Marriage with no sight

I think I'm going to be on the radio next week talking about getting married.

 

I believe I'm discussing all the visual stuff. It's a terribly sight-oriented thing, I've realised. I am to be wed later in the year which is why I'm dwelling on it, incidentally, and presumably why "the radio" is interested.

 

It's all about design. It's all about look. Yes it's about providing a meal and working out seating plans - I can contribute to that - but much of the rest of it is very visual.

 

OH OK so I CAN choose readings for the ceremony, I CAN choose the music that we walk up/down the aisle to (I get confused which is up and which is down; this upsets my future wife more than it should really). But clothes. Decor. Centrepieces. Flowers?

 

That's just the start. The further you wade into creating your own wedding, the more involved it gets, the more minutiae has to be chewed over.

 

And what about that moment when the bride appears? After having made so much effort, and having paid for a make-up artist, what's the correct response from a partner who can't see?

 

"You look lovely, darling," feels like it could easily be found out as a bit of a fib.

 

I'll be missing that knocked-out-of-my-socks bit when she turns up in her dress, looking wholesome and beautiful. Usually I compliment her on smell of perfume or whether her hair feels silky, things like that, but .... well ... I'm gonna have to get creative on the big day I think.

 

"Your aura is ..." naw. "The force is strong in you today ..." nope. I'll work it out.

The S Factor

I've got no idea why people are so obsessed with zombies these days.

 

World War Z? Sean of the Dead? And, well, other stuff more recent than that. There's plenty of it but it goes over my head.

 

I simply don't get it.

 

When trends arise that I don't understand, I have to assume that it's because of something visual. Basically zombies must "look" so damn cool that people with eyes just can't resist watching them.

 

It's the S Factor (where S = sight, just to be clear)

 

I lost my sight in 1984 at 13 years old, so, with the kind of media I was absorbing as a young teenager, I could be missing a layer of skin when it comes to zombie knowledge I guess ... but I severely doubt that, blog readers.

 

I'm mostly thinking about Scooby Doo monsters. An excellent example of the zombie genre I'm sure.

 

I'm imagining big-shouldered men lurching forward by extending their legs out in a semi-goosestep. And I'm imagining they've got their arms outstretched in front of them with upper limbs in-between which you might get captured if they fall into you. Right? That's a zombie, yeah?

 

And maybe that guy Den Heggarty from 50s style 70s band Darts looks like a zombie. I think also ended up on post Tarrant Tiswas, went "bong" with his bass tones and sang some kind of monster mash as well as having his own comic strip in Tops magazine (a quasi Look-In mag that no one else remembers except me and John Tollervey).

 

Well, what can I say, zombies must've got so much better since. Sooo much better. Cos zombies ain't all that, to me.

 

Also in the S Factor category I have to put people like Stacey Solomon. "Heart o'gold" I'm sure but, heck, can she really read an autocue? Or is someone kind of gesturing words at her so she can carry on presenting. Amazing really.

 

I appreciate she's an ITV celeb, and therefore low rent, but all I can say is ... she must look gorgeous. How else could a presenting career have sprouted?

 

It's the S Factor again. She must be oozing sex and I'm oblivious to it. I'm guessing the Slater girls on EastEnders must also look stunning.

En train

I spend so many hours on trains doing my commute.

 

A quick caluclation puts it at 12 hours a week. And only six thousand pounds per year too, amazing value.

 

Anyway, here is a pic from through the window of my carriage this evening. Enjoy it.

Vanish

I took Little Man to his swimming lesson yesterday. Thankfully he got in the pool this week - last week I had to sit on the very edge of the water getting soaked as I encouraged him in.

 

This week, whilst readying him in the changing room, he spotted something and let me know.

 

"Daddy, you've got a mark on your trousers," he said, putting his finger on it so I knew where. "It's black."

 

I could feel the mark a little so I scratched at it and asked: "Can you still see it?"

 

"Yes I can," he said, "it's not gone away."

 

I hate having to ask him to use his eyes for me. I don't do it very often unless it's basic kid job stuff like "Find the remote control for Daddy" if I can't find it - something I figure most parents do as they slump on the sofa after a hard day.

 

Having kids can certainly be a boost to your access requirements ... though many out there are probably reading this, vomiting at how I must be stealing his childhood away or reaching for the phone to call social services. It just happens, OK? He'll randomly offer up information that I find useful. I can't stop him being a visual being and he just says stuff. And if someone told you that you had a dirty great mark on you, well, you don't ignore it do you.

 

I rarely ask him anything visual or get him to do things I find difficult but, when I do, my personal rule is that it never places responsibility on his head and there are no consequences if he gets it right or wrong or chooses to ignore me. "Go and hoover the carpet" is not something you'll hear from me ... I'd rather over-vacuum a room taking ages using strategy rather than sight before asking that of him. It takes me far longer as I have to assume everything's covered in dust and suck every square inch time and time again even if they don't need hoovering which really can't do my joints or RSI any good.

