A couple of funnies

During the snowstorm we went traveling with a substitute travel teacher. Her name is Tai, (it rhymes with sky), because my regular travel teacher was out for a personal day. As a fellow student and I were walking during travel class we noticed Tai had fallen back some distance from us. Tai is completely blind but is an excellent traveler, so it was unusual for her to drop back. Melissa and I turned around and shouted back to her. We couldn't hear her reply so we walked toward her. "My eye fell out!" she shouted. One of Tai's prosthetic eyes had fallen out. She was terribly concerned as the eyes cost a few thousand bucks. We lifted up our shades to look for the blue eye but had no success in locating the eye. Suddenly Tai yelled, "Here it is!". The eye had landed in the sleeve of her coat. We all had a big laugh after she finally put the eye back in.

Another funny thing happened to me in cooking class. I was making a three course lunch and was preparing to frost my lemon cake with lemon frosting. I had two different courses on the counter, and each were in identical pans. Along with the cake I also had a green bean casserole. Sitting side by side I started frosting what I thought was the lemon cake. As I was putting the frosting on, it seemed like the cake was crumbling off every time I tried to frost it. Well, if you've ever tried to frost a green bean casserole the fried onions on top will adhere quite nicely to the frosting. Ugh!

All through the meal I was asked what the lemon taste was in the green bean casserole. I finally told them my mishap with the frosting. It didn't seem to bother my guests as there was little of the casserole left after the lunch.
More later.

My shop project is going to be a big surprise for my wife. I think I’ve told almost all my friends what the finished project will be so, if you know, please keep it from my Presh.

I have learned a lot about woodworking, the power tools, (and their names), and terms that I never heard before. Considering the environment, my shop teacher, Ric, has been extremely patient and helpful.

One thing I found out while doing this project with my sleep shades on is that I have become quite intimate or attached to my work. I have become quite the sander. Without ever seeing my work I must touch and feel the wood to see if it is in the condition I want it to be. While sanding I keep feeling with my fingers to see if it is smooth enough. Without vision I can’t say, “ That looks fine”, or “That’s good enough”. Touch seems to be a much more intimate sense than vision, especially when the only sense you are using to assess your work is touch.

I have used tools such as a table saw, miter saw, mortiser, planer and jointer.

Again, thanks Ric for being a good guy.

Alumni Banquet

The center has just celebrated its 50th anniversary. Fifth years ago, on November 1, 1959, the Adult Orientation Center took up residence in the YMCA building at the corner of 4th and Keo in Des Moines. To celebrate this historic anniversary we held a fabulous banquet and dance.

About 200 alumni, staff, and friends of the center gathered in the assembly room to rehash old times, eat a delicious meal, and listen to an array of speakers.

The people began to arrive an hour before the 5:00 starting time of the banquet. Everyone had a smile on their face or were listening intently to stories about the center that usually ended up with a hardy laugh.

The alumni came from all over the state and a several others from as far away as San Diego and Hawaii.

As we entered the Assembly Hall we were greeted with the fine music of pianist Curtis Chong. Our table contained a basket full of rolls. We quickly devoured them. After a few minutes our server brought us a bowl of dirty shrimp soup. This was one of my favorite courses of the meal. The soup was followed by a plate of pork tenderloin stuffed with a sausage and seasoning mix. We also had some mixed vegetables and a wild rice dish with mushrooms and celery. For dessert we had a slice of cheesecake with a berry compote drizzled on top. All of the food was prepared by the current students at the center. I was proud of our culinary skills! After dinner we settled in for some tributes, awards, and a student graduation.

Jim Witte, a former manager of the center, talked about the early days of the center. It was very interesting to hear about Jim’s time with Ken Jernigan, the founder of the orientation center.

After Jim Witte was finished speaking Karen Keninger, the director of the Department For The Blind, spoke about the experiences she had growing up blind. I enjoyed hearing Karen’s take on the half full, half empty glass metaphor. She explained that you may have a glass half full or half empty but the important thing is whether you are pouring into the glass or taking from the glass.

A good buddy of mine graduated from the Orientation Center at the banquet. Terry was given his certificate in the frame he had made in shop class. I will truly miss Terry.

After the banquet we walked about one block to the Convention Center for a dance in honor of the anniversary. There we had beverages to drink and watched the center’s instructors let their hair down. Boy, do they know how to party! It was a night full of memories and fun that I will never forget. More later.

Observations

Here are some observations I’ve made at the center in the last four months.

When I’m out with the gang and there is a sign for a restaurant or some other business I can’t ask the students who are with me, “Hey, what’s that sign say?” That’s the same with t-shirts with logos on as well. If the logo is big enough I sometime can read them, but usually I can’t unless I get real close and then the person thinks what the hell are you doing?

Once there were four of us watching TV and a funny scene flashed on the screen. I looked at the person on my right and asked what was the scene about and he looked to the person on his right, and that person was clueless. Then I asked the person on my left and she just shrugged. No one picked it up. I think we all laughed at the scene even though we didn’t know what it was all about.

Sometimes you can tell who a person is by the way they are tapping with their cane. Some tap, tap and others brush the floor more than tap. Whatever their method it should be in the shape of an arc. The cane should go out three or four inches wider than your shoulders and about an inch off the ground.

Voices are pretty individualized. Most people have a unique voice, probably like fingerprints, although some sound pretty similar to each other.
More later.

Ledges part II

After my third dismissal of offered help I stretched to the second to the last block. I started to lean toward the road, over compensated too much to the right and toward the runoff pool and s*@*, I was falling into the water! My left leg stayed on the edge of the road but the rest of me fell to the pool of water. I landed on my rear, with the left leg following in about 3 feet of water. Water was up to my neck. It took my breath away. After I had regained my footing and stood up I reached for a couple of helping hands. No way could they pull my sodden body and clothes, which included blue jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, out from the pool. I finally climbed out on the road after two or three unsuccessful attempts to free myself from the freezing water.

I was a bit embarrassed, but mostly angry at myself for not accepting the help from my teacher. We still had about a mile of walking ahead of us until we reached the shelter we were going to eat lunch at. When we finally got there my knee started to swell and hurt. I did not have to go to the doctor for my knee, and it is doing much better.

Nest time a teacher offers me some help, I'm sure I will take it.

