Whine and Cheese- I can't believe this thing is still around...

I'm taking part in Blogging Against Charity Day, hosted by Kara and Miss Crip Chick. Enjoy!

I remember watching the AMD telethon as a kid. I thought it was cool that kids with disabilities (who I totally identified with) got to hang out with celebrities for hours on end all in the name of a "good cause." The telethon looked like one big party- spoiled only by the pious whining of the host, who posed for pledge spots with children positioned like fashion accessories at his side.

The unease I felt towards Jerry Lewis was similar to the heeby-jeebies I experienced at Christmas in the presence of Mall Santa.

Mall Santa was inauthentic, tatty, an impostor whose job it was to affect paternalistic concern, the careless voyeur to my fledgling consumerism. Mall Santa had freakishly youthful skin and eyes. he said "like" and "cool" a lot. He could have been my older brother pulling a prank.

"So you want a Snacktime Kid? Dude, I heard those things bite kids' fingers off! Better not let it near your hamster, if you know what I mean!"

Mall Santa had surprisingly muscular legs, a high school jock in a fat suit and beard. I was mortified knowing that if I could feel leg muscles through the cheap velour suit, then surely he could feel my bony little butt. I felt dirty, like I'd signed up to make kiddie porn without knowing it.

When I was three, my mom was interviewed for a local fundraiser for the March of Dimes. I watched the show from home with my grandmother, talking to my mom through the television's speaker. For years I thought laugh tracks were the guffaws of people watching the same shows I was in their own homes. I'd laugh extra loud trying to hear my own voice in the chorus of chuckles.

My mom sat on a carpeted stage next to a large mounted television monitor. On the screen was a picture of a young mother pushing a child on a swing in a wooded playground. I don't remember what was said about me during the interview as a second generation disabled person. My mom was wearing a wool plaid skirt, the kind that always makes me think of librarians, and I remember the host asking her about the crutch that lay at her feet, about having polio as a kid and the effects it had on having kids.

My disabilities were too rare and too numerous to warrant a telethon. Nor did my disabilities elicit the classic "aww" factor favored by TV execs. Too many extraneous troubling things going on with my body at any given time to be easily "read" by viewers. Looking back I have to face the fact that I was a punk right out of the gate: too brassy, too bold, too weird to be typecast.

I'm Blogging at [With-tv]

Check it out- a cable channel tuned in to the disabled community! Read their mission statement here and add your support by signing the guestbook. Here's what I wrote:

As a person with a disability, I have aways been accutely aware of the
exclusion of people with disabilities from mainstream media outlets- their
stories, their images, their say in the production of culture. This opportunity
is long over due and eagerly anticipated!

Many leaders in the disability rights community have already pledged their support. The project is in its early stages, so audience support, participation and influence is crucial to future successes. Influence the scope and flavor of programming!

Let's add our images, our voices, our politics, our creativity and ideas to the cultural lexicon and amplify our presence! If you care about the arts and wish to shape the course of disability entertainment/ culture do so today by showing your support and spreading the word!

Unsicht Unseen

Today I received an email from a friend whose working in Germany. He wanted to know if I'd like to dine at Unsicht- Bar in Berlin during my vacation, scheduled for late fall. For some reason, I'd thought this restaurant was located in the UK- perhaps their is one like it there. I believe there's one located on the west coast too- owned and operated by a blind chef if my memory serves.

By "like it" I mean a restaurant with a truly unique twist. Patrons dine in total darkness, experiencing elegant three- and- four course meals served by blind/ visually impaired waiters.

Unsicht- Bar (meaning invisible or unseeable) has locations in Berlin, Hamburg and Cologne and should not be confused with Blindekuh (the Blind Cow), a restaurant with locations in Zurich and Basel. According to Wikipedia, Blindekuh was established by the Swiss- German Blind- Leicht Foundation to create employment opportunities for blind people in the food service industry. The name comes from the German equivalent of Blind Man's Bluff. I've yet to translate the German language press releases about Unsicht- Bar to determine if it too is a Blind- Leicht project. Obviously this is a story which begs more research and a first- hand account (I love it when research involves food)!

