Wisconsin, Minnesota and Vermont are part of a nationwide effort called “Open the Outdoors,” designed to help people with disabilities find accessible cabins, trails, and hunting and fishing opportunities.
In addition, the U.S. National Park Service soon plans to launch a Web site listing accessible trails and programs throughout the United States.
Cool Mobility, an Australian-based technology firm, is going into commercial production with its Sport Electric Wheelchair, which weighs a relatively light 103 pounds with batteries.
The chair stretches out to handle rough terrain, bouncing over curbs and gutters, and then narrows to negotiate tight corridors and doorways inside. No word yet on price or date of availability.
When merging with traffic and making lane changes, even the most flexible of us don’t always look over our shoulders to see if the coast is clear. That puts us - and everyone else on the road - at risk.
Reasonably priced, easily attachable, blind-spot mirrors give us the solution.
Outside your car, mount this durable ABS plastic mirror above or below your driver-side and/or passenger-side mirror. The view is 2.5 times wider than your factory-installed mirrors, letting you see sidewalks and curbs easily. The German-made optics are curved to reduce glare.
Choose Standard (shown above) for cars and Large for SUVs, trucks and vans. Mounts easily with a mini-wrench, which is included, and your screwdriver. A perfect task for Mr. 7 Hands!
Inside your car, simply clip this 15-1/4″ x 2-1/2″ mirror over your existing rear-view mirror. Nothing to install. Fits even large SUVs.
It’s so wide, you will know at a glance if there’s anyone in the blind spot of your car.
Mop Slippers, in our opinion, have one use - reaching into places a mop can’t reach and where a Gimpy person can’t bend to wipe by hand.
Marty keeps a pair under her bathroom sink to whip out once a week — O.K., once a month, maybe — to clean around her toilet and in the corners of the bathroom.
For that, Mop Slippers are great, but don’t believe the ads that say they’ll make floor-cleaning easier. They won’t.
They’ll just make floor cleaning more hazardous, especially if you wear both of them and go sliding around. Marty wears just one when she cleans the bathroom so she can stay steady on her feet.
The ads say one size fits all - which no one should believe about ANYTHING. Marty’s mongo size 11 foot fits the Mop Slipper so those of you with dainty(er) feet still will need the maid to do your dirty work or a thick sock between you and the machine-washable Mop Slipper.
Research shows 60 percent of Americans don’t take their prescriptions properly because they find the bottles hard to read and the information confusing.
Target is changing that with a new prescription bottle that successfully marries intelligent graphic design with functional industrial design.
Deborah Adler took on the redesign as a thesis project at the School of Visual Arts after her grandmother unwittingly took her husband’s prescription.
Both had been prescribed the same medication, but in different dosages, from a bottle which contained confusing information.
Adler, the child of a doctor and a former nurse, then began revising the familiar amber-colored prescription bottles, which have been around since the mid 20th century. (See Target’s Ad featuring Adler and her grandmother.
Adler’s ClearRX bottle is flat-sided so all the information is easily readable, and behind the patient information is a little magnifying glass for those with vision problems.
The medicine’s name is in large print on the end of the bottle, so you can see it at a glance and the bottles come with color-coded rings so each member of the family can have their own color and easily tell which medicines belong to them.
Liquid prescriptions come with a syringe to accurately measure each dose.
An envelope on the back of the bottle holds the drug’s patient information sheet - usually stapled to the bag by the pharmacist and tossed when you get home, leaving you sans information when you actually need it.
Adler currently is a senior designer at Milton Glaser Inc. in New York City, where she continues to make peoples lives easier through clever and clear design information.
ClearRx was listed as a “Best Invention” by Time Magazine and Business Week and Adler’s work is in the permanent collection in New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).
Gimpy people with aging eyes need to know more about light to navigate safely and live life a little brighter.
And Brock Neverman, of Green Bay Wisconsin, is a Geek among Geeks when it comes to light - especially flashlights. He shares our fondness for Surefire tactical lights, but he also can illuminate (We know, bad pun) many other lights you may not know.
Brock is the technical director at the Weidner Center for the Performing Art’s - a 2000-seat theatre on the campus of the University of Wisconsin Green Bay.
He uses myriad lights in his work and in his play, so much so that his wife has limited him to one new light a month. His web site is loaded with information about flashlights.
If he gets too technical for you, take a break and click here and here and here to see how he relaxes at home. An in-home pool sure must ease those long Wisconsin winters.
For about five years now, we have carried the small and extremely powerful Surefire Executive Elite tactical flashlight, which is fully operational with one hand.
With four times the intensity of a Mag-Lite, yet just a fraction of the size at 4.5 inches; 3.2 ounces, the rugged Elite fits easily in a purse, pants pocket, car glove apartment, or the drawer by the bed.
The Elite is so bright it will blind a person for a few seconds - which makes it a fairly effective non-lethal self-defense weapon, should that need arise.
It easily illuminates a tree at 40-plus feet and shines into the night like a spotlight. Even the squabbling raccoons in our trees pause when we turn on the Surefire.
The downside is the price, about $79 plus shipping, and the cost of lithium batteries. We did notice the Surefire site now offers a box of 12 batteries for $21, which is a better price than most depending on the shipping.
This flashlight makes you feel secure and the beam is magnificent. This is the last flashlight we will ever need and we recommend it to everyone - except little ones. This is not a toy.
We’re always on the hunt for a comfy pen and have found one in the Ergo-Sof PenAgain by Pacific Writing Instruments.
The Ergo-Sof is counter-intuitive - the more you relax your hand, the easier it is to write, which takes some getting used to. Because the PenAgain adapts to the contour of the hand, the weight of the hand exerts enough pressure to guide the pen - eliminating the need to grip it.
The Ergo-Sof, which can be used left-handed or right-handed, eases Cait’s hand pain and work’s wonders for Marty’s sloppy penmanship. The drawback, we’ve found, is that you must be sitting upright, directly over it, to use it, which limits its versatility. For example, you can’t recline and write, as Cait likes to do on her sofa.
The Ergo-Sof includes two refills, comes in a highlighter, and sells online at Office Depot, and Amazon.
LemonAid Crutches were invented through personal need. In August of 2002, Laurie Johnson survived a plane crash that killed her husband, Clyde, and 2-year-old son, Macallan.
The crash left Laurie with a severely broken leg and a two-year road of surgeries, setbacks and ugly crutches.
Acting as her own guinea pig, Laurie perfected her “designer crutch,” covering the pads with beautiful fabrics and moving into colored crutches made from powder-coated steel. She also designs and sells accessories she calls Crutch Wear.
Half of her profits go to Step With Hope, a nonprofit organization Laurie founded to help people grieving the loss of multiple family members. “For people going through very tough times, I want to be an encouragement,” she said.
Ideal for the condo, apartment or patio garden.
This light-weight light-duty tool set features four twist-off attachments that store in the telescoping (25″-41″) handle.
The aluminum tool heads are easy to change but do require some grasping and flexibility in the hand and wrist. The extended handle is long enough to avoid stooping while standing or having to stretch if you’re sitting down.
A ring on the handle lets the set hang from a gardening cart, walker or wheelchair.