 

I strongly believe kids should have jobs and responsibility towards the household though ... it's good grounding for their future. Actually, mental note, I must get him to do more round the house now he's getting older.

 

Anyhoo, back to the black mark on the trousers yesterday.

 

"I tell you what, Little Man," I said, "when we get home I'm going to rub something on it and put it in the wash. It's some magic soap that will take away the ..." I was interrupted.

 

"Vanish," said my five year-old.

 

"Yes, that's right," I said slightly taken aback that he was already a step beyond magic soap.

 

"Which one will it be?" he asked. "The red one or the pink one or the blue one?" I had no idea there were varieties of it but had quickly cottoned on that he knew the brand name, and probably from an ad break on a children's channel.

 

It upsets me a bit that brands break through into his little world so I tested it a bit further to see how well it had stuck.

 

"So, we'll go home, we'll rub the magic soap on the mark and then it will ----" I left a space for him to say the brand name.

 

"Disappear!" he shouted joyfully.

 

This pleased me.

 

The little girl has been exploring new words this weekend. I'm pretty sure we can now say that, after "mumma" her first word is "shoe". Well it's been developing from "ought" to "shoosh" round to something more like the word we know and love.

 

After a family discussion about what kinds of new things they could invent to put on toast in the mornings, I think we can now say that the third bit of vocabulary she has learnt is "ham jam".

Vanish

I took Little Man to his swimming lesson yesterday. Thankfully he got in the pool this week - last week I had to sit on the very edge of the water getting soaked as I encouraged him in.

 

This week, whilst readying him in the changing room, he spotted something and let me know.

 

"Daddy, you've got a mark on your trousers," he said, putting his finger on it so I knew where. "It's black."

 

I could feel the mark a little so I scratched at it and asked: "Can you still see it?"

 

"Yes I can," he said, "it's not gone away."

 

I hate having to ask him to use his eyes for me. I don't do it very often unless it's basic kid job stuff like "Find the remote control for Daddy" if I can't find it - something I figure most parents do as they slump on the sofa after a hard day.

 

Having kids can certainly be a boost to your access requirements ... though many out there are probably reading this, vomiting at how I must be stealing his childhood away or reaching for the phone to call social services. It just happens, OK? He'll randomly offer up information that I find useful. I can't stop him being a visual being and he just says stuff. And if someone told you that you had a dirty great mark on you, well, you don't ignore it do you.

 

I rarely ask him anything visual or get him to do things I find difficult but, when I do, my personal rule is that it never places responsibility on his head and there are no consequences if he gets it right or wrong or chooses to ignore me. "Go and hoover the carpet" is not something you'll hear from me ... I'd rather over-vacuum a room taking ages using strategy rather than sight before asking that of him. It takes me far longer as I have to assume everything's covered in dust and suck every square inch time and time again even if they don't need hoovering which really can't do my joints or RSI any good.

 

I strongly believe kids should have jobs and responsibility towards the household though ... it's good grounding for their future. Actually, mental note, I must get him to do more round the house now he's getting older.

 

Anyhoo, back to the black mark on the trousers yesterday.

 

"I tell you what, Little Man," I said, "when we get home I'm going to rub something on it and put it in the wash. It's some magic soap that will take away the ..." I was interrupted.

 

"Vanish," said my five year-old.

 

"Yes, that's right," I said slightly taken aback that he was already a step beyond magic soap.

 

"Which one will it be?" he asked. "The red one or the pink one or the blue one?" I had no idea there were varieties of it but had quickly cottoned on that he knew the brand name, and probably from an ad break on a children's channel.

 

It upsets me a bit that brands break through into his little world so I tested it a bit further to see how well it had stuck.

 

"So, we'll go home, we'll rub the magic soap on the mark and then it will ----" I left a space for him to say the brand name.

 

"Disappear!" he shouted joyfully.

 

This pleased me.

 

The little girl has been exploring new words this weekend. I'm pretty sure we can now say that, after "mumma" her first word is "shoe". Well it's been developing from "ought" to "shoosh" round to something more like the word we know and love.

 

After a family discussion about what kinds of new things they could invent to put on toast in the mornings, I think we can now say that the third bit of vocabulary she has learnt is "ham jam".

Kickstarting this old blog

I'm coming towards the end of a week off work and have been pondering whether or not to kickstart my blog again. If you're reading this, it seems I have. If I had the energy and willpower and conviction, I'd stick at it - wouldn't I?

 

This blog is called Do Your Worst because it was always meant to be a place where I just write - do MY worst at it - and sod the badly composed consequences. It's about having a thought, opening up my site and putting it down. It'd also be nice to make connections with people and hopefully "inform, educate and entertain" ... oh no, that's the day job seeping through into my hometime scribblings.

 

The phrase "do your worst" was also meant to be a kind of nod towards, well, the deity. Him up there. Or her. It's something like ... c'mon, throw all you've got at me, it's not going to put this spark out. A vague nod, I suppose, towards the fact that I went blind when I was a teenager and, in the same year, also had major open heart surgery.

