Intrepid Blind Traveler

We live in a time when many in America have journeyed miles away from home. Travel is relatively predictable, many McRestaurants,hotels, motels, web sites, and travel agents make the process nearly painless. But there was a time when travel was a considerable undertaking. Read about the 7 adventurers in John Keay's book and thrill at tales of daring and misadventureRead of Christian converts, gentlemen amateurs, and a blind man.

It is this kind of mid-list book that makes me glad we have libraries so that older books don't vanish from awareness in a time so driven by manipulated best-seller rankings and the talk show circuit.

The blind nerd

I met Ray during my elementary school years at LSB or Louisiana School for the Blind as it was then known. He always had a tape player and was always experimenting with it.

Just last night, January 27, he telephoned and mentioned to me getting a 300-gig hard drive, which he assured me was very easy to install. He's totally blind, btw.

Ray also told me about his new blog and that he planned to learn an audio program soonest. What's my excuse?) So visit him.

He's probably more conservative than am I, but, hey, different strokes for different folks.

DSL and that pesky green light

I have finally gone DSL. I like the ability to talk on the phone and be online. I have noticed, however, that DSL can be rather tempermmental. I telephoned Bellsouth last night and spoke with someone who sounded like she might have been in Bombay. She tested my line and asked me if the modem was showing a green light. I hate when sighted people do that. I feel stupid for being blind and not being able to see the green light. Too bad Bellsouth and DSL modem manufacturers couldn't have audible cues to indicate if information were being processed or not?

If you'd like to visit the online petition I've mentioned, go here.

Twenty Ads that Shook the World: A book review.

Ever wondered why 1984 wasn't like Nineteen Eighty-Four? Do you stop and think that most Americans know more about Morris the Cat than they do about William Morris? Well, Twenty Ads attempts to explain that and discuss ads that have become part of the cultural vernacular. Enjoy. Sighted people well no doubt enjoy the artwork that ends each short, witty chapter. Maybe I should copyright my slogan, Imagine That!

The Pearl Saga: Part II

The Pearl Saga: Book review

When one attempts to define fantasy, thoughts of sorcery, magic rings, ward stones, supernatural beasts, and duels between good and evil come to mind. These are all present in The Pearl Saga; but alongside them are artifacts usually associated with science fiction: space-traveling civilizations, particle beam weapons, genetic manipulation, and bio-cybernetic engineering. This uneasy juxtaposition helps to make The Pearl Saga a unique read. Echoes of Chinese traditional medicine and philosophy add piquancy.

I did find the books rather long and, perhaps, a little too Byzantine in plot with many story jumps and subplots to keep the reader slightly off balance. I still am puzzled by the location of the ring of five dragons which I thought the Dar Sala-at had taken with her when fleeing from the storehouse under the palace which the V'ornn used as their administrative center. This was how the first book ended. But in the third book, she finds the ring in the lock mechanism of the circular door of the same storhouse where she was said to have put it. I thought the techno-mages had put it in the lock and had been destroyed for their attempts to open something not meant for them. I know there are web sites that list movie mistakes and wonder if there are similar ones for mistakes in books. I hope I misread. But it's still a good series. I think 5 books would be perfect. Five moons, five dragons, why not five books, a pentology? I give the series an A-minus/B+plus. I wonder how the author keeps track of all the plot lines.

A Solution to Those Dreaded Touch Screen Machines at Stores:

As a blind person, don't you hate when you have to deal with touch screen pads? I do. Visit this link to learn about a viable alternative.

Text by David Faucheux

Happy New Year

I first became aware of a beautiful tradition from Vienna in 1997 when I was surfing my radio dial and happened upon www.krvs.org

The famous New Year's Day concert of the world-renowned Vienna Philharmonic is an ever-changing monument in music to the greatness of the Strauss family and the musical culture of a gracious city that embodies an imperial history without peer. The elegance, lightness, gaiety, and refinement of the music make me long for another time.

I wish I could be whisked back to one of the famous balls where the orchestras played all night at an ever-increasing tempo.

This year's concert did not disappoint. The marches including The Spanish March seemed more that which one would promenade to than fight by. Frederick Morton did mention in A Nervous Splendor how the Austro-Hungarian military had the most gorgeous uniforms and won prizes in Paris in 1900. The waltzes, the quadrilles containing bits from popular concert music, and the polkas had me floating away.

This blog contains a dash from The Telephone, a polka written by Johanne Strauss's brother, Eddie. I liked the sound of the telephone ringing in the concert hall, and what a hall, the Golden Salon. Attending this concert would be a dream come true, but I am told it is almost impossible to get tickets as they sell-out years ahead. You will also hear if you listen carefully at the end of the selection, the softly modulated German of Austrian Radio's Ernst G. who makes German sound refined.

I looked at too many Braille and cassette books last year. If you'd like to hear something about the books I enjoyed, click the audio link. I couldn't tell everything but hope to have given you something to ponder and perhaps, a few titles to check out from your local library.

Correction of audio: That's the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth, not death.

'Advocates for disabled wary of open source'

So says a headline at CIO.com, referring to open source efforts on Massachusetts. Some concerns about OpenOffice and the like:

1. The accessibility community has invested years in getting Microsoft products to work with the disabled.

2. Third-party adaptive technology vendors have based their products around Microsoft's.

3. The states deadline for OpenDocument format is Jan. 1, 2007, and right now it looks as if accessibility could suffer in favor of the deadline being met.

Open Source advocates respond that their approach will be more flexible and greatly speed up the usefulness of tech to the disabled, and they're open to the state pushing back the deadline. I'd take their side, as long as they mean this; it would help for Massachusetts to be flexible as well. Within e-books, open source and open standards can go a long way. Proprietary formats can add horrendous complexity to the reading process for those with, say, speech synthesizers. An OpenReaderish approach will be a blessing for people with disabilities.

Detail: Microsoft contributes to adaptive tech activities. Will this influence some accessibility advocates? I don't know. I'm just raising the inevitable question.

Text by David Rothman