Remote viewing and control of Apple products

Technology to the rescue again, and I'm impressed this time. I have always been a Windows man, I got used to the plethora of utilities and programs readily available everywhere for just about every need you might have, and with Dragon being the best, and unfortunately, somewhat only full service voice program that totally controls the operating system including mouse functions and pressing keys and combinations of keys on the keyboard, in addition to voice dictation, I just never seriously looked at trying Macintosh computers. I have always heard rumors of something called Parallels which supposedly allows you to run the Windows version of things like Dragon, but it never seemed fully baked and totally usable full-time in the Macintosh ecosystem. But, something changed recently where I wanted to give it a go. That thing being iPhone mirroring. I love VNC and other technologies that allow you to operate a different computer or device remotely. Software like this allows me to use my mouse and my voice through Dragon to remotely control other Windows computers on my network, and remotely off-site using things like TeamViewer. However, these things really don't work with Apple products. Even android phones and tablets can be controlled remotely through TeamViewer, with full functionality with the mouse and somewhat with Dragon typing things. Finally, as of late last year sometime, Apple finally enabled screen mirroring and control of iPhones. But, ONLY through Mac machines. Okay, not ideal, but getting somewhere. But how do I operate the Mac without a friend typing and moving the mouse physically for me? I know there are accessibility options to help with some of this stuff, but nothing would match the freedom and ability I have doing it remotely through my Windows machine. I didn't think this was possible. I was wrong. I don't know how long this device has been on the market, but I am pretty salty I am just now finding out about it, and is less than $100. It is called Comet and it is a Remote KVM device. I know, I didn't know what that meant either, but it is a simple box which plugs directly into your router using the included network cable, and features a HDMI input and a USB C port. All you have to do is plug the HDMI output of the Mac into this magic box (included), and attach the included USB C cable to one of the ports on the Mac. That's it, no software, nothing else is needed. No subscription necessary, and all you have to do is load up a browser on any network computer and type in the IP address of the Comet (or the URL provided in the manual) and after creating a simple password the magic happens. Without any fuss or headaches or configuration, whatever the Mac doing, will appear on your browser. Your keyboard and mouse work just like you were there in front of the Mac, and full control just happens. Since it doesn't depend on software of any kind, and simply appears to the remote computer as a display monitor and standard keyboard and mouse, it works in any mode that the Mac is in, even video. Sound is also transferred to the remote computer, and you can even allow your microphone to be used. I don't know how this magic happens, but this gives so much freedom no matter what I want to control. I imagine this would work on any device that has HDMI output, I'm thinking iPhone directly, a Roku streaming box, or maybe even a fire stick, though navigation might be a little tricky. But, through the Mac, I can now control my iPhone using the iPhone mirroring functionality. Technology to the rescue!

My journey from faith to atheism

I might have a unique perspective because I was pretty heavily involved in the church earlier in my life, and my faith had a profound impact on me throughout my later teens up through my early 30's, but now I find myself totally turned off and would categorize myself as an atheist.  Growing up I was very sickly and really struggled with pneumonia and illnesses so I really felt like I was going to live a very short life, and not that great of one.  As soon as I tasted the Manna from heaven and started reading the Bible and learning all I could from Christian teachers, I was hooked.  I moved off to college and quickly joined The Navigators (a college focused ministry at the time) and it helped shape my next entire decade.  After college I got heavily involved with a small local church made friends and led Bible studies and started pursuing other places I could serve.

At the time, for me, my faith seemed to answer the question I thought I was asking in the first portion of my life, namely what is the point of living, especially when life appears to be very short and has the challenges I have, and is there any reason to hope that there is something better than this that awaits me?  My walk with Jesus gave me the comfort of having a purpose in this life, and a promised future beyond this life that will be much better than this one.  I thought that was all I was asking and all I was needing, and for the better part of 15 years, it was enough.

But, I kept living and I seemed to be more getting stable in my ability to avoid bad illnesses and pneumonia.  My life no longer seemed to be ending anytime soon, and I started wanting more with my time here.  I wanted things and prayed for things that my God seemed to be deliberately keeping me from.  Things like a career, a wife, a family, things that other people just naturally fell into.  It took several years, but slowly my faith was starting to wane, especially as I dabbled in some of the fun things this life has to offer, things that were forbidden when a follower of Jesus.  Let's just say I waited until my 30s to really start living and to sow my wild oats and it hasn't ended yet :-)

I have tried off and on throughout the years since to try to recapture and get back into the faith I once held, but my entire being rejects it now, almost like an allergic reaction.  I know all the answers that anyone ever tries to give me, and I have heard nothing new under the sun that piques my interest to dive back into Scripture.  And now, with politics being so intertwined in the mix (which I personally find abhorrent and totally against what Jesus teaches), I am driven further and further away from ever reconsidering where I find myself.

Am I happier now?  Yes and no.  I am lonelier now, I don't have that friend I can talk to at any moment now, and when terrible things happen I don't have an outlet or a connection to something higher than myself that has the power to change things.  I have to rely on myself more and in some ways that gives me agency and focus which are certainly positive traits to have, and it makes me feel good knowing that I can do this on my own.  But which one would I choose if I could just snap my fingers and make it happen?  If I had to be honest, I would probably choose to go back to the faith.  Unfortunately, faith isn't something you can just turn back on, believe me I have tried.

December 31, 2019

On December 31, 2019 I felt a little dread.  I knew deep down that there was no way 2020 was going to be good, comparatively.  See, 2019 was the absolute best year of my memorable life.  I experienced things, learned things, and felt things I thought were too much of a dream to ever come true.  But they did, mostly contained within the 12 months of 2019 (okay, some fell somewhat outside the bounds and actually happened in 2018, but who's counting?), and something was nagging at me as I watched the crowds gather in Times Square and seeing all the hopeful faces looking forward to this magical thought of the 2020 year of our Lord.

When I was young, 10, 20, 30 years in the past, there seemed to be something mesmerizing about the very rounded-sounding 2020 that not just I sensed.  One of my best friends growing up, who had a much more aggressive form of muscular dystrophy than I, felt an even stronger draw as he looked to the future.  He told me, the grandiose dreamer that he was, that he was going to run for president this year.  Unfortunately, he died long before that even became a remote possibility for him, but kudos to him for thinking big.

This year was nuts, there really isn't any other way to describe it.  I'm one of the vulnerable ones for whom this disease, COVID-19, presents a particularly challenging journey for.  I've been through some bad flus which nearly did me in, so in some ways I know even if it grabbed hold of me pretty hard I would have a fighting chance to come out the other side, but this was not particularly the battle I wanted to have at this point in my life.  Thankfully, I have avoided it thus far but oh the crazy way we got to where we are now.  The details are not important save this one thought which I can't stop thinking about.