 

Ya know, thinking back on it, 1984 was a pretty crap year. And it's only now in my early 40s that I've started looking back on what happened with a sense of clarity and disbelief at what happened and how I wriggled my way out. More will unfold here on related matters I'm sure.

 

Let's see if the writing continues. I'll try and put some pics in from time to time but they're a bit harder to do.

 

On that note, I can hear a 1 year old screaming outside this room and ought to go and tend to her.

About this blog

Written by Damon Rose, this blog is here to help him gather thoughts and "do writing". It's just stuff, and stuff is just stuff ,after all.

 

You may have come across Damon in various ways over the years but you may not: He once was a performance poet, he was a DJ on a Kent radio station for a while, and - with his friend Sara Morgan - he was one of the presenters on the popular internet talk show BlindKiss, an archive of which can be found at the new address blindkisspodcast.com  (the old BlindKiss.com address has since been taken by someone else unfortunately).

 

More profitably he has worked for the BBC since 1997 variously as a TV and radio producer and since 2002 has been editor of the BBC's disability blog and podcast at Ouch.

 

Damon was born in 1970 on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent. He has been blind since 1984. He had to leave mainstream school at that point (he was 13) and attended New College Worcester (formerly Worcester College for the Blind), a boarding school in the midlands which gave him a grounding in blind and disability culture which has been the focus of a lot of his creative work since. He also got A-levels there and went on to university - shouldn't forget that really.

 

Damon lives in East Anglia with his partner and children.

 

All thoughts on this blog are his own and not those of the BBC.

Timbo and Essex Radio (1982 ish)

When growing up I was always fascinated by radio. I had a 'wristwatch radio' - a massive massive thing - that I used to play Radio One on whilst riding around on my bike. And at night times, I ccame across Radio Luxembourg and was kinda fascinated and weirded out that I was listening to something so far away that was apparently aimed at me. I lived in Kent at the time, born and bred.

In 1982, at the age of 11, I discovered a little bit more about local radio through a friend at high school. There was very little in the way of radio back then.

I was always aware of Radio Medway's existence but never dreamed of tuning in. But my friend introduced me to Essex Radio which had only been on air a few months, broadcasting from Southend just across the Thames Estuary from where I was on the north Kent coast.

I started tuning in and fell in love with it. It felt weirdly glamorous to have your own local station, at the time Kent's Invicta Sound was a good 2 years away from starting its broadcasts.

The programme I really liked was on at 9pm on weekday evenings - The Timbo Show. Timbo (Tim Lloyd) hosted a show where people could phone in, answer quizzes, have a cosy chat and he also played lots of current music. It was on between 9pm and 11pm before his soon-to-be wife Lindsay King rounded off the day on the station.

Listen to the start of the Timbo show - that jingle, oh that jingle. "T I M B O - well here comes Timbo, he's all set and ready to go ..."

At 10pm, half way through the show, he used to play a jingle which was, I think, originally sent in by a listener called Chris. It was The Timbo Rap. I remember all the words in my head ... it's ridiculous. How can I forget important stuff and yet still remember the Timbo Rap? dare I write out the lyrics in full here and prove just how tragic I am? Yeah, OK then.

To the tune of Good Times, that soul classic from the 70s by Chic.

The Timbo Rap - Essex Radio circa 1982

The Timbo Show is quite all right,
two solid hours of sheer delight.
The latest sounds are on the show,
the highlight of the day for Essex Radio.

Mr Lloyd with his dulcet tones,
singing to the music coming through his 'phones,
competitions and quizzes that will blow your mind,
he gives away fanfares, he's one of a kind.

Do the Timbo Rap give your hands a clap,
Timbo's a hero, there's no doubt about that,
give your feet a tap, to the Timbo Rap,
the man who put Essex, on the map.

Essex Radio star DJ,
get out of his way cos Timbo rules OK.
Good looking and handsome or so he says,
you can't deny Timbo's the best.

Get out of the armchair,
switch off the box,
tune into Timbo,
he's the king of the jocks,
if entertainment is what you seek,
listen to Timbo right through the week.

And one more thing before I go,
convert your friends to the Timbo Show.
Phone him on double 8 double 1,
answer the questions, join in with the fun.

Do the Timbo Rap, give your hands a clap,
Timbo's a hero there's no doubt about that,
give your feet a tap to the Timbo rap,
the man who put Essex, on the map

OK. I did it. it's out there. The thing is, if no one else puts it on the web then it'll never get on the web. See what I'm saying? I wonder how many people are now gonna search for Timbo Rap and find this blog entry? Did I get the words right?

Other things about The Timbo Show that I remember.

• Timbo for president - listeners were invited to write in and get a poster to put up in their window.

• I Love Timbo Badge -- I had one of these. Seriously appalling design even for back then ... but huge and I was so pleased i had one! I wore it to school the next day and a) got accused of being gay and b) was told to take it off my blazer by one of the teachers walking down the corridor.

