A Quiver Full of Arrows by Jeffrey Archer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I can’t say enough positive about Jeffrey Archer’s writing, it’s fantastic, it’s captivating, it’s, well, awesome. This book is a collection of short stories on a variety of topics, many of which made me chuckle, some of which were sad, but all of which were cleverly written.
The Great Santini by Pat Conroy
My rating: 0 of 5 stars
A fantastic, yet sad book about a young man growing up in a military family with a very strict Marine father. Plot focuses on the young man’s coming of age, his struggle to come out of his father’s shadow and become his own person. I definitely enjoyed the author’s writing style, it’s very descriptive and very real. After reading this book, I learned that the author draws on his own experiences in this book. I’m definitely planning to read more of this author’s works.
As the Crow Flies by Jeffrey Archer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Archer is definitely one of my favorite authors and this book definitely did not disappoint. Loved everything about it, highly recommend.
in this brief episode, I Testan app that I recently downloaded calledMobile Podcaster.
[powerpress]https://steves.life/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/2ae02-testing-the-mobile-podcaster-app2.m4a[/powerpress]
I am sitting outside using the iOS dictation feature to dictate this blog post via the iOS WordPress app. Like word press itself, I am pleased to find that for the most part, the iOS app is accessible. One weird exception, is that on the post compose screen, the title field and content fields seem to be reversed such that voiceover encounters the content field before encountering the title field. Certainly, this does not make the app unusable, however, it is a bit strange and is something I will definitely be reporting.
So why use the iOS app? For one thing, it’s a very convenient way to compose posts while on the go. You can also read and moderate comments and blogs that you follow. Another neat feature is that you can receive a push notification whenever someone comments, or otherwise interacts with a post. When you take into consideration that, like WordPress itself, the app is free, it makes for a very neat mobile blogging system. If you have a word press blog and haven’t tried it yet, definitely download the iOS app. I’m not sure exactly who to thank, but someone has clearly spent a great deal of time ensuring the app is accessible, something I definitely appreciate.
Well hello everyone, remember me? It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything here, so long in fact that I’m not even sure this post will actually publish. Since I don’t know if I’m essentially blogging to myself, I’ll keep this short and just say that I haven’t lost interest in blogging and plan to do more of it. Which begs the question, what will I be blogging about? Well I certainly have ideas, but if anyone is reading this and has suggestions about what they might want to see, please let me know in the comments area below.
Thanks for reading, there’s definitely more to come.
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As Christmas approaches many are thinking of the gifts they will give their loved ones and time they will spend with their family.
Last year when many kids were thinking of all the toys and gifts they were going to ask for, my little girl had only one item on her list. That item wasn’t a toy or clothes or even money. Her only wish was to help make a better Christmas for the kids that have to spend it in the hospital. I was so proud and knew I was blessed with a special little one. She raised over 300 dollars last year and we were able to purchase many gifts that were on the children’s wish list.
This year we are once again raising money to help supply gifts for the children at the University of Minnesota Children’s Hospital. If you are interested in helping Gabby in her quest please consider making a donation using the button below.
Thanks for considering helping Gabby’s Gifts. And Happy holidays to you all.
I don’t use the official Twitter app as I find it extremely confusing and unintuitive, however, I generally try to give it a quick look after every update as I know it may be the first Twitter app people are likely to encounter. The latest version comes with a number of changes, not all good in terms of accessibility. To be fair, I’m still exploring the new app, but I thought I’d jot down my observations thus far in the hopes they help others get started.
When you launch the new Twitter app, you are now presented with this very strange welcome overlay. I say that it’s strange because if you use VoiceOver, you’ll still be able to read one or two tweets behind this overlay (this likely matches what’s visually happening on the screen). What you won’t be able to do is activate any of the application tabs along the bottom of the app, nor will you be able to scroll through the tweets. All is not lost, however, as it’s possible to dismiss this overlay; here’s how I managed to get it working:
Note: I am told that a three finger swipe left while focused on the “what’s new” text will advance to the next block, however, this didn’t work for me. Might be worth a try though as that’d certainly be easier than the process just described.