As a collective whole, the human race, when they were financially and physically able to do so, decided to slow down everything for pretty much the entire year.  This was done in order to attempt to minimize the carnage and death that would befall the "vulnerable" populations of the world had we just went about our business and let the chips fall where they may.  Being one of the "vulnerable" I was very gracious and appreciative of the sacrifice the rest of society was making for me.  As I slowly watched the coronavirus make its way to the US in January and February, I started to venture out less and less and I started to take precautions around the house to prepare for an extended quarantine.  I even contemplated reducing the number of people I rely on to take care of me on a daily basis in order to minimize my risk and potential exposure.  It was early in the 2nd week of March when I feared that we were about to be hit really really hard and I was planning an escape with one of my aides to try to ride it out just with him somewhere in the deep South so I could have more options to not be indoors so much.

Then, the world took an entire left turn I did not expect was possible.  For an illness that did not target babies, and was seemingly easy going on teenagers and anyone under 50 without comorbidities, I honestly did not expect America to take steps anywhere close to what was going on in Italy and Spain.  But, we actually tried, sort of half-assed if you ask any Italian who lived through their quarantine, and for about 4 straight weeks even our federal government was 100% committed to this goal.  So, I stayed put, hunkered down, and did like everyone else, I stayed home.  And I've been home pretty much since then.

But what I can't get out of my mind is the sacrifice that I still feel is being shared amongst the populace in order to still try to protect me.  When states started to buckle, and our president was publicly working against the actual written and discussed goal of his administration (tweeting "Liberate Michigan", as you may recall), I understood the anger and angst of those who just want to run their business and/or spend the night out at the bar with all of their friends.  I selfishly was worried that we would quickly open everything up and I would be back to the starting point of where I was in early March.  

Was that wrong of me?  Haven't these people done enough in order to try to save me?  Could I possibly ask even more of them?  Do I deserve it?  Should perhaps this be the disease to thin out the herd and reduce the population of those who are a financial drain on the system?  Is that my self-loathing and poor self image of myself being an individual with disabilities who doesn't contribute as much, seemingly, to society as some of my peers, or am I just being honest with the way the world has worked for eons and how most pandemics do just that.  We, in this late stage of organized society and evolved thinking where humans feel that we can overcome anything if we just set our minds to it, have tried with all of the strength we've been able to muster to try to control, mitigate, and invent our way out of this, with varying success and lots of visible failures.  But, I get it, people are done, and even though I would like to see us locked down for another 4 months I know it's not realistic.  I feel guilty for even wanting us to do it.

So, to all of human society I say `thank you for trying this hard for me, I greatly appreciate it.  I'm still here on December 31, 2020, so your efforts have succeeded so far.'

Perhaps if we can get our heads out of our asses we can get the vaccinations much faster into the arms of those who desperately need them, and I for one am looking forward to the day when I can get mine.

So, am I more hopeful sitting here on December 31, 2020 than I was 366 days ago?  ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY!

I think we're going to learn the wrong lessons from the Trump presidency

Now that, thankfully, it's all over but for the shouting, it's time to look back and truly observe the strange long journey America just endured.  I want to start with a premise of which I would hope most could agree with: America has many real problems that are not being addressed by our federal government, and whether Democrats or Republicans are in charge, nothing fundamental ever positively changes in the lives of the average citizen.  I'm not talking ideological issues, hot button issues, or conservative/liberal ways of seeing things, but actual concrete problems many of us face which have yet to be addressed by anyone, like good paying desirable jobs, appropriate taxation, infrastructure, fixed roadways, 100 year old water pipes replaced, paid sick leave, quality health care and healthcare coverage that makes sense, good schools, affordable higher education, paid maternity/paternity leave, childcare options, and the promise of being taken care of when we get old.  Sure, each party promises to fix a subset of these concerns each and every election, but when it's their turn to drive, the other side simply blocks every attempt to get anything lasting signed into law.

Washington doesn't work anymore, and the people are growing tired of the dysfunction.

To somewhat answer this angst, felt by many, along comes a political outsider with the name recognition and uncontrollable tongue and twitter fingers to start a revolution.  Very few recognized it for what it was, but once it wiped out every other Republican contender and set its sights on at least making a somewhat favorable showing in the general, more and more concerned citizens started responding to its siren song.  From a disappointedly headlined convention in Cleveland, to some very strange attacks on a war hero from Arizona and some awkward moments with Billy Bush, emerged a force to be reckoned with.  He seemed poised to be in the ideal situation to perhaps tackle some of these real issues since he is his own man and comes in without owing favors to some wealthy aristocrats, without the need to kowtow to politics or getting bogged down with party infighting or ideological hangups.  Even Dave Chapelle, while deeply disappointed in the person America chose to represent us to the world, had a sense that at least the opportunity was there for him to shake things up, potentially for the good.  Most others on the left couldn't even give him that much, but no matter because some of them would certainly come around if the outcome Trump was seeking turned out to be a beneficial lifting of all Americans.

Sadly, this was not meant to be.  He doubled down on the misogyny, the racist dog whistles, the immigrant bashing, and the laserlike focus on enriching himself and his rich friends.  And then the presidency went off the rails.

Fast forward to the fall of 2017.  With much more hyperbole on both sides, still the federal government somewhat worked like normal with each side giving and taking just enough to, in their minds, position their party for gains in the midterms.  But when it came to passing a funding resolution to pay for the first real budget put forth by the Republican majority, something started to buckle and a disturbance in the force was felt across this great land.  By all accounts, the budget that passed earlier was a gift to corporate America, and enshrined tax cuts for the wealthy while slashing ordinary deductions middle-class Americans were accustomed to.  It also increased the budget for the military while cutting programs geared toward the poor, but importantly didn't include any earmarked funds for Trump's border wall, and the fight for that was teed up and ready to go.

The way I remember it is this: after months of Trump bashing illegals, Mexicans, and pretty much every other brown person not born and raised in the states (and even some who were), the question of what to do about The Dreamers was forefront on many political minds.  Trump decided that they weren't real Americans and should be classified with all the other illegals to potentially be deported.  It was assumed Obama fixed this problem with the DACA executive action, but the administration found a way to get it overturned in federal court.  All of this is in the minds of the Democrats when the negotiations start, and the conventional wisdom forced them to make a stand to prove to the Latino community that their concerns are front and center in the Democratic Party (hoping, of course, for their great support in the upcoming midterms and 2020 election).  Certainly, "The Wall" had to be the big sticking point for the Latino community, right?  If the Democrats fold and provide any funds for this "racist symbol" they will lose not only all of their support, but also the super-woke who were screaming for nothing but Full-Resistance.

