In my dreams someone invents the hydraulic, adjustable kitchen. I can imagine it but I'm not an engineer. I got the idea from watching Pimp my Ride where they often used hydraulics to make some cool addition to the trunk come up to a usable height. I thought, "why can't kitchens do this?" Imagine a kitchen that can adjust to different sized family members with the push of a button! What if you could cook as easily from a wheelchair as you did when you were ambulatory? What if people with back problems didn't have to stoop to see things in lower cupboards and short people didn't have to run and get a step stool? :) What if the counter could always be at each household member's perfect height?

I picture the lower cupboards on a base that sinks into the floor as needed to lower the counter top, upper cabinets on a track that come down as you need to reach something or see what's stored there. Obviously above-the-fridge space isn't going to move but all of the major counters and cabinets ought to. I don't know about the sink--I can't picture what's possible in terms of the pipes. Perhaps the sink would have to be a stand-alone exception and simply a second, lower sink would be available for wheelchair/little people use. Stoves might also be on a platform that can rise or sink as needed.

I doubt I could afford such a system even if I had a house to put it in but new homes should just be built this way. No one knows whether they will be in a wheelchair or develop a painful back problem. Similarly, homes should just come with ramps rather than steps, and wide doorways should be the norm. Then no one has to scramble to adjust to a future disability. When my son was in a wheelchair we had to move to a different apartment entirely!

And hey, if you make some money and want to kick me a donation, the paypal button is to the right of this post. :)

ETA: I used to just squat for lower shelves but then I fucked up my knee. Oh and while I'm dreaming, all cabinets should have lights you can turn on--especially lower ones.

ETA2: http://barrierfree-px.rtrk.ca/wheelchair-accessible-kitchen

Some of what I'm talking about but only marketed/for wheelchair users. I'd think bigger than that! It should be part of home construction, especially homes where different-sized people are expected to use the kitchen regularly.

Today is the 19th anniversary of my son's bicycle accident, where he acquired a traumatic brain injury. He nearly died, was in a long coma, had two brain surgeries and a long rehab. So I am grateful for his survival and continued life.

PS Wear a helmet!!! He wished he had done so, let me tell you.

makes me want to dance :)

When the day starts out with the blue screen of death, it has to get better from there. Right?

Poll at:

http://community.livejournal.com/thequestionclub/86168785.html

I hear the LJ folks are paying attention to this.

The uproar is not about being able to x-post your LJ posts, it's about others being able to share their comments to your LOCKED posts on FB/Twitter, thus perhaps giving things away about your identity or post.

I know I would not appreciate that!

I think my friends are sensible enough not to want to do such a thing and I certainly have no plans to. :)

If LJ wants to add a cool feature, why don't they appear in the "Share" options all over the 'net nowadays and make it really easy to share links with our friends?

They disabled embedding. Here's the link--remember the Bumblebee Girl? So cute.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYlAwvz8uwc

I'd like to dedicate this to Dr. Bronstein.

Ran into this in comments about something else at Daily Kos, worth repeating:

White people enjoyed FHA loans in the 1950s ...but nonwhites were cut out on the biggest wealth-building chance in postwar America.

Fair housing advocate Charles Abrams, writing in 1955: "From its inception the FHA set itself up as the protector of the all white neighborhood. It sent its agents into the field to keep Negroes and other minorities from buying houses in white neighborhoods. It exerted pressure against builders who dared to build for minorities, and against lenders willing to lend on mortgages."

Sociologist James Loewen (2005): "More than 98% of the millions of home loans guaranteed by the FHA and VA after World War II were available only to whites."

Sociologist Troy Duster: "Of 350,000 new homes built in northern California between 1946 and 1960 with FHA support, fewer than 100 went to blacks. That same pattern holds for the whole state and for the nation as well."

That did not change until 1968 when the passage of Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act (aka the Fair Housing Act). Then, in the 1970's alone, housing prices tripled.

And we think the absence of a black middle class is accidental, or natural, or the product of market forces alone?
-------

Exactly.

Today at No Longer Quivering, Vyckie answers critics who ask her why she's dwelling on the past and why can't she just move on? It's a question we both get, so I'll include my answer here. I touched on this a few weeks ago, which in part inspired her post, which inspired me to re-visit it. :)

Frankly, I wouldn't bother to do this writing out of revenge or bitterness. It's harder on me than on my former abuser! He might be momentarily embarrassed when an entry appears and have to fend off a few comments by saying, "Oh yeah that's my crazy ex-wife; she's just bitter."

I have to relive hours of this stuff in order to write it. I have to feel it all over again. No amount of revenge would make that worth it to me.

No, I write with young women like my former self in mind, sincerely wanting their marriage to work and not understanding the dynamics sufficiently to know when it won't. I write for the young Mahasrayas out there who are puzzled and ashamed by their behavior and don't understand why they abuse their wives, why they feel powerless over the anger and frustration.

I also write for all of those people who make it worse by demonizing the abuser and by belittling those who are abused, by saying they ask for it or they must like it or otherwise dehumanizing them.

I write with the hope that more people will think deeply about these issues and come away with a renewed desire to do whatever they can to end the cycle of abuse and care for the victims, while providing services to heal the batterer. I also hope that we can offer our teens classes in good communication, managing feelings, and other skills that might enable them to start out with better relationships than their own parents had, if they come from troubled families.

I think anyone writing solely out of bitterness wouldn't get very far because the process is so unpleasant. It's not the kind of motivation that would sustain you.

I was compiling these for a piece of writing I did elsewhere, and thought that perhaps I should just make a note of them here. It can't hurt to have them on hand.

Suicide Crisis Line phone numbers:
Santa Cruz County
Monterey Peninsula (includes San Benito county)
Toll Free
831-458-5300
831-649-8008
877-ONE-LIFE
877-663-5433

Santa Clara County:
(408) 279-3312 (Central County)
(650) 494-8420 (North County)
(408) 683-2482 (South County)

San Francisco: (415) 781-0500