• TPR - Timbo did a series of shows from the front room's of listeners. The show was controled back in the studio by a robot - TPR - Timbo's Production Robot. It sounded like Roadshow Robbo. Where the hell am I dredging these memroies up from? I'm rapid cycling.

• Timbo did a saturday morning show called The Saturday Whatnot. I think children used to come into the studio, more family oriented.

• When the Saturday Whatnot wasn't on, Tim could be heard doing 'The Timbo Roadshow' on a Saturday lunchtime.

• Quizzes on the show include: Timbo stuck in the middle and The Gogglebox quiz (toot toot).

In late 1983 Timbo was moved to lunchtimes on Essex Radio and everyone I know started listening to The Rod Lucas Show on the newly launched Radio Kent (was Radio Medway). And that's a whole other story.

Essex Radio remembered - a selection of those old jingles on the station that liked to be thought of as 'somewhere special'.

Another new thing

Dull as it is, this is me posting on my brand new laptop as mentioned in the previous post. Vista is up and working, jaws 9 beta is running, and I've just deleted the pesky Google Desktop apploication that somehow weedled its way onto my machine.

I'ts only taken about 5 hours of my time today. That's fine isn't it.

I'm having real sympathy with Mac cultists in the last few days. Is there a screenreader for Macs that is half way as good as JAWS?
I don't think there is.

Anyhoo. This vista thing is gonna take a bit of getting used to. And JAWS 9 isn't as nice and smooth as jaws 7 used to be.
Just Sky Plused Empire Strikes Back with audio description on ITV this afternoon. WHo'd have thought that button 3 on my TV would bring anything worth watching.

'puters

This is quite cool. For the first time ever I am writing this blog using a wireless laptop. Can you tell the difference? Just loungin' around, thought I'd connect with cyberspace, moved my computer towards me a little, and whaddya know I'm posting without even having to wander to another part of my house where the computer resides. Well actually it blew up but that's another story. I'm a little late to this wireless thing, seems everyone else has been into it for quite some time.

Took delivery of a brand new laptop at the weekend - note, not this one. It has Vista on it - Microsoft's new operating system.

I'm using JAWS 8 with it currently but from the get go I have been having problems using it. For starters, the JAWS installation CD is designed so that you can install the screenreading software independently. Yeah. Well. That may have been the case on Windows XP but not so on Vista it seems.

Vista's big seling point, and big innovation, is its added security. So far it seems that the inbuilt Vista security methods are getting in the way of me installing jaws in the first darn place. In short: it doesn't all speak.

I got someone else to help me install it and now have JAWS on board. However, there is a certain amount of learning that I need to do it seems. For starters, where has the shutdown button gone? How do you turn your PC off in Vista? It used to be in the start menu. Not any more.

But oh ... JAWS doesn't work too well in the Vista environment yet. Certain things just aren't being voiced. I have to say I am extremeley disappointed so far.

JAWS 9 is due for release any day now though so maybe this'll fix the bugs. It had better. JAWS specifically claims it supports Windows Vista.

IF anyone has any tips for me, please leave a comment on this blog. My home email address is not working currently so I am not picking up any personal messages.

Save the cheerleader, save the world ...

Is it just me who's obsessed with Heroes? It's fabulous. I just accidentally discovered something about Claire though whilst googling. Darn this internet ... with no warning at all you can find yourself amid spoilers for TV shows by dint of what country you're in. For Americans, the fact that Claire's parents are <##edited names out###> is just everyday common knowledge because it was broadcast months ago ... but not so in the UK. So, Heroes fans, be careful when 'surfing'. I also darn well found out what happens to Hiro at the end of the season too. Or at least I think I did. It makes no sense from this distance though so I'm not really sure about it.

Remember ... save the cheerleader, save the world ... OK?

the week ahead

Interesting day ahead tomorrow. WE do this, like, podcast every month. WE've been doing it since March 2006. But one of the usual presenters, Mat Fraser, isn't able to make it. I don't think he was entirely happy when we said that we wouldn't be able to do it on the Sunday night in the middle of the bank holiday weekend to fit with his overloaded timetable ... but he has graciously stepped aside now and in his place this month is disabled comedian Laurence Clark - go and catch his show if you can, he's great. So, yeah, interesting. Some great guests on the show and some really good subjects lined up to chat about. Oh gosh all this disability angst and introspection!

What else. Oh yeah. Interesting article about disabled people and tattoos hopefully will be up and ready to go on the site this week. Some really interesting stuff planned too.