The Unsicht- Bar website explains that table settings are arranged to coordinate to the numbers on a clock face. Fair enough, I can see how this might help the uninitiated sighted person to navigate their first meal in the dark. The site also notes that the food is prepared in bite- sized portions so that visitors don't have to worry about cutting their food!

As someone with a vision impairment, I find this consideration amusing as well as a wee bit troubling. It reminded me of a meal at a friend's house when I was nine. My friend's mom made us lunch. Setting the plate in front of me, she picked a knife and began cutting the food for me! We tried to laugh it off- my friend had certainly eaten with me enough to know I could cut my own food. But her mom made an assumption based on damaging misconceptions of what blind/ visually impaired people are thought to be able to do.

I remember her mom getting really embarrassed and hurriedly saying something like, "Oh I'm so used to cutting other people's food, I don't know when to stop!" My friend offered that she still tried to cut up her food too sometimes, but it was a weak cover up.

I'm quite sure I could cut a steak or debone a fish without looking. But then, I've relied on my sense of touch much longer than Unsicht- Bar's sited patrons. For me, touch has always been an integral component and allie to seeing. For years I thought that everyone linked sight to touch like I did, that if you love art and aesthetics then you're a sensualist to boot. I now know that isn't necessarily the case. Perhaps Unsicht's boneless/ knifeless policy is nothing more than a bit of hand- holding intended for ambivalent guests, the clock face analogy extended to touch- phobic foodies who want to know exactly what they're putting in their mouths.

It just so happens that Eastern Europe is flecked with diamonds- in- the- rough tourist attractions of particular interest to PWDs and "With-" minded folk. Other sites on my Hit List: the Kasper Hauser Museum in Ansbach, Germany for a peak into a decidedly intriguing passage in the history of early specialized education. Too bad I won't be there in time for the festival held in Hauser's honor each September.

I'm beginning to think that Ansbach just may be my spiritual home, as their other major attraction is none other than the extravagant Rococo Festival held in July. I'll take any excuse to dress up in skirts and big hair! I am a southern girl at heart.

[Visual description: A double portrait of Kasper Hauser in bronze or possibly iron, stands in a cobble stone square. The figure in the foreground has a disheveled appearance and stands with head cast downward. He holds a battered satchel in one hand and a letter in the other. The companion figure in the background is poised and finely dressed. His hat lies on the ground at his feet, as if knocked off or lost in some unseen disturbance.]

Cross- posted at [With-tv]

The Post Review Is Slavishly PoMo

Lately, I've been caught up in a flurry of activity hailing from the fabulous ranks of disabled bloggers who are hell- bent on transforming people's attitudes about what it means to be a PWD. These are revolutionary times, but those of us furiously typing away at our computers have surely earned at least a virtual vacation? Perhaps a trip to the Carnival where Andrea Is Buzzing About- what else? Being on holiday!

If you haven't heard of the highly- addicting blog carnival phenomenon, there's no need to feel left out. The Web is teeming with fascinating disability- positive posts. It seems I wasn't the only BlogHer partipant with mixed feelings about poorly- considered conference accessibility and swag overload. Are you the woman I saw getting on the elevator with the red and blue flashing wheelchair spokes? Girl- those are bitchin!

Penny linked to a number of resoruces recounting the delightfully eccentric history of prosthetics. Also be sure to check out her latest posts.

Kaye claims to be taking a vacation from blogging this month, but I can't resist imagining her sipping mint juleps at CNN headquarters in Atlanta, following her excellent commentary on the institutionalization of children with developmental disabilities during the 40s, 50s and 60s.

