Blog Archives
Review of Targus Laser Presentation Remote
I had fun with this one, letting out a bit of my campy side along with my geeky side. I guess I’m just so giddy about getting a new laptop and this fancy new presentation remote. I don’t work for Targus, but I sure wouldn’t mind if they sent me a check! Ha ha. Really, though, I am so happy with this product and it fills a need that anyone who does presentations and has a MacBook Air is going to need to fill. I wish this information had been there for me when I was frustrated with the lack of any solution in the Apple Store yesterday. Just get one. You won’t be disappointed. Or your money back. (If the store you buy it from has a money-back guarantee, that is.)
P.S. There is a tiny switch inside the remote (which you can see when you pop off the back) that allows you to set it to Windows PowerPoint, Mac Keynote, or Mac PowerPoint. Very nifty, but you might overlook it if you didn’t know better. So now you know!
I welcome you to June by singing “June Is Bustin’ Out All Over!”
One of my favorite songs for one of my favorite months: “June Is Bustin’ Out All Over” from the Broadway musical Carousel– music by Richard Rogers and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein. Have a great June!
Interview from 2004: 30 Years of Pride
The Groovy Like A Movie studio came to the Wedding Expo at the Center in San Diego to interview people for a project called 30 Years of Pride on May 17, 2004, and I was one of the people they interviewed that night. The studio gave me permission to share this on YouTube, and since I can now post longer videos to YouTube, I’m posting the original video with only a couple of minutes trimmed off here and there.
It is timely that I am publishing this video on the day of Phoenix Pride’s 15th anniversary. Thirty years of pride for fifteen years of pride. This is the beginning of the pride parade season, so it is timely. I hope that it inspires, educates, informs, and entertains.
Singing and Singing Happy Birthday in ASL
This is a creative interpretation of The Birthday Song sung in English while signed in ASL (American Sign Language). It is more a compilation of different ways people sign Happy Birthday in ASL than it is an answer to “how do you sign Happy Birthday in ASL?” It is difficult to sing these words and produce these signs at the same time, because the signs do not match the words verbatim— it’s like trying to rub your belly and pat your head at the same time.
I chose these sign couplets with similar handshapes to create sign rhymes; for example, the line CAN’T-WAIT ARRIVE-BIRTHDAY BABY YOU uses the B handshape for all four signs, the line CONDUCT-SONG-BIRTHDAY, TUG-EAR-BIRTHDAY uses the “Closed X” handshape for both signs, the line THRILLED BIRTHDAY uses the “Open 8″ handshape for both signs, and the line HAPPY BIRTH DAY TO YOU uses the 1 handshape twice and the B handshape thrice. I saved the “regular” signs for last, as the last two lines are the two most popular ways to sign Happy Birthday.
I thank the deaf people from other regions from whom I learned the signs CONDUCT-SONG-BIRTHDAY and EAR-TUG-BIRTHDAY, and I thank YouTuber hippiesordo for the line “YOU BORN TODAY, WOO-HOO.” This song is dedicated to my ASL interpreter friend Paul on whose birthday I made this video.
Singing “Try To Remember” from The Fantasticks in 1996
I put on a one–man cabaret concert in 1996. This is one of the songs I sang— “Try To Remember” from The Fantasticks, lyrics by Tom Jones & music by David Schmidt. This performance was held at A Better Worlde Galleria in the Mission Hills neighborhood of San Diego, California in 1996. My pianist was James Bianchi.



