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SPIRIT NEWSLETTER - December 2000

K-W Access-Ability: A Community of Equal Access and Equal Opportunity

Staff Members:

Executive Director
Chris Hodnett

Book Keeper
Wayne Kaiser

P.H.I.R.S.T LINK Manager
Ronald Fleming

PHIRST LINK Tutor
Joyce Nieuwesteeg

Contributors:

Randy Barrett

Ron Fleming

Chris Hodnett

Joyce Nieuwesteeg

Do you have something to say? Or would you like to contribute to our newsletter by submitting a poem or short story?

CONTACT US:

K-W Access-Ability

Waterloo town Square
Lower Level
75 King Street South
Waterloo, Ontario
Phone: (519) 885-6640
TTY:(519) 885-4526
Fax (519) 885-4526
Mon.- fri. 9am - 5pm
kwaa@kwa.on.ca

Chairman's Message

Season's Greetings to all of our members. I hope everyone is getting into the Christmas spirit. If not, I'm sure our Annual Christmas party was a help. Everyone has undoubtedly been busy and working very hard and therefore deserve to let their hair down and let loose. I know that all of the staff and volunteers have been very busy and I commend them on their dedication to the agency. Everyone is deserving of a nice break before we head into what looks like another very busy new year. We hope to be doing a lot more fundraising this coming year, and we finished off this year by having a raffle with the prizes being two handmade afghan blankets created by one of our talented members. Tickets were available at the office and also at the Christmas party. The draw was held on December 15th, just in time to be given away as a Christmas present. I know that over the years the holidays have become very commercialized, but I still think there is a lot giving and good will to our fellow man. And so I would like to thank everyone who has been a part of K-W Access-Ability this year and wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

Randy Barrett
Chairman

Executive Director's Address

As the year 2000 comes to a close, there remain a number of outstanding issues which have yet to be decided.

We are still unclear as to the future of Waterloo Town Square and our office space. The entire First Gulf project seems to be on hold for the moment. We anticipate however, some resolution to this question early in the new year.

I referred in our last newsletter to the impact of our loss of Bingo revenue. Fortunately we have received clearance to run Bingo with Mirage Bingo, and while we are not earning what we did in the past, we are generating some fund raising income, which is a great help!

We are still seeking volunteers to fill the vacancy of the Resource Information Person. I am hoping to find people who are willing to assist with some office work and answering phones. If you think that you would be willing to help out in this way, please contact me.

Our Annual Meeting was held on Thursday Sept. 21st and we welcomed two new members to our Board of Directors; Peter Dunn, faculty member in the School of social work at Wilfrid Laurier, and returning Board member, Xanthe Martin. We also had guest speaker David Lepofsky, Chairman of the O.D.A. Committee speak. Mr. Lepofsky encouraged our audience to band together in letting the Government know how important strong O.D.A. legislation is to our community.

The past year was an one of great uncertainty for our agency. I believe however that 2001 will be a year in which we make great strides. We look forward to the challenges and opportunities and encourage you to do the same.

On behalf of all the staff, I wish to extend our sincerest best wishes for the holiday season.

Chris Hodnett

.P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK NEWS

Greetings once again from P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK. Our Weekend Web Page Workshop was a great success with everyone turning out their own personal billboard to the world. Pages featured hobbies, photos, interests, jokes, e-mail addresses, creative writing, and animated graphics. These member pages will be uploaded to the web soon, so that anyone anywhere in the world can access them from KWAA's home page. Call us if you would like to attend a similar web page workshop.

P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK also hosted groups of visitors from Freeport Hospital these past months. David also visited us from the Low Vision clinic of the University of Waterloo.

As the needs of our students continue to grow, P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK continues to develop instructional materials and lesson plans. These materials translate the lingo of computer manuals into familiar terms; ensure the consistency of our instruction; allow us to track what modules students have covered; give guidelines to our tutors; and provide handy reference material.

Several of you have referred friends and acquaintances with physical disabilities to the P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK programme. Your referrals are one of the best compliments you can offer us.

Remember too, P.H.I.R.S.T LINK provides training for persons who have received funds for a computer, under the Assistive Devices Programme. We also offer job-related Assistive Devices Training Courses for those who qualify, under the Ontario Disability Support Programme. Computer system and work station assessments are also available.

As we approach the end of this year, I wish you all a safe and restful holiday season, and a new year that lets everyone make the most of their abilities.

Ronald B. Fleming
P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK Manager

COMPUTER CORNER: SEASONAL COMPUTING

At K-W Access-Ability, we vary the background on our P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK computer screens in accordance with the seasons. Right now, we are looking at a winter scene. That reminds me that it's not only people that suffer a kind of seasonal affective disorder. Computers technology is also susceptible to the winter blues. So here's some food for thought that I've scrounged away to carry you through the winter season.

