Mommy, I am Deaf!

I had wondered why no one’s bought the poster of “Mommy, I am Deaf!”  for awhile. I checked the site, and the poster had somehow gotten cattywampus. So I took off all the old items and re-did them. This time, I used a good photo taken by a terrific, professional photographer– Mark Benjamin– after the show at NTID in Fall, 2008.

Mommy, I am Deaf! by Betty G. Miller, 1995

This painting, ”Mommy, I am Deaf!” came out of Betty’s personal experience. Even though her parents were Deaf, she had two older brothers who were both hearing, and their first language was American Sign Language. Betty came along, the youngest child (and the only girl) and it was assumed — expected, even– that she was hearing the same as her brothers. Betty’s parents were not aware of her hearing loss until a few years later when she started school.

The news affected the whole family– brothers and grandparents, as well as her parents. Everyone was upset. Remember, this was in the late 1930s, and deaf people wanted hearing children (unlike today when deaf people welcome deaf children). Betty’s mom and dad didn’t want her to suffer from discrimination and lack of access to the world, as they had.

Actually hard of hearing until losing what was left due to a fever in her 50s, Betty struggled through much of her young life balancing between the Deaf World and the hearing one. This struggle, as well as what she observed of the lives of her parents and friends, became a recurring theme of her paintings.

Original For Sale: $2,750; posters for sale for much less!

This painting was shown twice, and the small art show in Manayunk, Philadelphia in 2006, and in the recent large retrospective at the Dyer Gallery at NTID, Rochester. Matted in purple and framed in black, the dimensions of this piece are 20 in. wide by 16 in. high; acrylic paint and collage on black posterboard. The original is for sale on our Etsy site: purpleswirl.etsy.com.

This image is also available as a poster (three different sizes) our Cafepress site: cafepress.com/purpleswirlarts.

 

Zoom into trouble— Mac trouble

Here’s an edited version of what I wrote my friend, Larry, last night after spending three days of a holiday weekend trying to fix my computer:

My Mac is making me nuts. I can’t work with it this way. The display grows past the size of the screen is the best way I can explain it— when I move the mouse, the entire desktop moves. Doesn’t matter what program I’m using, or what resolution I set for the display. Also the fonts change. On some lines they are bigger than others and as the lines scroll where it gets bigger stays in place and the lines change. Like keeping a magnifying glass in place while scrolling the text behind it.

I’ve already stripped most of the login progams, so that’s not the problem, and I’ve first repaired permissions, then got out my install disk and repaired the disk (something was repaired, but it still didn’t solve the problem.) Then I reinstalled the system from my disk, taking system 10.4.11 back to 10.4.3 and THAT didn’t do it either. Have updated back to 10.4.11 and it’s still crazy-making. Can you help?

Now, I normally don’t have simple problems. I’m pretty good at troubleshooting Macs, and am one of the go-to people for my Mac-loving friends, just as Larry is. And I’d never seen this before (in hindsight I may have, but it was so long ago and part of exploration— not a problem— that I don’t remember).

Larry said he had seen it before, and fixed it before, but couldn’t remember how. Both of us spent time on the Apple Knowledgebase site looking for answers and didn’t find it. I know I was using the word “expand” as a search term. Perhaps if I’d used “zoom” the answer would have shown up.

Luckily for me, Larry’s son Gary is a Mac-fix-it-pro and when he saw the email, he said:

Sounds like she’s got the Universal Access option(s) enabled. If so, then she needs to go to the System Preferences, select Universal Access, and turn off the Zoom option under the Seeing tab.

Really? Could it be that simple? Yeah, it was. Gary was right, and Larry remembered having done that before. I finally realized, too, why this happened— because I know that I didn’t turn on the zoom:

I figured out how I turned on zoom by mistake. It has a 3-key shortcut and I was trying to either, do a bullet mark with option-8 and included the shift key by mistake, or was trying to figure out how to do a true em dash in a new-to-me program, and hit the 8 instead of the hyphen-minus key.

So now, I’ve run “Software Update” repeatedly until it told me there’s nothing left to update and will be getting back to work, to the twitterverse, and all things computer— tomorrow. Merci beaucoup to both Larry and Gary for helping me out!

