https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtLusC7zkvs ++++ My column for e-architect begins: Joel Solkoff’s Column – Volume II, No. 2 Writing on architects plus their role in the imminent global Baby Boom housing crisis Zaha Hadid’s Miami compared to my life in rural “Rust Belt” Pennsylvania “Miami has long been the economic and commercial capital of Latin America, both English […]
Central Pennsylvania
Lady Gaga: When you became disabled in “Paparazzi,” you needed cooler equipment
What I want you, oh dear Lady Gaga, as a disability and elderly rights advocate here in State College, Centre County, Pennsylvania to do is:
Sing for us at noon at the bingo parlor at Addison Court, 120 East Beaver Avenue, State College. Addison Court is an independent residence for the elderly and disabled. There are 90 of us. Several of us could use cheering up. We do not get to hear a lot of live music. Dazzle us.
Advocate for us. After Florida, Pennsylvania has more elderly residents than any other state in the union. Centre County is attracting large numbers of elderly residents who retire here. Yet the music venues in Downtown State College are closed to us because Downtown businessmen do not think it is worth their while to provide access so people using canes, wheelchairs, walkers, scooters, and power chairs can listen to live music.
Meanwhile, you could do a lot to increase opportunities for elderly and disabled residents of my town.
Come on by. Use your wealth to buy a front-wheel drive
or an Amigo real wheel drive
Second Life: Virtual World Special
Editorial note: Of course what everyone wants to know these days is what effect will Zynga have on Second Life? (Readers are encouraged to provide answers.) What follows is a guest blog by John J. Meier, assistant librarian at Penn State‘s Physical and Mathematical Sciences Library providing background on Second Life. This originally appeared in Voices of Central Pennsylvania with the […]
Segregation threatens your soul
From Where I Sit: My column in Voices of Central Pennsylvania, October 2010 “Trouble, trouble, I have had trouble all my days. / It seems like trouble going to follow me to my grave,” sang the great blues artist Bessie Smith. An African-American, Smith’s skin color put her in her grave, according to the authoritative […]
Ask candidates their position on disabled, elderly voters
From Where I Sit: My column in Voices of Central Pennsylvania, September 2010 “Who will protect us against the protectors?” Plato (428-348 BC) asks. Over the years, in a variety of situations, it has become useful to question what happens when people put in charge of helping others help themselves. The question came quickly to […]
Only revolution will liberate the disabled and elderly
The following is my July/August, 2010 column From Where I Sit for Voices of Central Pennsylvania: I have been trying to shield my readers (until the appropriate time, like now) from the clear purpose of this monthly column: To foment a peaceful revolution that will hereafter change forever the daily lives of individuals with disabilities […]
Travel barriers limit lives of those with disabilities
The following is my June, 2010 column From Where I Sit for Voices of Central Pennsylvania: “Are you really my son?” my 84-year-old mother, who suffers from dementia, asks. Six weeks ago my mother, Dr. Miriam Pell Schmerler, stopped answering the telephone by herself. Our weekly calls were models of the bizarre, with my combining […]
Technology allows blind people to drive cars
The following is my May, 2010 column From Where I Sit for Voices of Central Pennsylvania: Imagine racing a Ferrari F430 (worth $406,000) at nearly 182 miles per hour and being blind since the age of three. This event took place last month at an airport in Turkey where Metin Fenturk, a folksinger, broke the […]