Trip to Ledges State Park

On Tuesday the school went to Ledges State Park near Boone, Iowa. It was supposed to be a walk in the park but ended in a soggy mess.

Once a month the school plans a group activity for the students and staff. For the month of September a field trip was scheduled for Ledges State Park. We were to walk some trails, eat a picnic lunch and play some group games.

It all started out fine with a beautiful walk on a couple of trails. We were all sleep-shaded (wearing our blindfolds) as we navigated along rocky trails that traversed up and down and around the park. Our canes came in very handy on the stone steps. The steps had varying degrees of width and steepness.

After walking about one hour we came across a rocky ledge called table rock. At that time our trail leader (who was totally blind) told us we could take off our shades. It was a beautiful view with breath taking descent to the road down below us.

I had heard a few cars on the park road and also heard the cars splashing through some unseen water.

After trekking down to the road I could hear running water across the road. When our group encountered the water we had two options: walk through the two inch water flowing across the road or try to walk along the edge, half skipping and half jumping from one cement block to another block. These blocks were about 18 to 24 inches long and about 8 inches wide. The distance between each cement block was approximately two feet from each other.

While being sleep-shaded the step from one block to the other block was anything but easy. If you slipped off one of the blocks you had two directions you could fall. One way was back on the road and step into the two inch water. The other direction was to plop into three feet of water that flowed to the river. You can probably guess which direction I took.

I had already crossed over one set of blocks without too much trouble. It was very exhilarating stretching from one block to the other. After successfully finishing the challenge, I gave a war cry and thought the water crossings were over. Not so. Up came the second water crossing.

It seemed to be a little deeper on the road as the cars made bigger splashes. Well, I knew if I chose the walk on the road I’d have wet feet for the rest of the day and I had just completed my first trek over the water.

I started over the water with a seemingly longer stretch than my first block bridge I conquered. Mark, my travel instructor, was there and asked me if I needed a hand. Three times he asked and three times I declined his offer. Sort of like Peter did in the Bible.

To be continued…

Funnel and Sieve

A couple of weeks ago two other students, our supervisor Dave, and I traveled to Kansas City to visit Missouri's version of our orientation center. It's called Alphapointe. It is much different than ours. It's different physically and philosophically.

The building itself is only seven years old, and still smells new, where ours is ... well, a hell of a lot older. Alphapointe is all on one floor, where our orientation center has six floors, seven if you count the basement and we do use the basement. Alphapointe is located out in what seemed to me to be an office park-like area. Away from the city. In Des Moines we're located smack dab in the middle of the city.

In my opinion the most important difference is between the philosophies of each orientation center. While Alphapointe has an environment of a sheltered workshop where workers assemble writing pens for the federal government and manufacture plastic bottles for VA hospitals, it seems like they funnel their clients in that direction. It seems to me that they teach their clients specific skills to reach their goal of employing them.

The goal at the Iowa center, in contrast to Alphapointe, is to give the students tools they need to be competitive and independent in their daily living. Don't get me wrong, we work hard at the center and we earn the tools we have when we leave the school. Since we have the tools to cope in the day to day activities it takes to secure a job and hold onto any career that we choose, I believe we have a stronger center than other states do.

As I've noted in this writing the Kansas City center tries to funnel their students toward a certain type of employment. The Iowa center is like a sieve, students venturing out to do whatever career they are interested in. Now, everyone isn't successful, but everyone has the green light to try out what they are interested in. I think we are pretty capable of doing anything, except drive a cab, or fly a plane, although with the computers on board, piloting a plane may be more realistic than driving a car.

In short, we are given the tools to achieve whatever we want to achieve. It's like teaching a person to fish, not just feeding him the fish.

Pound cake

I'm at home for the next week and a half and wanted to try out my culinary skills. I've been cooking with shades on at the orientation center for the last three months and wanted to see what it was like to cook AND see. It was pretty easy, but not as easy as I thought cooking without shades would be.

We got a new mixer so I looked at the recipes that came with the manual to see if any of the recipes tripped my trigger. I really wanted to try out the new mixer. Well, the double chocolate pound cake looked pretty damn delectable.

The recipe called for a lot of the good stuff that bakers use. Flour. Now that's taking my cooking to new heights. Sugar. I didn't mix up the flour and sugar, nor did I toss the flour into the garbage can. Baking powder, milk, REAL butter and few other ingredients that raised the carb count for each slice of cake.

I cooked the cake on Wednesday and added a drizzle of chocolate glaze Thursday morning. The verdict: well, I'd give it a B. I thought it would be a bit more moist. The flavor is excellent though and I won't have much trouble getting rid of the cake to friends and family. A scoop of ice cream would be a fine addition to the cake.

The mixer worked great and I would be negligent if I didn't mention that my wife helped me most of the way. Comments like, "You don't have throw the ingredients into the bowl, just let them drip." Or, "How did cocoa powder get into the utensil drawer?" Really, Chris was a big help and I don't think the cake would have turned out as good as it did without her help. More later.

Questions and answers

I received an email from a friend, Kelli, who commented about my blog and had a few questions for me. I'll answer those questions here as I'm sure you will find that they pertain to my blog.

First question, "How do I operate the oven?" Well the controls all have Braille labels next to them and I try to read them, but really have memorized which controls are where. To regulate the temperature the oven always starts at 350 and every time you push the button it beeps and increases or decreases by 5 degrees. You have to pay at least a little attention to the beeps to know what degree your oven is at.

Next question. "Do I plan to have any adaptions in my house?" Yes. I plan on labeling some things in Braille, especially in the kitchen. I already have puffy, brightly colored stickers on the microwave and stove. Chris marked the washer and dryer too, with markings to help me know the controls on those appliances. Having the Braille labels will help me remember the Braille code and reinforce what I have learned at the center.

Last question. "To read emails, is there a computer audio function that reads it aloud or how does that work?" Yes, there is a function, both at home and the center. Those programs are called screen readers. I use a Mac at home and there is a program called VoiceOver that reads the text on the screen. I also use Zoom which magnifies the screen image. At school I use the PC program JAWS which is the only way I can read email or for that matter do anything at all on the computer. Listening to the computer is much quicker than reading magnified text. The larger the text the slower you read.

