INDUSTRIAL DESIGN FOR SENIORS

      I heard a very interesting interview on the CBC the Current this morning.

      A woman had been working on industrial design. She began to see that many of the things that were designed were far from senior friendly. She tried to influence fellow designers to put seniors on the agenda. Other designers were not interested.

   She decided to learn more about design and seniors so that she could influence her fellow designers.

    She had herself made into and 85 year old woman. The face took 3 hours to prepare. She had plugs in her ears for poor hearing. She had contacts that were partly opaque so that he vision was limited. I forget what they did to her legs to make her walking difficult. Style of clothing was considered. 

   Then she tried to live her life. It was difficult and challenging. Mobility is a great problem for seniors. On the streets people were impatient to get around her. People complained about her holding up traffic in the airport. People pushed and shoved to get her out of the way. Stairs, sidewalks and railings were a problem. Signs were a challenge. 

    So donning this costume over a series of years she learned more about what experiences seniors had. She also had more ammunition to try and persuade other designers to keep seniors in mind. 

    The world still isn't senior friendly but it has improved.

   This project reminds me of a book I read many years ago. BLACK LIKE ME  I enjoyed the book and got an idea of what some challenges might be  for black people.

   The book was severely criticized but I think it did open up some eyes. 

END OF THE ELECTION

     The Canadian election is over. Most of the commentators and analysers have gone home by now. I don't spend much time listening to all the paid wise men making comments. 

     So sometime in the evening I get to know a few of the broad issues and that's enough for me whether I like the results or not. 

    The Liberal party won the most seats but not a majority of seats so they cannot freely pass legislation unless a smaller party votes with them. The PC party came in second. Their leader lost his parliamentary seat . I did not like the PC leader and I think many Canadians did not like him. I thought he would be divisive for the country. 

    The liberal party spoke of unity for the country. I hope they can achieve some of it. If a few people want to take their ball and go home that's fine. We are allowed to express our own opinions

    So now the government has to get down to work.

    We have to look at elections as a whole. There are good things and bad things that happen. And then people have their individual opinions about things. Sometimes there are periods where they don't get much done and make political maneuvers to prevent legislation from passing. 

    Many people may not be familiar with a parliamentary system. The party with the most seats forms the government and presents legislation which the whole parliament debates. At the end of discussion a vote is held. If the governing party has  majority the legislation is passed. The Prime minister is the leader of the majority party. The leaders of the parties are chosen by the party. The only time people get to vote for the prime minister is in his own district. 

CANADIAN ELECTION

      Tomorrow is the federal election in Canada. 

      It's been an interesting story compared to many elections here. Our elections tend to be  little boring.   We have three main parties and a number of small parties to make things interesting. We usually have the liberal party govern for a few years and then we change to the Conservative Party of Canada. 

     This time we've had the liberal party for about 8 years. The leader became shop worn and was not liked by the public or his party. The CP's went up in the polls. If an election was held in January, the CP's would have won by a landslide.

      Suddenly the unpopular Liberal leader resigned and in a few weeks the liberal party went up in the polls. Cp party disappeared in the polling and the liberal party regained it's status as the leader. The Cp party is in the same situation as the liberals a few months ago. they have a leader who is not very popular. 

     So tomorrow we will find out who gets to lead our government. 

     What I've found is that there is a tremendous amount of misinformation spread around. One does not know what is close to the truth.

AGING II

     I have mentioned a series of radio programs that deal with the elderly. I've found them interesting and informative.

    They are on CBC ,the Canadian broadcasting corporation. The program is the current. The next issue is Monday morning.

   Heads up. the next program is on gray divorce . Divorce rates have gone down in every age group in Canada except  seniors. 

   I will be listening.

   As an aside 90% of divorce over 80 is caused by obsession compulsion. 90% of senior murders are a result of obsessive compulsion. 

APRIL SNOW

      Every year I post about April snow. Yesterday was that April snow day.

      It started in the morning as a little rain. Through out the day there were odd times that there were  few snowflakes. Sometimes huge flakes which I call snow balls. About 7 PM it started to snow heavily. Snow very quickly stayed on the ground and didn't melt. It snowed until some time after midnight. 

     This morning we had about 10 cm (4 in)  of new snow and visibility was very poor. 

    The good thing about this snow was that there was very little wind. We can get a blizzard in April with high winds. 

    Here are a few views from this morning. 

      

EAR BUDS II

        So how do you fix something that isn't broken? That's what happened to me. I got my ear buds working but they weren't broken.

      The people who made suggestions were in the ballpark. Nothing was broken. Nothing needed fixing. You suggested looking for something that just needed a click.

      It was that simple. There were three places where sound could be adjusted. I had looked at all three places to adjust sound. On one of them I didn't look carefully enough. On the blue tooth sound a line was bouncing in the sound indicator. I assumed it was telling me that the sound was on. Looking at it again I saw that there was a little cross bar that actually indicated the sound. The little cross piece was on zero. It only took a heart beat to turn the sound up and yes there was music. 

     What was playing was ABBA take a chance on me. I even heard vocals in the background that I had never heard before. 

    So I was happy and listened to my music for an hour.

    Thanks for all your comments and suggestions. I knew you'd get me there. 

EAR BUDS

     I recently won a set of earbuds in a draw at the casino. I've always wanted a set of earbuds so I was happy.

    Setting them up was a bit tricky, but I got it. I had a few other problems but they were solvable. I discovered quite a few things along the way. I had to or I wouldn't be listening to music. You can control the sound on the earbuds themselves. You and control sound on you tube and then you can control sound on the computer. So you have three different ways to control sound. You also have three different things to go wrong. 

