Category Archives: Slice of Life Vignettes

Key West

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Late in the afternoon, toward the end of March, the Azamara Quest pulled out of Miami Harbor heading for Key West, Florida, and then on to Cuba. The air was hot and humid. My husband and I went out on our balcony to watch the land pull slowly away as we sailed out of the harbor. We could hear the music playing from the upper deck.

 

Key West is located on the southern tip of Florida. It divides the Atlantic Ocean from the Gulf of Mexico. It is known for many things but the one I found most interesting is that Ernest Hemingway lived there for almost eight years from 1931 until 1939. But he kept the house until he died. I often wonder if he was sorry he didn’t stay or expected and hoped to go back some day?

 

The time that Ernest spent in Key West was one of his most prolific periods for writing. During that eight year period, he worked on Death in the Afternoon, Green Hills of Africa, To Have and Have Not, For Whom the Bell Tolls and some of his short stories. The Snows of Kilimanjaro was written during this time.

 

Why am I talking so much about Ernest Hemingway? Because that was why I was looking forward so much to our one day stop in Key West. I’d arranged for us to take a tour in the morning after breakfast and then we’d spend time walking around on our own.

 

Once the tour was over, the first place we headed for was 907 Whitehead Street and this is what we found: Ernest Hemingway’s home.

Miami

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We went to Miami Beach for four days in late March. We wanted to remember what the sun looked like. In Ann Arbor, the skies were either cloudy and rainy or it was snowing and cold. What would it be like to go outside in just a tee shirt and pants? We were both very tired of putting on sweaters, jackets, gloves, boots and hats every time we left the house.

 

Landing at Miami International Airport was WONDERFUL! The sun was shining. The skies were blue. The temperature was 76 degrees. We smiled as we put our jackets in our suitcases and called an Uber to take us to the hotel.

 

The Gates was in Miami Beach, a block from the ocean. We had great views from the room of the pool, the trees and flowers. Once we unpacked, we went out for a walk to see the neighborhood.

 

The receptionist at the front desk had suggested that we walk down to 17th Street and turn right. We were glad we did. There was block after block of restaurants and stores. The center of the street, which was very wide, was closed to traffic. All the restaurants had put their outdoor tables and chairs there, under large tents.

  

We picked a Spanish restaurant and ordered seafood paella and sangria. It was a wonderful evening. We enjoyed a slight breeze as the day faded into night.

 

Parlez-Vous Francais?

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What do you do when every time you push a button on the control panel, the words on the screen are all in French?

This story began when I was cooking Christmas dinner last December. We were all ready to sit down and eat. The buffet was just missing one dish—the sweet potatoes. I’d left them for last because they just needed a few minutes to cook.

 

I put the package in the microwave, shut the door and punched in the time. Silence. Mmmmm! I tried again and then one more time. The microwave had quit. I didn’t know if it was tired since I’d been using it all morning or, because it was purchased in 1992, after 25 years it was finished.

 

After everyone went home, my husband and I talked about getting a new microwave. We needed something that was reliable. In the past year we’d also been having problems with the oven. Sometimes it would cook. Other times it might not be in the mood. It had been installed in 1992 also. Actually, they were a wall combo and you really couldn’t replace one without replacing the other.

 

The best time to buy appliances like these is after Christmas and during the first week in January. The reason is a number of stores in Ann Arbor have sales at this time.

 

We quickly found out that a microwave-oven combination that has to be installed in the wall is much more expensive than just buying a microwave and an oven separately. And, you can only replace a wall combo with a wall combo. Otherwise the kitchen will look pretty strange.

 

So, we bit the bullet and went shopping. We quickly found exactly what we wanted with the features we required at three different stores. The only difference was the price.

 

We needed white so it would fit in with the rest of our appliances. Well, white is no longer the “in” color. So not only did we have to pay more, we had to wait. So, it wasn’t until the end of February that the microwave-oven combo arrived at the store.

 

On Thursday, February 22, the installer came out and installed the new combo and took away the old one. Everything went smoothly. After he left, I got out the instructions with the intension of learning how to use the different features on both ovens.

 

This is where the fun began. No matter what I punched in, the words that appeared on the screen were all in French. The first few times I used the iTranslate app to try to figure out what the screen was telling me to do. Then I realized that this was taking too much time. How was I going to cook a meal or reheat something?

 

I decided the best thing was to call Kitchen Aid, register the combo, and ask how to get the screen to speak English.

 

I called the number on the registration card and waited and waited and… You get the idea. After about 20 minutes a woman came on the line. She told me this was the number to register a product in French Canada. French Canada? I was in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She gave me the number to call for the United States.

 

I called and after another twenty minutes, a different lady came on the line. After registering the product, I asked her how to get the oven and microwave to speak English. “Oh,” she said. “That’s easy. Just press Tools and choose option 9.”

 

I did and put my iTranslate app away for another time.

Beyond the Wall

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I was intrigued by the title–Beyond The Wall: The Human Toll of Border Crossings. This lecture was sponsored by Wallace House and given at the Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan on Wednesday, January 31, 2018.

There were three speakers: Brooke Jarvis, Jason De Leon and Ann Lin.

I was especially intrigued by Brooke Jarvis, a journalist and 2017 winner of the Livingston Award for her story “Unclaimed “. It was featured in The California Sunday Magazine in 2017.

About 18 years ago, a man was found in the desert of the southwest United States. There had been some kind of accident and he was taken unconscious to the hospital. He was in very bad shape.