Both programs, JAWS and VoiceOver are nice. JAWS is more powerful, but not by too much anymore, and one important thing to remember, VoiceOver comes FREE with the Mac. JAWS costs about a thousand bucks.

Thanks Kelli for the email and continue to have fun working in Colorado. Since I was the one usually falling off my bike, it's much safer having one of my friends piloting the tandem than me riding solo.

More later.

Graduation

Hello again from Des Moines. After two days of rain it looks like the rain is finally over. Today will be my last day here for two weeks, as we will be having our summer break/vacation. It's a sad day for me as one of my good buddies has completed his stay here at the center. Jim is graduating today and will return home.

He was my walking buddy and we did a lot of other things together. Along with another buddy, Terry, we would go out to eat breakfast and dinner together. At night we would all sit down and talk about the day's events. They would drink coffee and I would drink a diet pop. I will truly miss my buddy Jim.

Along with Jim there were two other students leaving as well. RJ graduated and John will take off to attend college in Illinois.

More later.

I'm on!

Well, I'm writing this from my monitorless computer at the center. I usually talk to Chris on the phone, dictating my blog to her, or wait until I get home and enter a blog from my own desk top. Hopefully I'll be able to add to my blog at a more regular pace.

The editing process is a bit more difficult for me here than it is at home, so bear with me.

I've had a pretty good week with travel and Braille. Those two classes were giving me fits the past couple of weeks. I was getting more than a little bummed out.

I was getting no where in Braille. I was not feeling the dots very well. The teacher gave me a new workbook which would be similar to reading a large type reading book. The spaces are a bit larger than the normal Braille book. It makes reading the Braille much easier for me. I always could remember the dot placement but couldn't feel the dots.

In travel I was getting lost or walking off the sidewalk. Yesterday I traveled around the court house without an incident. The last time a deputy sherif stopped me twice and asked me if I needed help. I told him that I was in a class and could get back alright. He didn't want me to walk back. I finally had to take off my shades to convince him that I could make it back on my own.
More later.

"Shaft"

My white cane is a very important tool to the blind. After thinking about it, I think a cane is the most important aid that a blind person has. Mine is so tender to my heart that I gave it a name. Shaft goes with me all over Des Moines and while I'm home too. It is there when I wake up and there when I go to bed. My wife thought it would be fun to have a contest to name my cane. So, if anyone has any names that I could give Shaft, let me know. I'm warning you though, I am very fond of Shaft. It will have to be something that strikes a chord with me or I'm keeping the name Shaft.

I have two canes, my white cane and a fold up cane. I use the fold up cane when I take a bike ride. I fold it up, place it on my rear rack bag and use it when I get off the bike. It's really neat how it snaps to attention and very easy to fold up. It's similar to tent poles that utilize shock cords. But it is heavy. About twice as heavy as my white cane. It also gets caught in cracks in the sidewalk very easily. It's like combing your hair that has a few tangles in it and your comb gets hung up in the tangles.

My white cane, on the other hand, is lightweight and goes over cracks as smooth as a Lexus drives over bumps in the road. I must say that Shaft is my favorite. I don't even have a name for old foldy. It's a real clunker. Maybe I should trade the clunker in for one that gets better mileage.
More later.

Alicia

I want to tell you the story of one of the students at the school. Alicia is a pretty young lady whose life changed dramatically in November of 2006. She was riding in a vehicle that went off the road, rolled and ejected Alicia from the vehicle. She was sprawled on the highway, bleeding, in and out of consciousness while the ambulance was speeding to assist her and take her to the hospital.

Because of the accident and the massive internal bleeding which caused irreversible damage to her optic nerve, Alicia will never see again. Only blackness, no light or even shading will she ever experience in her lifetime. It's like having to wear our sleep shades 24/7. Even with the shades on I can see a little light and darkness.

Alicia sometimes seems a bit down, melancholic and sometimes she is happy, laughing and really funny. Alicia is quick witted and makes all around her laugh. I don't think she wants pity or sympathy, she only wants people to understand what she is going through. She is so observant that she knows when I steal french fries off her plate.

Alicia wasn't born blind, she never even wore glasses, so blindness is all very new to her. She knows what she needs to do to become more independent and it bothers her that she isn't as independent as she would like to be.

Recently she has been doing much better in traveling class, even went to a doctor's office solo. Some might not think that is too big a deal, but it was for Alicia and the other students at the school who knew about it.

One regret I have is that I was not attending the center when she had her 7 course dinner. Rosemary turkey, mashed potatoes and homemade gravy, chocolate lust cake and a few other dishes to make it 7 courses.

If I misrepresent Alicia or give any information which is incorrect I'm sure she will let me know, loud and clear.
More later.

Buddies

Let me tell you about a couple of my buddies. I've been doing a lot of things with three of the students here: Jim, Terry, and Ian. They all have different eye conditions. Jim has RP, Terry has macular degeneration, and Ian is an albino which predisposes him to visual problems. Jim and Terry are about my age and we do quite a few things together. We go out to eat, joke around, and do some walking together. Jim was a CAD (Computer Aided Design) operator until three years ago when his vision became too poor to operate the CAD. He hasn't driven for about eleven years but still gets around quite well. He has some of the poorest vision of all the students.

Likewise, Terry doesn't see very well either. He has had macular degeneration most of his life, has never driven a car, and is possibly one of the funniest persons I've ever known. He has a line about everything and is quick on his feet with his wit. Although he's had eye problems most of his life, he was a state champion pole vaulter in 1970. He ran his own business for 25 years and might start the business program that the school has. That program deals with vending machines--filling them and repairing them. That job is something our program can train people to do.

Ian just graduated from high school last spring and has some vision problems associated with his albinism. When you think of a person who is an albino, you think of no pigmentation in his genes. He has white hair and very white skin and usually wears long pants and a long-sleeved shirt along with a hat when he goes out. We go out to eat together quite frequently and we end up usually going to the same place. He ends up ordering the exact same thing from the menu every time! His vision is not as poor as my other two buddies' vision. He is planning on attending college in the future.

Hopefully after everybody's done with the school my buddies and I can still keep in touch. More later.

Business class

Three times a week we meet for a class called the Business of Blindness. The class alternates between three different times during the week. In this class we discuss all sorts of things that affects us and the people around us. We may have a speaker come in to discuss resume writing and interviewing for jobs, a counselor come in and tell the younger students what they will need to do to get ready for college or our director will discuss various items relating to blindness.