    Finally, I had things set up so that I could use the ear buds day after day. It was pleasant. A few days ago, I had to repair the ear buds. When I went to use them again there was no sound and at this writing I still have no sound. I have been all over the place looking for a way to fix the problem. I think that there must be one little click that I am missing. 

   Wish me luck for finding the solution. 

PLANTS

      I am not a gardener , but many of the blogs I follow have a lot about plants in the content. I admire the experts who can name all the plants by their various names. 

     I appreciate plants and enjoy them and look after  them.

     Spring comes slowly to the northern hemisphere. For months I've heard about plants in various stages of development. People look for buds and blooms. I'm impressed by they show us. 

     Here in Alberta, Canada, plants are slowly coming to life. There is green grass in some places but not very much. I do have bluebells which have buds. Peonies and bleeding heart have shoots coming up. There is some green in the iris patch. The wild poplars are flowering.

     So I see some people who are very concerned when the temperature drops. Two nights from now we get a temperature of minus 7 C. Are my plants going to be harmed? No. They will certainly pause development.

    So I like the way plant scientists have mapped out zones for the most suitable plants to grow. If I tried to grow a peony from Florida, it probably wouldn't work unless I planted it in the house. 

   It always intrigues me how they have mapped zones and developed plants to thrive in these zones. 

ENGLAND

    My wife was born and raised in England until she was 14 and came to  Canada.

    Her father died when she was nine and her mother became incapacitated shortly after. She had a sister who was 5 years older and a brother who was five years younger. They tried to live on their own with their mother but it didn't work out. They were split up and went to live with relatives...older relatives whose own children had left the home. These aunts and uncles did not want young kids so it was arranged that they would  come to Canada to live with and uncle.

    When thy left England they were not able to take much with them. Some of the personal things they had were left. 

   So I'm getting to the point of my post. They were given some small gifts before they left England. Today I was cleaning and upset a box of stuff that I wanted to get rid of  for downsizing. I picked up a little book like thing and asked her , "what's this?" She said it's a gift I was given before I left England. It hit me why some of the things she has are so meaningful. She had very little so the small gifts mean a lot to her to this day. 

   So I understand why downsizing here moves at a glacial pace. 

   She also knows who gave her every gift all through her life. 

SENIOR CARE

     I've been enjoying a series on senior care on the CBC's  the Current. 

     Today they had a couple of sisters talking about the care of their mother and step father. They described a tremendous amount of push and pull. The mother and step dad wanted to stay in their home and look after themselves. The sisters know that the step Dad is struggling to cope. The sisters feel guilt about putting their mother in care. There are many different issues competing with each other with the potential decisions that are going to have to be made.  

    Who makes the decisions. The person with dementia is still cognizant enough to be in on the decision but can't make a rational decision. Family members don't always agree. The siblings doing the most care feel that they should have more clout in the decision. 

    It was interesting to listen to these two sisters discuss their mother's care. 

   Not all families have a nice cut and dried family dynamic. 

   Our family had a different set up. My Dad had remarried so there was a step Mom. Dad was the one who developed Parkinson's and needed care. For a few years our Step Mom was able to look after Dad. She had 2 of her own children in the community.

   Our Step Mom had things figured out. For a decision she would call Dad's 4 sons. She was skillful in getting us to agree to the same thing. Then she would  go to Dad and say, " the boys say..." Then he would agree.

   It finally came to the point where Dad had to go in care. He didn't want to live in care so told our Step mom the he would go back home which was 300 miles away. She asked Dad how he was going to get there. He said he'd take the train. The train hadn't run for 50 years. That was the end of the discussion.

   Even though our step mom has been gone for a long time she still deserves a pat on the back.

   Our step Mom died before Dad so Dad did get to go back home but in the nursing home. 

LOST ANYBODY LATELY?

     All of us have had experience with losing someone. Someone who isn't where they are supposed to be. 

    I had such an  experience this week and by last evening we were frantic.

    I had emailed my son and daughter about my medical situation. I do this when I want them to get exactly the same message.

   My son replied in a couple of hours. Nothing from my daughter. Next day , nothing from my daughter but more from son and daughter- in- law. So I started emailing and messaging my daughter but no reply. 

  Third day no reply from daughter. I began to get very worried and stressed. My daughter lives in Chicago. I live in Alberta, Canada which is a long way from Chicago. 

   So last night we were super frantic. We could imagine all kinds of dreadful things that could have happened. About 9:30 last night when I was checking messenger after many times that day, I noticed that she was on line. Relief! 

   I was able to talk to her. Since her husband was off this week they more or less went off line so she had never seen all my emails. They both like gardening so had been outside. Of course,  she was surprised that we were that worried and made many apologies. 

  Usually we think of children being lost. In this case  a person wasn't really lost. We just couldn't make contact.

   We did have a good sleep last night.  

APRIL FOOLS DAY

       Tell me now, is April Fools day still celebrated?

       I may have been some where else, but at one time April first was full of fun. Everybody had a finger in the pie when it came to some shenanigans.

     Radio stations always had a good gag. I haven't heard anything this year but then I don't listen to the radio very much.

    Newspapers also had excellent tricks.

    When we were little kids at school we delighted in trying to play gags on each other. We even tried to pull one over on the teacher. 

    So are you playing any April Fools jokes? Has April Fools day had it's best before date? Or am I just out of the loop?