Apologies to my PC friends who may be thinking this post doesn’t make much sense; and to my Mac-loving friends, here’s hoping that if you get into similar trouble with a Mac that expands, or zooms, past the size of the monitor frame, that you’ll remember reading this and know how to fix the problem.

 

SAVE now on Deaf Quotations t-shirts

“As long as we have deaf people on earth, we will have signs…”

The “Deaf Guy” t-shirt

Between the time you read this, and Sunday, June 21st, you can save on T-shirts at Deaf Quotations! Cover Your Nakedness! That’s what Printfection, the store that hosts Deaf Quotations is saying. Save on “Veditz Quote” tees (one version shown below) and “Deaf Guys are…” and “Deaf Gals are…” tees (one modeled by Larry, above).

I love the Deaf Guy T-shirts. I wear them every time when I travel: long sleeves for cold weather and short sleeves for warm weather. I get a lot of attention and laughs from people who enjoy reading them. And I have about a half-dozen of them. —Larry B.

SAVE — use one of the following coupon codes at checkout:

COVERYOURNAKEDNESS – SAVE $5 on orders over $25

COVERYOURFRIENDS – SAVE $10 on orders over $50

COVERTHEWHOLEFAMILY – SAVE $20 on orders over $100

"As long as we have deaf people on earth, we will have signs..."

To SAVE, just go to: http://www.printfection.com/deafquotations

 

Betty’s Cartoon – “Please Sign Slowly”

Back in 1979, Betty worked at DCARA— Deaf Counseling, Advocacy & Referral Agency in Oakland, California as Public Relations Director. Among other duties, she was responsible for the agency newsletter (she became Executive Director for part of 1980, before moving to Los Angeles). [And for us geographically-impaired folks, Oakland's what's on the "other" side of the San Francisco Bay Bridge.] Naturally, she put her art skills to work and created cartoons for the newsletter.

Last month, NAD had a board meeting and fundraising event in Philadelphia, site of the next Conference in 2010. A week before the event, Nancy J. Bloch, NAD CEO, asked Betty if she had artwork that could be used in the auction, with the proceeds to be shared between Betty and NAD. Well, most of Betty’s work retails between $2-4,000 so we went looking for a drawing that would be suitable for auction, and found some of the cartoons from the DCARA era. Most of them were created on tracing paper, but we found one that Betty re-drew in 1986 on good drawing paper. So we bought a new frame for it and brought it to the fundraiser. 

It was interesting to see the different responses to the drawing. One guy went up to Betty and told her how much he identified with that experience. Other people talked about whether the man was the kid’s father or a new teacher. The drawing was bought at auction by Rodney Danco. Here’s a photo of Betty with the drawing, and a close-up of the drawing itself.

Betty G. Miller in her art studio with a cartoon drawn in 1986.

"Please Sign Slowly" ink drawing on paper, 1986

Poor guy, he will be mortified when he finds out what the girl is saying! But it’s even worse for the girl! 

Related sites:

Original artwork available online: purpleswirl.etsy.com 
NAD— National Association of the Deaf: nad.org 
DCARA— Deaf Counseling, Advocacy & Referral Agency: dcara.org

 

Color names

This was fun, and a little frustrating. I only got 27 names in this game, but I know I typed in a lot more than that! Some of the things I typed were spelled wrong, so weren’t accepted and I didn’t try again. Others just aren’t in the list. Here’s a head start for you– you can enter two words, such as “deep peach” (which would have been accepted if I’d thought of it then), and some of the words seem random — “coffee” and “mocha” and “walnut” were not accepted, but “chocolate” is on the list. Try it, just for fun. And use the comments to let us know how you do.

If the graphic doesn’t show below, just use this site URL:

http://www.oneplusyou.com/bb/view2/colors

27

Created by OnePlusYou – Free Dating Site

 

Vegan soap— a Mother’s Day suggestion

Today Betty and I were watching a TV program called “Modern Marvels” on the History Channel. The focus was on bathrooms— history, technology, manufacturing and future trends. And they mentioned that water isn’t enough to get clean, you need soap too. 

The reason soap works is that the oil on your skin doesn’t mix with water, and soap emulsifies it— that is, the combination of fat or oil and an alkaline solution mixes with the oil on your skin and hair and lifts it off. The water then washes it all away. 