On Friday she talked about alternative ways of doing daily chores and other things. She read an article from Kenneth Jernigan telling about how different ways of doing things is fine and dandy. Just because it is different doesn't make it a bad thing to do. For instance, he wrote about how a blind man and his wife differed on brushing their teeth. She applied the paste to her toothbrush and was annoyed once when the paste fell into the sink before she got it into her mouth. He was surprised when he heard that was how she got the paste to her mouth. He simply bit off a small amount and never lost his toothpaste to the sink.

This is just an example of how a blind person can achieve almost anything, only they may have to do it in a different way than a sighted person does it. More later.

Eating Out

I've mentioned eating in the Home Ec room with the 3 course and 7 course meals, but I'd like to tell you a little bit about the times we go out to eat. A lot of the time we just walk out to the Court Ave area and eat at a couple of our favorite restaurants. Often there are just two or three of us going, and occasionally a half dozen of the students go. The two favorite places seem to be The Royal Mile and Fong's Pizza. The Royal Mile is a bar/restaurant with a very good fish and chips meal. The price is right. You can get two big pieces of battered up fish and thick french fries for about six bucks. Another place just about across the street is Fong's Pizza. It used to be a Chinese restaurant for many years, and then it changed with the times to be a pizza place. The pizzas are excellent with a variety of styles and toppings. The atmosphere at Fong's is friendly and they have vintage rock and roll playing in the background.

Occasionally we'll head out of the neighborhood by bus or in cabs to visit a couple of other favorites. One of my favorites is the La Hacienda restaurant, where I went for my first solo travel trip. The Mexican food there is excellent, the service is the best I've ever seen, and the prices there are very, very reasonable. The trips we take in the bus to the different restaurants are always fun because we get to sit and talk and laugh and tell jokes. In the future I hope to write about some new restaurants we visit and the adventures that go with them. More later.

More travel

I'm going to different places in my travel class. Tomorrow I solo to the Fareway grocery store. It's an important location because Fareway will be the grocery store that will be used most often to buy my food for cooking class.

To get there I first must walk a couple of blocks to catch the #3 bus out to Fareway. Once the bus drops me off I must navigate down a nice wide walkway to the front of the mall which houses the grocery store. While I'm walking down that nice wide walkway I cross three drive lanes. There didn't seem to be much traffic on the drive lanes when I visited the store twice last week. Mark, my instructor, accompanied me on those trips. After walking to the front of the mall I must go through two doorways to actually get into the store. Then I will walk to the service area and ask them for a token from Fareway. There will be no doubt that I made to Fareway. Of course I will have my sleep shades on. More later.

Dana

I know this blog is about my experiences in Des Moines, but I want to tell you about my new daughter-in-law, Dana. It isn't often when a dad marries off his son and also walks the bride down the aisle, (no, the bride and groom are not brother and sister), but that is exactly what I did on July 18, in St. Paul. I was honored and touched to be asked by Dana to walk her down the aisle at my son's and her wedding. It was a very emotional day for me, I'm glad I doubled up on my Prozac. I think Dana is a person who you not only become closer to her as time marches on but you also become closer to your own family because of her. Enough said. Thanks, Dana.

Banquet

Sorry about being delinquent in writing in my blog, but I had little access to a computer the last week. I also married off a son, and I got to walk the bride down the aisle! It was double frosting on the cake.

Today at the Center we had a run-through or practice of the meal that we will serve at the 50th anniversary of the Center. We had a local chef who directed the practice run. The meal consisted of a pork loin stuffed with sausage and various spices, a wild rice recipe, a very good soup with shrimp in it, mixed vegetables with tarragon butter on it, and finally for dessert we had two different kinds of cheesecake. With the help of another student who read the recipe which was in braille, we made the wild rice recipe and we also helped make the dinner rolls. The wild rice recipe consisted of wild rice, onions, baby portobello mushrooms, spices, and chicken broth. We had to mince the onions and mushrooms, sautee them, and also also mince some parsley that we added at the very end. The wild rice came out quite tasty. After everyone was finished cooking we had an elegant dinner. Most of the food was eaten up, but we had 23 pounds of pork loin and we could only eat about half of that. Many staff members were included in helping make the dinner and in eating it as well.

Tomorrow we will have a normal class schedule and I hope to buckle down on my computer and my braille. I've also stained my picture frame, and the next step will be to varnish it. And in Travel I'll be practicing going to Fareway, as today I went to the bus stops that I'll use to get to the food store. I have made it across the alley from hell many times and will probably quit calling it that name.

I almost forgot that last week I had my first real big solo trip traveling by myself (with my shades and white cane). I went to one of our favorite restaurants which I had to walk a couple of blocks to catch the bus, ride the bus to a stop near the restaurant, and walk the rest of the way to the restaurant. I made it without making any mistakes. Later about twelve other students met me at the restaurant and we had a very good dinner. The crowning glory was my meal which included chile rellenos and an enchilada, except that they were all meatless with cheese and it was the next day before I found out I received the wrong order and the vegetarian in the group got my beef enchilada! More later.

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Traveling

Travel is my last class of the day and my favorite class. I think I like it so much because I get outside. The instructor Mark is calm--I don't think he'd raise his voice even if a semi was barreling down the street towards us. Lately I've been crossing streets and discovering new bus stops. Crossing streets is not the easiest thing because sometimes I don't go straight across. Sometimes I take a 45 degree angle while crossing the street. There is one street corner, 4th and Grand, which I do very well most of the time. Why? Because the crosswalk is at a 45 degree angle! I've discovered a few new bus stops that I will take during my travel class to different destinations. Tomorrow I'm taking the bus to La Hacienda, a favorite Mexican restaurant, on 31st and Ingersoll. Later on this week I plan on taking a group of students there for dinner.

Finally I want to talk to you about an alley from hell. Whenever I cross the alley next to the school building I either end up walking down the alley or in the middle of the street. Today I was so mixed up and in the alley for so long that I ran into the dumpster on three different occasions. We practiced crossing the alley about a dozen times, and the very last time I ended up in the middle of the street. The problem with the alley is it slopes down into the street and I follow that. I'll just have to keep practicing going across that alley. More later.

