2018-05-01 11:10:36

Oh tis the merry Month of May, or alternatively the sober month of may depending upon how much blood there is in your alcohol stream as one friend of mine used to put it.

Hope everyone is having a good 2018 so far now that its a third over, though unfortunately I recall from April's topic not everyone is, which is a shame, still hopefully things will get better annon.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-05-01 13:56:01 (edited by vaibhavbhandari 2018-05-01 13:58:32)

what? it's may? I just didn't realise until I saw this topic!
lol
Am I dreaming or it's really may.
OK I just checked now it is. smile
I hope my this month goes well cause I am going to get holidays after just 18 days! Hope everyone else also enjoys this month.

I am not someone who is ashamed of my past. I'm actually really proud. I know I made a lot of mistakes, but they, in turn, were my life lessons. Drew Barrymore
Follow me on Twitter, Discord and Instagram

2018-05-01 14:11:48

If only the weather would wake up and take notice.

Facts with Tom MacDonald, Adam Calhoun, and Dax
End racism
End division
Become united

2018-05-01 16:48:24

Hi there, a new month, new things to do, new things to learn, new what ever you want to be new.
smile I had a smaaal hollyday from friday to today, I was at country, I just ordered a new phone an hour ago because my old crap, the galaxy s3 neo, now longer has a power button which stays unpressed, when I plug the battery, it just reboots itself and it is from the button.
I have a s.g.s7 edge, it is not in perfect condition because my grandmother has no things to do and she destroyed the software, the battery and the glass has scratches because one of my cousins, which is 1 and a half year old dropped my phone because her parents and my grrandma are giving my phone to her, always when she wants it.
So, this time I am going for a Nokia 3, howp that will be good for me.

I am myself and noone is ever gonna change me, I am the trolling master!

2018-05-01 19:08:55

Nokia? Wow! Now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time. Used to be, they were the kings of cell phones, now it's Apple and Samsung.

2018-05-01 19:14:32

Yeah, I remember most blind folks using Nokia until the launch of the iPhone 3GS and Android 2.3.

“Can we be casual in the work of God — casual when the house is on fire, and people are in danger of being burned?” — Duncan Campbell
“There are four things that we ought to do with the Word of God – admit it as the Word of God, commit it to our hearts and minds, submit to it, and transmit it to the world.” — William Wilberforce

2018-05-01 19:15:34 (edited by vaibhavbhandari 2018-05-01 19:16:24)

yeh me too. Haven't heard from a while and I hope it will be good for you Angel smile.

I am not someone who is ashamed of my past. I'm actually really proud. I know I made a lot of mistakes, but they, in turn, were my life lessons. Drew Barrymore
Follow me on Twitter, Discord and Instagram

2018-05-01 20:17:29

My friend has one and it is stock android, only the Nokia suport app exists.

I am myself and noone is ever gonna change me, I am the trolling master!

2018-05-01 21:07:02

So, this will be the first time for me, participating in something like this.

Here in India, it is currently 12:27 AM. Why I am telling you this? You might be wondering. Well, I have just turned 19, that is the first may is my birthday.

As for what I am doing this month? I am waiting for my final exam of school’s result, trying to find a programming class, tried and failed to convince my parents for not to take me in a marriage function, (formal function? Loud music? Overly stuffy clothes? Count me out!) Writing my fanfic, trying to complete various video games, (mainly BlazBlue continuum shift extend, and manamon.)

As a side note, buying that game here in India was such a hassle.

I also am wondering whether to create a topic concerning music composing software’s, (payed and free ones,) whether I need a MIDI keyboard, or my system’s keyboard will do. As well as thinking how much knowledge of music I will need to compose. And trying to make myself convince that people will not respond harshly to this topic on this site.

This is going to be a quite a busy month. Since once the result arrives, I will have to start preparing for college.

