Holly @hollyamory@mastodon.social
Immigrant (Minnesotan in the UK). Bisexual. Partially sighted. Linguistics student. Also talk about space, cricket, baseball, social justice, dogs. She/her
Sometimes it is better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.
--Terry Pratchett
I'm really happy to answer questions or sanity-check an image description for anybody who asks (time and energy permitting of course).
With of course the caveat that visual impairment covers a huge range of conditions as well as personalities; I can't speak for all of us!
There's a bit of an art to image description but it's really a skill that can be learned.
Some friends were having a hillwalking day around Hope/Edale, places I can get to on a train without too much difficulty. So another friend and I joined them for a pub lunch.
They asked us if we wanted to join them for the second part of their hike so we did. Me in my totally unsuitable sandals and sundress. Both of us out of shape. I had an anxiety attack at the beginning too. But our friends were so kind and the views were spectacular. I'm glad I did it, no matter how much my legs hurt now!
I'm working on a new option to disable Mastodon's fancier UI animations for those with vestibular disorders. If you experience motion sickness from the Mastodon UI, I'd appreciate your feedback! 😊 #a11y https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/pull/5393
LB made me laugh so much but it isn't described, so here you go.
It's a drawing of a map of the UK (labeled "Britons") with a orange rectangle (labeled "tarp" being pulled over it it by drones at the corners (also labeled as such) to shield it from the sun. The part under the tarp is labeled "shade."
Need assistance with project quite technical pls lmk if you can help details below
yo wtf music is just wiggly air
btw when you're used to a DE QWERTZ keyboard and you want to type a :) on a US QWERTY it comes out as a >( and that's exactly how I feel about the layouts respectively, no kidding.
(Cont) If you can, take a brief cold shower every few hours and really focus on those 'hot' zones to cool them down.
There have been days where I've had to spend two hours in a cold bath with a book to keep cool enough to not get a migraine. Drought & water restrictions here mean baths are out of the question now so I've had to ramp up all the other things.
Ooh, also, suck on ice cubes. :)
I hear there's a bit of a heatwave in the UK right now. As someone from the UK who's been living in South Africa for almost a decade, some things I do to deal with the heat:
* Feet in a bowl of cold water
* Ice pack wrapped in a damp tea towel (especially good under your feet in bed at night)
* Damp tea towel around neck
* Spray bottle to spritz self with water
Keep your 'hot' zones cool; armpits, under boobs, crotch, back of knees. Having cool feet and neck helps immensely too.
I think there's a tendency, especially now computers are ubiquitous and (relatively) cheap, for designers of such gadgets to be concerned only with how many features, information or options they can cram in.
They don't always appreciate the cognitive load demand they're placing on us--a group who already have to concentrate more just to get around and do basic tasks. We don't have special heightened senses or magic powers like Daredevil: it's just hard work, mental work, that we have to put in.
LB: I have different needs and experiences from @marcozehe (I'm not a braille user, for one) but I thought his run-down of specialist gadgets might be interesting for people I know too.
I like that he mentioned how support, patchy at best in English, is even worse in other languages as this is something we hear too little about.
And "the sheer richness of them can cause a cognitive load that gets in the way of enjoying certain activities"? This is so relevant and so important to me!
Rediscovering blindness products
In recent months, I have discovered a tendency within myself that longs for more focused, hassle-free environments or niches, where distractions are reduced to a minimum, and I can immerse myself in one thing, and one thing only. And that has lead to rediscovering the merits of some blindness-specific products. A bit of history Pr ...
https://www.marcozehe.de/2018/07/01/rediscovering-blindness-products/
#AssistiveTechnology #Blindness #Braille #Daisy
#a11y #webde
“In Brooklyn, when the sun goes down, pirate radio stations fire up their transmitters and take to the air, beaming transgressive, culture-bearing signals into Caribbean, Jewish and Latino neighborhoods. The Brooklyn Pirate Radio Sound Map is an archival home for the sounds of renegade community radio at a crucial turning point in its history.”
Hey London ppl: can you or do you know anyone who can help me get some estrogen and tblockers, just to last a week-month. I just moved here and signed up for a GP and should be registered Wednesday but I'm going to run out of both before then, and hopefully I can get a same day appointment but they are usually taking 3 weeks :o
Boosts and help very very appreciated.
Of course my normally sighted friends could see things like facial expressions and tears but still, I'll take it (and at least they told me about these kinds of things afterward!).
#Hamilton was SO AMAZING! We sat in Row C so I could actually see things! Like, I could distinguish the actors! I felt like a normal person!