So, it happened.  The fateful moment from which there was no coming back from.  Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer put their foot down and demanded an entire litany of things while at the same time giving $0 to go towards Trump's Wall.  There was a lot of back-and-forth and complaints on both sides that neither side was playing fair… I believe The Democrats should have made a large deal and dangled in front of Trump a reasonable amount towards his border wall.  Doing so, I feel that they could have exacted some great concessions that would have been super beneficial (oh, I don't know, paid sick leave for all workers, actual progress on legislation to fix The Dreamer situation for good, migrant worker legislation which would benefit companies and workers, etc.), and they easily could have proven to Trump that they were worth dealing with.  I truly feel that all Trump wanted was something to hang his hat on and to show to his followers that he is the dealmaker they elected him to be, and if the Democrats were the ones to make this dream come true for him I truly believe they would have found a more willing partner to at least attempt to tackle some other things in the future that the majority of Americans could agree were real problems.

But, the Democrats refused, and they shut the government down for over a month.  They actually won this battle, because Trump eventually relented on most of the sticking points and nothing was included in the CR for "The Wall".  But the die was cast.  In the mind of Trump, it was over.  Never again would he even consider doing a deal with the Democrats in any fashion.  From that point on the Democrats were even bigger enemies than before, enemies of the state, and not worthy to even talk to, or be allowed to win any future elections.

I contend that Trump was not ideologically tied to what the Republicans were selling, but just that it fit his particular narrative that he was preaching at the time.  He found a forgotten group of people and he made himself their hero, and now those people form the backbone of the new Republican Party.  For the record, after he got in office I believe he could have been swayed away from taking the country for such a hard right turn.  I still feel he had the potential to not become the president who just focused solely on dividing all of us; giving to his diehard supporters exactly what they wanted all of the time in the mistaken hope that he would get reelected.

It's hard to know how this would have played out and who would have benefited politically from the deal I penned above, but it's hard to see how any alternate agreement would have resulted in an even more contentious future than where we currently find ourselves.  Just look at what comes next in 2018, 2019, and 2020 in our timeline.  Where can we even begin to imagine how things could have turned out worse?

And on top of it all, Trump even loses his reelection, so it didn't even work out for him.  I guess you can say it eventually-sort-of worked out for the Democrats politically since they now hold 2/3 of the executive and legislature, but at what cost to our political discourse, all of the unfixed problems, and at the human cost and the lives lost with all the fighting over COVID?  Surely if we had a more functioning federal government when the pandemic hit would we now be in this dire of a situation with over 1/4 million Americans dead and a very disturbing looking December and January looming in front of us?

Which leads me to Joe, good old drama-free sleepy Joe.  Joe is the right man at the right time to rebuild the important parts of government that Trump took a flamethrower to, the EPA, the FBI, the civilian leadership of the military, the DOJ, and to a limited extent the CDC and the FDA.  It is important to reestablish the partisan-free nature of many of these civilian jobs, and to "build back better" some of the fundamental democratic ideals this last group barely paid lip service to.

However, is Joe the right man (or woman, or other non-binary gendered person) at the right time to actually address the fundamental problems America is facing?  Do we want to just get back to the way things used to be, or should we take a real assessment of where we find ourselves and start to steer this ship the right way?

For example, after the White House is fumigated can we have a serious adult conversation about our dealings with other countries in the world?  We can't pretend that everything Trump did on the international playing field was wrong for America.  Getting NATO members to chip in some more funds to pay their fair share, ending the Isis threat for good, convincing Mexico to take the illegal border crossings seriously, stopping the caravans from Central America, somehow convincing some Middle Eastern countries to normalize relations with Israel, using the threat of tariffs against enemies and friends as a penalty to force a more favorable deal, and like it or not North Korea and Iran are certainly more intimidated against messing with us or our friends.  Now, what it cost us diplomatically to achieve some of these things, I'm sure we will be upset about when we find out, but I don't think it is a good wise move to try to turn all of these things back to where they were in 2016.  Surely we lost some time and some major influence in the affairs of the world, especially looking at the moves China and Russia made during Trump's distracted phase, but just trying to get us back to the beginning shouldn't be the goal.  Yes, we should certainly sign the Paris Climate Agreement, but dealing with Iran and North Korea will require some new thinking.  And don't even get me started on Russia.

Domestically, all Trump really did for us was to make it obvious what our real problems are.  He didn't make much progress to bring back the factory jobs, and his tax cuts certainly didn't do all that much for the average family.  Big business sure loved him and their record profits are quite visible in the nonstop running up of the stock market over these last 4 years.  This, however, simply made the rich richer and didn't do all that much for the rest of us.  The cost of healthcare, childcare, rent, all kept going up and up and wages were just barely starting to creep up before Covid.  People still had to work multiple jobs just to make it, and a higher percentage of the population relied on government programs (like SNAP or Medicaid) just to get by.  We weren't being led into some magical future where jobs were lucrative and plentiful no matter how much the Republicans wish it to be true.

But, what can we learn from the Trump years that will help us in 2021, 2022, and beyond?  Were there any domestic successes where certain populations are now excelling where they once weren't?  Are certain industries returning to American shores due to the policies of the last 4 years?  If so, these should be encouraged to continue and more runway given if they need more assistance to grow.

My point is this: Trump came to Washington to, supposedly, drain the swamp.  What he meant by that, we can only imagine, but surely each one of us recognizes a certain part of the federal government that we totally think is either useless or actively working against the ideals that we want America to be about.  For us, that is the swamp that needs drained, and I think if certain parts were drained appropriately by Trump, let's not waste our time filling it back up when we don't need it or want it.  I fear Joe may have a tendency to want to do just that.

Interstellar (2014) Time Travel

I just came back from the multiplex seeing Interstellar starring Matthew McConaughey, and I was very pleased with the science portrayed in the movie.  For statistical purposes, I am a Christopher Nolan fan and I appreciate most of the movies he makes.  From a pure ratings standpoint, I give it an 8 out of 10, with points off only for some unnecessary heavy-handed drama toward the end which could have been presented in a more natural way IMO.

Beware, spoiler alert.  I am going to attempt to explain my thoughts on a time travel issue  essential to the plot of this movie, so please don't continue reading if you haven't seen it yet (are excited to do so).  If you couldn't give a shit less about seeing it and are just hard up for some meandering thoughts about time-travel paradox resolutions, please continue on since my blog could certainly use some extra views.