Catching up

I've been a little delinquent on writing lately, so I'll try to catch you up on things. First, thanks to all who read my blog and thanks to all who post comments. Also, when I'm in Des Moines I will talk to Chris and using the speaker phone I will dictate my entry to her. It's not as easy as sitting down at the computer and writing it myself. She does a great job with it and is so very, very patient. Thank you, Presh. I want to thank all the visitors to Des Moines who come to the school. Tylie, Lynor, Denese and Sally. Kay and Homer, David, Tom and Jane and if I missed anyone I'll add them later. A special thanks to those who haul me to and from Des Moines. Chris and I will be on way to St. Paul for our son's wedding. Zach and Dana will be married on Saturday. Great guy and great girl. Well, enough of this stuff, as you all know: It's all about Kenny:)

Update on classes:

Computer class is going very well. Cip (sip) is a great teacher who uses applicable situations to teach shills on the computer. For instance, I write a document to another teacher who is in charge of putting out a newsletter. In the process I've learned many important keystrokes. It's a bit harder for me right now to edit word processing without seeing the document on the screen. As I've said before there are no monitors for the computers. I've also entered a list of keystrokes to a document on the computer. This reinforces my memory of the keystrokes. God knows I need help with my memory.

Braille has a teacher. Rebecca has replace Mary who retired last month. I have only had Rebecca for a teacher for a few classes. She is very organized and very patient. A soft-spoken instructor, (most teachers are except Cip). Rebecca is the instructor who does the newsleter and she knows sign language as well as Braille. Pretty cool. I'm seeing progress with my Braille. I'm giving Rebecca most of the credit now that Mary is gone. I listen to a cassette tape in class with my name on the tape in Braille. I can actually read my name in Braille. I can write my name and read my name now and I'm only 55 years old. Yowzer!

In shop class I'm working on my picture frame. I've used a radial arm saw, a miter saw and a power sander while making the frame. I've used a variety of clamps in the precess. One, in particular, was like teaching an albatross to run. A very awkward tool, the frame clamp, was really a help while gluing the frame together. Rick is probably the most laid back, patient teacher of all. Never one to get excited. Rick is always calm and collected amongst shaded students using power tools. Rick also knows his music. He might get some tickets to hear Iris Dement when she comes to Ames. If he gets the tickets, I'm there, man. Iris is on my list of performers I would like to see before I die, or she dies. I don't think either one of us has plans of leaving soon, though.

Cooking class also has a new teacher since Mary has retired. Larry took over the kitchen chores just this week. My first recipe was tofu cinnamon rolls. They tasted a whole lot better than they sound. Larry has already orchestrated a fine lunch made by the students under his supervision. I'll give a more detailed update on Larry as I get to know him better. Oh, yes, he also drives the "white whale", the name we call the bus which takes us on field trips.

All the time I have to write now. More later.

Camping II

The two incidents I mentioned in the previous entry I'll expand on in this entry. First, the raccoon encounter. Although I was not present the night it happened I heard about the raccoons a number of times.

It seems that raccoons enjoy a little sodium in their diets as they devoured a bag of Doritos. They made quite a racket eating and fighting over the snack food that was left out under a screened shelter. The shelter had no floor so the varmints entered through the bottom of the shelter. A teacher was in the shelter as well, lying on a picnic table after he left his own tent for fear of snoring and waking up his fellow tent mates. Bang! Something fell to the ground. Screeeee! The two raccoons seemed to be fighting over the same chip. The teacher exits the shelter in a hurry. One student whose head was only a couple of feet away from the melee was oblivious to the noise that everyone else was kept awake to, he is deaf and losing his vision, slept through the whole episode.

I wrote a bit about sitting around the campfire and singing to the strumming of a guitar the second night of the trip. The guitarist, who has love on his mind, left his rather nice guitar out all night long in the rain. Luckily the guitar was in its case and only got a little wet. He would have to buy another case but the guitar sustained little damage.

Camping

This week the school went camping at Backbone State Park. We loaded up the bus with all our camping equipment before the 4th of July weekend. I missed a day of camping because of doctors appointments. They had to put up the tents with their shades on as well as walk the trail with their shades on and visit Niagara Cave in Minnesota, also with the shades on. I missed all three of those ventures.

When I arrived on Tuesday afternoon I got to cook using my shades. First I scrubbed some potatoes, cleaned them up, and then cut them in bite size chunks. Then I fried them on a huge griddle with butter and onions. Then my partner for making dinner grilled some brats and hot dogs. By the time we ate, which was about 8:00, everybody was starved. Off came the shades. They scarfed up the potatoes and brats and hot dogs. For dessert we made s'mores. Then we sat around the fire and listened to one of the students play guitar. We made our own lyrics to "Sweet Home Alabama." The young kids were getting a little loud and fairly graphic.

After a few more songs we heard thunder in the distance. We called a few people to check on the weather for us, and decided to slip into the tents early. Soon after we were in our sleeping bags it started to rain. Through the night it rained on and off.

We woke up to a steady rainfall and decided against making breakfast at the campsite. We loaded up the bus with our tents and other camping gear and headed back to Des Moines, stopping in Oelwein to eat breakfast at McDonald's. We arrived in Des Moines to partly cloudy skies and took out all our camping gear and tents and hung everything up that was wet in the shop class. No shades today at all.

Thursday morning, after everything has dried, we'll bag up everything and put it in the storage room, ready for the next camping trip. A couple of incidents at the campsite included an encounter with a couple of hungry raccoons and a waterlogged guitar. I'll write about those in my next entry. More later.

(Here you go, Checker... and thanks for reading my blog, Chad.)

Tandem

About fifteen minutes before I left for Reform School, a few weeks back, I purchased a tandem bike. You know, a bicycle built for two. I didn't have a chance to ride it until the July 4th weekend, and ride it I did. I started off on Thursday evening with Zach. We did a nice little loop on the bike trail. I tried to steer it from the back seat from time to time. That didn't work too well. Have faith in your pilot. On Friday, Gary came over and it went somewhat better. We had some trouble stopping and I had a little more faith in my pilot steering around corners. Later on Friday, buddy Steve came over for another tandem trip. More faith in the pilot still. Not that one pilot is anymore trustworthy than the other, but I just stopped leaning and trying to steer from the back seat. Finally, I went for a thirty miler on Sunday with buddy Poot. Excellent day, excellent ride. The thing you must remember while riding on the back, you have no control over the bike. At least very, very little control. I'm sure the next time Zach or Gary takes me for a ride, the ride will be much smoother. I'll just look at their back when we are turning a corner. I'm off to the baseball game. Taking the tandem. Should be fun.

