Outlook on Radio Western

What’s a fire tornado? How do the northern lights appear in the night sky? What does Joe Biden’s wearing of aviator sunglasses represent culturally? Who is The Falling Man? What exactly is a meme anyway? And what do Mike Pence and Grandpa Simpson have to do with one another?

To our blind listeners, for answers to these questions and more, check out Outlook this week where we speak with Christine Malec and JJ Hunt, a blind/sighted team, out of Toronto, who are behind Talk Description to Me, where: “the visuals of cultural events and the world around us get hashed out in description rich conversations”. From one podcast team to another, this episode contains silly moments like our thoughts on how fun goalball actually is to discussion on moving images such as the 9/11 Memorial.

JJ has a background in theatre and draws on that in his work describing images and the sighted world that we, as blind people, can often miss. Christine is a musician and audio description consultant and together these two are making quite a splash in the ever expanding world of audio description.

And for our sighted listeners, could you describe, in detail, the horror and the heroic actions on a day like 9/11 to someone who was unable to see it with their own eyes? Audio description is an art form and a necessary one, like all art is, but it matters to many of us who want to feel included and to have access to what is seen in popular culture and in news and current events around the world. Some blind people have something of a visual memory and others have never seen, but inclusion is thankfully becoming an universal standard.

Find and follow them on social media, by listening to Talk Description To Me on podcast streaming services everywhere (you might even find something that interests you about the world we see and the parts that can pass us by), and find out more by going to their website:

https://talkdescriptiontome.buzzsprout.com

And you can find Christine’s Patreon page here:

https://www.patreon.com/ChristineMalec

We’re celebrating our 100th episode of Outlook, on this final Monday in January, with guest and friend Sky Mundell and his keyboard.

As a child, our guest begged his dad for a piano and his dad said he’d buy him one if he learned a particular Beethoven song. There’s a timeless quality Sky has. He shares with us his adoption story, mainstream and segregation in education, and he explains his love of music and technology (mostly self taught), capping off our celebratory show with three classic keyboard tunes.

So don’t miss this 100th show, with Sky Mundell, winner of Vancouver Island's Got Talent 2011.

Check out Sky performing live for Vancouver Island's Got Talent here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bapemFdu4cA

And his music Facebook page can be found here:

https://www.facebook.com/skysmusicpage/

Check out the latest episode of Outlook where we speak with Natalie Martiniello and Jen Goulden from Braille Literacy Canada (BLC) as they celebrate thirty years.

They discuss the early influence of braille literacy in their lives, how Braille Authority of North America (BANA) made Canada realize we needed something of our own, and what our guests believe is the future of braille in the literacy of Canadians who are blind and visually impaired.

In January, the month of Louis Braille’s birth, Natalie and Jen share their bilingual perspective, while explaining the unique connection to Mr. Braille that French-Canada holds close to its heart.

What is Braille Literacy Canada and how is BLC at the forefront of the education into the value of braille in this country?

To learn more, check out the official website at:

http://www.brailleliteracycanada.ca

Mixed Bag Monday, though I know when it’s a podcast, days of the week aren’t a part of it anymore.

It’s our second episode of 2021 and the first with us two co-hosts back at it, as Outlook discusses what’s in the news, in the world of social media, and what’s happening on this show in the weeks to come. It’s another Mixed Bag Monday show.

Today, on Outlook, we discuss the recent celebrations for World Braille Day and Louis Braille’s birthday, our music making to cheer us up in the midst of this pandemic, and also the latest rumours going around on TikTok with young people needing not only mored education on someone from the past like Helen Keller, but how it’s more important than ever that we showcase the best of the ordinary lives of those of us living with disabilities. We are out here and we are making things happen and disability makes us stronger.

https://worldblindunion.org/blog/news/wbu-statement-for-world-braille-day-4-january-2021/?fbclid=IwAR15EcpVqFITrPPTvmTs9z7H7pmiQMjrQmvA1FV5qtHwUFsaZxuTUA7Myjg

https://medium.com/@isabellalahoue/the-generation-that-doesnt-believe-helen-keller-existed-e14d5945013c

https://rikermusic.bandcamp.com

http://soundcloud.com/skipatrolmusic/ski-patrol-lighting-up-a-dark-season

Have you ever seen a children’s picture print/braille book in your local library? Or any braille at all for that matter?

Our first guest on Outlook for 2021 is a public service librarian from the National Network For Equitable Library Service (NNELS). Pikiora Wylie moved to Canada from New Zealand when she met a Canadian and, since moving here, has lived in Ottawa, northern British Columbia, and now resides in Montreal, Quebec where she is learning French during the pandemic.

This episode originally aired on 94.9 CHRW Radio Western on January 4th which is a special date on the calendar for many blind people. Braille is feared by many, but we at Outlook promote it for equal literacy levels as the sighted have at their disposal. On this episode we talk about how Pikiora became a librarian and her mission for helping people get access to information makes her an important ally and resource, with her job at NNELS. And she tells us all about the resources available on NNELS’s website including tutorials and their YouTube page, with those and how to get a Canadian library to sign up as a way of creating greater inclusion for any of its blind patrons.

We discuss how publishers can make material accessible from the start and how that makes all the difference, instead of having to redo things later, and our guest lets us know about the accessibility summit that takes place every winter between resources like NNELS and publishers.

NNELS is an information access resource for Canadians with a print disability (low vision, blindness, learning disabilities) and Pikiora tells us all about the needs of blind and low vision Canadians who reach out to NNELS for books made accessible.

https://nnels.ca

We’re Back! Before Outlook, this is where it all began.