There is more than one kind of computer virus. As we enter into the cold season, computer keyboards and mice become major risks as sources for picking up cold germs and other surface-born viruses.

Courtesy dictates that one should wash their hands thoroughly with soap and water before using a public keyboard. Common sense also dictates that one should do the same afterwards for their own protection. Rubbing alcohol on a cotton swab may be used to clean your keyboard and mouse at home. Considering that germs spread exponentially just like computer viruses or chain-mail, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

With the change in weather also comes a change in humidity. You may find yourself discharging static electricity from your fingers to your keyboard and mouse, especially if you use a wheelchair. These static discharges can temporarily lock-up your keyboard and mouse.

A symptomatic solution is to reboot your computer using the reset button, or the CTRL+ALT+DEL keyboard combination; hold down CTRL and ALT and tap DEL twice. A quickie solution is to ground yourself periodically by touching some exposed metal on your computer chassis. A more long-term solution is to spray the floor area around your computer workstation with an anti-static spray. Use the type of spray that is sold at a computer store, not the anti-static spray you use on your clothes.

If you use a wheelchair, you can ground static discharges by attaching a small metal chain to the frame of your chair, and allowing it to drag on the floor behind the chair, free of moving parts. No matter what solution you use, make sure to save your documents frequently.

Condensation is another factor that computer users have to contend with in the winter. If you transport disks between home and work, or between home and KWAA, condensation can build up on the read/write surface of the disk, and lead to data loss when you go to use the disk in a computer. Make sure you transport your disks in sealed plastic "baggies", and that you have pressed all the air out of the bag.

If you carry disks in the cold, or leave them in a cold car glove-compartment overnight, you may find that you cannot retrieve files or install programs from the disks until you let them warm up to room temperature. That's because the disks have shrunk microscopically in diameter and circumference, and the files are no longer the same radius from the centre as specified in the disks' MBR (Master Boot Record) index. A worse-case scenario occurs when you save a new file onto a cold disk. After the disk warms up, you may never be able to find the file again, unless you get the disk back to exactly the same temperature it was when the file was saved. The moral of this story is to let all of your disks warm up to room temperature before using them.

Finally, as the holiday season approaches, you may wish to send seasonal "muck-luck" letters to friends and family. To save time having to type a separate letter to each person, you may wish to have a standard letter automatically addressed and personalized for each recipient. This would be a good time to explore the mail-merge function in your word-processor. Better yet, book an appointment with P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK, and we'll show you how to do it here.

Seasons Greetings!

Ronald B. Fleming
P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK

INTERNET CORNER--WHAM, SPAM, MAILBOX JAM

If you are unfamiliar with the Internet, you might think that the spam to which I am referring is a can of luncheon meat. However, those of you who have a lot of experience with the Internet know that spam is any unsolicited e-mail (i.e. you did not ask to receive it), often advertisements, that are sent to hundreds or thousands of people.

You might get spam from a company or person stating that if you do not want them to send you anymore e-mail, all you have to do is reply to their message and ask them to remove your name from their mailing list. DO NOT respond to these e-mails. By responding, you are not only telling the sender that your e-mail address is indeed a valid address, but you are also telling the sender that you read and reply to your mail. Spammers (people who send spam) love dealing with people who read and respond to their e-mail. This is how they make money.

Have you ever wondered how shammers get your e-mail address? There are several ways to do this:

1. Running programs that collect e-mail addresses from news group postings.

2. Getting your address from a subscriber list (i.e. some Internet Service Providers have membership directories from which your address can be taken).

3. Finding your e-mail address in an Internet "white pages directory" (such as canada411.ca).

4. Buying a list of e-mail addresses from someone who already has one.

5. Taking your address from you without your knowledge when you visit a web site.

6. Using the "finger" command to find online users' addresses.

7. Obtaining member names from online "chat rooms."

8. Taking your address from subscription lists of popular e-mail distribution lists. For example, if you subscribe to a mailing list re your disability, spammers can get your name from that mailing list.
If you can use a free service provider such as Hotmail or Yahoo, or an anonymous address such as MyEmail while you are on the Internet, this will greatly reduce the amount of spam you receive. If you visit a web site that asks for your e-mail address, you can either enter a fake address to avoid receiving spam from that web site, or use one of the free service providers. In the case of the latter, you will probably still receive spam, but if you reserve your free Internet account specifically for this purpose, at least most of the spam will be limited to the one e-mail account.

