Blind-accessible health, safety and security products

Safety and Security Source offers health, safety and security products for the blind--ranging from a talking blood pressure monitors to a talking thermostat.

Katastrophic Katrina

The word hurricane, if memory serves, derives from the name Caribbean Indians had for their storm god. The estimates of damage wrought by Katrina will doubtless be stratospheric! I understand that Jefferson Parish residents are asked to stay away for a week and will be allowed to return only to collect supplies and then are asked to leave for another month. Martial law may be declared. I could wish this disaster might be the means by which New Orleans could rebuild and become again the Paris of North America. May God bless all the victims of this mega-cane.

Louisiana Voices

Louisiana Voices is a program to promote Louisiana culture, including authors and writing. I chose to feature a short selection from Tales about People and Places in Louisiana, by W.C. Abbott, because it reminded me of a visit with my grandparents. He actually was their contemporary. His nostalgic anecdotes and vignettes depict a rural way of life that has all but vanished from the South of today. Enjoy and share with an elderly relative. You'll both be glad you did! - David Faucheux.

Addendum from The Other David: David worked from the talking-book verson. Amazon says this book is out of print. If so and if Louisiana schools could obtain permission for free or at a limited cost, Tales might be an excellent candidate for digitization by Distributed Proofreaders. - David Rothman.

Chef promotes cooking workshops for the blind

I could wish this chef might visit Lafayette to present this workshop. I have always loved food, its history, lore, mythology, and savor. My biblio database is studded with many gastronomic gems such as Square Meals, Kitchen Confidential, On Food and Cooking, Classic Indian Cooking, An Ocean of Flavors, As Easy as Pie...

I enjoy storing taste sensations in my gustatory library. Often when I am with friends, I want just that one taste of their perfectly grilled swordfish, that must-try cheese cake, or a unique appetizer such as fried dill pickle slices. They often oblige this little idiosyncrasy.

Do you have a list of want-to-try foods? I do. Tournedos--studded with black truffle shavings in a Port Wine demiglaze. Easter ham soaked in Dr. Pepper, studded with kumquats and prepared in that way John Folse does so well. And a cornucopia of culinary delights too vast to enumerate here. Also visit Chef Vikas Khanna.

Trinity Root: A tree's sacrifice

Click the link to hear how a tree is remembered for its role in 911.

A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat: Book Review

BOOK REVIEW
A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat. RC 57170

I recommend this best-seller to you if you like "Old Dogs, Children, and Watermelon Wine" and such Southern expressions as dog-cuss and mule-headed. I thought the writing was clear and demonstrated a refreshing brevity not seen in this era of ghost-written bloviating autobiographical memoirs.

You learn of former Marine Sergeant Miller's adventures in politics, his views, some such as his present pro-Life stance which this original pro-Choicer came to after having lived to be a grandfather, and others such as his views on ecology including reforestation that were based on common sense. I don't buy reforestation with pine trees creating a monoculture that is nothing like an original hardwood forest.

I thought about emailing Senator Miller to ask him for his thoughts on blind people and how we should tackle that 70 percent unemployment, a task that is surely Sisyphean. I suspect that as with other senators I have attempted to email over the years, Landrieu, Breaux, Kennedy, and the late Wellstone, my efforts will go unrewarded.

But read the book! It's worth it. We can hope that a Republican writes his version. Lincoln's Party No Longer: A Moderate Republicrat Speaks.

Site for accessible software

Access.info is a site devoted to accessible software--you may want to check it out.

--Text by David Faucheux

Blogger for Word add-on

I'm writing this post in Microsoft Word--but with just a few taps on the keyboard, it will end up in Blind Chance, through the Blogger for Word add-on. David Faucheux and I are investigating whether BfW program would be helpful to him. The regular Blogger interface can be confusing for blind people. There are certain problems with BfW such as the handling of images and links, but it still looks most promising. Meanwhile a big thanks to Rusty Perez for the pointer.

Quipu

Were these lots of knots spreadsheets in string--or books instead? In a history of writing for the blind, I seem to recall that a kind of string writing was developed for the blind in early 19th-century Scotland. Different knots were developed, 7 or 8, I think; and each could be tied in one of four positions on a cord. This allowed the alphabet and some basic punctuation to be developed. Beats encoding a book into the aromas of incense. Let's smell Gone with the Wind today! Shall we? Alfaction as literacy. Haptics is literacy.

Spoken Here: A book review

Persons interested in linguistic diversity might enjoy clicking the audio link to here my review of Mark Abley's language book. Another book of interest might be Vanishing Voices (RC 52195); both books discuss what might be lost should we lose our minority languages. Some 90% of the world's approximately 6,000 languages are spoken by only 10% of its people.

