Patti's Blog - Advocate for Elders, People with Disabilities and Their Families

Christopher Webster, Man With Asperger's, Embraces Strangers With Free Hugs Campaign

Excerpt from The Huffington Post: (click for entire article)

Though living with Asperger’s syndrome makes it difficult for Christopher Webster to interact with strangers, it hasn’t kept him from hugging hundreds of people he doesn’t know.

For the past six years, the San Antonio resident has stood on a busy downtown street corner holding a white sign whose big block letters read, “Free Hugs.” The 27-year-old offers up embraces to willing passersby to bring kindness to the world and to help him deal with his social issues, the San Antonio Express-News reports.

“I do it to make the world a better place,” Webster told the news outlet. “One hug at a time.”

Katie Beckett: Patient Turned Home-Care Advocate

Patti's Comments:  She just passed away. Rest In Peace & thank you for making the world a
better place!

Excerpt from NPR: (click for entire article)

It started with a 3-year-old girl in a hospital and the president who was angered when he learned that federal rules prevented her from going home.

The president was Ronald Reagan. The girl, Katie Beckett, had contracted viral encephalitis, a brain infection, when she was just five months old. She'd gone into a coma for ten days, and when she came out she suffered a paralysis that left her unable to breathe without the help of a ventilator most of the day.

After more than two years living in St. Luke's Methodist Hospital in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the family reached the limit of what its private insurance would pay for Katie's care. Medicaid, the state and federal health insurance for the needy, started picking up the cost of that expensive breathing machine and other care.

But Medicaid would pay only as long as the little girl lived in the pediatric intensive care unit at the hospital.

Beckett's parents, Julie and Mark, said they wanted their daughter at home. The girl's doctors agreed, saying she needed to grow up in a more normal environment than a hospital room.

More on Gertrude Stein and Hats

Excerpt from Planet of the Blind: (click for entire article)

Our good friend LB has written per our post about hats and the wives of geniuses: Perhaps it was a jaunty hat that lured Ms Stein into driving a supply truck for the American Fund for French Wounded during WWI.  And then in WWII, perhaps a rather broad-brimmed, lower-profile chapeau would be more appropriate as she, an American Jewish lesbian, quite remarkably sat out the German occupation of France with famous art collection and life completely unscathed, perhaps as an active Nazi collaborator.

In Memoriam: Nicholas deBelleville Katzenbach

Excerpt from Constitutional Law Prof Blog: (click for entire article)

Law students know him as the "Katzenbach" of Katzenbach v. McClung, 379 U.S. 29 (1964), the "Ollies BBQ case" upholding Congressional power under the Commerce Clause for the accomodations portions of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and of Katzenbach v. Morgan, 384 U.S. 641 (1966), the "Puerto Rican voting case" upholding Congressional power under §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment for the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Nicholas deBelleville Katzenbach served as Attorney General (and Acting Attorney General) in the LBJ Administration, litigating a host of civil rights cases.

Maurice Sendak is Interviewed on the Colbert Report

Excerpt from SCBWI: (click for entire article)

    Stephen Colbert:  "Every celebrity is out there cashing in on chidlren's books and I. Want. In.  What's it take for a celebrity to make a successful book?  What do I got to do?"

    Maurice Sendak:  "You're started already by being an idiot."

White House Highlights Ralph Braun as a “Champion of Change” for his Dedication to STEM for People with Disabilities

Excerpt from Examiner.com: (click for entire article)

On Monday, May 7th, Ralph Braun was one of fourteen individuals honored at the White House as Champions of Change for leading the fields of science, technology, engineering, and math for people with disabilities.   

“STEM is vital to America’s future in education and employment, so equal access for people with disabilities is imperative, as they can contribute to and benefit from STEM,” said Kareem Dale, Special Assistant to the President for Disability Policy. “The leaders we’ve selected as Champions of Change are proving that when the playing field is level, people with disabilities can excel in STEM, develop new products, create scientific inventions, open successful businesses, and contribute equally to the economic and educational future of our country.”

White House To Honor Disability Innovators

Excerpt from Disability Scoop: (click for entire article)

The White House plans to honor 14 people Monday as “Champions of Change” for making a difference in the lives of people with disabilities.

The honorees were selected for their leadership in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math, collectively known as STEM. Each has used their expertise to improve education and employment prospects for Americans with disabilities, the Obama administration said.

Monday’s event is part of a regular Champions of Change series at the White House, which is designed to highlight leaders in a different sector each week.

Prolific 92-Year-Old DVD Bootlegger Sends Thousands of Films To Troops Overseas

Patti's Comments:  Love This!!!!

Excerpt from Geek O System: (click for entire article)

When you think of pirates and bootleggers, there’s typically two places your mind might go: Punk kids, or vast organizations of bootleggers, all with thick accents. Hyman Strachman is neither of those, instead, he is a 92-year-old World War II veteran. He is however, probably one of the worlds foremost bootleggers. For eight years, Stachman has been running a pretty impressive bootlegging operation from his apartment, copying thousands of first-run movies, and sending them to U.S. troops overseas. Hardly some punk kid.

Over the course of his bootlegging career, Strachman went from burning the DVDs on his own personal computer to purchasing a $400 rig that would let him copy 7 at a time. Amusingly enough, Strachman does not actually torrent or download the films himself or anything, but rather buys them from a local bootlegger, and then proceeds to bootleg said bootlegs. Though his methods may seem a little roundabout, his record is impressive; he’s sent at least 4,000 boxes of DVDs, free of charge, to soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Wisconsin woman, 80, lands plane after pilot passes out

Excerpt from the Chicago Tribune: (click for entire article)

An 80-year-old woman with little flying experience knew her husband had died after he fell unconscious at the controls of a small plane, yet she remained calm as she landed the aircraft at a northeastern Wisconsin airport, her son said today.

In a phone interview with The Associated Press, James Collins said he's also a pilot and had helped his mother Helen Collins via radio as the Cessna twin-engine plane began running out of gas Monday evening. Another pilot also took to the skies to guide her to the ground at Cherryland Airport, near Sturgeon Bay - about 150 miles north of Milwaukee.

He said his mother took lessons to take off and land about 30 years ago at her husband's urging, in case something happened to him, but never got her license. She has flown hundreds of hours by his side.

The Real Leadership Lessons of Steve Jobs

Excerpt from Harvard Business Review: (click for entire article)

His saga is the entrepreneurial creation myth writ large: Steve Jobs cofounded Apple in his parents’ garage in 1976, was ousted in 1985, returned to rescue it from near bankruptcy in 1997, and by the time he died, in October 2011, had built it into the world’s most valuable company. Along the way he helped to transform seven industries: personal computing, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, retail stores, and digital publishing. He thus belongs in the pantheon of America’s great innovators, along with Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and Walt Disney. None of these men was a saint, but long after their personalities are forgotten, history will remember how they applied imagination to technology and business.

In the months since my biography of Jobs came out, countless commentators have tried to draw management lessons from it. Some of those readers have been insightful, but I think that many of them (especially those with no experience in entrepreneurship) fixate too much on the rough edges of his personality. The essence of Jobs, I think, is that his personality was integral to his way of doing business. He acted as if the normal rules didn’t apply to him, and the passion, intensity, and extreme emotionalism he brought to everyday life were things he also poured into the products he made. His petulance and impatience were part and parcel of his perfectionism.