Personal

My dear friend (and former bandmate), Chris Cook, is drawing some really amazing things. I love the way they feel! There’s a sort of Southwest meets Northwest magical realism that, to me, seems totally Chris. The vibrancy and warmth in the drawings has the same sort of feeling that I used to get sitting in his kitchen, drinking Lipton tea and rolling Top tobacco after a meal of red beans and rice. Thanks Chris!

On Tuesday, the National Federation of the Blind filed suit against Target, claiming that its site is not accessible to blind users.  This certainly would be a case to watch since, to date, we’ve thought accessibility requirements as having legal weight only with government sites.  Whether or not the NFB wins the suit, it will likely bring increased focus to the subject.  And the fact that they also mention that the Target site is "powered by Amazon.com" would seem to suggest that this isn’t the last we’ll hear about this.

"Target?s website ? which according to its home page is ‘powered by Amazon.com’ ? contains significant access barriers that prevent blind customers from browsing and purchasing products online, as well as from finding important corporate information such as employment opportunities, investor news, and company policies.

The plaintiffs charge that Target.com fails to meet the minimum standard of web accessibility. It lacks compliant alt-text, an invisible code embedded beneath graphic images that allows screen readers to detect and vocalize a description of the image to a blind
computer user. It also contains inaccessible image maps, preventing blind users from jumping to different destinations within the website. And because the website requires the use of a mouse to complete a transaction, blind Target customers are unable to make purchases on Target.com independently.

‘We tried to convince Target that it should make its website accessible through negotiations,’ says Dr. Maurer [NFB Pres.]. ‘It?s unfortunate that Target was unwilling to commit to equal access for all its online customers. That gave us no choice but to seek the protection of the court. The website is no more accessible today than it was in May of last year,
when we first complained to Target."

More information available from the Disability Rights Advocates Web site including a Fact Sheet and the complete complaint.

Yesterday I had to stop my second attempt at an anti-depressant due to allergic reation. Here’s how it goes:

1. Start new meds
2. Eat meds daily for three weeks
3. Start feeling way better
4. Break out in a rash
5. Stop meds
6. Have nightmares, itching and insomnia for a week or two
7. Repeat

First I tried Wellbutrin. Yesterday I had to stop Effexor. Monday I’ll get a new one. If this happens again I’ll just go back to drinking heavily.

At last, walking slowly toward us from the parking lot, was a man built very differently from the men gathered around me. He had none of their Midwestern roundness, none of their low-slung solidity. He was tall, lean, somewhat frail, and instead of clomping along on big feet, as the others tended to do, he picked his way forward delicately, as if someone had told him to watch out for broken glass.

He was dressed differently too. Rather than the dapper uniform worn by his teammates, Meeden wore baggy street clothes–he preferred to play in his everyday duds, his teammates insisted–and he carried a sad little Kansas City Chiefs tote bag. Also, while every other man looked as if he’d been to the same Supercuts that morning, Meeden wore his white hair rakishly, almost foppishly, long. The wispy strands fell well below his shoulders.

The Unnatural Natural