Oh and it's not public knowledge yet (I think) but I know who the new editor of Disability Now is going to be! And it's a person whom I owe an awful lot to. Gosh, how confusing that a 'rival' publication should have someone I know so well at the helm! But are we rivals really? Perhaps not. DN is able to be more of a campaigning newspaper which is interesting and worthwhile. The BBC can't easily get into campaigning in the same way, publically funded 'Auntie', nor have the same angry societal corrective stance. BBC OUch is mainly about personal features and community: exploring what's in our heads and hearts. But, when written down, even that looks a bit crap. We push a bit beyond that. And sometimes just wrap stuff in big fluffy cotton towels and smother it before it comes to life. What am I talking about.

Oh and we're stalling but working up a really REALLY big new site re-design for Ouch - which is likely to be a really big change and quite likely to make the Ouch team work in a relatively different way. Lets see. Can't say much more because my contract stops me from saying anything remotely specific.

No emotion

How? Just how the fuck am I supposed to reflect and broadcast my 'current mood' when there is no drop-down box or list to choose from on this blog? Am I supposed to fucking well use words or something? Well how old fucking fashioned and fucking useless. Not even so much as a fucking 'status line'. I'm fucking off to Facebook.

Harry Potter

Have you ordered your Daisy version of Harry Potter yet?

A guide dog free zone

Thanks to all for your comments after my post about retiring my guide dog.

Right. Well I did it. He's gone. Liam finally retired. I am now without dog for the first time in 16 years.

I was petrified at the idea of giving him up. But, now he's gone, I am kind of beginning to appreciate not having a dog now. It's a nice break after 16 years not to have a knee high hairy golden shadow that needs feeding and putting out every few hours. It's now down to me and my trusty white cane.

so on my first day without, I turned up to work especially early. It's funny but having to use a cane feels slightly less dignified and makes me feel a little helpless. I don't think I used to feel like that when I was a full time cane user though. I know loads of people use them with no hassle and no wish to get a dog. I turned up early so no one would see me walking through reception and down the corridors in my new inanimate mobility aid world.

Tip tap, smash. Tip tap, smash. Actually I wasn't that bad ... I know the place so well that I could get by without barely using the cane at all. I imagine people think blind people use white canes in their own homes. Nah. If you live in a place and know it well, you don't need a cane. No self respecting blind person would use a cane to get from the lounge to the kitchen or vice versa. Similarly I could pretty much get by at work without a cane but there are so many people around that I think it's best to keep it in my hand and remind people I won't easily get out of their way if they charge towards me. Ladies and gentlemen, it's a health and safety concern.

Not much to say really other than I'm doing better than I thought. And have even had some mobility training around my home area. never thought I'd be able to find my way back home. With a dog it's a piece of piss - he knows which house is mine so will just walk up the front path to my door without me asking. With a white cane, well, it's two trees then find the hedge on the right. Cross the road at this point. Pass two skinny trees, three severe metal lamp posts that could really hurt ... and then find the big tree. Double back slightly and it's the second gate on the right.

You have to remember much more if you're a cane user. Not so good for a mid 30s fella who's definitely having classic thirty-something memory issues. Was that the second tree or the first? Not a matter of life or death but more a matter of home or someone elses's home.

My guide dog is about to retire

My guide dog Liam, who I've had for seven and a half years, will be retiring at the end of this week. He's now nine years old. Liam is a bit of a stressy sensitive dog so this seems the best time to retire him.

So, what does this mean. It means that Damon has to go back to using a white cane - something he hasn't done since leaving school in 1991.

Scared? Me?

Guide dogs make walking much quicker. They anticipate obstacles in front of you and correct your route before you bang into it, often without you even knowing. With a white cane, however, you don't know that an object is there until you whack into it. That's the main difference. Also white cains don't anticipate you might want to go into Sainsburys because you've been there so many times before! You have to really have your wits about you if you're a white cane user, concentration mode on high, be happy for journeys to take longer ... and of course it's much more of a physical and joint-aching experience sweeping that stick left to right constantly.

So. Liam retires. Might even be today I'm not sure. There are a couple of legal documents that the new owner, my friend Ewan, has to complete before we can 'do the transaction'.

But won't you get a new dog straight away, Damon?

Sadly not on this occasion. The waiting list is long and it seems my district team are over-stretched due to staff absence.

The positive thing here is that by relinquishing Liam, I am then classed as a Priority One. I am therefore much closer to the top of the list than had I been with dog. I didn't feel I could hold onto Liam much longer though because his sensitivity and stress is displaying quite a lot lately. He needs to retire and start a new life. A real unselfish move, eh? Well it's taken a while to come to this decision. I was about to give him up in April but then my friend Sara died and I just felt I didn't want to lose another big part of my life so soon. I feel like I'm jumping into a big deep dark hole.

When might you get a new dog then?

Good question. It may be around November time if I'm lucky. That leaves me 4 or 5 clear months without a dog. Possibly longer.

I expect my independence to dip and I forsee spending more time at home or my cash layout on taxis getting higher. All at a time when my fixed rate mortgage is about to end and go up in price by about 400 pounds a month. I am going to be so broke!

