Inter Views

I've met some very helpful people on my way to and from the Genealogical Research Center of Northeastern Pennsylvania. When I'm in downtown Scranton a few people have asked me what bus I'm waiting for; someone actually once asked me if I was waiting for the Carbondale bus, so I'm assuming I had asked this person more than once about the bus over the preceding weeks. Sometimes for exercise, I walked home from Walgreens which is about nine blocks from our house, and sidewalks are occasionally blocked because of construction. At these times construction workers are more than happy to help me across the blocked areas.

Now I'll review some movies.

These won't be in order, since I don't remember the order in which I saw them. First comes The Help, which was a pleasant surprise. The Help is based on a book about the fictional travails of a number of maids in the pre-civil rights South. My mother wanted to see it, so I grudgingly went along. The movie told an engaging story, and probably a fairly accurate one. Next comes the Three Musketeers, which I wanted to see because I read the book. As of yet, I haven't listened to the entire book, but not for lack of interest. I have so many other books to listen to, and I'm always getting new ones. The character portrayals are fairly good, but creative license took its share also. I don't want to say too much because I obviously don't know who's seen what movies.

Along came The Debt, which seemed a good movie to see at least by the previews. The movie is a fictional account of an Israeli covert ops team sent after a high-level Nazi after the war. However, the reality proved different from the expectations. The characters just didn't seem that believable. We saw J. Edgar fairly recently, and it was very good. They aged Leo fairly well, and if a legally blind man can say that you know the makeup artist must've done an excellent job. I know people would rather see something inconsequential by the fact that the film was never number one, but people should see it.

Two disappointments came next, in the forms of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, and the Iron Lady. One of my biggest complaints about both movies was that I couldn't always tell when a flashback occurred, and when we were back to the present. When we went to see Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy I asked my mother if I could say at the ticket counter that we wanted two tickets for the alliteration, but she said no. I thought this unfair. I didn't find the movie very thrilling, even though it was billed as a thriller. It was especially difficult with the Iron Lady to tell when flashbacks occurred as their ages grew closer together. Iron Lady is the story of England's first and so far only female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher.

To close where I begin, I recently had an interview with The Valley advantage, one of our local papers. Joe Bryer, the head of the Genealogical Research Center of Northeastern Pennsylvania thought it would be a good idea for someone to come over and interview me, and I agreed. Joe thought it would be a good idea for the same reason I'm writing this blog, to show that people with disabilities can do much more than sit at home and twiddle their thumbs. The web address is www.thevalleyadvantage.com.

Turkeys

I had a nice Thanksgiving; I'm supposed to say it because I got to see my brother, but in reality it's because I like turkey and homemade peanut butter pie. Unfortunately, I had to put up with my brother for 3 days, but on a happier note, I got to see my three little cousins. My father always gets up at 5 or 6 AM to start the turkey, so it's always ready by the time we sit down to eat at 2:00p.m. I like the drumsticks of the turkey, but last year my cousin Michael decided that he wanted to try one. I ate one, and he ate most of another. This year too he had one and I had the other, so I think it's become a tradition.

After dinner Brandon, the youngest, started playing with a rubber ball and a catchers toy that my dog has. He wanted to play catch with me, and when I asked Bryan, his father also my cousin, he said it was fine. For the most part, I threw the ball at Brandon, obviously not very hard because I could only generally aim. A few times Brandon threw the ball, and I used the bat. However, I did my best to avoid this because I don't really like having things thrown at me for obvious reasons. Once Brandon's older and can understand what visually impaired means, I will make absolutely certain I remember to tell him this story.

Eventually, they left, so we only had one houseguest and that sadly was my brother. Since he didn’t leave until Sunday mayhem ensued. My parents and brother went out shopping on Black Friday, but at a normal hour not 5 AM. For dinner we ordered pizza from Revello’s, and all five of us thought it very good. I say five because Max had some too, just not that day. Saturday found a full 12 cuts of pizza left from the previous night, and six cuts of white pizza.