Interstellar deals with messages through time, and it falls prey to the classic chicken & egg time-travel paradox most similar-type movies have limited ability to handle.  For instance, if a message is received from a "future" that turns out to be the sole cause for that "future" to even be possible, how did this particular "future" come into existence without the all-important message being received in the original timeline?  In Interstellar, Matthew McConaughey is led to a secret NASA mission to save humankind by certain binary messages he receives in his daughter's bedroom one dust-stormy day.  By him receiving these messages, he is able to do what he needs to do to be in a position to send back an important encoded message to his grown up daughter some 30 years later.  The problem: future Matthew is the one that sends the binary message to original Matthew.  If future Matthew doesn't exist or get there, original Matthew doesn't go to NASA and all of humanity is lost it seems.

This is a problem for a lot of viewers, I am finding out.  However, I believe I found a way for some of it to make more sense (at least in my mind) after pondering it for a few hours, so please let me explain.  We are told in the movie about 2 plans to save humankind, Plan A & Plan B.  Plan A is for current humans to solve a theoretical physics problem with time & gravity to build O’Neill Cylinder-inspired spaceships to take a significant portion of humans off our dying world and hopefully transplant them (eventually) on a Type-M planet in some other galaxy accessible through a newly-discovered wormhole.  Plan B is to simply continue the human race by sending embryos through the wormhole (with a caretaker) to start a colony on an agreeable planet and give up any rescue-plan for earthbound humans.  At the end of the movie (with lots and lots of heavy-handed drama thrown in for good measure), we thankfully find out both Plans worked, it seems, only because future-humans made it possible for the wormhole to exist and for Matthew to find a way to send the all-important messages back through time to himself & his daughter.

I concede that future-humans are necessary for the blackhole "tesseract" Matthew is able to use to send messages through time using gravity waves, as that is the only thing that makes sense.  My contention is that the wormhole was not future-human created and just appeared at a fortuitous time through natural or otherworldly means completely unrelated to Earth's current food predicament.

Ignoring the messages-through-time alternative timeline which we watched over a course of 3 freaking hours, the "original" timeline must have gone like this: Plan B succeeds completely without Matthew McConaughey flying the ship.  Plan A fails with everyone on earth dying.  Remember, they were going to launch anyway even before they met Matthew.  Future-human people (from Plan B) eventually figure out the extra dimensions and the possibility of sending messages through time using gravity waves, so a subset of them create the blackhole "tesseract" to enable a potential human to do this very thing Matthew does in the movie.  They probably had no idea whether it would ever be used or even work, but perhaps they heard about original Earth and Plan A and perhaps some of them wondered if it would be possible to, perhaps at this future point, save some original humans.

Unfortunately, this doesn't solve the future Matthew problem, but perhaps this can be one step closer to having this movie makes more sense.  Thoughts anyone?

Google Wallet Fail

Okay, I ordered one of them new fandangled Google Wallet physical "debit" cards because I wanted to look cool.

It arrived in the mail about 10 days later, and I promptly transferred some money to it from a prepaid VISA rebate card I just received from a drunken PSU purchase I made several months back at Newegg.  I set my purchasing PIN on the Google Wallet website and I went forth into the actual world to convert my virtual Google money into physical goods at the nearest Costco.

Silly me: I had this mistaken belief that since Google is one of the most forefront technologically advanced companies this world has ever known, surely my upcoming transaction at the cash register would go off without a hitch.  Nope, my shiny new Google Wallet physical card is unreadable and the purchase failed.   Of course, the credit card terminal had no problem reading my PNC debit card, but this was no way to impress the cashier.

I left dejected, only to try later that night at a bar.   The cool bartender took my fancy order of Grey Goose & Cranberry and I promptly handed him my Google Wallet card.  He was so impressed, told me this is the first one he's ever seen, and went to swipe my card.  FAIL again.  I curse Google under my breath, and ask the bartender to type in the entire card number to try to process the purchase that way.  Success, but wow what disappointment...

I know the problem: for some reason my magnetic stripe on my new card has lost its magnetism.  Okay, simple enough, I need to cancel the card and order a new one.  Looking on the Google wallet website, I easily find the "Cancel Card" option but it's silent on whether I can easily order a new one after doing so.  So, I call a friendly Google Wallet representative, (855) 492-5538 for those who may be wondering, and I expect to be greeted with the most knowledgeable technologically astute representative of all time.  Silly me: wrong again.  She barely understood the English language (understandable), she wouldn't listen to my clear description of the problem with the magnetic stripe, kept trying to solve a problem I wasn't having, and refused to transfer me to her supervisor when I started to get irate.

During an irritatingly long 5 minutes on hold, she must have finally talked to someone nearby who understood how credit card terminals worked, and told me to cancel the card online and I would then immediately be given the chance to order a new one.  Sheesh!  Why couldn't the website have just told me this to begin with?

Google Glass and the future of technology

Exciting days are ahead for individuals with mobility impairments, especially those who have little use of their hands or arms.  Google is in its final stages of releasing the most technologically advanced augmented-reality accessory this world has ever seen.  It is called Google Glass; a wearable computer that you look through with your right eye that interacts with you and the world around you.

For starters, it will be voice activated to provide information on what you are looking at, it will photograph or record video on your audible command, it will let you stay connected to your social networks all without touching your phone, and it will (most likely) provide a voice-enabled interface to your cell phone to make/receive calls, video calls, text messages, and emails.

This is a game changer, even with the estimated $1500 price tag.  On top of that, Google is going to open up a development platform for people to create their own uses (apps) for this awesome technology.  One project is already underway to use Glass's (expected) eye tracking capability to accelerate and steer an electric wheelchair.  For those of us who have difficulty driving our wheelchairs with muscles that don't work very well, the future looks bright as technology comes to the rescue again.

I encourage you to check out the project on Indiegogo to watch its development and possibly contribute to its success.

Disabled Advantage

According to a recent New York Times article, some people are under the impression that reasonable accommodations, made for people with disabilities to compete in sports  alongside able-bodied competitors, can actually give that disabled individual an unfair advantage.

I have a physical disability and use an electric wheelchair, yet I compete every week in a USBC-Sanctioned bowling league with my team. About five years ago the USBC decided to look into the issue of accommodations for wheelchair users, and to make a set of rules to guarantee the right of individuals with disabilities to compete in bowling leagues and tournaments.

It used to be illegal to propel a bowling ball using anything but your hand, but now the use of rails (stationary, or mounted directly on wheelchairs) or other mechanical aides are allowed. However, just because there is a rule protecting my right, this doesn't necessarily preclude issues I may have with other bowlers who may feel that I have an advantage propelling my ball with my wheelchair instead of my arm.

What I have found is that just about everyone is initially thrilled and encouraging when I roll up onto the lanes with my team and bowl and participate in the activity. However, let's not forget that this is a competitive sport… and when I got good enough to start influencing the skill of my team, and started excelling, some of those same people started more than a few fights claiming that I had an unfair advantage. I have heard accusations of not having to deal with approach stickiness, grip problems, release inconsistencies, and lots of other complaints. However, from my vantage point, able-bodied bowlers still have the advantage because they don't need to deal with wheelchair motor jerkiness, inability to adjust rotation or ball speed or loft, or a myriad of other difficulties I have had to overcome.

