Archived Newsletter - Winter 2005

Hello everyone and welcome to the festive Christmas edition of the newsletter. I hope this finds you well and free from all the nasty "bugs" which appear to be around at the moment. I hope also that you are all ready and prepared for the Christmas celebrations. Things have been really busy here in the office lately but I think we are catching up now. I must apologise if you have not received a Christmas card and Chairman's letter this year, I had a problem with the computer when printing the labels off and am afraid that I may have missed some. If you haven't received it, please don't take it personally and may I take this opportunity of wishing you a Very Happy Christmas and Peaceful New Year. This time of the year always makes us look back at the year just ending and I was thinking what a good year it has been for the Association. We have welcomed several new members so that our membership now stands at around 2,500, we have received a couple of really good legacies, we had an article published in the Devon Today magazine and although we were sorry to lose Steve, we are very fortunate to have acquired the services of Rod. His computer class has proved very popular and is another service we are proud to be able to offer. We have welcomed new trustees and now have a very strong board of trustees to take the Association forward. I have been very fortunate in having the opportunity of meeting lots of you throughout the year and hope to meet many more of you in the exciting years to come. The trustees are currently working on our business plan for the next few years and I hope to be able to report even more exciting changes in the next newsletter. I am really sorry that we still (at the time of writing) haven't had the large diaries and calendars in yet. I actually ordered these back in July and started chasing them because I wanted them for the Show and AGM in September. I was told that the gentleman from the VIP Trust had died and that his son was going to honour all the orders placed at least for this year. I am afraid that the son appears to have taken on too much and although he keeps promising them to me, they still haven't arrived. We will certainly source them from elsewhere next year but in the meantime many thanks for your patience and fingers crossed that they will have arrived before you receive this.

The following was published in the Exeter Society Newsletter but it doesn't say where it came from, I just felt it was appropriate with Rod doing the computer classes, its called The Computer Swallowed Grandma!

The computer swallowed Grandma, Yes, honestly it's true.
She pressed 'control' and 'enter', and disappeared from view.
It devoured her completely, the thought just makes me squirm.
She must have caught a virus, or been eaten by a worm!
So, if inside your 'inbox', my Grandma you should see,
please 'copy, scan' and 'paste' her and send her back to me!
I've searched through the recycle bin, and files of every kind,
I've even used the internet, but nothing did I find.
In desperation, I turned to Jeeves, my searches to refine,
the reply from him was negative, not a thing was found 'online'.

This is a tribute to all the Grandmas who are fearless and have learned how to use a computer.

Not much from Clubs this time, I assume they are all busy with their Christmas lunches but thanks to June from Seaton & District Club for sending in the following "Our Chairman, Peter Halsey and member Arthur Saunders were taken to the Annual Arts & Crafts Show and enjoyed the day, particularly as Arthur had entered a car made from bits and pieces, he received second prize for it. They particularly enjoyed the cake cutting, glass of wine and meeting the Lord Mayor. In May the Club had the privilege of a talk by Mr. Daniel Byles who is a Consultant Ophthalmologist and his talk on various eye conditions was enjoyed by members. We were asked if we would be willing to help the Medical School and a few of us were taken to the R D & E where we were received and welcomed by a cup of tea. We were introduced to the students and they were shown how to administer eye drops and to do eye tests. Peter took some of his aids with him and the students were very interested in seeing how they help him. The time flew by and it was so interesting, we feel we have helped a little to enable the students to continue their studies and help future patients who will have the same problems as ourselves." Thanks June and I look forward to meeting you and all the members at your AGM in January.

The West of England School are looking for members to join its Old Pupils Association so if you were a pupil of the school, please contact Mrs. Searle on 01626 360986.

If you are involved with a Club, you may like to know that you can make a group visit to the Green Lane Herb Link's Community Herb Garden. The garden is situated 3 miles from Totnes and features wildlife habitats as well as cultivated areas of vegetables, medicinal herbs and flowers. Groups can use the space for free or take part in structured activities such as ointment making and nature games for a small fee. Contact Frances Wright on 01803 866373 if you are interested.

Also of interest to Clubs, we have been kindly donated a large carrier bag full of tea bags and another of catering packs of coffee. If you could make use of these please give me a ring, free to a good home and first come, first served! We only have a coffee in the morning here and don't bother with a drink in the afternoon, Rod and I both drink a lot of water so we will never get through all those tea bags here.