Then the program showed an artisan making soap the traditional way, by boiling down animal fat to render it free of solids and impurities such as blood, and adding lye to create the soap (a process called saponification).

Now, this info on how soap is made isn’t new to me, but seeing it, watching her tear apart the fat, boil it, stir it— eww. I don’t cook meat (though I still eat some, less as the years go on) for a number of reasons, one is that I dislike dealing with the fat. And while saponification changes fat into soap, the idea of it made me check out vegan alternatives. So, I went directly to Etsy.

Etsy is a handmade marketplace. While we have a shop on Etsy to sell Betty’s original art work, the largest percentage of work for sale is handmade crafts. And I love shopping on Etsy! First of all, I know that I’m supporting individual craftspeople who are doing work they love, and everything I’ve bought has been great! 

A search on Etsy for vegan+soap turned up over 9,000 entries! This is one that caught my eye— “Cut Grass” soap. It looks beautiful and smells like cut grass, perfect for spring. It’s from a shop called Sherri’s Scents and Soys and is one of over a hundred listings. And that’s just one of the thousands of shops available on Etsy. (Click on the photo to go directly to the listing.) Ingredients include things like Olive Oil and Babassu Oil (a great name, whatever it is). 

Once on the Etsy site, you can do a search on vegan+soap and see what catches your eye, or go to the Mother’s Day Showcase for more ideas for a wide range of budgets. Another option is to see my favorite sellers. 

My mom died back in 1995, but if she was alive, I know what I’d be giving her for Mother’s Day.

 

What’s the name of that woman who got the award, the one who fell? Oh, yes, Betty G. Miller

Saturday, April 4, 2009: What a day. A wonderful day for Betty, even if she did fall (more on that later, and yes, she’s fine). Actually it’s a wonderful 3-day weekend. 

Betty and I are in DC for Gallaudet’s Charter Day ceremonies and the Gallaudet University Alumni Awards. Betty received the Alice Cogswell Award from the Laurent Clerc Cultural Fund (LCCF). Their focus is on culture, and honored her for her life’s work as an artist showcasing the deaf experience, and also for her work as a counselor in the field of alcohol and substance abuse.

I’m fighting exhaustion and burning eyes to write this, but I’ve learned from experience that I really need to write this, or at least start it, before I go to sleep for the night. Otherwise, I lose the energy left from the event itself. (I did write a good draft, finishing it up now, a few days later.)

The three of us arrived in town on Thursday– that’s me, Betty and our dog Tucker. Our first stop was the NAD office, where we visited with with old friends and colleagues. Because Tucker isn’t a certified assistance animal, we couldn’t stay at the hotel; but our friend David Nelson welcomed us into his home yet again. Seems we stay at the l’hotel Nelson nearly every time we come to DC.

Friday, the busiest day

I AM NOT a morning person. That’s a pretty well-known fact among those who’ve had the misfortune to see me before noon. So, I’d spent the entire week successfully working to pull back my body clock enough so I could get up and function by lunchtime. The first event of the weekend was lunch with GUAA board members (Gallaudet University Alumni Association), LCCF committee members (Laurent Clerc Cultural Fund) and all the people who were receiving awards. Met some interesting new people such as Darian Burwell (”Mom’s name was Marian,” “Ah! now I’ll remember it.”) who received the GUAA Outstanding Young Alumnus Award and was sitting across the table from us; and saw some old friends, such as Ron Hirano, Betty’s classmate, who received the GUAA Pauline “Polly” Peikoff “Service to Others”Award. 

A LECTURE BY DR. HARRY LANG was scheduled for after lunch, and we all walked over to the Sorenson Center Atrium. Lang’s lecture was on Abraham Lincoln, “Actions Louder than Words.” This year marked the 200th anniversary of Lincoln’s birth, and among the many contributions to the nation was his signature on April 8, 1864, on legislation, known as the Charter, which enabled the Columbia Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb and Blind to grant collegiate degrees. Dr. Lang said that in his research, he can’t find any proof that Lincoln ever wrote anything himself mentioning deaf people, but there are stories that show that a deaf woman reporter, in all likelihood Laura Redden who was reporting on the Civil War from Washington City, was seen interviewing President Lincoln and they were writing back and forth to each other. 