Solo

I did my first true solo on Wednesday. It took me around the "home block". The "home block" is a four block square which encompasses the school. South one block, west one block, north and then east until you get back to school. It's flat and fairly safe. There are a couple of parking garages, a few trees at the edge of the sidewalk and four corners. I had three small incidents: I walked into two parking garages and stepped off the sidewalk into the street.

The first incident with a parking garage took me into the garage a fair distance. I knew I made a goof when there was no breeze in my face and the sun wasn't shining. I stopped to gather my thoughts then heard a car engine someplace near me and waited for it to pass. It didn't pass. I'm thinking, "Why don't you go around me?" Then I moved to one side and the auto moved by me. I guess I was standing right in front of the car. I then followed the sound of the car and after several steps was greeted by a breeze and sunshine. That happened one more time but I only ventured a few steps in before I realized that I was in a garage and exited the garage and went on my merry way. I also stepped off the curb but righted the situation quickly. I made it the rest of the way pretty much without incident. I did not peek once. That would be cheating and give me no satisfaction from the journey. I'll be crossing streets, and visiting retail stores in July. That may be interesting. More later.

Bye, Bye Mary

On Thursday, June 25, 2009, we bid farewell to Mary Clarke. Mary was a 25 year veteran at the Orientation Center. She taught sewing, traveling, braille and home ec.

Students, former students, staff and friends gathered in the rec room to celebrate Mary's retirement. People started to arrive at two o'clock and at times the crowd nearly exceeded capacity for the room. The well wishers hugged, reminisced, and thanked her, sometimes shedding a few tears. By the time the event ended well over one hundred friends of Mary had come to pay homage to the unforgettable teacher.

At the end of the party there were only a few peanuts, a small amount of punch and out of two large cakes only about a dozen pieces of cake left. It was an afternoon Mary will never forget.

We'll miss you, Mary Clarke.

More later.

Solo (sort of)

Today I went traveling and had two firsts. I walked alone for awhile, and I went up and down an escalator. During traveling class today the teacher and I walked in the Des Moines skywalk. We went to buy a corsage for a retiring teacher and then traveled up an escalator to a food court. To get on the escalator I had to feel around at the bottom of it, searching for the bottom step. I found it and grabbed hold of the railing to make sure it was the up escalator and positioned my foot on the bottom step. I held on to the railing all the way up, with my white cane about two steps in front of me. It didn't seem very weird; as a matter of fact it felt fairly safe holding on to the moving railing. At the top of the escalator the cane moved ahead of me until it stopped, and I knew that was the top of the escalator and I stepped off. Then we went to the food court and I got a diet coke and sat around talking to the teacher for a few minutes.

Then we had to go down the escalator. Going up kind of reminded me of a pilot taking off in an airplane, and taking the down escalator reminded me of a pilot landing the plane. It was a little scarier going down. My first step off the down escalator had to be more precise than the up escalator so I wouldn't lose my balance.

We started retracing our steps and the teacher told me that he had to get a retirement card for the same teacher we got the corsage for. He was going to go to the store by himself, so he told me to go back to the school by myself. I got a little nervous when he left and I had to navigate the skywalk solo. Everything went almost perfect. I used people's voices and footfalls to know when and where to turn. I used the sound of some stores to tell me where I was in the skywalk, and I pretty much shorelined all the corridors. "Shorelining" means you are close to one side and you kind of tap the wall. The only trouble I had was I went too far and missed the door to the street level. I was very close and went back twice but just couldn't locate the door. Lucky for me the teacher bought the first card he saw and he must have hurried back to join me and catch me in my dilemma. Maybe he was more nervous with me walking by myself than I was! After he directed me to the door, I had no problem descending the steps and then walking back on the sidewalk to the school. I'm ready to solo again. More later.

Cakewalk

When I arrived yesterday in cooking class I had a cake pan with ingredients in it, and beside the cake pan I had a tape recorder to listen to. Since I had my shades on and I don't read Braille, the only way to "read" a recipe is by listening to it. After listening to the recipe directions, I added the ingredients, mixed them up, folded them in, and put the cake in the oven at 350 degrees to bake. After about twenty minutes I tested the cake by putting my finger on the center to see if it would spring back. It did so I took it out and put it on top of the stove to cool. I didn't have time to put frosting on it, so another student put the frosting on this morning. We had it for dessert at our lunch today. One student had three pieces, and after lunch the pan was empty. It was the best thing I've made in cooking class so far!

Extracurricular

I've been telling you about school and what's it's like to be here in Des Moines. Let me tell you a little bit about last Friday night. It started off with a seven course meal made by one of the students. A seven course meal is kind of like a "final" in cooking. I'm still only cooking one course meals. The student who cooked the meal made tomato basil soup and breadsticks, along with fettucini alfredo, stir-fry vegetables, jello salad, a slushy drink, and a three layer cake. The soup was excellent, the fettucini was very tasty, and the cake was delicious. When the students eat the seven course meal, they have to eat with their shades on, even after school hours. That is the hardest thing I've done so far--eat with my shades on. I had only one mishap during the meal. Trying to pick up the cake I tipped over the pitcher of slush and it spilled on my lap and on the floor, but luckily there was only a little bit of the slush left in the pitcher.

After letting the meal set for awhile in my stomach, I had to work out. I ran on the treadmill, did a little bit of the EFX machine, and finished on the air dyne, the Antichrist of exercise machines. I was saturated with sweat, so I decided to go to the roof to cool off a bit. I took my tunes with me and was listening to them when a couple more students came up to the roof, too.

Soon there were six of us on the roof. We'd listen to the music, tell funny stories, and sometimes we would just sit and stare at the city lights. One student saw only darkness with his eyes, but I believed he grasped the mood of the city that night more than most. It was a little surreal with the night lights of Des Moines shining below and us on top of the building looking out.