When I rolled a 246, was it harder or easier for me to do so than an able-bodied bowler?

BlueAnt S4 to the Rescue?

On my continuing journey looking for the perfect cell-phone system for someone who can't use his/her fingers, my stop today takes me to the BlueAnt S4. As I mentioned in a previous post, I require a truly hands-free solution to make and receive calls since God chose to make my life just that much more interesting.  Anyway, as you may recall, I have tried several voice-triggered devices that work in conjunction with a cell-phone, like the DriveBlue and the Moshi Bluetooth speakerphone, but I always felt that I still hadn't found what I was looking for...

I still feel that way, even after trying the BlueAnt S4, but at least I know what I want now.  The BlueAnt feels like the more refined older brother of that bitch Moshi. He has a deep manly voice, and he sounds a little stern ordering me to "Say a Command" when I utter the magic words, "BlueAnt Speak to Me".  Mr. BlueAnt is very similar to Ms. Moshi in many ways, but he seems to be more specifically designed for today's smartphones and refuses to even pair with my old Sony Ericsson T637. On top of that, BlueAnt is not designed to dial any of the contacts directly... and he makes your smartphone handle all of the heavy lifting to figure out if you want to call your friend Steve. I understood this from the start, and set out to find the correct smartphone to pair him with to make my life easiest. After extensive research, and hours upon hours of reading blog posts and Amazon reviews, I settled on the original Motorola Droid RAZR. See, I'm not satisfied with just making and receiving calls... I'm always looking for the most adaptable solution to needs (or wants) I may have in the future, and the RAZR seemed like a good candidate. Since my fingers don't work to slide/tap/long-press/pinch/flick whatever images or words appear on the magic glass-like screen, I needed a phone that would give me the option of using an alternative input device to interact with it. For the longest time, no elegant solution existed for the smartphones on the market... until EasyBlue... a little Bluetooth dongle for the PC that pairs correctly with most Android 3.2 or higher devices, and enables the (mostly) full control of the phone using the mouse/keyboard (yes, and even voice software like Dragon NaturallySpeaking) you already own (check out this YouTube video for a great demonstration). I want to try to focus on the BlueAnt for now, so I won't get into all the particulars of the EasyBlue or the RAZR, but I will say that the path I went down works the best for me at this point and the voice commands built into the RAZR work pretty darn good (more details below). Sure, I wish I could've gone with the iPhone 5, but Apple (to this day) refuses to allow a Bluetooth mouse to interface with its iOS (even through EasyBlue) and I am dependent on this technology to work with my phone in certain situations. I am a fan of Android however, and I love the open-source feel to all of it, but man... Siri would have been nice.

Anyway, back to BlueAnt... first impression is that he is much bigger than I thought he was going to be, and heavier. This wouldn't be a problem if I planned on using him on my visor in my car, but since my voice is weak I still need him pretty close to my mouth and hanging him on my shirt looks extremely goofy. Fortunately, I quickly discovered that the BlueAnt can hear me just fine, and I am pleased to report that BlueAnt uses a microphone-array setup that filters out background noises and amplifies my voice better than anything I have ever used. He understands almost all of my commands, and when I am speaking commands to the RAZR to dial Steve (for instance), I've had very good results. On top of this, everyone I call is reporting that (for once) they can hear me loud and clear. This has allowed me to take him off on the front of my shirt (when I go out) and hide him inside my shirt pocket... the quality is ever so slightly diminished, but voice commands and phone calls work almost just as good so I am happy. I still wish that there was an external microphone option so I could mount him permanently on my wheelchair somewhere, but what are you going to do?

Pairing him with my RAZR presented no problems, and all of my phone book contacts were automatically transferred into BlueAnt. When a call comes in he will announce either the name of the caller (weirdly in a female text-to-voice kinda way) or the phone number (in his voice), and will then ask if I want to "answer or ignore". As long as the choice is made fairly quickly, these voice commands work wonderfully. Unfortunately, there is still no way to hang up the call by voice, and I miss that feature every-single-freaking-day and wish someone would bring it back. When not on a call, BlueAnt is always listening for his command phrase, "BlueAnt Speak to Me" and he is very quick to respond when that exact phrase is spoken anywhere near him... and thankfully, he almost never false-triggers because of the complicated phrase. Some users have complained about this in their review of the S4, but I am happy he doesn't go off every time I sigh (like Moshi did). He also hasn't locked up on me yet, and has survived a drop to the floor already. He will last almost 2 full days between charges (I leave him on day & night) and the speaker quality is excellent. However I hate the touch-sensitive buttons on the front for volume & trigger... they are not responsive when you really need to use them, but they will react like crazy when someone is trying to slide him into my pocket or put him on the charger.

After triggered with his command phrase, he will ask you to "Say a Command" and he will respond if you ask him to "check battery" or "call back" the last incoming call or "redial" the last outgoing call or "cancel" if you changed your mind. He will also allow you to "pair" him with more than one phone simultaneously or adjust the "microphone sensitivity" or to turn on/off the "LED lights". He also will directly dial Bing-411 using the "favorites" command and then a certain service like "weather" or "news". If you forget the commands, you can always ask "What Can I Say" and he will quickly spew off everything he knows.

Of course, it would have been nice if he was able to directly dial your contacts by saying "call Steve at home", but alas he cannot. To accomplish that goal, you must say "Phone Command", and BlueAnt will take way too much time by saying "activating the built in voice commands on the connected phone"... and will then hand you over to your phone's internal voice command options. The RAZR has a pleasant female voice, and she will first tell me to "please wait", then she will ask me to "Please Say a Command". The most useful commands I have found, strictly using my voice, start with "Call" then the name of one of my contacts like "Steve Kelly". I can follow it up with a certain phone, like "Mobile 1" or "Home 1" or I can wait till my female RAZR voice confirms and dials or asks me which phone. If she wasn't sure what contact I wanted to call, she will ask "Did You Say..." and wait for confirmation after saying a name. Otherwise, I am instantly connected. I discovered, quite happily, that she can also directly dial any phone number I say aloud, so a command of "Call 614 555 1212" will get a confirmation from you (with a few alternatives of what she thought she heard, if you answer in the negative) and then a dial out of the number you spoke. I love this feature, and I won't be dependent on only calling people/businesses I have already pre-programmed in my phone. Other useful commands I have discovered include "check battery" and "check time".