If you fancy treating yourself to a Christmas present, we have lots of new products for sale as well as some donated items. If you are looking for a last minute Christmas present, what about one of our delicious Christmas puddings? They really are very nice and only £5. We also have a couple of dressed dolls left as well as a knitted blanket, some large knitted socks and some knitted gloves. We have the small pocket diaries in and they are £4. New products we have had in recently include a large print atlas and dictionary at £15 and £13. A very large calculator for just £20, I-caps for £9 and for those very fit members, talking pedometer for £11, talking skipping rope for £14 and a football with a bell inside for £10. We also have an iron guard for £21, a freezer alarm (to warn you if you accidentally leave your freezer door open) for £10 and a carbon monoxide and smoke alarm for £36. This really is a life saving device and for only £36, a must if you have a gas appliance or solid fuel fire, it will speak to you if you have a carbon monoxide leak and will beep like a traditional smoke alarm if you have a fire. We also have the new DAB Pure Radio which is £99. It is an excellent radio but if you are thinking of purchasing one, please remember to check first whether you can actually receive digital radio in your area. I know there are some areas of Devon where it is still not available. Don't forget we always have a large selection of talking and easy to see clocks and watches and now also have a large selection of good quality daylight lights. If you are interested in any of these items, just pop into our shop from 10am - 1pm Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday or give us a ring on 01392 876666, we will be quite happy to post anything out to you.

We have been donated a couple of boxes full of talking classic tapes and if you are interested, come in and have a look at them or give us a ring. Phil Jenkins of Teignmouth has an upright piano which is free to a good home, he says it would be ideal for beginners or perhaps for a club or home, it is in reasonable condition but just needs tuning. Give us a ring if you are interested and we will put you in touch with Phil.

Mrs. Hill from Axminster has for sale a Prisma colour video magnifier which was £600 new, is only three years old and has only been used about six times during this time, she is looking for £250 for it and can be contacted direct on 01460 221508. She also has a Peak Illuminated Loupe 15x which cost £41 and has hardly been used, she will accept £20. She also has a liquid level indicator, a talking key chain and a talking watch. Give her a ring for more details.

Mr. Stokes of Exmouth has a Rainbow Probe CCTV with 14" screen for sale, if you are interested, contact him direct on 01395 263717.

We have a Rainbow Robotron Talking scanner here which we will let go for offers of around £100, we also have a Modular colour TV magnifier which has a 3x magnifier and has only been used for demonstration purposes, was selling for £249, we will accept £125. Also here in the Centre, we have a toaster type tape recorder, a TV sound receiver, a calendar clock, talking bathroom scales, a light probe, Braille wind up watch, Braille travel clock, small 9 band portable radio, FM clock radio, Phillips tape recorder, a garden thermometer, a 3 band Sony radio, a 3 band portable Morphy Richards radio, a talking weather clock, a Braille compass, a talking watch with bracelet strap, Braille bathroom scales and the Braille Gospels. If you are interested in any of the above, please give us a ring, we will accept offers as these items have been donated to us and although are not new are in reasonable condition. Rod and I had never seen the Braille scales or compass before but they both work, I insisted Rod use the scales as I don't like what they tell me!

Any of you who were having the Big TV Guide will probably be aware that it has now gone out of production due to the loss of a major sponsor. If you are owed any money back, I have details here in the office of the Administrator.

If you are looking to receive more information on tape, have you heard of the Cue & Review Recording Service? They are based in Scotland but send tapes out throughout the country. They record The Herald, The Sunday Independent and The Evening Times as well as the Radio Times, History Today, Inside Soap, Earth Matters, Four Four Two, More, SFX, Star Trek and The Sun Newspaper. They also record many more too many to list in fact but if you are interested then please contact them direct on 0141 563 0306 or visit their website at www.cueandreview.org.uk, e-mail information@cueandreview.org.uk.

As you know, we are using tapes for the newsletter at present but are looking to change to CDs and I would be interested to have your views on this. Would you prefer us to use CDs or would you like us to stick to the old tapes? You can receive your newsletter by e-mail if you wish, just give me your address and I will arrange it.

Do you find it very frustrating when ringing a big company, to have to listen to lots of options before you finally get to speak to a human? Well, there is a gentleman from America who is working on shortcuts as to how to get over this problem. You can visit his website to find out more, www.paulenglish.com/ivr. I must admit that I haven't had time to check it out but if you have any shortcuts, please share them with us.