But it's little things, ya know, like leaving my desk at work ... just popping for a coffee. From this distance, today, it suddenly feels like a big chore with a cane. And, as I said earlier, you get none of that animal intuition from a cane - if I were to walk into the coffee bar at work, Liam would navigate me round people, misplaced chairs, tables etc, and take me directly to the counter where he knows I'm used to going to. And ya know, I'd barely even notice! With a cane, I'll have to bang into everything first before correcting my route. This could mean banging into a few people on the way too - moving obstacles as I like to think of them. But I'm sure my senses will sharpen up again and I'll start having to try and detect obstacles and people. Yes, blindies can do this - obstacle sense they call it. It's not as special as Channel 4 recently tried to make out in their superkid documentary, it's just about understanding the sound around you and the echoes. Layer of sound, muffling versus clearness, slight pressure on the eardrum when someone walks past and disrupts the sound path, etc. stuff like that. It's hard to put into words but it does feel like a sixth sense that you really only notice when you have to - i.e. when you go blind.

Anyhoo. Am not going to be unhappy about Liam retiring because he needs to and I'm pleased for him.

If any long term cane users want to post here and tell me I'm a total wimp then please do! :) There are loads of people who choose to stay with a white cane and would never go near a dog. In fact, the vast majority of blind people use canes over dogs. There is an art to it but I've lost that art. That's the issue today. Truth is that suddenly everything will be different again and I will need to readjust. Aaargggh!!!! Oh and there's also real potential to enter into a few undignified smash-ups with a cane, less regular than when you're using a dog, well, especially when starting out again. I'm sure I'll document them here with red face.

Wayfinder Access: audio demonstration

A few days ago I wrote a blog entry about Wayfinder Access - a GPS direction-finding solution ... a bit of software you can put on your mobile phone. It's meant for people with visual impairments and is optimised for those who have a mobile speech synth/screenreader like Talks or MobileSpeak.

Kate pointed out quite rightly that it has potential benefits for wobblers too, people with Cerebral Palsy whose direction finding abilities are somewhat crap because of all that spacial awareness built-in malfunction ... I hope I used the right medical terms? I think Kate refers to herself as Map Disabled.

Anyhoo, I've just found an MP3 on the net; an audio demonsstration of the product done earlier this month by a fella in North America called Earl Harrison. You've gotta love the internet!

mp3 Audio demonstration of Wayfinder Access. (if you click the link directly you will be waiting a minute
or two for the audio to load into your PC. Best idea if to save it to your hard disk so you have more control over it and maybe even transfer it to your iPod. right click on the link and 'save target as' and do your usual saving routine you'll be familiar with I'm sure)

What you'll hear -- Earl sspends about 5 or 10 minutes going through the product in his house. You can choose the destination you are travelling to at home, and have the route calculated before you leave your front door. (I think you can also browse the route and see its twists and turns before leaving home too but Earl doesn't show this)

It's crucial to know that you can use Wayfinder either on foot as a pedestrian or in a car. There are two different modes on Wayfinder - the 'in car' mode turns it into a gizmo very similar to Tom Tom with that classic SatNav cool calm controlled female voice we're used to. In 'pedestrian mode' it falls back to using the speech synth you have on your phone because speech synths can give you much more and better information than the built-in female satnav voice just mentioned. (speech synths can read street names, for instance, built-in satnav clear voices can only say pre-recorded limited info such as "in half a mile, turn left")

So, after Earl has setup the route in his house, he gets in a car and we go into car mode. We hear what Earl, as a blind passenger, gets from the experience. He can help navigate.

One thing blind people often have a problem with is giving good directions to car drivers if, for instance, we want to get back home. A pedestrian and driving experience can be much different hence this function gives you real control and the ability to stop faffing around and tell your mate exactly where you want to go, giving directions as you go along.

"But Damon, what does the front of this pub look like? There are a few here but I can't see the names because it's a bit dark"

"I don't blinking well know!"

atnav will at least take you to within about 30 feet of its front door.

Note there is also a 'taxi mode' but I don't yet know what this does. Remember I'm writing all this as someone who has googled about Wayfinder and not yet used the darn thing. The version I need isn't out for a week or two.

Next Earl gets out of his car and plots another route on his mobile that he is going to attempt as a pedestrian. We hear him walking along with his guide dog Patrick being told by the phone where to turn and how many feet until the destination on a regular basis.

So there ya go. It's deep blind tech so you may want to skip to the bit where Earl is in his car if you're not too bothered about the menu system on the phone and would rather just jump right to him using Wayfinder in action.

God the net is great! I've been waiting for someone to post an audio demonstration and here it is! Maybe I'll do one when I get the gizmo.

Any feedback or thoughts appreciated! And if anyone knows of any other audio demos, or is about to do one, email me or post here. I'd like to blog it.

nostalgic tv blast

The Oddball Couple. Fleabag

robotic stooges

Baggy Pants and the Nitwits

haleys' comets


Oh no! I'm experiencing rapid cycling of old remembered TV shows this morning. Lisa, if you're reading this, you want to thank your lucky starts you won't have to listen to me today wittering on about ...