At last we left the roof. A bunch of us congregated on the front steps at street level, when I finally went in to shower off. During my shower I started hearing some booms in the distance and knew somewhere close fireworks were being shot off. By the time I got to my window and looked out, the fireworks were finished. I learned later that the group on the steps had gone into the building about five minutes before the fireworks began, and they missed them, too. I thought that was funny. More later.

Botany, Barbecue, Buses

Today I went on my first field trip. We went to the Reiman Gardens in Ames. Brother-in-law Dean, you have to get over there. It was fantastic! I was disappointed at first when they said we had to wear our shades in the first hour while there, but I was badly mistaken. Seeing nothing visually really opens your other senses to your surroundings. I never knew the different textures of different flowers and plants could be so varied. It was really a whole new experience at "seeing" my environment. Some flowers felt velvety, some felt spiney, and even some felt serrated. Some smelled like black licorice, some smelled lemony, and some didn't smell at all. We found sage, rosemary, and thyme, but struck out finding parsley. I really was amazed that my other senses could visualize so much. I was a little disappointed taking off my shades and even put them back on for a little while longer. The butterfly house was amazing there. All sorts of butterflies in different sizes and colors. Plus the vegetation there seems like out of prehistoric times.

Following the museum, we stopped at Hickory Park for some barbecue. Luckily for me we didn't have to wear our shades as I find eating with shades on is the most difficult task of all. We got back to the Center (home) and had a retirement celebration for one of our teachers. I will write more about her next week.

My final class of the day was my Travel class. We walked up to the bus stop, me with my shades off because we were crunched for time. That tells you how fast I travel with my shades on. The other guy had no choice because he is totally blind. We jumped on the bus and went out to Wal-Mart again. Stepping out of the air-conditioned bus, the hot air felt like a furnace, and I then put my shades back on. We followed our same path as we did a week ago, and it seemed a bit easier this time. We walked in to the service desk and then sat on a bench in the store while our teacher purchased some batteries. We had a conversation with another guy sitting on the bench who I did not know was there until I jabbed him in his arm with my hand, feeling for a place to sit down. The other guy with me hit him on the leg with his cane. The man on the bench repeated, "That's ok, that's ok."

We retraced our steps and cautiously stepped on the stairs to the bus, felt for the coin deposit, and found a seat. The first two seats in the Des Moines buses are always reserved for people with special needs. It's really amazing the conversations you hear on the bus when your shades are on and you can't see a thing. Instead of only using one sense, your eyesight, you use your other senses, and it just seems like you are aware of more of your surroundings than when you use just your eyesight. That seems really funny to me. We were dropped off two blocks from the Center. The last two blocks went very smoothly because I'd been on the terrain several times before and finally walked into the school 30 minutes after school was dismissed. Chris says I already had to stay after school! More later.

Walkin in the Rain and Minute Steaks

For Traveling I had to walk in the rain around the block on Tuesday. Carrying an umbrella with a white cane and trying to stay dry is not the easiest thing to do. Half of me was soaking wet, the other half was dry, and my arm holding the umbrella was very tired. The reason the teacher said it was necessary to go out in the rain was because every day sounds are different in the rain than when it's dry. I think I only walked off the sidewalk once or twice, and since it was raining, the guy on the bottom step was not there and I didn't run into him.

During Cooking Class I made minute steaks with cream of mushroom soup. I dropped one steak on the floor but quickly retrieved it and doused it with water. While frying them up my very patient cooking teacher told me to touch each steak, and if they were soggy to keep cooking them until they firmed up. I then placed them in a casserole pan without incident and drenched them with cream of mushroom soup. Today, Wednesday, the students came to the cooking class for lunch, and my minute steak recipe was one of their entree choices. No one got sick, and I heard no complaints.

On Wednesday I continued on the computer learning a few more keystrokes using the JAWS program. This evening I was up on the computer but must have forgotten a few key strokes because I couldn't find the document I was working on this morning.

For Braille, I worked on the letters k, l, and m. They are very similar to a, b, and c--just another dot added to each letter. Not only did I work Braille in Braille class, I worked Braille in cooking class too. Maybe my teacher's patience did wear a bit thin.

On Thursday we're going to Ames to visit the butterfly museum and then to Hickory Park to eat. With the hot weather, I can wear shorts. More later.

Radial Saw and Cinnamon Rolls

The cinnamon rolls I told you about earlier made it into the oven today. We got the dough out and flattened it out with a rolling pin, only I didn't use the rolling pin until after I had kneaded it with my hands and finally figured out what the rolling pin was for. So after I finally used the rolling pin, I rolled out a half inch thick rectangle. Then I rolled it up like carpet and sliced it two fingers width. You always have to have something to gauge the distance because you're not using your vision. As soon as they started to smell, people started popping their heads into the Home Ec room. It didn't take long to have the platter gone. They turned out delicious, and everyone who had one agreed with me that they were delicious.

In shop class I used a radial arm saw for the first time. I had to measure a piece of wood to a certain length, and then line it up with the saw. After careful scrutiny with my fingers and hands, I got to finally turn the saw on. I cut a length of wood three different times, two times it was too short, and the last time it was too long. BUT I left there with all ten fingers! The instructor stressed the 3 M's: Machine, Material, and Me. The machine is checked for the guards to be on and the blade in back position. Then you check the table for chips of wood or some of your tools by sweeping your fingers across the table, to make sure nothing gets chucked by the saw. In the ME, make sure that you are holding on to the piece of wood at least a hand's length away from the saw blade. And you crank that puppy on and you let 'er rip!

The last class of the day was Traveling, and I walked around the block. I had to get the rhythm right with the cane and my feet, and the height of how high high I lift the cane with each step. For a time there it looked like a silly walk from Monty Python. I ran off the curb a couple of times, ran into one parking meter, and struck a person who was sitting on the bottom step in front of his apartment.

I want to thank everybody for reading the blog, and I really enjoy hearing comments from people, whether on the blog or by email. More later.

My Classes

I have five classes that I attend daily at the center. I go to my CBS classes in the morning and my HT classes in the afternoon. My CBS classes are computer, Braille, and shop and my HT classes are home ec and travel.

We begin our day at 7:45 with everyone meeting in the rec room with our director and take roll and discuss the day's agenda. Then it's off to my first class, computer. Remember that the computers do not have monitors and we use a program called JAWS, (a screen reader program). In my initial class I wrote a little about myself and learned how to use JAWS just a little bit. I learned a few commands like, line by line reading and some editing commands. It's all keyboard commands. No mouse. The instructor is an out going individual who is also very competent computer user. She knows her JAWS.