Of course, I have a wish-list of other things I could do entirely by voice... hanging up by voice is on the top of that list, speaking dial-tones to be able to select "3" when prompted by some automated answering service sure would be awesome, and sending/receiving text messages completely by voice prompts would be great as well... which leads me to a thought that I perhaps chose the wrong phone for BlueAnt. I have tried several different Android apps which supposedly allow you to receive/send text messages directly by voice, but none of them seem to work through BlueAnt. I don't know if it is a specific BlueAnt communication issue, or a problem with the RAZR not tying the voice prompts correctly in the Bluetooth stack to the BlueAnt microphone, but something isn't working. The best I can do is to run the official BlueAnt android app that will (sometimes) read out incoming text messages over the speaker. That is something, but after seeing some examples of how Siri can interactively prompt you to respond to text messages entirely by voice, I am envious. There is a review of the S4 on Amazon which seems to indicate that BlueAnt works well with Windows Phones using version 7.5 (Mango) that also have the type of built-in voice texting reply prompting that I want... look at this YouTube video to see what I mean. Fortunately, I'm not on a contract with Verizon so I may get the chance to try BlueAnt on a Windows Phone someday... and I sure hope it works like it looks like it does.

Anyway, I am mostly satisfied with my new cell-phone solution. At least I feel like I'm living in the 21st century now and not tied down to an old T637 candy-bar style phone anymore. I wish I could do more things by voice directly on my RAZR, but thankfully the world seems to be heading in that direction.

Obama the Lightning Rod

My sister came in town the other day, and refused to go with me to a Barack Obama rally that was happening in downtown Columbus. This led to an interesting discussion that gave me a slightly better insight to where this rage toward Obama is coming from on the right. It's still incredibly fuzzy, and I wholeheartedly disagree with their position, but at least I kind of have a tiny little bit better underst... oh hell, who am I kidding?

My sister Stephanie's highly paraphrased quote on Obama: he's the most socialist, food stamp making, Israel hating president ever... she basically said she hates the man (which, coming from a Christian is illuminating). When I confronted her with similar comparisons to Clinton, Bush (food stamps, marginal tax rate, etc.), she quickly dived into a different-reality-based reason: the end times are being ushered in faster with him as president, and her facts come from her relationship with God more than anything else... She is especially troubled with Obama's stance that {though we still support them *mostly* unconditionally} Israel needs to work with others in the region and learn to get along with them.

We {me & her} cannot agree even on what the *facts* are, because we are interpreting things from different beginning points. At that point I didn't know where to go. The bubble that Bill Maher talks about, I better understand now... it isn't a conscious plot to lie to others, but these people truly have a different worldview that isn't based on rationality. It is based on a faith that something *other* is better, and more correct, than what we see around us... that *other* thing can be family values, religious experience, societal pressures, etc., that are much more likely to improve {in their mind} if Obama isn't in the White House. He is the lightning rod for their rage about America and what its citizens and society have become {Internet porn watching, food stamp receiving, single parent gay activists}. And untruthfulness, dishonesty, and irrationality {when talking about these things} are common tactics... Because the end {getting Obama out of the White House} will justify the means to them.

Fuck the Olympics

The Olympics is a celebration of what a physical body is capable of. I have Spinal Muscular Atrophy, which is a degenerative motor neuron disease, and all it is good for is TAKING AWAY everything that the physical body is capable of doing. So, I am an expert at what the physical body is UNABLE to do... I can't walk, I can't speak loudly, I can't reach out and touch anyone, I can't feed myself, and I can't express many outwardly physical emotions.

As I'm watching the opening ceremony tonight of the 2012 Summer Olympics, all I'm reminded of is the millions of people around the world who are physically unable to display any type of grace, expression, or excitement BECAUSE of their physical disability. Sure, there is a segment of the Olympics that occurs after the regular games (the Paralympics... typically unaired on national television, of course) that includes those with physical impairments, but it is still focused on what a person is physically capable of doing.

I am physically capable of moving one finger to drive my electric wheelchair, and I'm physically capable of speaking well enough for a software program to convert my speech into text. Where it is the celebration for what I am physically capable of doing? Who is TiVoing the program where my physical abilities are expressed and shared with the world?

Am I bitter? Perhaps... I must admit that I have been drinking tonight... but this does trouble me. In a world where it seems that the only thing that matters is what one is physically able to do, I wonder where I fit in. Sure, some of these thoughts tonight are probably a result of me being single... and the fact that I am constantly reminded of how difficult it is to attract a mate without the ability to reach out and touch... but it is there.

I apologize for the negativity tonight... wait, no I don't... fuck that... this is what I'm feeling.... I hope you enjoy the 2012 Summer Olympics, as I'm having a hard time doing so.

Voice-Activated Devices

My disability has made it difficult, or nearly impossible, to push the simplest or softest of buttons. 10 years ago I could feed myself, pick away on a standard keyboard, play my PlayStation 2, push my cell phone keypad buttons, turn on the radio, and use a well designed remote control. Today, I can't do any of those things because Spinal Muscular Atrophy is a cruel bitch.

But, technology to the rescue, at least for some of those things. The fewer things I can do with my fingers, the more things I seem to be able to do with my voice. When I first started seeing these gadgets on the market, I made it a point to try as many of them as I could afford. Please note: I'm going to provide links to all the devices I mention, but these are not paid or sponsored in anyway… I just like to be helpful.

Today, I'm going to focus on cell phones because I found it the most useful of voice-controllable devices. Outside of a computer, a cell phone will give the most bang for the buck when it comes to freedom and independence… as long as it can be used independently without help from anyone. In future postings, I will be sharing about remote controls, radios, alarm clocks, lamps, and tons of other devices. Thankfully, the list is expanding each and every year.

In my search for voice-controllable cell phones, I quickly discovered a major problem. Sure, while some interesting gadgets were starting to appear in the consumer marketplace, almost all of them required some type of physical activity on the users part to put the phone into "listen" mode. To this day I don't understand why someone would want to push a button on their cell phone just to then ask their cell phone to call Steve. Why not just push the button on the phone that calls Steve directly? This type of "voice control" doesn't interest me and can't help me because if I can push one button, I can probably push all of them.