The above options should help control the flow of new spam into your mailbox but the best way to prevent spam is to filter your mail. For those of you using K-W Access-Ability as your Internet Service Provider, filtering must be done on the main computer at the office, rather than on your individual computers.

For those of you who are using other e-mail programs such as Outlook Express, Eudora, etc., you can add filters to these programs. If you use AOL, you will likely not be able to make use of a filter, at least not for the earlier versions of AOL.

You may remember in the last Newsletter, Ron talked about not forwarding any virus warnings you receive. Most of these warnings are hoaxes and merely clog the information highway with unnecessary e-mail. Although not as obvious, this is also a form of spam.

I hope you find this information useful. Have a happy, spam-free holiday season, and I wish you all the best for the New Year.

Joyce Nieuwesteeg
P.H.I.R.S.T. LINK Tutor

A WORD FROM DEB

Hello, I just wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself; I'm Deb Quinn. I've been working here at K-W Access-Ability for a few months officially as a social work graduate student. Before my stint in social work, I worked in Recreation adapting programmes for people with disabilities and I'll be looking at the recreation programmes offered here and welcome your input/suggestions for improvements.

I'm also involved with providing employment supports for persons with disabilities. Actually it's the Ontario Disability Support Programme (ODSP) new employment support initiative.

We are considering running some information session specifically geared to employment issues. I see this as an opportunity to prepare or start thinking about employment and the supports available to you and certainly talk about any fears, concerns or obstacles; really anything you perceive as roadblocks to finding and maintaining work. So I'm wondering how interested you? As they say finding/maintaining a job is a full-time job I've struggled with this myself. As always you're feedback and input is welcome.

An important part of my job here is being available to you to listen to suggestions, concerns, personal issues etc really anything you'd like to talk about I'm here to listen. I also live with disabilities and understand the struggles, frustrations which sometimes are difficult to work through... So let's talk... Get connected... Have coffee... I'm looking forward to meeting many more of you over the next few months. I'm usually in Monday's and Tuesday's 10:00 a.m. till 4:00 p.m.(other days can be arranged) so give me a call and we'll set up a time.

Until then I wish you all, a safe and happy, holiday season!
Deb

WHO'S NEWS

Christmas 2000

Our Agency Christmas party, was held December 9th 2000 and what a party it was! Spurred on by the fine cuisine provided by Kenendys again this year, and the Karaoke sounds of Christmas, provided by Walter Mueller, a fun time was had by all.

Again this year the "Spirit Award" was presented to the member of the agency most exhibiting the qualities of Corene Hamill. The Award was presented by one of last years winners, Ronald Grant, to Mary Ciszewski, for her energetic work in the area of fundraising. Congratulations Mary!

Welcome Back Mary Culliford!

After a long hiatus, Mary Culliford, long time volunteer with our craft group, made her return.

Assisted by Deb Quinn and Margo Hodnett, Mary and the group are singing a new craft tune. Look for more in the New Year from this gang.

Fundrasing Fever

The long awaited draw for the 2 afghans was held Friday December 15, 2000 at the office of K-W Access-Ability. 1st prize was won by Beatrice Ullner of Waterloo. 2nd prize went to Lori Draper of Elmvale. Thanks to everyone who participated either through selling or purchasing tickets. A special note of thanks to Ilene Atkinson for her generous donation.

IN MY OPINION

If you are a member of Project Lift, you will have recently received an invitation to a meeting on January 16, 2001 to vote on dissolution of the Project Lift.

I am not in favour of dissolving Project Lift and in fact made a presentation to the Board of Directors of Project Lift with what I considered to be an acceptable vision for the continuation of the Corporation addressing a real need in the community; providing affordable out of town transportation for social recreational purposes.

This transportation would be provided by volunteer drivers, utilizing a bus similar to the ones Project Lift presently uses, only older. Upkeep of the bus and insurance costs would be paid for through the sale of advertising on the side of the bus. The cost to use the bus would only be the cost of the fuel.

The Board of Project Lift did not support this vision. One of the major concerns of the present Board members of Lift is that if the corporation continues it will need a strong Board. Many of the present Board are not interested in serving on a future board.

I am also concerned about the future Board. While I believe that there is a role for Project Lift in transportation, I also see the need for a strong and vigorous Board of Directors to ensure the vision.

I am prepared to be a part of this future, but I am not willing to do this unless others are also dedicated to making this vision a reality.

If you recognize this transportation gap in our community and are willing to work to change things, please contact me.

Chris Hodnett

K-W ACCESS-ABILITY WILL CLOSE FOR CHRISTMAS AT 5PM ON DECEMBER 22, 2000 AND REOPEN AGAIN AT 9 AM ON TUESDAY JANUARY 2, 2001. THE STAFF WISHES EVERYONE A MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

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