2018-05-01 23:57:38

Hi,
I don't exactly know what's happening this month, so I'll just take things as they happen.
Last month was awesome though. Best day had to be last Wednesday.
I went to a little theme park here in the UK called Paultons Park. We were going to go to Thorpe but my carer phoned up the night before and well, they closed on that Wednesday. I was gutted because he'd booked the whole day off specifically, and he was also gutted too.
However on the Wednesday morning I had a brainwave, if he's booked the whole day off let's try not to waste it, and I looked, and Paultons Park was open. This actually had a couple of rides on my bucket list of things that I wanted to do.
I conquered my fear, and in the process did my bucket list. It was well worth it. The Lost Kingdom is definitely my favourite area of that whole park, an area themed to dinosaurs with two roller coasters!
They don't go upside down or anything liket hat, but they do go around 40 mles an hour and one inparticular had some nice g-forces.
It's hard to pick a favourite, between Velociraptor, and Flight of the Terrasoar. Velociraptor was really unique because it starts you otu by going backwards up the lift hill, stopping, and then gradually accelerating, taking you back through the station and then out onto the track, then after the track, it does it all backwards!
Flight of the Terrasoar is hard to explain, it's more llike a traditional roller coaster but it had some really interesting feelings, especially the bit just before it comes back into the station, it made my face feel a bit funny, only way I can describe it.
Anyhow, back to this month,
I don't exactly know what's happening. I'll probably end up playing some games. I actually found a new audiogame that I will be posting about soon, but I don't want to do that until I've played a little more through it. Unfortunately you ahve to do a lot of listening, and when I tried playing earlier, I actually dozed off by accident and missed what happened so I don't know what sort of choice I have to currently make.
I hope everyone is well.

2018-05-02 04:51:25

@Dark eagle welcome to monthly chat and happy birthday for yesterday. Btw, personal  and insulting behaviour aren't permitted on this site (check the site faq), so don't worry about posting topics  regarding music software or anything else.

I also sympathise about not fansying the  less my thing, and also a right royal pain when you can't see anyway, this was why when my lady and I got married in 16 we had a small dinner at a restaurant for the 25 or so wedding guests, not a huge great bash.

@Aaron the dinosaur park sounds cool, also nice that there are some decent coasters that don't go upside down. I can't do that because it risks my glaucoma getting worse and I don't  want to risk my remaining vision, but I do like rides occasionally.

Interesting people mention Nokia phones. Before I got my Iphone 5 in 2012, I had an old Nokia. it had no speech, no access functions at all, but it did feature honest to goodness buttons and a simple on off switch. It seems sort of strange now but yes, there was a time when I just used my mobile phone for, ---- well phoning people big_smile.

I finished my review of the second Oxford time travel book today which was good, always nice to get another one up, also at the moment I'm doing some of the Doctor who short trips. These are short stories with doctor who characters, originally novels but since produced as a long series by big finish, and tend to be really good, especially as they're far more at the speculative end of Dr. Who than the big scifi bombastic soap opera end which is something I always approve of.

Less good, its 4 Am and I've been up since one, which is irritating!

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-05-02 15:28:09

@Dark Eagle, 'M also from India. Anyways I'll have to agree with you for that loud music thing. smile And a happy belated birthday!
@aaron, Wow nice park! smile

I am not someone who is ashamed of my past. I'm actually really proud. I know I made a lot of mistakes, but they, in turn, were my life lessons. Drew Barrymore
Follow me on Twitter, Discord and Instagram

2018-05-02 18:36:44

So, late happy birthday.

I am myself and noone is ever gonna change me, I am the trolling master!

2018-05-03 00:17:46

The Dinosaur park sounds interesting smile.
My nephew has finally started saying words, his first 5 being "Wha's'at?", "kittycat," "bye," "puppy," and "dinosaur." Eh, his mother's first words were things like "mommy" "daddy" "bubby" and "cracker", but which one had the better priorities? Questions and animals vs family and crackers? ... Now I'm glad I don't have any crackers, for this somehow makes me desire to eat them. hmm

Not anything of value to say about me, so I will instead let a depressed whale summarize.

看過來!
"If you want utopia but reality gives you Lovecraft, you don't give up, you carve your utopia out of the corpses of dead gods."
MaxAngor wrote:
    George... Don't do that.

2018-05-03 19:48:10

It was great while it lasted but ongoing problems that were simply not being addressed plus a number of unfulfilled promises has made me reconsider my subscription to the Aira service, and I ultimately decided that these problems just weren't acceptable in a paid service, so I canceled my subscription and will be going back to using Be My Eyes and Be Specular. Maybe in six to twelve months time I will revisit Aira to see if things have improved. As things are right now, I'm not willing to keep spending money on the service.

It's a pity too, the service itself is great, but their customer service, between calls not being returned, promises not being kept, and known problems not being addressed, leaves a lot to be desired, especially for a paid service.

2018-05-03 21:17:32

My nokia is here, android oreo, stock and it is verry good so.
Well, do you know how to install your self a tempered glass on the screen as a blind user?
I probably know, but I want no problems like beying too left or to right or something like that.