For my breakfast Saturday morning I had three pieces, and then we got ready to leave to get our Christmas tree. Both boxes of pizza were on the oven, which is pretty high up, and we thought this sufficient. I imagine by now you can all see where this is going. At the same time we were finding our tree, Max was finding how to get the pizza. One of Mark’s mayhem -causing incidents had occurred, but the second had yet to. We ate hamburgers for dinner that evening and being refrigerated they weren’t accessible to Max. However, that Saturday night Mark killed my mother's dryer because she was washing his clothes at the time. Thus after causing all this mayhem he went home the next day. On that note, I'll say farewell until my next entry.

Interlude

Continued from previous entry
It was around 1:15, so I prepared to leave. I shut down my computer, said goodbye to everyone, and went outside to sit on the bench. It basically is the bus stop, so if you're waiting a long time, you at least get to sit while waiting. There was paving going on further along the bus route, so it was 10 or 15 min. late. When the bus arrived, I took it back to downtown Scranton, and because we were concerned that I had missed it, my mother drove me home.
The rest of the day went fine, except for the ending. Mark came home around 11:30 that Thursday night. Friday he went for a walk with one of his friends around Lake Scranton, and after they were done she dropped him off. No Appalachian Trail stuff, it was strictly above board. She also knows me fairly well, knows I'm visually impaired, but still she waved at me. Mark said in an incredulous voice, you waved at my brother, my brother. She started laughing, and I just shook my head, turning away. I enjoy making fun of people who wave, beep, or in some other way try to catch my attention that is totally useless. Of course it's only funny if somehow I find out who they are, so I can tell them later of their utter foolishness.
While he was here, we went to our summer place, which was fun. We didn't really do anything on Friday night, but on Saturday night we made s'mores. On Sunday we went to the Wyoming County fair, and all had gyros. Then Monday afternoon we came home.
We came home Monday afternoon, and then Mark and I went to see Cowboys and Aliens. Both of us thought the movie was pretty good for its kind. The movie won't win any Oscars, but then it was designed to entertain, not win awards. It fulfilled its task of entertaining admirably. Then we had leftover pasta salad and pasta for dinner. Then my mother and Mark went for ice cream, which I heartily approve of. Then on Tuesday we went to Revello’s Café Pizza for dinner. The next day my mother and Mark went for Chinese food, and I was forced to have seafood salad. As anyone who knows me can tell you I truly despise shrimp, pasta, and olives. My Wednesday night was very nice because they took Mark back to the bus station.

GRSNP

I got up a little before the alarm clock buzzed, had pizza for breakfast, performed the rest of the morning routine, and headed for the bus stop. When I need to take the bus, it is very convenient for me because it goes right past my street corner. The COLTS (County of Lackawanna Transit System) bus dropped me off, and then I walked across the street to get the bus that went to the GRSNP. The acronym stands for Genealogical Research Society of Northeastern Pennsylvania, and for my next trick, see if you can pronounce that five times fast. My mother followed behind the bus as sort of our version of a mobility instructor.
When I got dropped off, I went inside, and asked for Joe Bryer. He showed me the computer I would be using, and I got to work trying to find the full screen magnifier. I looked for one because I thought it would be Windows 7, but I found out the hard way that the operating system was Windows XP. So I downloaded a trial of Zoomtext because I didn't have my copy with me.
Joe gave me some instructions to run PDF searches using Adobe Reader Professional, and it was fairly easy. One function Joe wanted to show me, but couldn't, involved showing me how to search on the I:\ drive. The drive was an external hard drive, but as far as the computer was concerned it didn't exist. He left me so he could go back to other work, and to give me more time to familiarize myself with the system. I put my hand on the hard drive, and felt around for the cords between the hard drive and the computer. I found the two cords, and made sure each one was in properly. Sure enough one of them must've been loose because I heard the tone that indicates a USB device has been plugged in. The computer now not only detected the I:\ drive, but it also detected the H:\ drive.
When I got Joe's attention, he asked how come no one else could figure this out, but a blind guy did? He asked it in a humorous way, and I indeed found it very funny. After the computer said yes the I:\ drive does exist, I looked at the instructions Joe had given me to see what came next. I copied PDF files from the My Documents folder on my computer to the I:\ drive, and the whole process took about 28 min. Speaking of instructions, Joe had printed them larger, for which I was very grateful.
I told Joe that I was copying the files, and he came over a bit incredulous because he said no one had been able to figure out how to do that. He said again humorously that they've been saved by a blind guy, which I also found funny. Even though all his quips were meant to be humor, some people would still have taken offense to them, but I have an irreverent sense of humor.
Well, next time I'll finish my story, and tell you all the things that happened to me while my annoying brother was home. The website is www.grsnp.org if you want any more information.