Call Him Conservative, Just Don't Call Him the E Word

Okay, so I'm watching the CBS evening news, and I want to make it clear that I'm NOT saying this because I like John Roberts- I'm annoyed by the tone of the news coverage that assumes that if a person becomes ill his/ her ability to work must be thrown into question, analyzed and then ever so graciously (read: with great condescension) approved by- whom? journalists? the public at large? George Bush? Really the Cheif Justice only retains the public's support by virtue of the fact that he's received a managable prognosis. And that seizure he had was ever so polite, earning the qualifiers "benign" and "idiopathic." Robert's seizure was nothing like those icky, scary seizures disabled people have- heavens no!

An earlier news story at NBC noted that a person who has more than one seizure over a span of years is considered to have epilepsy, but no one at CBS has dared suggest that Roberts in fact has epilepsy. No, the CBS team prefers to soft pedal the facts: the Cheif Justice may have to take anti- seizure medication from here on out, but what does that prove? Nothing! Scads of people take anti- seizure meds for the street cred alone! Doesn't mean they have epilepsy! No, instead CBS deemed it necessary to reassure its audience by recapping the recent ailments of other Supreme Court Justices as further evidence of Roberts staying power. There were charts and shit. I couldn't take the visual aids.

Also, Kay Olsen comments on a disturbing case in California involving the alleged murder and unauthorized organ farming of a disabled man.

And earlier in the week, perhaps prophetically, she remarked on the perils of bad epilepsy jokes as told by weather men.

Herzog's Other Obsession

I just watched Werner Herzog's 1987 Cobra Verde over a bowl of mint chocolate chip ice cream - a great combination. I highly recommend it. The film is nowhere near as good as The Enigma of Kasper Hauser or Fitzcarraldo or Aguirre, but there's no shortage of gorgeous scenes. I read that Kinkski got completely fed up with Herzog over his handling of the film extras while on location in Ghana, though I'd say it was to great effect (Klaus getting pissed, not the alleged exploitation). He bristles like a Ferrel cat in just about every scene. Raging and preening about (if one can do both at the same time) he engages a field of Amazon warriors in frenzied army drills. The effect astonishing and grandly absurd. African women (the free Africans or newly- enslaved, those who have not yet been forced to leave their homeland) figure heavily in the film, though their narrative presence is not well - defined. Still, there insertion intimately informs the films' deeply troubled conscience.

I was disturbed to read this review that tries to make Kinski's da Silva a sympathetic character. I mean this is a film about a raping, murdering bandit turned slave trader - a self conscious RMBRS as some closing dialogue suggests, but what's the point really for such observations? Does a criminal's capacity for introspection and moral ambivalence make him a lesser tyrant? I suspect this mindset serves as the fulcrum point for many of our current social problems. Herzog has made a brilliant career of exploring ideas about human culpability.

I'm becoming more than a bit obsessed with Herzog's tangential obsession with disability. Cobra Verde is bracketed by images of disabled people. The film opens on a blind Brazilian troubadour plucking a violin and ends with Kinski's da Silva collapsing on the shore in despair as a man bent with polio approaches from the distance, walking on all fours. The new king and former ally of the slave trader da Silva has sent a number of young polio survivors to the slave fort in a symbolic gesture (as in, the slave trade has crippled the nations of Africa, or something along those lines). But its easy to overlook this heavy - handed "message" when confronted with these unforgettable young men.

My viewing was colored by the knowledge that Herzog (as is his custom) used real polio survivors as opposed to actors portraying disabled people. This awareness took me out of the film in a way that defied all my expectations about narrative filmaking. Instead, my reaction was something like, "Oh shit! People still contract polio in Africa! Someone should make a film about THAT, and why the fuck people still suffer from totally preventable diseases!" This was quickly followed by, "People are big colonialist assholes!" A smashing example of what the director calls "ecstatic truth" in filmaking, but one that ironically speaks to the ndustry's idiotic refusal to cast disabled actors. Of course, casting directors seem incapable of wrapping their heads around even the simplest physiological concepts, like normal female lifespans and body types. So what can you expect?