst, play dates, recover, social skills, Stanley Greenspan, strategies, tantrums
Posted in Autism, Disabilities, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
August 2, 2010
[picapp align=”left” wrap=”true” link=”term=ryan+zimmerman&iid=5396560″ src=”http://view4.picapp.com/pictures.photo/image/5396560/mlb-chicago-cubs/mlb-chicago-cubs.jpg?size=500&imageId=5396560″ width=”234″ height=”301″ /]Ryan Zimmerman hit a dramatic walk-off home run to give the Nationals a 7-5 win over the Philadelphia Phillies Saturday in front of 38,049 fans at Nationals Park.
In the ninth inning, Zimmerman slammed a Brad Lidge pitch 430 feet over the centerfield wall with Michael Morse and Adam Kennedy on base, erasing the Phillies’ 5-4 lead. As soon as Zimmerman hit the ball, he knew it was over the fence, starting a slow jog, watching as the ball left the field. Zimmerman then threw his batting helmet into the mob of teammates waiting for him at home.
In the past week, Adam Dunn has dominated the headlines for being the subject of a possible trade. Saturday’s trade deadline came and went, and Dunn remains a National. Against the Phillies, it was as if Zimmerman said, “Hey, don’t forget about me!” (By the way, who is that Strasburg guy again?)
To read the rest of my article on Examiner.com, click here.
Tags: Adam Dunn, Ryan Zimmerman, walk-off home run, Washington Nationals
Posted in Baseball, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
August 2, 2010
Adam Dunn, one of the best home run hitters in the major leagues, will remain a Washington National.
The trade deadline has come and gone, and Adam Dunn will continue to hit home runs for the Washington Nationals, possibly even tonight against the Philadelphia Phillies at Nationals Park. The slugger, who was sought by several teams, will remain with the Nats until at least the end of the season.
The Nats had already traded infielder Cristian Guzman Friday and closer Matt Capps Thursday for prospects.
The New York Yankees, Chicago White Sox, Detroit Tigers, and Tampa Bay Devil Rays had reportedly been interested in Dunn, but the Nationals’ asking price was apparently too high.
To read the rest of my article on Examiner.com, click here.
Tags: Adam Dunn, Cristian Guzman, Matt Capps, trade, Washington Nationals
Posted in Baseball, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
July 31, 2010
Andy Igrejas, Brenda Afzal, and Dr. Sarah Janssen speak in favor of the Toxic Chemicals Safety Act. Photo by Mike Frandsen
Environmental advocates rallied in Washington, D.C. Thursday to support legislation to protect the public from toxic chemicals that have been linked to disorders and diseases such as autism and cancer.
Representatives from the Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families Coalition and Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) held a press conference in front of the Capitol Reflecting Pool, urging Congress to overhaul a 1976 law that does not require all chemicals to be tested for safety.
The press conference took place alongside a giant inflatable rubber duck to symbolize that even simple items such as toys may contain unsafe chemicals.
Dr. Sarah Janssen, a scientist with NRDC, said most people have a story of someone who has been affected by unsafe chemicals: “People who have had cancer, problems conceiving a child, children with learning or developmental problems, asthma, and parents or grandparents struggling with diseases like Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s — all of these chronic illnesses have been associated to some extent with exposures to toxic chemicals.”
For the rest of my article on Examiner.com, click here.
Tags: autism, cancer, chemicals, legislation, NRDC, safety, toxic
Posted in Autism, Disabilities, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »
Mike's Blog 
Examiner “Upgrade”
August 15, 2010Examiner.com is going through an “upgrade.” Unfortunately, and hopefully not for long, there are a lot of formatting problems with the articles. They’re working on fixing them. Hopefully everything gets back to normal soon, but I wanted to say that I’m not responsible for the problems if you look at my autism and sports articles. If you commented on the articles, those comments should reappear soon.
Tags: articles, comments, Examiner.com, fixing, problems, upgrade
Posted in Autism, Examiner.com | Leave a Comment »