Twitter is just as unintuitive as it’s been for a while, however, here’s what I’ve discovered with the new design. First, there is now a row of tabs across the bottom of the application: “Timelines,” “Notifications,” “Messages,” and “Me.” At the top of the application is a button that says “people” then a title which changes depending on which tab you’re in (the title text does not match the name of the tab of course) “search” and “new tweet.” Just a quick note: I still don’t really understand what the “people” button does, but fortunately, if you’re as confused by it as me, there’s a back button that will actually, well, take you back. Below this top row is your timeline/messages/”me” info, again depending on which tab you’re in.
The “notifications” tab seems to show Twitter Mentions and I suspect it probably shows something else as otherwise, why not just call it the “mentions” tab? I should note that this tab also has a “people” button as described above and just as described above, I still don’t really understand it.
The “messages” tab shows you any direct messages you’ve received. Double tapping on any message will show expand the thread showing any on-going discussion you might be having with that particular Twitter user. on the definitely very cool side, there’s an edit box within the conversation view making it super easy to reply.
The “Me” tab shows your own profile and activity. One thing worth noting is that if you want to change any of the application’s settings, the settings option is found within this tab.
I don’t know if this is a product of the upgrade or if I’ve just not used Twitter for a while, however, the client decided that I should start receiving push notifications for every mention and direct message received. It took me forever to figure out how to shut this off, but approximately 45 obnoxious push notifications later, I eventually did. If you find yourself in this situation, here’s how to fix it:
I realize I’m being pretty hard on the new Twitter here, however, there are some neat aspects I want to call out. First, if you double tap and hold on a tweet in timelines, you get a context menu, “Mail Tweet, Copy Link to Tweet, Report Tweet, and Cancel.” If you triple tap a tweet in timelines, you get a similar context menu containing, “Reply, Retweet, Favorite, and Cancel.” The VoiceOver hint advises that you can “triple tap for quick tweet actions,” which is a very nice touch. I really do like this triple tap menu as it provides fast access to the features I use most.
There’s still a lot about the new Twitter Client I have yet to figure out. On the plus side, there does seem to be some additional accessibility support in the form of the triple tap context menus and VoiceOver help tags. If you decide to try it, however, just be prepared to deal with the initial welcome process and an interface that to me, seems less than intuitive. Are you using the upgraded client and if so, what are your thoughts? Please comment below.
There are so many things I’d love to learn more about, things I want to try. Unfortunately, I often find that I simply don’t know anyone involved in whatever it might be, at least not personally. Sure there are forums on the net for just about everything one can imagine, but sometimes even finding that can be a challenge.
Wouldn’t it be great if there were a centralized place to find a mentor, regardless of subject? Essentially a place for people who are enthusiastic about — insert subject here — to make themselves available to others starting out? I’ve seen various sites offering this sort of thing, but most are aligned with a specific industry or group and frankly, if you’ve found such a site, you’ve probably already found other relevant resources.
I got this idea from a recent Email i received from a blind gentleman interested in coin collecting. his question to me was whether I knew of any other blind coin collectors as he had questions regarding logistics and such. Not only do I not know of other blind coin collectors, but, well, I don’t know any at all. Knowing nothing about coin collecting, I don’t even know where to suggest he start other than searching Google and hoping for the best. This sort of thing occurred quite frequently in my former life as an assistive technology instructor; a client would often show an interest in something or other and ask if I could connect them with someone with that same interest. I “social network” quite a bit and so know many people doing many things, but certainly I don’t have all subjects covered and honestly I’m glad I don’t. 🙂 Still, knowing there are people out there who are passionate about whatever their interest happens to be, it strikes me that this would be a really neat resource. All that being said, does anyone know if such a resource already exists? If it does, I want to share it with the world as I feel it could benefit many. If not, how do we create it?