I have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. I didnt find out until I was over 45.

When I first started taking medication it reminded me of the first time I got glasses: a clarity that made everything much more understandable. My variant is Narcoleptic ADHD with Hyper-Focus. That means that if I go to a *Mission Impossible* movie I am very likely to fall asleep just as the helicopter starts to drop; its just too exciting for me. It also means that when I do pay attention to something I can pay WAY too much attention. If God resides in the details then I am shacking up in heaven. Since Im a web developer that sometimes comes in handy. Some folks also find it very annoying. I had a great time with the first assignment. I was able to pull together all the members of my team. We created a presentation of uneven quality but which met the requirements. I also made a couple of friends on the team. Just for fun I reached out to other members of the class with similar interests, and others who share my vicinity. One of those classmates lives right where I do, in Montanas capitol, Helena. Like me, Victoria Tyrrel doesnt have a car. However, I was able to borrow my husbands car so we went out on this assignment together. It enhanced the experience in many ways: Victoria is half my age so she has a different perspective on the shops, although we are both in IT we know different parts of the elephant, and she is just an interesting person. Since I work 40 hours a week and spend the remaining time doing my art to the detriment of my housekeeping I decided to use this class as an opportunity to explore the apps on my new iPhone, and new-to-me technology generally. Great concept. Like many good ideas it has its flaws. So on Saturday, October 27, a lovely sunny day in Helena, I picked up Victoria and we went to four stores: Prickly Pear Quilts, Birds and Beasleys, Frayed Sew, and Lasso the Moon. The night before I had downloaded Story Kit from the Apple Store. Heres a link to my largely incoherent use of Story Kit: http://iphone.childrenslibrary.org/cgi-bin/view.py?b=ojid5dlzftre7bd4djpz. Then I went off to the Sewing Palace and made this skirt:

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I had intended to do the same store analysis but time ran out. I went to the grocery store and intended 2|Page

to do it there but I had to go to work for some private clients on Sunday and time ran out. My intention was to answer the questions from our assignment and enrich them with photographs and text and recordings. Story Kit was designed for developing narrative expression in children and is simplified so that it can be used by teachers, children, and their relatives, with a low technology level. I think I should have used something more sophisticated. I could not access any of the files I generated and then worse yet, it would not load to the server. I tried multiple times over the weekend. Monday at the end of my work day I tried to contact the Childrens Library. No emails were answered. I tried calling their 800 number and it was disconnected. I got hold of a librarian friend at MIT to see if she could help me extract the files. Nothing worked. Believe me, my hyper-focus was full-blown at that point. But then again, I am lucky I didnt just fall asleep. Tuesday I started digging even deeper and found the name of a woman at the University Maryland, Dr. Allison Druin. She forwarded my email to Elizabeth Bonisignore, a Ph.D. student who provides technical support for the program. I was finally able to upload the files, and she sent the raw files back to me in .zip format. Im going to pass those over to Victoria to do with them what she will. This is all the time I have to spend on this week being as a week from today, on my birthday, November 6, theres this little election event where my office really has to pay attention to what is going on, and me in particular, being as the website is where all the results will be displayed. INSIGHTS: Something I know full well as a web developer, test your software before you put it into use. Being creative sometimes means being persistent. Take ownership of the assignment and make it my own; Im the one who gets to learn from it. Think globally; act locally. Oh, yeah, I already knew that. Im looking forward to meeting my new team. I hope YOU paid attention so far.
Kathleen Ely Web Developer Office of the Montana Secretary of State http://sos.mt.gov and http://www.mtrules.org (406) 444-5835 Work Hours: 8:30 a.m. 5:00 p.m.

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