Great things about being blind. finding the right chocolate

Someone gave me a box of chocolates for my birthday. It was a mixed box. I didn't know what any of them were. It came with one of those guides but I didn't want anyone to tell me. Just reach in and grab a chocolate and be surprised. The element of surprise is fun. Besides, if you get one you don't like, you just have to eat another one to get the bad taste out of your mouth right?
I always like doing this. If I wasn't blind, I might be tempted to read the chocolate map inside the box.
I just had a delicious dark one with nuts in it!

Kim Kilpatrick
Storyteller
Performer
Disability Awareness Presenter
kimjkilpatrick@gmail.com
Masc Artist in the schools and with seniors
www.masconline.ca
Member of the Ottawa Storyteleers gig group
www.ottawastorytellers.ca
Blog about great things about being blind
http://kimgia3.blogspot.com
Look for me on facebook at kimjkilpatrick@gmail.com
Follow me on twitter at kimtulia4
Sent from my iPod

Great things about being blind. Do guide dogs work all of the time?

People often assume that my guide dogs work 24 hours a day. So, let me clear this up. They do not. People often think my guides guide me around my house. No they don't. When they are home, they are dogs. They sleep and play and wander around. Tulia is snoring on her bean bag bed beside me in my home office. She doesn't have to be here. She could be lying in the sun in the livingroom or anywhere she wants to be. But, she tends to stay in the room with me mostly. When we first bring guide dogs home, it is recommended that we keep them with us on leash for a while. This is so they don't get into bad house behaviours. Yesterday, when I was writing about the sounds of my various guides, I thought about where they like to be in the house. Gwenny liked her own space. She did not usually follow me around except when it was dinner time. Margaret stuck to me like glue and always had to be right with me. We have low windows in the livingroom and she enjoyed looking out of those windows a lot. Tulia seems to like this very much too. Gia liked to lie at one end of the couch or stretched out near the stairs. As she got older, she liked to lie at the bottom of the stairs going to our home office. She didn't always come up here although when Tulia came, she climbed the stairs more often so both dogs could be with me. Tulia likes to lie in front of our couch. She likes to lie by the livingroom window and look out. She loves to lie in any patch of sun she can find. She tends to curl up. Gia would sprawl out. Sometimes the dogs move out of my way. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they wag or move their collars so I know they are there. I just walk carefully and slide my feet so I don't trip on them. They're pretty good about letting me know where they are. So, don't feel sorry for those working dogs. They get lots of down time too. One of the doctors who had patients in our nursing home where I used to work said that she wanted to be reincarnated as one of my guide dogs in her next life.

Great things about being blind. Disability adavantages?

I read a very interesting article yesterday.  It was about broadcasters hiring people who were deaf and lipread to tell them what Kate and William were saying at various times.  I laughed at first and then thought about it.  There are some deaf people who are using the skills they acquire because of their disability to make money.  So, I started thinking.  What other types of jobs could people with disabilities do using their disability as an advantage.  Comments most welcome.  I know that I'm a good conversation eavesdropper.  Does that make me a candidate for the secret service?  Don't think I'd like it.
come on and be creative.
Would love to hear people's ideas for various disabilities and careers.

Great things about being blind. The sounds that become familiar.