A TREE PLANTING CEREMONY was next. Sponsored by Green Gallaudet, the tree was planted near the Gallaudet and Alice statue on the front lawn in honor of Lincoln’s 200th birthday. Someone was seen saying, “It’ll be 100 years before you’ll see this tree from Florida Ave.” Someone else replied, “That’s okay, we’ll be here 100 years from now.”

BETTY WAS INTERVIEWED by Abby Drake, Assistant Director of Alumni Relations in the Library. This was an informal, filmed interview that GUAA did with all the award recipients. Then we went back “home” to rest, before joining the GUAA and LCCF folks for a BBQ at President Davila’s House, aka “House 1″ of five houses in faculty row, a part of historic Gallaudet— from a time when teachers lived on campus. Both Betty and I were winding down by then, and were unusually quiet at dinner.

Saturday, the Awards luncheon

MANY OLD FRIENDS were there. Many were from the Gallaudet Class of 1957— two people received awards today, Betty and her classmate, Ron Hirano. At the table, most of us had known each other and been friends for at least 20 years, some twice that long. Betty’s friends included people from her “art life,” others from her “college life,” and many others from her “community life,” including people from the time she worked at Deafpride, Inc. as an alcohol/substance abuse counselor.

PADDY LADD was at the next table. Paddy is the Senior Lecturer in Deaf Studies at the University of Bristol in England. I didn’t expect him to remember that he met both Betty and me before, but he actually remembered it more clearly than I did. He came to our house for dinner when we shared a house with Margaret and Aloy Bibum about 15-20 years ago— he was friends with them in England, and was in DC for a year for the Dr. Doctor Chair in Deaf Studies. He very clearly remembers Betty taking him down to the basement where she had her art studio, and showing him not only her paintings, but her father’s artwork, too. He was struck by the power of the images, and Ralph’s clear illustrations touched his heart. 

BETTY WAS CALLED UP TO RECEIVE HER AWARD, walked about half way to the stage and fell. Really fell! Flat on her face. About 5 or 6 people rushed to help her up while I froze for a few moments, and when I reached her, she said she was fine. “I didn’t intend to fall for Gallaudet again,” Betty said when she reached the stage, and relieved laughter rippled through the room. After a shaky start— “The fall made everything zoom from my head!”— Betty read, and revised on the fly, a speech which focused on the times when Gallaudet affected her life. Kanny (aka Barbara Kannapell) was filming this, and put it up on YouTube, here’s the video, which shows the fall, but not all the folks helping Betty get up: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVwTdMpudDg

WE TRIED TO FIT EVERYONE and everything into this visit, because this was the first time we were back in DC in two years. So after the big event, we went out to Bethesda to meet one friend for coffee, then had dinner back in DC with another friend. 

Sunday’s windup & finish

Sunday’s plan went off without a hitch. First, we had brunch with a group of old friends, then later that afternoon we had some private time with Betty’s oldest and dearest friend, a true BFF, Barbara Kannapell and her partner, Eileen Paul, while our dogs played with each other. Then we drove back to Philadelphia. We left about 6 pm, and didn’t get home till nearly 11:00. We hit serious congestion four times during the drive, and stopped at the rest station for about 45 minutes to recharge before completing the trip. Our cats were fine— mad at us for leaving, but fine.

THANKS to David for hosting all three of us again, and to the friends back in Philly who took care of our cats. Thanks also to Sam Sonnenstrahl and his staff for their work putting this together, and to the LCCF/GUAA for the award. 

FEELINGS— Betty was going strong on excitement and adrenaline for the entire weekend. She’s done without her daily naps, or shortened them. She told me several times how wonderful she feels, and how good it was to see so many old friends. Me, I feel proud. 

More info: 

Abraham Lincoln and Gallaudet: http://lincoln200.gallaudet.edu/

Charter Day: http://www.gallaudet.edu/x2303.xml

Laurent Clerc Cultural Fund: http://www.gallaudet.edu/x2027.xml

2009 LCCF Award Recipients: http /alumni.gallaudet.edu/enews.asp?ID=15006

 

“…WAS IN TOWN SHOOTING LAW ABIDING CITIZENS.”

“…WAS IN TOWN SHOOTING LAW ABIDING CITIZENS.”

