#139: Your flight has been delayed, again!

Foreign. Welcome to blind guys chat, where oren emile. Hello. Jan bloom.

Hello.

And mohammed lashear. Hi there. Talk about the a to z of life.

Well, hello, ladies and gentlemen. We all went in there. You're very welcome to episode 139 of Blind Guys Chat.

Yeah, Happy New Year. Actually, you did one. Sorry. You can cut that out. Oh my God.

I'll cut everything out.

Bye.

Bye.

See, I wasn't here for the last one, so it feels like.

Yeah, that's true, that's true. We had a quiet one, you know, I wasn't here. Yeah.

But we're.

We're still recording in January. Still the longest month in the years.

About.

Well, today is actually Blue Monday.

Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

Yeah.

Which is. Isn't this the day that people get their, their credit card bills? Is that it or.

Yeah, and also.

And it's the furthest away from your paycheck, isn't it?

But also. Yeah, also with the days are very dark still, you know, Etc. And, and you have some hopes with 1st of January. Yeah.

Well, there is, there is good news in terms of the winter because I just realized. Well, I didn't realize. We realized over the weekend as we were talking to my mother that Easter this year is early. Easter is right at the end of March. So basically we just have two more months, two and a half months of winter.

29Th of March, it's going 29th of March.

The clocks go fall back, spring forward.

There's going to be a grand stretch in the evening really soon.

Okay. Okay.

That's what that all. That's what that all means.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But did you have a lot of snow in, in, in Ireland?

We had zero snow and I. My heart is zero. None at all. I'm so upset.

Zero.

There was a tiny bit up north up in Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK officially. Really? Hardly. Hardly enough to mention.

Oh, oh, oh, well, thank God. Yeah, yeah. Because I've been thinking of you because we had even the, you know, the sleigh from the, from the top. We. We removed it. The kids have. Well, T. Roy, Rosalie, they are 16 and 14 years old, but they have been playing with a sleigh like they were K. Now 5 and 6 year olds. They were going downhill, my friends, etc. Amazing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Chef, he was loving it. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Dogs that they were really. Yeah. That is the best weather for them.

They love the snow.

Yeah, they love the snow.

You know, this morning I woke up and Google weather told me it would snow today. And they lied to me.

Oh, it was 8 degrees.

How it was going to snow, I don't. I'm going to complain.

Yeah.

I'm going to write a strongly worded letter. How dare they get my hopes up.

You remember that I was traveling to San Francisco in the first week of. And then I was. It was with this whole snow thing, you know, the expectations were low and. And that came out as well because the Netherlands is. Is not used to snow at all. You know, when you go by train or road, you know, it is terrible. It is really. And even also the airport was not really doing well.

O.

Because you need to de ice, you know, all the planes. Yeah, all the planes. And, and what I learned is that Schiphol has a daily rate of airport aircraft. Yeah. Departing is between 50, 60, but they have a capacity for. For de icing is. Is 10, 10 aircraft. So you can imagine. Yeah.

Everything crawled to halt then.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there is a delay, you know, so they have cancele majority I think in. In the end all of the European flights, you know, to other European countries, but they were trying to keep up with the intercontinental ones. I went to the airport on Saturday because the meetings were from Monday night, Monday evening to Wednesday. So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. So I would arrive on. On Saturday, you know, because it's still nine hours difference. So you know that you are a little bit adapted, etc, so well prepared. Mark was also going there. No, okay, that's good. I went to the airport. I'm sorry, it's cancelled. You know, at 12:00am you know, after two hours waiting it was. No, no, the flight was not. Could not continue now. Okay, now what you see then Clauda and. And Oren at the departing when everyone is waiting to get on board, etc. Well, you see people falling, fainting, they're crying. Yeah. Unbelievable. Yeah. Real drama. And then they said, yeah, sorry, all the hotels are full, but you need to do it. You need to arrange accommodation by yourself and you need to go to the transfer desk. And then. But, but can you imagine it was already a lot of flights were canceled, so there was a big queue for the transfer, DES, etc. You know, so it's terrible. And then you see those hope hopeless people, you know, even with families with children because it was the end of the Christmas holidays that they spent everywhere. So. Oh, it was devastating. I was also traveling with assistance, you know, so one big hooray for assistance. Oh, that was really good. So I was also back in the wheelchair, you know. Yeah. Lazy Me, you know, back in the wheelchair being transported to the transfer and that was a queue, but with.