Every year, around this time, we at Ketchup On Pancakes sit down by the fireside for a talk on the interesting year we’ve just experienced and the one still to come and 2020 was no exception; far from it.

So we may not be recording as many episodes here as we once did, but even though we’re focusing our attention on Outlook and our advocacy on that show most of the year, this podcast still means a lot; it’s where we started our podcast work and the idea for a show about advocacy and blindness came out of this show which is more personal and focusing on family, humour, and creativity, a place where we can discuss any number of things unrelated to disability.

On this year-end-review, we start with the creativity with a visit to downtown London, Ontario just before Christmas where Brian and his bandmates (all COVID-19 precautions seen to) played a bunch of holiday favourites. That leads us right into the crackling fire and we talk about what’s changed (one Christmas to the next), about the pandemic that we did not anticipate interfering with ongoing podcasting projects, and where we are with our music and our writing.

We feature the recent holiday themed song (Lighting Up a Dark Season) we wrote and recorded about a terrible accident five years ago and we share a bunch of Christmas memories (along with our cassette clip of the week as proof) of the pancakes with Ketchup breakfast that’s the inspiration behind the name of this podcast. Some family members have taken on the pancake making technique passed down to us from our father’s mother (Oma) and are carrying that tradition into the future.

So check out our By The Fireside episode for 2020 and we will see what we have to say by next year. See you by the fireside.

(Note: we also say goodbye to two beloved pets that passed away in 2020. Rip Dobby and Lumos.)

You can hear the holiday-themed song Brian produced and Kerry wrote lyrics for here:

http://soundcloud.com/skipatrolmusic/ski-patrol-lighting-up-a-dark-season

And Brian's band's debut EP can be found here:

https://rikermusic.bandcamp.com

On this final episode of Outlook for 2020, we (brother and sister hosts) return with another Mixed Bag Monday for a discussion about how Outlook has grown over the past year.

In a year where we were made to record from home rather than going into the station, we changed from 30 minute-long episodes to hour long shows where we began a year of interviews that can’t be beat: From mothers with blind children and teachers of blind students to discussions on music braille and perfect pitch. From learning about dangerously designed bike lanes in city design to what travel looked like to blind adventurers, before this pandemic changed all our lives, all travel included.

In 2020, we made the move to get Outlook up on all podcast platforms including Apple and Spotify, at Outlook On Radio Western.

We continue to consider and feature the outlooks of everyone who want to speak with us and we at Outlook On Radio Western will return for even more interviews and a focus on life with a disability in the world in 2021 and we hope you’ll join us for all that and more.

Here's a link to the song Kerry wrote the lyrics for and I produced:

http://soundcloud.com/skipatrolmusic/ski-patrol-lighting-up-a-dark-season

And my band's debut EP which was just released:

https://rikermusic.bandcamp.com

On one of the final episodes of Outlook for the year, we speak with Judy Robinet, advocate and ally to those of us with disabilities as she shares her own journey with the “D word”.

Her father was the major influence in her life, but along the way she met other influences including Stevie Wonder and went on in the fields of child and youth development, special education, and orientation and mobility training.

The accident she went through as a teenager made her disabled and “disfigured,” basically being told she was no longer marriage material, that education was beyond her reach, but her father’s words kept her going: “Choose a life worth living”

And so she did. And so she created a resource to help people realize that there is life after disability, a life worth living:

https://alifeworthliving.ca

Welcome to December and our first International Day For Persons With Disabilities or IDPD episode before 2020 comes to an end. The interviewer becomes the interviewee, but you can’t totally take the host out of the guest and we three soon find out we have one thing, in particular, in common.

He’s on AMIAudio with the afternoon talk show Kelly and Company. Today, he’s our guest. We speak with Kelly MacDonald about the pros and cons of his years at W. Ross MacDonald School for the Blind and Deaf-blind and how it shaped him, how he got the best of both worlds, how he’s worked with Accessible Media Inc. since it was a basic reading service, and how a career in media and broadcasting has given him so much.

His radio voice is classic, well practiced, and perfectly suited to spending an hour together. Having an accessible network in Canada like AMI is helping to promote inclusion in media representation so check out Kelly and Company, weekdays from two to four eastern:

https://www.ami.ca/listenlive

And also available as a podcast:

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/kelly-and-company/id1235188417

Someone who is blind has just as much of a stake in a healthy environmental imprint as anyone else. Yet, when you hear a bicycle flying by, when the wizzing sound of the bike’s tires surprises you when it’s most often too late, when this is a dangerous impediment to smooth travel on public transportation, it’s serious and must be taken into account.

On this week’s episode of Outlook, we speak with Oriano Belusic about the recent results of a B.C. Human Rights Tribunal case he filed about dangerous bike lanes and “floating” bus stops in Victoria.

It’s a situation that matters because the environmental issue and the safety of all pedestrians, blind travellers who have no choice between car or bicycle, they are both of consequence. It is one form of city design that could and has spread to other cities around the country and the world. We need to be considered and included before, not after-the-fact.

On this latest show, we discuss Oriano’s early life growing up in Croatia, what he’s built as a life for himself here in Canada, and what he’s seen the need for the Canadian Federation of the Blind (CFB) to be.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/bc-floating-bus-stops-human-rights-tribunal-1.5811152

https://www.timescolonist.com/news/local/cycling-guidelines-need-to-be-revised-in-wake-of-tribunal-ruling-advocate-1.24243483