Less than a week after writing my article, Dennis M. Ritchie – a tribute I find myself writing another. This time it is much “closer to home” as it is a man I call my friend. Herschel Hayo was my boss’s boss so our friendship was not best buddies or anything. I’ve never been to his house nor he to mine and yet I think a great number of people in my position still think

of Herschel as their friend. He was that kind of person – no one was beneath him or unworthy of a smile and a chuckle.

Herschel was a good man and there are too few of them around. Even in casual conversation it was clear how much he thought of his family, and they of him. His wife, Barbara, would light up when she was with him after many years of marriage. That says a lot about a man.

We have many challenges here at work but Herschel was always level headed and practical about problems. I never saw him ‘blow up’ over a problem or lose his cool… it just wasn’t in his nature. He also had a way to make you feel important, even when you blew it. No mistake was the end of the world with him as long as you wanted to make it right and not do it again. He had the patience of Job, as the saying goes, and would let people have their say and actually listen even if he disagreed and then would come to a decision without shutting them out or making them feel small.

I’m going to miss seeing Herschel in the office every morning when we get coffee… seeing his perpetual smile… hearing his laugh… learning from his wisdom. I know the loss I feel, as big as it is, is nothing to what his family is enduring now. I pray peace on them that they can grieve and move on without letting this tremendous loss become depression or worse. All my love to them as they feel the loss of their love.

I don’t know if Herschel was saved or not – sadly conversation like that usually doesn’t present an opportunity at work with your bosses – but by outward appearances I’d say he was. I sure hope so because I’d really like to see him again one day.

Go in peace, my friend.

My friend Captain Craig Jiovanni at the best Key West fishing charter boat, the Ultra Grand Slam, has an article to that effect as well. He told me that he’d not seen any oil when he was out either.

Too often fear drives what we do and we don’t rely on God to protect us. Perhaps it’s because we have stepped out of covenant with Him or perhaps we just don’t have a close enough relationship with Him to know how capable and desirous He is to help us. Or maybe it’s just a bad day and our faith is weak. Whatever the cause we need to let Him help us back up to our feet, brush ourselves off and just replace that fear with faith that will bring any problem to its knees!

At work I program our online ticket store for tours and attractions so anything to do with the web is interesting to me.  I have been listening to a lot of podcasts since getting my first Mac computer system, which I fell absolutely in love with.

One of the podcasters I have been listening to is Allison Sheridan of the Nosillacast Podcast – hosted at Podfeet.com -  a Technology Geek Podcast with an Ever so slight Macintosh bias.

Allison often mentions people who use their computers a little differently than the majority, usually because of the inability to see.  I have to admit, between talking about, and with, her un-sighted friends and talking about Screensteps and Honda Bob, Allison has a way to burrow into your subconscious and make positive changes to those around her… well, positive only if you NEED Screensteps or own a Honda or Acura in the LA or Orange County area, otherwise you’ll buy something you don’t need or want to move to California… but the rest is positive!

I have recently gained access through work to Lynda.com which is a great training tool for anything computer-related.  If you are looking to learn something then consider them for your needs.  I’m not affiliated with them in any way but I am truly impressed with the vast knowledge they have on-hand for anyone to tap into.

So, what’s my point?  Good question!  I do tend to ramble a bit.  I ran across a 3-year-old course on Accessibility and thought it would be a great thing to look into, especially considering my job.  I started watching the videos and they talk about Mac Voice Over.  I turned it on and went to the site I work on daily.  I have never been so bored in my life!  We have about 30 cities in which we sell tickets and on every page the reader would go down each city before getting to the good stuff in the main page!

Not only that, as if that’s not enough, but it said “Right-pointing-black-pointer” before every one of them because that’s the name of the little triangle bullet we put before each city name! Oh my gosh!  I would go out of my mind if I had to sit through all that!  I’m just glad we are upgrading the entire store over the next few months so I can help nudge us into the latter 20th century. (Yes, I know it’s now the 21st century but we are WAY behind!)  I feel like I personally owe an apology to every blind person who has visited the site.  I’m sure they never came back.

The really bad thing is I went to some other popular sites and a lot of them stink as badly or worse than my work site does.  Big sites that should do better for their visitors/listeners/viewers/etc.  Even CNN.Com has about 30+ links you have to skip over to get to any of the content on the actual page and then you have to go through related topics and other “fluff”.  If I had to rely on Voice Over to get the news I’d be screaming by now “Just give me the story!”

Here I am writing, infrequently as it is, in a blog about new perspectives and boy did I ever get my eyes opened… literally!  I’d like to encourage everyone who works on web pages to take the effort to learn more about web site accessibility.  There is so much to learn – not just screen readers.  I just learned that many people with dyslexia use narrow page width to help them read better.  Who da thunk it?

Now, how do I get everyone at work on board?!  I feel a devious plot developing!