With your special VIP status.

Hello. Oh, hey, I'm already. Oh, do you want. I'm at the top of the queue. Yeah, yeah, so. And then they said you can come, come tomorrow. But then you. We will. You have to fly via Las Vegas because that is. Because the direct flight is already full. Oh, okay. N. Okay, let's do that. You know, that's the only option. Yeah, no. Okay then. Okay. So I came back in the. The next morning again, same time, same place, you know, a lot of snow again in the. In during night time, etc. So we were really thinking, oh, what will happen? You know, and then we came there and then we were moved from, from gates already. And then we had to. Because I had to transfer in Las Vegas for two hours. No, that's already tight. So. But yeah, but then my flight was postponed with two hours. I said, oh, this won't happen for my transfer time in my connecting time in Las Vegas, you know. So I went back to the transfer desk again, okay, Long queue. Okay, but again with the fancy help of assistant. And then even they want to refuse me. But then the, The. The lady. Yeah, but then the lady who, who served me on Saturday. REM voice. Hey, is this Mr. Bloom?

Hello?

Do you want.

What. What is, what is the problem? Well, well, yeah, yeah, now, so and so. Okay, well, then I will book you on a later flight in. In Las Vegas, you know, so then you have four out. Then you have. Then you. I would leave at 4 and now at 10pm, you know. Okay, okay, now well done. So then we move back to the gate, to another gate. And then we waited and we could board at 2:00pm Nah, great. You know, and I was traveling for the first time in my life with premium economy. So I was sitting there enjoying, you know, myself in this chair, etc.

Etc.

Make myself comfortable. And then. Yeah, guys, there is a. He's your captain speaking, you know, Da da, da, da, da. We have some delay because the push wagon, they. There's a problem on the airport with the bushwackers. I don't know why, it's too icy or whatever, but there was a queue, so we have to wait. Now in the meantime, we got served with some drinks. No, no, no meal, but some, some drinks, etc.

Water.

And then at 5:30pm so we. Can you imagine, we were sitting there in the aircraft from 2pm to 5:30pm at the gate. You know, can you imagine? I was Reading books, etc, you know, no worries, you know, it was enjoying my nice chair et. And then at 5:30, yeah, we got a push wagon. So we were pushed away from the gate now. Hooray, we're going. But now guys and girls, boys, we need to queue for the de icing.

Come on, that's crazy.

And we were queuing up. Okay, now, yeah, that's normal, you know. Okay. But it was a long queue, of course from the whole day already. And then we were queuing up and then the captain came again at 6:45pm a quarter. He said, ladies and gentlemen, I have a message to make. You know, the good news is that we are in the queue. Yeah, fine. But the bad news is that it will take a long time till we are finished with de icing is still too long. And then ladies and gentlemen, there is an, an A law that prohibits us, you know, from the working hours because. And so we have to leave this queue and we go back to the.

Gate to swap your staff, the crew out.

No, they cancelled the flight because they couldn't. Yeah, they canceled the flight. So. But, but, but we could. Yeah, you can imagine you cannot really turn away. You make, make a turnaround or you turn with a Bowie.

Did you not do your. But I'm really special.

Everyone was 400 passengers in the, in the, in the aircraft, you know, so, so, but okay, but then all the gates were occupied so we could have. We had to wait. Yeah. So we left, we, we left@Delta 3 and we returned back on Echo 8. So we made really a nice move, you know, and he probably wants to.

Walk at that point. Yeah.

So at 8pm we were back at the gate. So that was a nice long journey from 2 till 8pm wow. And you did not move anything, you know, so that was the longest journey I've ever. Right. Without moving. Anyway. Okay. But then there was another queue at the transfer desk. But now even me, I could not enter that gate or, or the transfer desk. So I gave up. And then I had to wait at the assistance launch. They had an. Also a back line, back door to the transfer desk, you know, the special assistant. So. And then they said we cannot help you at. Anymore at Tuesday. Or it was then Sunday so we cannot help you at Monday. Tuesday you need to go. The only option is Wednesday, but your meeting's over. That's what I said to them as well. Then it's over.

So.

Okay, so, but, but this is how it is. So they booked me on the Wednesday flight. Okay. Then Monday morning I called the travel agent, you know, because I book my flights, not personally online, so I do it via the company travel agent.

Yeah.

And I said, well, so. And so now I will look and they could find a new ticket for normal economy for the Tuesday.