Baggy Pants and the Nitwits -- Do you remember this? I think it was on air in the UK around 1978 or 1979. It was two cartoons shove together in one double bill. Baggy Pants was a Chaplin-esque cat who waddled around a lot and did silent movie type prat falls with his blank unfathomable little cat face. The Nitwits starred Tyrone, a retired superhero who solved mysteries with the help of his walking cane, Elmo, and his handbag-wielding wife Gladys. From the web it looks like this was a derivative too, maybe from the Laugh In. A half hour cartoon. The Nitwits was the main show for me, very funny, quite dry for a toon aimed at kids if I recall.

The Robotic Stooges -- bizarre cartoon version of The Three Stooges: Larry, Curly and Mo. They had extendable robotic limbs like Inspector Gadget. Huh? The link here will take you through to a show that aired in America called The Skatebirds - for, apparently, it is from this Banana Splits-like mid 70s show that the toon came from before it was spun out on its own. Why did this cartoon ever come into being?

The Oddball Couple -- Again, doubtless based on classic sitcom The Odd Couple, this starred a cat and a dog in business together - or did they live together, I forget. The cat, Spiffy, was suited and booted whereas the dog, Fleabag, was a bit of a scruff. Oh just think of those cat and dog / class war antics? Sing with me: "Oh the oddball couple are a couple of a couple of oddballs - eggballs"

Other stuff? Do you remember a weekly show on BBC1 for kids called Going Places? It urged people to write in for fact sheets about stuff going on around the UK that kids should go out and do. Could it have been presented by Su Ingle and Peter Pervis? Or was Su Ingle only on Wildtrack with Tony Soper? The following link is to a page on TV Cream featuring Going Places and Wildtrack - though here they call it We're Going Places which I think might be wrong. But what do I know.

Brilliantly on the above page I came across the quote: "DIFFERENCE OF OPINION HERE, GEOFF". Can you remember where you heard that? Answer at the bottom of this blog ... but you'll need to turn the screen upside down to read it. Geoffrey Wheeler, not just a quiz show voiceover, but also the man who urged us to get our Come and Praise hymn books out while listening to 'A service for schools' on Radio 4 on a Thursday morning. I learnt from that show about how the Soviets persecuted Christians and people hid their bibles and everything! Sing: "jet planes meeting in the air to be refueled are the things I know so well". Wheeler was also on Songs of Praise later - funny how he had time to fit in a show based on gambling around his christian commitments. Dig my biting topical satire 30 years on? I'm really getting up to speed at 36. STOP PRESS, this website reveals that he invented Winner Takes All too. Oh I've given away the answer. I love that there is a Wikipedia page about it. Most depressed to see that the talentless Bobby Davro did a version of the quiz for Challenge TV in 1997.

Aww, it's going round in my head now: "Autumn days when the grass is jewelled and the silk inside a chestnut shell"

Rapid cycling. Mark Curry was in Bugsy Malone. He played the producer ... and the ginger haired girl who pushed Blousie out of the way to do an outrageous audition was Bonnie Langford!

Finally this morning. I discovered in my web wanderings today that The Beatles had an animated series from 1965 to 1969 in the US. I'm sure it must have been shown in the UK? I've never seen it - though obviously have seen Yellow Submarine and it's ridiculous swirly colourful trumpet-nosedness. And, in another name blast from the past, I discover that Lance Percival did the voices for Paul and Ringo. I vaguely remember his flopppy blonde hair? Have I got the right guy? From panel shows in the 70s? I dunno, maybe from that afternoon gameshow The Cartoonists that had Bill Tidy, Willie Rushton and others being funny. Rapid rapid cycling. Lance: could be a twin of Tony Hart?

Question: who else had a little crush on Tiger from The Double Deckers? And what film do I remember The Double Deckers crossing over into?

Gotta go now. Is anyone on my wavelength?

When was stuff invented?

I have this idea that absailing was invented somewhere around 1979. And I'm sure this is because Blue Peter did an item about it. There seemed to be a proliferation of absailing items on TV at the time as producers thought it'd be visually interesting to get their presenters to slide down a geared rope thing.

I wonder if it existed before then? That was when it hit my radar / landscape.

Anyhoo, the point is that because I learnt about it in 1979, in my head it was new, that's when I date it back to - even if the Romans were absailing off their big white buildings.

Equally I date the invention of the word 'shit' to about 1977 - the first time I heard it in the playground and went home and said it to my mum. How was I to know? I was surprised my Mum was angry because as far as I knew, it was just some cool new thing the older boys said. How did she know what the kids at Iwade County Primary School were inventing?

Went to see Grease, the musical, at the cinema in 1978 when it came out. It was a birthday treat. My sister and I were obsessed with the songs afterwards and Mum and Dad got the cassette and we played it in the car all the time.

Shocked was I when I listened a little closer to the track Greased Lightning and heard John Travolta sing, "You know that it ain't shit when you're getting lots of tit".