I am myself and noone is ever gonna change me, I am the trolling master!

2018-05-06 15:03:17

Well things have been interesting. Yesterday we went to the awesome Italian near me for awesome grub with my parents, and my brother and his fiance which was very nice, we then took my wife canooing since one of my mum's friends is a paralympic canooing instructor and runs try out days.
She actually loved it so much she ended up getting a longer go since  gave up my spot for her, as unfortunately despite it being paralympic kanooing if you can't see your always stuck having to be in a two man boat or canadian since you can't steer  damn thing big_smile.

Stil my lady enjoyed it which was good.
We then went to a very awesome concert with the hallayOrchestra who did among other things Saint-Saëns  organ symphony which was quite awesome indeed, also Poulenc's gloria which I'd not heard before but which was absolutely hilarious! Anyone who can set a hugely triumphant "miserari" definitely had to have a sense of humour, indeed I was amused to learn he based it on old frescos he'd seen of angels sticking their tongues out, and one occasion in which he saw some terribly devout benedictine monks playing football, it then occurred to him "why should religious music be dismal!" so he wrote a really off beat gloria that I'd love to hear again.

The Orchestra also played The William Tel overture, not just the famous bit that everyone knows, but all of it. I always prefer it that way since I tend to think if you miss out on the leed up to it the galop doesn't mean as much, plus I do remember a rather lovely old storyteller story from the eighties which featured the tale of William Tel set to Rossini's music, narrated by none other than Tom Baker himself (he did a surprisingly evil duke Gestler).

Unfortunately on the way to said concert we had an arguement both with an aggressively nasty fellow in a wheel chair, and an irritatble lady with a push chair who insisted that seats at the front of the buss were not! for blind people, despite the fact its physically impossible to get a guide dog between the standard seets and their is a disability marking, a fact which the council have actually confirmed, but drivers keep forgetting about, insisting the area is just for people in wheel chairs and people who have procreatedd bugger anyone else.

It was nice to read in one of the books on perception of blindness which I was looking at for my thesis that having the universal disability symbol be a "wheel chair" (when in effect only %8 of people classified disabled have wheel chairs), really isn't helpful for public perception.

Anyway, to cut a long ramble short, this also made me think about sat nav programs, ie ones that could give you directions from getting from a to b. I have blind square which is handy as far as it goes for knowing whats around you, but it'd be nice to get somethig a bit more directional, especially if it will work with gallilao so if anyone has any thoughts or suggestions that would be useful to know.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-05-11 03:20:30

Well, I finished my first year of university about a week ago. And I shall be heading back for the summer semester in about a couple of weeks. I have also now been learning Kendo for about well, a month or two now. And of course programming. Because that's what you do when you are in a computer science like major. So, in conclusion, my time has been spent mainly with computers and swords. All and all, not bad.

I have a website now.
"C: God's Programming Language
C++: The object-oriented programming language of a pagan deity" -- The Red Book
"There, but for the grace of God go I"

2018-05-12 18:05:27

So, I have finally come back from the event which I mentioned in my previous post, and it was just as bad as I anticipated. Though it had to do more with bad management then the loud music.

I always explain hearing the extremely loud music is kind of like when sited people see directly on to sun, or any other sharp light, which would dazzle their eyes. In our case, it would make understanding your surrounding area a nightmare. Thankfully, my cousins always took me away from that area to sit far enough.

So, I also have been playing with duallingo for Japanese, since I wanted to learn that language. So far, it is going fine.

Then I also am trying to find a class for learning programming, but no one is willing to teach me. I am lost how should I convince them?

And the result of my final exam of school is coming at 14 may, and I don’t think I am tense. Instead, there is an eerie calm inside me regarding this subject.

@Jaseoffire

You are quite lucky to learn the Kendo, since when I was younger I always wanted to learn martial arts. But here in India, there are not many sources to learn martial arts in the first place, and even then, they won’t teach me due to my blindness. Still, if I ever had a chance, then I will not miss it to learn.

Now, if only there were instructions online for those kinds of things, why do people have to hoard knowledge?