Tulia is snoring on her doggy bed. She is the first guide dog I've had who snores loudly and often. when I first heard this in training, it was a little hard to get used to. With each dog, I get used to a different set of noises. It takes a while to learn to read these noises and know what is going on. My first guide would howl when she got excited and prance her little front paws and I heard the click click as she did that. She really ran in her dreams moving paws all over the place. Tulia has some very active dreams too with much tail wagging and running of paws. My second guide dog Margaret made whimpering noises when she wanted to go and see another dog. I heard Tulia do something like this the other day when a friend was coming to meet us. A little tiny whimper of excitement but I don't think I've yet heard her bark. Gia made little squeaking noises when she was excited and she wagged her long tail in a certain way always with a thump thump. She also made little snorting noises when happy and always made a certain long sigh when she settled down to sleep.
A very contented sigh which she also made just before she died.
Tulia snores as I've said. She snorts when she gets excited and wags fast and furious. She also makes a kind of rumbly sound when she is settling down or curling up and she makes a long drawn out slide of vocalization from high to low when she is stretching.
I'd miss these sounds if she wasn't here.
Gwenny used to scratch the carpet looking for just the right spot to sleep on. I would discourage this when I could. After she died, I woke up one morning to a similar scratching sound. My heart leaped for a moment thinking she was back. Then, I realized that the sound I heard was someone scraping ice from their car out in the parking lot.
The other day I was playing with Tulia and realized how much I still miss Gia's squeaks when she played and how they growled together when they wrestled or played tug.

Great things about being blind. More ice cream adventures.

Writing about ice cream adventures with my guides, reminded me of my first dog Shana.  shana was a family pet that we got when I was about 5.  she was a lab mix.  she was black and felt mostly like a lab.  she was a wonderful dog.  she gave me my love of dogs and help me move towards getting a dog in many ways.  We didn't take her to obedience.  I guess they had it then.  We also let her have some of our food.  She ran loose at our cottage.  One thing we used to do was to give her the empty ice cream cartons to clean out.  I would not do this now with my guides.  She loved to do this.  One of my most favourite sounds as a kid was hearing Shana clean out the cartons.  She would get so excited and walk around the kitchen pushing the carton ahead of her, licking furiously at it.  Her whole head would be inside the carton and so she would bump into the cupboards or other furniture.  She wagged furiously all the time too.  Her tail banging against the stove which made a hollow sound.  Her tail was a wildly wagging thing and always whacked into everything loudly and with gusto.  What a great sound memory that is.

Great things about being blind. Steps towards accessible voting.

this is a federal election day in Canada.  I have voted in every election (federal, provincial, and municipal) since I was 18 and of legal voting age.  I feel voting is a responsibility and a privilege.  Voting has not always been easy for me.  The first tool I used to assist me was a template.  This is a cardboard which is placed around the ballot and has holes in it to mark where you should mark your x.  The early templates were not labeled with braille or raised numbers and they were worrying in that ballots could slide around in them.  Newer models like the one I used in the advanced poll the other day are much better but still not perfect.  Last fall, when I voted in the municipal election, they had a talking voting machine.  this was amazing.  For the first time, I could vote completely independently.  The ballot was slid into the machine, I put headphones on, blacked out the screen, and the machine talked to me and as I arrowed through my options, read the names and confirmed my selections before printing the ballot.  The other day when I voted federally, the official had to come in and read the list of names.  I have been asking for years for a brailled list of names at least to go along with the template, but this has not happened yet.  I've heard that the provincial election in the fall will include talking voting terminals as well.  Hopefully, the time will come soon when I can vote completely independently in all elections all of the time.  I am optimistic.  Things are moving forward.  We just need to keep educating and advocating. 

GGreat things about being blind. Royal wedding watching?

II'm not a huge royal follower or royal watcher. II don't care much about a dress, auniform, a look. I do love music and sound and the sounds of bells. But, I was very happy the other day to discover that the royal wedding was audio described by accessible media here in Canada. On a channel called the accessible channel. 888 for me and many of you. Recently, I have been hired as a freelance reporter for them and did my first story a couple of weeks ago. The stories are of things interesting to their viewers. Everything on that channel is audio described meaning visual things are inserted into the sound track. I didn't get up in the middle of the night to watch. But, when I did get up, I turned it on to check and see what it was like. It was good if you like that type of thing. The best thing about it though was that a person who is blind could watch it on their own at the same time as everyone else and talk about it around the water cooler later. I smiled when I thought of scaring people by saying, "Yes I really liked the audio description of the dress!"
To find out more about accessible media, go to
www.tactv.ca