"Mum," I shouted through from the back seat, "Do you think John Travolta knows that's a swear word?" The sexual bit re: 'tit' bypassed me for a few years more.

How had I not come across that word until 1977? It's like the fug of childhood and brain development cushioned me. I'm sure they didn't say words like that on TV around that time - no not even the Sex Pistols. Well they certainly didn't on Jackanory anyway, I can tell you that.

I wonder if my Nephew Cameron knows the word yet at 7. I wonder if my sister will be angry if I ask him. "Hello Uncle Damon, are you still weird today? Are you going to start talking about polar bears again?"

"Cameron. Just wondering. What does S H I T spell?"

Am I sounding like Dennis Norden? Trust me, in 2025 I'll be hosting a new version of Looks Familiar on daytime ITV - if TV exists then. TV, I'm sure, will be de-invented soon.

Wayfinder Access - GPS direction-finding for blind people

OK. This is cool. I've previously written about how visually impaired people are now really starting to use GPS to give an extra dimension of direction-finding in an article on Ouch: Don't scrimp on your access, you're a long time dead (15 March 2007)

I vaguely mentioned a product called Wayfinder in the article - couldn't do too much on it as it was on the BBC, no commercials please.

Since writing it though, a new product has been developed, it's called Wayfinder Access, read more about it here: Wayfinder Access on the TalkNav site

They've taken the original product aimed at the sighted market, worked with the blind community and turned it into a product that now speaks more (though you have to also be running the Talks or Mobile Speak mobile screenreader software) and worked it up into an interesting product.

That said, I've not had chance to test it out. But I believe it speaks more, gives more relevant info to people who can't see - such as what Points Of Interest are in the vicinity: pub across the road, cinema round the corner,church 100 yards further down the street etc.

So, going back to the start with a bit more detail.

Blind people are so gadgety and tech obsessed you wouldn't believe it - hardly surprising for a group whose computer is their pen, their newspaper, their accessible mail, their browsable shopping experience and more. Blind peple surely have the best gadgets?

Lots of us are now carrying around mobile phones with a bit of talking 'screenreader' software on it, e.g. Nuance Talks or the new Mobile Speak from Code Factory. These products can only work on certain phones: Symbian platform phones with Talks and I think Windows mobile platform with Mobile Speak (don't know enough about this product yet as it's fairly new). I use Nuance Talks on my Nokia N73.

To spell it out, screenreaders are bits of talking navigation software. They make your phone talk and have intelligent ways of helping you access the visual concepts. Blind people might just say "I've got a talking mobile" though :)

SMS, web surfing, creating and using phonebooks, they're the things visually impaired people typically use speech enhanced phones for.

Wayfinder Access, once installed on yer talking mobile, allows you to plot routes from A to B. You can review them at home before you leave if ya like. You also need a GPS satellite receiver. Mine, a very slimline and small Holux GPS receiver, is about the size of a packet of chewing gum, you can see it in the Ouch article I linked to at the top of this entry. It speaks to my phone using a Blue Tooth wireless connection. Easy as pie.

You apparently need to walk outside with your GPS reciever pointed skywards to lock onto the GPS satellites up there in low level orbit. Once it has a lock you can simply put the receiver in your jeans pocket ... so don't go imagining you need a big visible dish on your head. It's all very discrete. You won't look like a crippled Borg monster.

I'm going to be really interested to get this product and start using it. The big thing for a blind person about going out is usually that you need to know where you're going and what you want before you leave home. Mostly. The GPS map software will allow me to be a bit more adhoc, flexible, relaxed. I'll be able to find cafes that I didn't know were there, walk around and then ask the GPS phone to point me to the nearest tube station. Maybe even walk through a big wide-open park ... wide open areas with no pathways or landmarks are usually next to impossible to navigate through.

I'm getting mixed reports as to whether these systems work well in built-up areas though. This will be interesting to test. London could be a satellite blackspot for pedestrians. GPS receivers need 'line of sight' communication with satellites.

The next big thing being talked about is 3G direction finding. i.e. not just the use of a GPS but also extra help from mobile phone transmitters that, through a process of triangulation, can help you set coordinates in satellite blackspots ... which also includes indoors! GPS certainly won't work in Brent Cross or Blue Water shopping malls now will they. Be great when they do!I'll just drop a Point Of Interest marker outside each shop I want to visit then I'll be notified of them as I walk past them in future - not disimilar to what eyes and brains do if you think about it (oh, just for the sake of clarity, you can drop markers with Wayfinder too, plus share them via SMS to your mates)

Hope this was interesting or useful.

See my above Ouch article for more on the excellent Loadstone GPS project: A group of blind fellas who are creating a FREE piece of GPS software for mobile phones. At present you can only drop and share markers though, there are no maps so you can't tap in a postcode and get a route spurted out at you. Very useful though, take a look.

Wayfinder costs approx 260 pounds currently.