But sometime in the year 2000 I found it. A fancy new Qualcomm QCP-2760 cell phone through Sprint. The phone itself was unremarkable by itself and the buttons were really difficult to push, but Kyocera sold a car speakerphone kit specifically for that model that interacted with it in some magical way that promised total dialing control just by talking to it. My dad & brother helped me wire it to my 12-volt wheelchair batteries, and after clipping the "visor" microphone to my shirt lapel I turned it on. After programming keywords, contacts, numbers, and other stuff it asked me to say, I tried it out. It truly was "always listening" for a trigger word and it was quite responsive with a quality sound on both ends. It could dial all of my contacts, and it could dial any number I needed just by me saying the numbers out loud. Incoming calls were not announced by name or number, unfortunately, and I discovered quickly that the voice "answer/don't answer" options didn't really work. I was forced to put my phone in auto-answer mode and it just answered every call no matter where I was. Occasionally, it would lock up and quit responding but a simple on/off always took care of it. Looking back, a lot of thought was put into its design and though it has its quirks and problems, it has not been topped yet feature-wise in my opinion. Firstly, the trigger word was required to be heard twice within 2 seconds of each other… what an innovative idea. Today I'm using a Moshi Bluetooth Speakerphone (more on that later) and it will activate several times per hour just by the TV or by me sighing (I still can't figure out how a sigh sounds like "Hello Moshi", but I digress). For activation by voice, the Kyocera speakerphone would beep when it heard the "magic" word/phrase that you chose when you first programmed it… then, if it heard it again within a very short time it would start the voice dialing prompts. There were a few false calls here or there I made accidentally, but otherwise I felt this was a very good system. The obvious drawback (besides being speakerphone-only) is how bulky the entire kit was, and the difficulty for most people to wire it to their wheelchairs. And, while using it, you are stuck with the Sprint Network and that 1 particular phone. It served me well, however, for 4-5 years but I knew I had to keep looking for its inevitable replacement.

The day finally arrived, I believe sometime around 2005… I found a cell phone and speakerphone option that was much simpler in its design and implementation. The Sony-Ericsson T637 through Cingular (now AT&T) and the DriveBlue Speakerphone made by the French company Parrot. Without any wires to the phone, the DriveBlue could dial and receive calls entirely by voice. A wired microphone was still used, but the speakerphone itself was a 1-piece 12-volt plug-in gadget that was amazing in its simplicity compared to the Kyocera kit. And, since it didn't need wired to the cell phone it seemed too good to be true. Bluetooth was in its infancy, and the companies that included it as an option on their cell phones all seemed to have a different idea on what protocols and handshaking modes to implement. Because of that, the DriveBlue had to be paired with just the right phone to take advantage of everything it could do. The Sony-Ericsson T6xx series along with 1-2 others were the only cell phones that the DriveBlue could interact fully with. Having one of these phones paired with it allowed it to activate voice dialing by using the "magic word" instead of pressing a button.

Now, the Sony-Ericsson T637 was special in itself. To this day, it is only one of a handful of phones that had a built-in "magic word" voice dialing option. In a pinch, with a headset, you can dial the T637 without any other kit or speakerphone. Unfortunately, the programming is poorly done and you only get a weird series of beeps, sounds, and tones to indicate what your voice is being interpreted as. There is no confirmation on who you are dialing or where you are in the prompting modes. Answering is only possible using auto-answer or pressing a button. But, voice dialing with a "magic word" is there inside my phone, so I still felt good about it :-)

However, I was much more satisfied using it in combo with the DriveBlue. Bluetooth pairing was simple enough, and it quickly copied over my phonebook. A DriveBlue application appeared in my Bluetooth menu on my phone, and going in there allows complete configuration and programming of the keywords and names of all your contacts. Unlike the Kyocera kit, this one announces incoming calls by name (if they are in your programmed contacts), but it still won't announce the number for unknown callers. The "magic word" was needed to be heard only once for the voice prompts to start, so I had to make it a very weird complicated 3-tone phrase to stop it from activating all of the time. It still did, but that was the best I could come up with. The voice dialing prompts were basic, but effective, and allowed different numbers for each contact to be dialed (home, office, and cellular), but unlike the Kyocera kit it cannot dial a non-programmed number. It would rarely lock up, and accuracy was pretty spot-on. One great feature not repeated with any other device was the ability to hang-up using only your voice while on a call. Every other device required me to wait until the other side disconnected (and that can be several minutes if the call went to voicemail). During the call, the DriveBlue listened for the "hangup" magic word and would respond immediately. Unfortunately, I did lose more than a few calls due to inaccurate interpretation, but I love that feature and miss it every day. Sound quality was, however, poor compared to the Kyocera as it sounded very tinny and crackly with the T637, and the people I called said it didn't sound as clear either. The build quality was suspect as well and the microphone wouldn't work unless it was pulled out of the socket ever-so-slightly. Again, to make it work on a wheelchair you still need to wire a 12-volt cigarette lighter socket to the batteries, but this is a much simpler modification for a friend to do. Parrot quickly released version 2 of the DriveBlue and called it the DriveBlue + and they promised better sound, better compatibility, and a better microphone. I upgraded when I could, and found the build quality was better with the microphone connection but not with the microphone itself. Sound was only slightly improved for me, but this one seemed to lock up several times per week.

I bought several original kits, and several + kits and they lasted me until almost all of the microphones broke. Replacements are difficult to find, and they quit making the DriveBlue sometime in 2008. You still see the occasional original kit available on eBay, but they are getting rather rare. Parrot later produced one additional car kit that included the "magic word" option, but it was a complete fail. With the EasyDrive, Parrot not only did away with the external microphone, but they made the voice prompting much more complicated and not as responsive. I didn't feel like mounting something so big so close to my mouth anyway, so I quickly sold it on eBay before it lost its resale value.

Well, now I'm using the Moshi Bluetooth Speakerphone. Moshi is a company that sells various items that are entirely voice-controlled, and for a little while in 2009-2010 they made a cell phone speakerphone meant for a car visor. It is completely self-contained, charges with USB, and is always listening. It works out of the box with most Bluetooth phones, and does a fair job doing what it was designed to do. Unfortunately, it seems a little too simple and/or dumbed down for the general population and doesn't allow any customizing or programming your own voice for better recognition. The microphone isn't sensitive enough for my weak voice, and everyone complains they can't hear me very well. On my end, the sound is a massive improvement over the DriveBlue, and quality wise Moshi is pretty solid and has survived several large falls to the floor. To activate voice dialing, you must say "Hello Moshi" then one of several pre-programmed key words. You can't directly program your contacts and dial them by voice, but a simplified version of "call favorite 3" or "redial" is used. Incoming calls at least announce a text to speech version of the contacts name, or the number (finally), and the incoming options of "answer/ignore" work flawlessly. It does lock up sometimes, but no worse than anything else. One thing Moshi can do is to interact directly with the voice-control/command options on your cell phone. By first saying "Hello Moshi", then saying "Phone Command", you are then able to interact directly with your particular cell phone's built-in voice options (play a track, call Steve at work, etc.). Moshi has been a good intermediate step, but the major drawback for me, besides the microphone quality, is the physical size/shape and lack of an external microphone jack. Since I speak quietly, to have any chance of anyone hearing me I wear it on my shirt collar. It looks a little goofy, I've been told.