Are you all managing now with the chip and pin cards? I have been informed that the Co-op in Seaton will not accept a signature instead of a PIN no. even though the bank have agreed to it. Have you had any problem like this? I know that the Co-op in Topsham accept signatures so wonder if it is up to the individual managers. Please share your experiences with us.

If you are an older person living in the Exeter area then Carol Smith from the RNIB would be interested to hear from you, she is running a project which has been set up to improve the quality of help given to older people with sight problems by health and social services. She is wanting to give older people with sight problems the opportunity to be involved in the project from the beginning. She hopes to talk to some groups of older people with sight problems to find out about their experiences of health and social services, what is good (and bad) about the way services are provided and ideas they have as to how services might be improved. She is looking for a discussion group of around 10 to 12 people. The group would meet for around an hour and a half, refreshments will be provided and travel costs paid. Participants will be sent a report of the points raised at the discussion group, but any individual contributions will be anonymous. No date has been set yet for the discussion group but if you live in Exeter and are interested, give Carol a ring on 029 2044 9557, she will ring you back to save your telephone bill. Please contact her by the end of December as she is very keen to get this project going. You can also e-mail her on carol.smith@rnib.org.uk.

Guide Dogs are conducting a Needs Survey and are looking for people to give their consent to be contacted for a phone interview. You do not need to be a guide dog owner to participate, nor are there any restrictions on age or location. If you can spare the time for a telephone interview and would like to be involved then please contact them direct on 01189 838204 or e-mail Femi.Nzegwu@guidedogs.org.uk.

The Northcott Theatre in Exeter are providing audio described performances of several of their productions next year, including The Fall of the House of Usheretts in January, The Crowstarver in March, Joking Apart in April and The Boyfriend in April. They also have audio described performances of their pantomime, Dick Whittington. Contact the box office direct on 01392 493493 for more details.

A couple of dates for next years diary now (sorry if you haven't received it yet!), the Sight Village exhibition of high tech and equipment for visually impaired people takes place next year in Birmingham from 18th - 20th July. Our Annual Show and AGM will be held, once again, at The America Hall, Pinhoe, on Saturday, 2nd September.

If you are desperate to remain in your own home but need help in doing so, you may be interested to hear of a company called Sunshine Care, they are an independent agency that prides itself on providing clients with highest quality of care. They specialise in temporary or long-term live-in care and companionship. They can also provide shorter domiciliary care visits and live-in care where they pay the staff direct to take the burden off you. The domiciliary care service is only available in the Plymouth and South Hams area. I have no idea how good they are or what they charge but if you are interested, why not give them a call and have a chat, they can be contacted on 01752 242454.

Many thanks to those of you who have already sent us in donations and Christmas cards. Thanks also to those of you who support us regularly with the standing order scheme, donations of this nature enable us to carry on with our important work for the residents of Devon.

After receiving the last newsletter, Purcilla Paisey of Exeter has sent me in a whole load of her poems to share with you, I've just picked the one for now and she calls it Knit One Pearl One;

Knit One Pearl One, Knit One Pearl One,
Oh dear, all those knit one, pearl ones.
I mean to say, knit one pearl one,
I mean to say I've dropped nine stitches.
Now start again, knit one, pearl one, knit one pearl one!

Thank you Purcilla.

Our low vision service is continuing to be very busy and popular. Thanks to Rod Wilson from Optima for stepping in and running our clinics for us until our own Rod has completed his training. Clinics will be run on a regular basis in the New Year so if you think we could help you to read, do your knitting or sewing or to be able to see labels, then give us a ring and make an appointment to come in to our low vision clinic. You will be given an hours assessment and offered the chance to purchase any magnifiers or aids which will help you. If low vision aids are not for you, why not pop in and try out our Chatterbox, this is a wonderful piece of portable equipment which will read correspondence for you and thus help you to maintain your independence. Chatterbox is a lot of money, i.e. £1,000 but you are most welcome to come in here and try it for as long as you wish, just make sure you make an appointment first.

The Devon Association for the Blind is here to help you so if you need any information or advice or would like anything from our shop, just give us a ring or pop in to see us. Pat is always happy to see people in the shop and any one of us will be pleased to deal with your query on the telephone.

The shop, resource centre and office will be closing on Friday, 23rd December at mid day and will re-open again on Tuesday, 3rd January 2006. The answer phone will be on during the holiday so if you would like to leave us a message, we will get back to you upon our return.

It now just remains for me to say, keep healthy and warm this winter and have a very enjoyable Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Best wishes from Sue, Rod and Pat.

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