It may sound as if Blogger cut me off, but I had finished my content. I hated to add another link just to say, "This has been David Faucheux for Blind Chance thanking you for dropping by." You know that I always appreciate my listeners.

Note: The background singing comes from a CD, "Music from the Top of the World."

BBC blog recognizes David Faucheux

David's among several blind podcasters mentioned in a positive way in a BBC blog devoted to people with disabilities.

A new and different network

PWDBC

Click the audio link to learn about this new network that has just launched.

"It is important for us in the disability community to advocate and legislate, but it's time for us to create and celebrate both our historical and future contributions to American popular culture," said Howard Renensland, PWdBC Founder and President.

(Taken from recent press release)

For more information, or to submit resumes and demos, contact:

Howard Renensland, Founder & President

PWdBC, People With disabilities Broadcasting Corporation

Post Office Box 685, Wilton, CT 06897

203-216-1300

howard@pwdbc.org

www.pwdbc.org

'Losing sight and finding vision'

From Robert Nagle's wonderful post to the TeleRead blog:

Here's a cool audio interview on itconversations with Susan Krieger, a professor of feminist studies at Stanford. Her book, Things No Longer There - A Memoir of Losing Sight and Finding Vision talks about her process of going blind and how it caused her to reflect on visual memories and how they change over time. Fascinating talk. She started writing the book while still able to see, but by the time she finished, she was completely blind and unable to read her own book. (Curious anecdote: she found a person at Stanford to recite the books-on-tape version of this same book, and because of considerable delays, that person ended up becoming severely visually impaired as well. So, as Krieger put it, a blind person wrote a book she herself couldn't read and would be read aloud by another person who couldn't read it either).

The interesting (and relevant) part of this talk is Krieger's description of how blind people adapt to reading text material, how quickly they get used to computer voices (and how often she speeds the computer voice up to find a certain passage). One advantage to computer readers to regular books-on-tape is that she can search for keywords or references, while in traditional books-on-tape you can only proceed through the text in linear fashion. Before her eyesight completely deteriorated, Krieger was still reading blown up versions of text on TV screens and had developed all sorts of reading shortcuts.

She describes her struggle to get an ebook version released which would be accessible to disabled people. Although Adobe has improved their PDFs for accessibility, in fact, the computer voice reader had lots of problems deciphering Adobe fonts in the ebook version of her book. She personally had to intervene to make absolutely sure that the ebook (an Adobe PDF with DRM) was in fact accessible to other blind people like herself. Her publisher ended up having to use a similar-looking font to provide greater accessibility to the visually-impaired. One lesson learned from her tale seems to be that an ebook reader needs enough flexibility with fonts and font size to make conversions to alternate formats easily.

Blind podcasters

Check out http://www.whitestick.co.uk/podcasts.html to learn about podcasts by and about the blind.

Text by David Faucheux

Swamp Pop: Louisiana's unique musical genre kinda explained by a non-expert

Visit KBON to hear the music in action.

Here is an excerpt about Shane and his first book, called Swamp Pop, Cajun & Creole Rhythm & Blues.

Shane Bernard, is a Cajun from Lafayette, Louisiana, and the son of swamp pop pioneer Rod Bernard. He obtained his master's degree in history with an emphasis on Cajun and Creole studies from the University of Southwestern Louisiana, where he worked for the Center for Louisiana Studies. He attended Texas A&M University, where he earned his P.H.D, and serves as historian and archivist to the McIlhenny Company of Avery Island, Louisiana, maker of the world-famous Tabasco brand products. Shane has contributed to the journals Louisiana History, Louisiana Folk Life and The Journal of Folklore Research, as well as to Goldmine magazine; he also writes regularly for the British magazine Now Dig This and has annotated several music anthologies on compact disc.

Chronic fatigue syndrome links

1. Medical Mystery: Kids and Chronic Fatigue - Interview with Shanon and son Anthony. I like what Anthony says about CFS: "It's kind of like rechargable batteries. They're always empty no matter how long you charge them. It's very frustrating."

2. About Shanon McQuown's book, "Harnessing the Wind - Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and My Son."

Text by David Faucheux

Potpourri

I read a book, Secrets of the Code, that discussed that hot Dan Brown novel, The Da Vinci Code. Visit www.secretsofthecode.com to learn more.

I also read The Shop on Blossom Street. This is more a women's book. Visit www.debbiemacomber.com to learn more about the author.

I received an interesting email about a blind video wiz.

And lastly, someone told me (probably to make me feel better) that maybe one can make too good a score on the tests for the trivia gameshows and they mightn't want you on. They mightn't be able to afford too many factoid collectors. Doubt it.

To learn which of the items above I have audio blogged, click the link!