The man had no identification, and because he was unconscious, no one could ask him who he was. This man was kept alive for years on respirators. But, who was he? What was his name? Where did he come from? Did he have family waiting for him?

Eventually, after 18 years, a Border Patrol Agent came to see him. He was determined to find out who this man was. He ordered the man’s information put in several government databases. Within two days the man was identified and his sister located.

For families of people who try to come to the United States illegally, a source of great trauma is, if they don’t make it, how does the family find out what happened? For years these families suffer–wondering, worried and traumatized.

Our current border walls and surveillance systems in the southwest United States are quite secure. The only way left to try to cross illegally is through the desert. Many people, if not most, die because of the terrain, lack of water and the terrible heat.

Currently there are about 800 bodies in morgues in the southwest United States waiting to be identified. There are also online websites for families seeking information about their loved ones who never arrived.

Wouldn’t it be humane, once someone has died trying to cross, to let their families know? Technology has advanced so much that this could be done by the repatriation of bodies or DNA evidence.

What do you think?

My Introduction to Video Game Streaming

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I am someone who consistently loves trying something new.  This has lent to me having a lot of hobbies, such as video games, writing, and photo manipulation.  Overall, I would say I’m a very creative person with a passion for delving into games.  I believe there have been times in my life where I wished I could make some sort of living from video games.  I remember a period of time where I thought about seeking employment as a game tester, but nothing ever came of it.  Nor did I have success in pursuing a degree in software engineering; that never panned out because a full-time job took priority over college courses.

About half a year ago, I started viewing videos on YouTube from a vlogger called Tipster.  He is someone I gradually found I had much in common with and I started looking forward to whatever new videos he’d post.  After several months, I started checking out live broadcasts (or streams) of his on a site called Twitch.  Over time, more channels got added to my watch-list – among them Katastrophe, Stando, and YeskaYuggz, Tipster’s sister.

The more time I spent viewing streams, the more it felt like something I wanted to try for myself.  This feeling was compounded when I viewed a YouTube video from Tipster on what it took to be a successful streamer.  Providing a good commentary, engaging with your audience in the chat room, and just being yourself and having fun are key components to building a thriving Twitch channel.

The start of 2018 felt like a good time to try something new.  After researching what I’d need to begin streaming, I bought a set of headphones with a mic attachment.  On January 9th, I broadcast my very first video game – Dead in Bermuda – from a Surface Book.  The basic premise of the game is to keep the eight survivors of a plane crash alive until they can be rescued from the tropical island – not necessarily Bermuda – they’re stranded on.  I had attempted multiple times to get through the game, but all of my playthroughs ended with two or more characters starving to death.  The longest I lasted was around 29 days.

I started streaming Dead in Bermuda with the intent to survive for 50 days if possible.  I don’t know if it’s because I was taking my time and thinking things through more, but I surprised myself by actually making some good headway this time.  I started feeling more confident that I would make it through the entire game with all eight characters.  This belief changed when one of the survivors – Illyana — died of illness on Day 47.   The next night, her father, Yuri, succumbed to depression over losing her.  Despite this setback, I ended my stream at the 50-day mark with the resolve to try to make it through the rest of the game with the remaining six characters.  It might be difficult since Illyana and Yuri were the most skilled at researching and scavenging, but I aim to do my best.

On the flip side, my forays into streaming were just as much of a learning experience.  When I reviewed the first couple videos I recorded, I discovered that the mic on the headphone wasn’t the best.  In addition to picking up my voice really well, it also recorded every breath I took.  I hate to use the term ‘mouth-breather’, but that is pretty much what it sounded like.

Prior to my final recording of Dead in Bermuda, I decided to invest in a webcam.  I believed it might be good to have an alternate mic recording my commentary as well as have a visual of me reacting to the game.  The one downside to this is that the volume of the game was too high.  As I found out when I reviewed the recorded video afterward, the sound effects and music of Dead in Bermuda were so loud that it was drowning out my commentary at times.

Since I failed to gain much of an audience with Dead in Bermuda, I decided to switch to a more popular game on January 12.  The one I picked this time was Party Hard, a satirical little game where the objective is to slaughter the participants of a given party without getting killed or arrested.  Prior to starting my stream, I tweaked the game’s volume and moved the webcam video to a different corner of the screen so it wouldn’t obscure what I was doing within the game.  I was much more animated in my commentary with Party Hard than I was with Dead in Bermuda.  I felt more confident that I would start building an audience to my budding channel.

Unfortunately, I found out after I’d recorded 90 minutes of gameplay that I’d hit another snag.  For whatever reason, the mic failed to record my voice at all for the entire broadcast!

While I haven’t yet recorded any further streams as of January 17, it is something I do plan to continue.  I have been spending my time researching to avoid any further hiccups.  I have also been brainstorming on ways to make my channel unique and entertaining enough that viewers will want to keep tuning in.  And I have ideas geared toward putting together a background for the webcam that will better showcase my interests, such as reading and photo manipulation.

The bottom line is that streaming is something that I greatly enjoy so far.  I could easily see myself doing this long term, even if I don’t gain much of a following from it.  I’m glad to have some means of sharing my love of video games with like-minded individuals.  And if I can entertain an audience while I’m at it, then all the better.  It will mean I’ve finally found the perfect niche for myself.

For any readers who are interested in giving my channel a chance to see what I’m all about, be sure to tune in for the streams of Sahara4877 at https://www.twitch.tv/sahara4877.

Tags: Twitch, video games, streaming, Tipster, Dead in Bermuda, Party Hard, games