2018-05-12 20:46:32

I remember Canooing at summer camp, had dude in the back steering, and me in the front rowing, and he kept trying to steer us into stuff to be a jackass. I kept trying to keep us clear, but you really have so much more control from the back of the boat, anyway, he steered us into the rocks on the other side of the lake then tried to blame it on me. I was like awww heyll naw buddy, and they ended up believing me. What pissed me off is that they wouldn't give me a one seater kayak, as I could see good enough to do it without endangering myself and yeah, kayaking with two people is just well... pointless imo. I did kayaking up at our camp in the mountains this past August in my own boat and my dad and his wife, my little nephew and the little poodle in the canoe. Hell, I went keyaking by myself when I was maybe 15 or so up at camp, I jumped in, and went down the creek by myself and weaved in and out of people swimming, never hitting anyone, so suck it camp counselors. (Yeah I know I got a problem holding grudges). Also, fishing activity in the camp sucked because they put me with this guy, look, I've fished since I was like 5, but they put me with this guy who wanted to do everything himself and barely let me touch the rod. And, this was a camp for people with disabilities, they had people with all ranges of them from blindness, to deafness, physical handicaps and so forth. Some people were in wheel chairs, so they should know how to handle people with disabilities. Oh, and this one time they had BB guns for us to use at the rifle range, they used to have .22 rifles, but that ended before I got there. The fucking counselors, who were brothers, one 17, the other 24, were fucking carrying the guns around pointing at each other and shit, like excuse the fuck out of me? I was 14 at the time, I took both their guns from them and carried them up myself. You do, not, do that shit. I shot my first gun at 7, it was a pistol. But, I don't care if you know next to nothing about guns, it should be common sense that you don't point them at people.

They also had this area called the Senior's lounge for kids 14 and older. I went to that camp twice, once at age 12, the other at 14. I remember when I was 12, looking forward to being able to go into the senior lounge when I was old enough. You know what, when I was 12, it was totally cool, but two years later, they let little kids in there, they jumped up on and ran on the air hockey tables with their shoes on so they didn't work anymore, because dirt clogged up the holes. It wasn't a senior lounge anymore, it was a playpen for the youngest kids. Then when I was 12, the first time they had you take a swimming test to see if you could be allowed to go in the deep end, here's the thing though, if you failed the test, you were restricted to the shallows (which I understand) but also, you were required to wear a damn life jacket? like huh? I passed the test, but I got 3 warnings, because part of the test required that you tread water for 2 minutes, which I did, but I was moving around a bit too much for them, but I fail to see what that matters if I don't stay in one spot, I can move when I need to, and I can tread water, I drift a little when I do, but who cares, if I need to start swimming again, I can, if I get tired, I can turn over on my back and float. I wouldn't ever be so tired that I couldn't make my way over to the wall and grab on though. Oh but I got them back though, I used to be able to hold my breath for like close to 4 minutes back then, so I'd lay on the very bottom of the pool and they didn't know where I was, then I'd just pop up.

When I was 14, I met a friend there who I went to elementary school with. I knew he was having some problems, I knew he had a terminal condition, but man it was a shock and rough to see him in that condition. He remembered me, but he lost a lot of his mental faculties. He used to be really smart, witty, telling jokes and stuff all the time, then he went from that to not being able to learn or retain anything, slowly losing knowledge of stuff, like how to read braille, forgetting stuff like in which order we put our bathroom supplies, etc. So yeah that kinda sucked to see him like that. It's kind of like if you've ever had an older relative with dementia, but happening to a 14 or 15 year old kid. Also, when I was there for the first time, my Uncle died while I was there.

Facts with Tom MacDonald, Adam Calhoun, and Dax
End racism
End division
Become united

2018-05-13 02:05:27

@dark eagle Actually, I should really go over my japanese stuff as well. I remember some stuff, but not all of it. Martial arts is one of those things that you could describe in text until you are out of words and still not cover the topic correctly. Even images and videos for sighted people really don't do the practice justice. The best way to learn is by actually doing the exercises with someone. Now, for learning programming, provided you have a computer and a screenreader, learning shouldn't be that much different. Depending on what you are learning of course. You might find graphics programming difficult for example. Basic stuff dealing with strings that can be output to the console shouldn't be too difficult. Also, some IDEs are not very usable. If you are just learning python, the command line should carry you through, but for java, I'd recommend eclipse, and for C++ I'd recommend something like Code::blocks for building projects, but you may want to write and edit the code itself with Notepad++ or similar text editor.
@Iron Cross Those are some interesting stories.

I have a website now.
"C: God's Programming Language
C++: The object-oriented programming language of a pagan deity" -- The Red Book
"There, but for the grace of God go I"

2018-05-13 02:18:04

@Dark Eagle

It's not hording knowledge, it's thinking that because you are blind you are helpless and shouldn't have the knowledge.

@ironcross32

Just out of curiosity, where and in what years did you go to this camp.