Still Here

Well, the apocalypse didn't get me. I've heard it didn't happen because two of the Horsemen got stuck in the mud, and the other two got into a fight with Gandalf and lost. I hear the date’s now October 21, and I hear the headless horseman is dying to get into the action. Enough about the apocalypse though.

My mother and I went to see Pirates of the Caribbean: on Stranger Tides yesterday, and we liked it very much. I haven't seen anyone reviewing it on TV, but I can't imagine the reviews are pretty. Since it's a movie about pirates, mermaids Blackbeard, and general works of imagination, therefore it should be panned. I can almost guarantee you without seeing any official reviews that this is their opinion. Not all movies can be the King’s Speech, and not all should be. When it first came out, the critics panned Independence Day, and that made a lot of money. I think to be a movie critic, you must have your imagination removed.

I don't want to give too much away because I don't want to ruin the movie for anyone. Those who've seen the three prior movies will enjoy this one as much as the others, and I think those that haven't seen any previous installments will enjoy this one as well. I don't think I'm giving too much away when I say they're searching for the fountain of youth, and no they don't meet Indiana Jones or his father at the fountain. Another thing I'll tell you is stay until the very end, meaning until the credits are done. That's all I'll say. I forgot to say, Pirates of the Caribbean was also in 3-D, but there were very few scenes that I could imagine being enhanced by 3-D. We saw it in normal mode, and that was fine by me.

I also rented Tron Legacy a month or so ago, and that was excellent as well. How it was described, I thought there'd be a greater difference between the real world and the world of Tron. When they were in Tron, everything was outlined in light, and that to me seemed to be the only difference. Tron is a world that exists in computers, and is reached by stepping through a door from our world to that one. For being such an odd concept, it turned out to be a pretty good movie. It's not necessary to have seen the previous movie, since I didn't. I still thoroughly enjoyed it.

When it came out, a few months ago, we went to see The Conspirator. This is a movie about the woman charged in the conspiracy to kill President Lincoln. It too was a good movie, and I think it paints an accurate portrait of the times.

The rapture

Happy doomsday everyone. I've only noticed one effect of doomsday so far, I've gone blind. Oh wait! I was blind anyway, nevermind. I'll check back in tomorrow, but for now over and out.

Windows 7

I recently got a new computer from Dell because some of Dragon’s higher commands were disabled. They were by no means critical in nature, but I would’ve liked to see how they worked. I don’t have a money tree, so I couldn’t afford a top of the line computer. I looked in the Dell outlet store, and got an Inspiron 570. I got Windows 7 because unlike Windows Vista, I heard good things about the current windows operating system.

I must say it works really well, and the accessibility options were fairly easy to setup. For one thing the magnifier option is right on the start menu, and you can change the level with a simple plus or minus sign. Also, you can choose between a number of views similar to Zoomtext, such as a scrolling magnifier, a docked magnifier that only enlarges part of the screen, and the full screen magnifier which I have on. Next to the views tab is an options menu where you can invert colors, have the magnified view follow the mouse, keyboard, and text insertion point. A number of narration options are also available, but I don’t need them. I’ll look at them at another time, and tell you my readers what I find.

Another feature that I really like is the speech recognition option, and this really is recognition. In Windows XP you could only dictate documents, and if you chose to do that then you might as well type the documents, it would go faster. With Windows 7 you can switch between programs, open programs, and dictate documents with a fair degree of accuracy. One has to set up the microphone, and then train it. If it’s a quality program, then it is worth the time.

I also setup my new computer, and put the other one in Mark’s old room. They were fairly easy to set up, even though I did most things by feel. I plugged everything into the surge protector I also purchased a monitor, and the other computer went active too. The only annoying part involved hooking up the cable running from the back of the monitor to the computer.

In the next entry, I’ll elucidate more of what I did in the previous two months.