My second class of the day is Braille. The class is located just around the corner from my computer class. The teacher is a pro at Braille. At least, I think she is. Braille is a touch language which you feel with your fingertip and I am starting to read and WRITE it.

My last class of the morning is shop. I will be using power tools to make my projects. YIKES! Anyone who knows me will probably think that I'll come home minus a few body parts. Remember, I'm wearing sleep shades in everyone of my classes. The instructor tested me on my fractions while I used a real groovy measuring device. It's like a six inch screw with notches in it every half inch. I'll try to get a picture of it on my blog later.

My first afternoon class is home ec. I have the same teacher for home ec as I did for Braille. She knows what she's getting into with me as a student. I went right to work making dough for cinnamon rolls. Everything went fine except when she told me to check the mixing bowl for flour and gunk at the bottom. She had already taken the dough out and placed it in the refrigerator. I went over to what I thought was the mixing bowl and found that the bowl still had a relatively large quantity of flour in it. She wanted me to throw out the excess flour in the garbage before I washed it out. I did what I was told to do and pitched out the flour into the garbage can. Only when I did throw it out, I didn't have the mixing bowl in my hands, I had the flour container! Ooops.

The last class of the day is travel. I went with my instructor and another student to a Wal Mart and was dropped off at a bus bench. Now, the bench was not real close to the store itself. We had to tap tap across a frontage road, down a parking lot lane and across the front drive of Wal Mart. We then went inside to find the service desk. After achieving our goal of find the service desk we had to head back to the car which included walking across the front drive, the parking lane and the frontage road. I finally got a picture in my mind of the layout of area we had just navigated aroud at the time I jumped into the car and head back to the center. This was my first traviel experience and the travel teacher went with us.

As a teacher myself and having worked with an outstanding teacher I can honestly say that evey single one of my teachers are of very high quallity. They have patience, confidence, great knowledge of the curriculum, good strategies, and above all are caring individuals. More later.

Week #1

The first week at the center went very well. I started using the shades and white cane, met my fellow students and staff, moved into my room and started eating. The shades were a bit scary at first but I am getting used to wearing them. You can't see jack while you are wearing them. While in total darkness, the white cane is a must, a real life saver. I plan on using the cane at home especially when I'm somewhere that I've never been before or when I'm in a big crowd. The cane makes you more independent. I don't worry much about going up or down stairs with it. I feel real comfortable with my cane.

The students have a wide variety of eye conditions and visual acuity. I'm the only one with glaucoma. I've learned that there are more eye conditions than I knew existed. I knew about glaucoma (of course) and macular degeneration along with eye problems associated with diabetes. I never heard of Stargardt's Disease before. This is an eye disease which affects young people. I'll let you know about other conditions later. That was usually the first question I was asked, "What's your eye condition?" was asked several times the first day at the center. The student's vision acuity ranges from 20-200 to total blindness. There are two students who cannot see a thing. But, they get around very well and are quite independent.

My room is very nice and believe it or not not I keep it spotless. It is on the sixth floor and looks out east not far from the Des Moines River. I get into my room using a key card which I've locked in my room only once. We use a shared bathroom with laundry facilities and a couple of showers. Men only, the females are one floor beneath us. We are strictly forbidden from visiting them on their floor.

We get an allowance for meals and we use it everyday to visit the nearby andd not so nearby eating establishments. They do not have a cafeteria, so we must eat out most days. The public sees that blindness does not stop us from being independent. We get out as much as we can. More later.

Touring "Reform School" in May

After setting up an appointment and Googling the directions the night before, we took off to tour the Adult Orientation and Adjustment Center in Des Moines. Having no difficulty in finding the place we parked the car and went inside. We met the receptionist who called Dave, our tour guide and shortly Dave arrived. I did not know it at the time but the receptionist was blind. We met Dave in a spacious room he called the rec room. Dave talked a few minutes to us about the place and popped in a 30 minute DVD that described to us what a great experience the training center was. Stuff was said like, “Changed the way I lived” and “Helped me to do things that I never had the confidence to do before.” I did notice when viewing the DVD the chairs were situated very close to the TV. I thought, they knew enough to do that.

The structure is a converted YMCA building with six floors. The procedure was to take an elevator up to the top floor and work our way down. Only that wasn’t the case. We went even higher. We went up to the roof! Pretty cool view of downtown Des Moines and one of the prime spots to watch Fourth of July fireworks. The roof was adorned with boxes of flowers, which were planted by the residents. I didn’t mention this but all the residents wear sleep shades and must use a white cane. I tried on a pair of sleep shades and it is impossible to see anything through them.

The sixth floor contained the men’s’ dorm rooms. They were all singles. There is a shared bathroom. The rooms had a dresser for all my summer clothes, (shorts, t-shirts, and underwear). I’ll throw in a few Hawaiian shirts to wear on special occasions. The fifth floor had the women rooms.

Quite a bit of the building is taken up by the library (sixty per cent). The library contains all the cassette, digital and Braille books used by the blind and handicapped for the entire state of Iowa. They have over 100,000 different titles. Braille books take up an enormous amount of shelf space. It takes 88 Braille volumes of large like three ring binders to make one copy of a dictionary. One shelf, which encompasses all four walls of a fairly large room, will get you only one volume of an encyclopedia written in Braille. That’s quite a contrast to digital media. Just think how much information you can store on an iPod or other hand-held devices.

The classrooms we visited were computer, shop, home ec. There were no monitors on the computers. In shop class I will make a picture frame using power tools. Remember, I will be wearing sleep shades, which are not possible to see through. The home ec class expects me to make a seven-course meal for my family. That may be messy.

We finished the tour in the basement of the facility. An exercise room with plenty of equipment inhabited the basement. I would have available to me, treadmills, fx machines, stair steppers, and numerous free weights. Dave opened a door to an adjoining room that almost made my eyes water. In front of me lay a 60-foot pool. Cool. I plan on doing a few laps once I’m there.

After the tour we went to the director’s room and had a conference call with Joe, my contact in Waterloo, Sandy, the director and Dave. We all agreed I would benefit by staying at the center for a few months. On June 8 I will be heading to Des Moines.