I ask because when I was a kid, I went to a summer camp in Minnesota call Camp Courage, it was a summer camp specifically for handicapped kids. The counselers there were very supportive and always allowed us to decide how much help we needed, as long as we were careful enough to avoid hurting others or ourselves.

One of the ways they did this was to pair up more able bodied volunteers with a less able partner. If you volunteered you got some extra perks as a reward for helping. The perks offered were nothing big or that would make others feel left out, though everybody knew why you were getting them, so nobody ever complained about it.

My last year there, because we moved to Florida the next year, I was paired with a kid in a wheelchair, in no time we became fast friends and did everything together. The one thing they wouldn't let me do was to push his wheelchair, they said that it was camp policy for safety reasons. But when we were away from the camp village and on easy level ground, they broke the rules and let me push him, but one of the counselers always stayed close, just in case.

That was the one thing I missed the most after we moved to Florida, I always had a good time those two weeks I was at that camp.

My last time there was in the summer of 1970 and I was 13.

2018-05-13 10:03:42

It would have been 1998 and 2000

Facts with Tom MacDonald, Adam Calhoun, and Dax
End racism
End division
Become united

2018-05-13 10:29:43

The summer camp thing isn't really as much something we do in Britain as a matter of course, my lady went to one I think in the states but it wasn't exactly that one.

I did once do an activity scheme called "breaks" but that was more about taking disabled kids to do stuff ranging frm canooing to pot holing in concrete tunnels. it was also for a younger age group generally, ie about twelve and under. The two things I did there which were cool were firstlyy white water rafting, including swimming down the white water rafting course in a buoyancy aide, and secondly bridge swinging, which is sort of like bungy jumping but less extreme (I couldn't bungy jump myself due to eye pressure and glorcoma but bridge swinging is okay since your always upright).

Basically a rope ladder is slung under a 60 foot or so bridge over a stream. You start from the bottom and climb up the ladder wearing a waste harness connected to a rope pegged into the side of a bridge and with slack being paid out by someone on the ground, When you get high enough, you drop downwards  swing out below the bridge. Depending upon whether the person at the bottom controlling the rope likes you or not you may or may not actually get dunked in the river big_smile.

it was pretty cool actually, I remember it rather well even though I was about ten at the time.

anyway friday was interesting. I had a singing lesson.I'm' not doing a lot of vocal work at the moment which is mildly annoying, though as we have another vocal studdies course in  London at the end of june I probably ought to think about something.
My teaching is going to send me something from Don etzetti to work on which should be good, its been a while since I did anything seriously Italian.
I spent friday doing gethsemani from jesus christ superstar, which is wonderfully dark. I do feel a bit of hubris trying  essentially put myself into the roll of Jesus, but hay that's why its called acting big_smile.

I might actually take that one along in June to work on since there is a lot to be done with it, not quite as hard vocally but a lot of acting to get through.

We then went to the selston music festival concerrt. This is a competitive music festival which appens in november, though in may they have a concert for those who sponser festival eventt. My lady and I weren't actually singing, which was mildly annoying since we've  had many chances to do performing recently, but the concert was rather fun, everything from four women who sang some of the songs from sister act to a couple of brothers who did a fascinating arrangement of nights in white satin.

Anyway, not a lot going on today other than more work for me. As well as working on my phd I also need to get my review of dragonquest finished. its interesting going back to Anne McCaffrey's books now. I read a lot of her stuff as a gteenager, but then when I hit 19 started to find them a bit irritating so haven't read anything since.
However its fun to go back to them these days since I can both appreciate what is good, and  see the problems, actually that is one thing which mildly annoys me about so many book reviews (especially on goodreads), they are always "this is the best book ever!" or "this is the worst book ever!" without much by way of nuance or logic.

That is why when I write reviews I try to talk about the stuff which is good, and the stuff which wasn't, and also why! I thought something was good or bad.

This is particularly interesting to do for books that so often get a one sided appreciation like McCaffrey's, especially when you read through them and see them get better as they go on.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-05-13 14:46:17

Hey, Dark. That's pretty cool that you are working on something from Jesus Christ Superstar, I've been a fan of that rock opera ever since it came out somewhere around 1970. I've heard it so many times that I probably know the whole thing by heart. Last month, for Easter, there was a live performance of it on TV, though it wasn't audio described, I still enjoyed it. Come to think of it, there wasn't much in the way of scenes without dialog, so even if they had wanted to, it probably wouldn't have been suitable material for having audio description applied to it.