The future awaits, but my next attempt will be the BlueAnt S4. It is the only "magic word" enabled cell phone option (that I am aware of) that hasn't been discontinued. It is very similar in all respects to the Moshi, except for 3 very specific differences. #1: there are no favorites it can directly dial (Moshi at least had 6); you must use the "phone command" option to call anyone, #2: there is an android app that interacts directly with the BlueAnt that supposedly allows you to listen to and respond to text messages completely by voice, and #3: it can stream music from your phone. I just bought one, and once I have the chance to try it out, I'll post the results. But, I may just skip android and try it with the iPhone 4s and Siri to see what I can do just by talking :-)

Open Letter to my Federal Representatives

Hello,

I just wanted to contact you to share my opinion on the health care debate. For statistical reasons, I'm 39, permanently disabled due to SMA, use an electric wheelchair full-time, unable to find work, dependent on SSDI, Medicaid, and Medicare.

I support comprehensive health care reform. I believe it is the moral thing to do today. I am not religious, but I don't feel we should continue to treat our fellow man's total health according to profit motive. I believe it is time to take care of each other's needs as best as we can.

Believe me, I align my political views with the libertarians and would ultimately love to see a small Federal government, but since neither major party today is supporting that goal, the least we could do is use the power the government has to help people.

I don't like what the current bill has become, and I would rather support the public option, but I'm afraid of what will happen if we do nothing right now. People are dying for no better reason than because someone can make a dollar off of it.

Thankfully, myself, and my immediate family have good enough health care coverage, but many of my friends are forced to live without coverage, and many others are forced to keep working at terrible jobs just so they don't lose there coverage. I hear many say that government should stay out of our health care decisions, but government is already there in so many ways it isn't funny.

Government has shaped the current problems we find ourselves in by choosing to get involved in health care coverage decisions since the 40's; by selectively choosing to support employer-based coverage via tax breaks, by starting Medicare and allowing insurance companies to dump all of their covered people at age 65 on the government, and by selectively allowing certain evil insurance practices to continue simply because of money in politics and campaign contributions. Since these government forces continue to shape health care decisions, government alone is the only force left to turn them around for the positive.

In conclusion, I stand on the side of comprehensive reform with a single payer system ala Anthony Weiner's Medicare for all proposal. If that can't happen right now, I support competitive reform with the public option. If even that can't happen, I still support some minimal reform to stop the most evil practices done by the insurance companies today.

So, I ask you to choose for the common good in the decisions ahead. I hope that all members of the congress and senate consider the impact they can have for the good of all Americans in the few days.

Robert Stump Jr.

Must we be this scared of Obama?

http://www.star-telegram.com/242/story/1590670.html

Ok, maybe a slippery slope exists where we can fall from desiring simple health care reform... all the way to the government conspiring to killing our poor Grandmas, but I haven't seen it in my 38 years of living in the USA.

I get it... we are scared of repeating 1940 again. But, haven't we advanced as a society since then? Are we really so gullible as those living in Germany at that time? Wouldn't reason take over, or perhaps Fox News if we started to see documented cases that our old people were being sent to their death prematurely?

Really? We can't even talk about making our health care system better without accusations of secret death chambers in the works? I understand that big government is scary, and something to be leary of, but do we truly think that 1940 could ever happen again? Really? In this advanced age where information flows so freely and we truly are living in the age of freedom as never experienced before in human history... in this age, could Obama really be bringing back the SS and the extermination of an entire class by what he is proposing? Really?

Now, it has extended to the children. Some of our citizens have gone so far to not even want their children to listen to a speech from our elected president of these "United States" concerning the importance of staying in school and having a good education. They have demanded that their local school district NOT subject their children to this type of brain washing.

I weep along with those who wonder what happened to ideas, freedom, justice, and compassion for the less fortunate. This is what the health care debate is all about.

I speak as one of those who has pretty good coverage right now. However, I know deep down that this system can not continue as is. The number of people with "good" coverage will continue to shrink year after year... perhaps significantly. Should we really bury our heads in the sand and hope that this problem fixes itself? It seems so wrong to do so... think of the suffering that will occur by the millions of Americans if we wait until the whole system explodes and we are forced to fix the entire health care system at once. How many people will die when that happens?

So, I ask again... must we be this scared of Obama?

Joe Dallesandro

A good friend of mine has an infatuation (potentially unhealthy, but who am I to judge?) with a bi-sexual semi-star of the 60's and 70's who came out of the Andy Warhol Factory. He got cast in many small roles in some really obscure films, and he was generally known at the time as a hunk with beautiful long hair and a tendency to be found on camera completely naked with tranvestites.

I don't know why, but my friend is... ok, I'll say it... obsessed with Joe Dallesandro. Fortunately, she admits it, and doesn't care who knows! So, to feed the fire (being the good friend I am), I helped her put together a tribute video montage. It just got completed, and she quickly fired it off to Joe himself via his myspace page hoping to hear back from him. Not sure if he will, but in the meantime you can enjoy it yourself!

Fantasies of Joe

Alaska Poop?

Something strange is going on in the ocean waters near Alaska. There is a 15 mile stretch of... goo-like substance, kinda algae-like, kinda smelly, kinda oil-like... just floating there killing jellyfish and apparently a goose.

Were we so easily distracted with Michael Jackson's death that we didn't notice an alien taking a dump on us?

Huge blob of Arctic goo floats past Slope communities

Where I find myself

Hello, my name is Bob, and I have a ......... problem. That is why I'm here. I'll start by sharing a little about myself, and some of my thoughts I hope to put out into the cloud we collectively call the Internet.

I am a white male, currently 38 years old, single, and a wheelchair user. My particular disability is Spinal Muscular Atrophy Type II (SMA) and it has pretty much defined my life up to this point, and continues to steer me in many ways I don't want to go. Through many devious (and some completely unexpected) means, it has prevented me from walking, driving, playing most sports, and interacting with most people. Of course, it had some help along the way... my other stumbling block is shyness, and I have discovered that these 2 issues are deadly when combined.

So, I find myself today in a place I don't want to be... and it doesn't help at all when I see endless chatter of "amazing stories" of people who have overcome their disability and have such a positive outlook on life, and are able to thank god for their trials and tribulations... ugh... that crap gets very old and makes me want to puke... mostly because that is how I USED TO BE and I get pissed that I haven't been able to remember why I ever had those thoughts. But, I digress... I do recognize that the vast majority of people find themselves on a path in life they didn't want, and I know that there are many worse places or situations I could find myself in. This won't be a continuous "woe is me" diatribe, believe me, but I do hope to share some honesty and some larger thoughts and feelings along the way.

So, I have begun...