That’s what the closed captions said on my local noon news report today. But it wasn’t a story about a horrible crime wave. No, it was about actor Jamie Foxx who was in Philadelphia to film a movie called “Law Abiding Citizens.” Actually, the story was about his stalker, a man who entered his hotel room in Rittenhouse Square last month.

But what caught my eye was the misrepresentation caused by lack of punctuation and editing. Granted, this is real-time captioning, so they can be forgiven for not taking the time to add quotation marks to show the film name. But they are also listening to the broadcast, and the editor of the news program could have rephrased the sentence better.

Possibilities:
…was in town shooting “Law Abiding Citizens”
…was in town shooting the film, “Law Abiding Citizens”
…was in town filming “Law Abiding Citizens”

Given that real-time captioning usually can’t take the time to add quotation marks, the last one is preferable, and will read as …WAS IN TOWN FILMING LAW ABIDING CITIZENS. A less eye catching headline, perhaps, but one that communicates well.

 

Dogs still unwelcome, but cop is savvy

This story comes from my friends, Larry & Carolyn Brick. Residents of Philadelphia, they are currently going west– to ski– and have their two “hearing ear” dogs with them (the current preferred terminology is service animal). I asked Larry to be a guest writer on my blog because his recent email to friends and family not only shows the expected– that people still don’t understand about the rights of people and their service animals; but also that police officers have been trained and are often savvy. Big thanks to all the disability rights organizations who have worked for years to train police forces nationwide about the rights of disabled people!

Larry and Carolyn’s story:

Larry & Carolyn Brick with their dogs, Tiki and Takao

We’re at the Economy Motel in Nebraska City, NE. The woman in charge of registration refused to let us sign in because of the “No Pets” policy. She had a foreign accent and her daughter, approximately 11 or 12 years old, repeated what her mother said because I couldn’t understand her. She said that she couldn’t reach the manager and refused to read the ADA certificate on Takao, and she was willing to be sued. She said she was going to call the police. I replied, “please do that,” because she was breaking the law.

She called the police who arrived shortly. After explaining the situation to the officer he very nicely, and amazingly well, explained that it was a Federal Law and gave several examples of ADA with service animals– including the “No Pets” policy at Wal-Mart that was right behind the motel and how Wal-Mart allowed service animals. He even said that our dogs “…were not pets. They are service animals.” I was floored at how articulate and clear he was. He added that I could sue her and that’s not what she’d want to happen.

The officer suggested that she ask for a damage deposit to be returned if there was no damage. So, here we are, at an inexpensive motel, with an expensive $20 damage deposit that we expect to get back in the morning.

Conclusion: the next morning we got our deposit back, and when she came in the room to clean up while we started up the RV, she quickly came outside, smiling for the first time and waving “good bye,” perhaps because we left a tip on the table.

 

New! Flip Mino Camcorders with Betty’s popular Hand & Heart design

 

The Flip Mino camcorder with Bettigee's Heart & Hand design

Looking for a special gift for someone special? This is unique and functional– a camcorder with Betty’s popular hand & heart design. The Flip Mino camcorder is one of the new wave of cheap camcorders– simple to use, keep in your pocket or purse. Don’t expect $600 functionality from a $230 camera, but for ease of use and convenience, it can’t be beat. 

The HD version sells for $229.99 and the standard version for $179.99. I found a youtube video where a Wall Street Journal reporter tested the Flip Mino HD. Naturally, I’ve no idea what she SAYS, but the video is short and clear and gives a good idea of what to expect. You can find that here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jphji1Tbuc4

The camcorder is less than 4″ high and 2″ wide and weighs 3.3 oz; the HD version holds 60 minutes of HD-quality video on 4GB of built-in memory. The product page has full specifications available. 

One of the drawbacks of all lower-priced video cameras is that that they don’t have image stablization, so you’ll see shake in a hand-held camera. The Minos have a mount for attaching an optional tripod, and my favorite is the Gorillapod from one of my favorite stores, ThinkGeek:

https://www.thinkgeek.com/electronics/cameras-photography/82db/

The camcorders are listed in the store both under Bettigee Designs: Hand and Heart, and on the New Products page which is the one I’m giving you, below.

http://www.cafepress.com/purpleswirlarts/983492

For a really outstanding gift that not many folks will have, you can’t go wrong with this camcorder!