But you want the special, special premier.

But that was the only option. So direct flight to San Francisco. Okay, I will do that. So then I went on the Tuesday again back to the airport. I was checking in for a new ticket, you know, and then the lady at the check in, they said, but I see that your return flight premium economy on the. On the first day, etc. But hey, I see even there is a free place on premium economy. Can I. I will call and to get you on the premium economy. Many thanks for that, you know. So in the end, after some waiting half an hour or something, it was arranged. So I had my premier economy seat back again.

So that was good, like seven days later. Yeah.

And then after two hours later of delay etc with de icing and whatever, we were lifting off. And then I arrived at 1pm or 1:30pm in the afternoon in San Francisco. I went direct to the meeting room because the meeting was already started at 9am in that morning. So you can imagine that I was going hello. With my suitcase in my travel outfit. I was there joining the group and everyone was praising me. Of course, you know, what a hell of a job have you done and what great.

Yeah.

Wow.

And then you went home. Did you go home then on Wednesday?

No, Thursday. My dear friend Oren, I can really recommend it because I had no jet lag at all.

Stayed on the same time zone.

Yeah. So you had even a long day, a long night, etc, you know, the only person who was happy again all the time when I came back, you know, on Saturday, Sunday, etc. Was chef. But the people who dis were disappointed was Chantal and. And the kids there. Have you not been gone? You know, we had our own Happy Holidays etc.

Email us on blind guys chat.com drop us a line and come along. Email us on bl blindguyschat.com drop us a line and come along. Email us on blindguyschat.com read it out loud in the song now, folks.

Time for our guest. As you know, Irish guide dogs for the blind are celebrating their 50th anniversary. And today we are talking to Tom O'. Neill. Tom, you're very welcome to the show and you set up the Balbriggen branch of Irish guide dogs many years ago. So we want to hear about that. You're also a guide dog owner and so was your, your late wife. How are you doing this evening?

I'm doing good, yeah. Nice and relaxed.

Good, that's good to hear.

Nice and relaxed. That's not all the time that we hear from people who are interviewed. You know, they're always scared, you know.

Yeah. Only be worried when the, when the water comes up to your neck.

Oh, yeah.

Then I would be begin to be worried about it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

What's your road to getting a guide dog?

I would have gone to school in the west of Ireland and my family would be background would be kind of farming, that kind of stuff. But I certainly as a young fellow knew that that wasn't going to be the road. I had no idea what I was going to do, but I certainly knew that wasn't going to be my future. And as my 15, 16, I was playing football, Gaelic football, and the white ball would come in from the sky and I wouldn't see it. That was an early issue with me. So that led me to investigate with my parents as to what was going on. And I was told I had cataract and it would only be removed when the cataract was fully grown across the eye. So you're, you're probably talking here probably around 1965, 67, somewhere like that.

So a lot of knowledge, a year of birth. 1967. Oh my God.

Yeah, yeah. I was born in 1956, so that'll give you an idea where I am.

Oh, really? Yeah.

So it's probably in 1956, so probably about 1970. Yeah. I would have been in secondary school and then I realized like we lived in the countryside, I wasn't seen the stars literally. And that led me to start asking questions, I suppose. And there was no support in schools as there is today. There was no sna, there was no scribe, there was no readers and you couldn't even. There wasn't even an open door to approach a teacher as to look, this is where I'm at in life. So when I did my leave insert, which I passed every single subject that I could do art, I could do technical drawing, I could do work, woodwork, metalwork, but I wasn't able to see the print to do English, Irish maths, those kind of things. So it was difficult. So I hitchhiked, as you can do nowadays, from Tuam and County Galway into Galway and I picked up a free newspaper called the Galway Advertiser and I read the size 16 font, probably found myself a job in A factory. Hadn't a clue where I was going to be staying, all those kind of things that was 35 miles from my home. And got myself a job that was the 3rd of September, 1974. And I haven't been unemployed since.

Wow.

So. But I've changed jobs an awful lot of times in the 70s because. Yeah, yeah. I can't. I can't.

What kind of factory was it? What kind of.

What was literally made nuts. Literally made nuts. It was called. The factory was called sps. And my. I was working. Think about this. With a visual impairment, I was working a lathe now. And I. Why I would have picked up that job would be because of my metalwork skills in the previous school I was in. And my work was to line up that drill with the center of a piece of round metal and literally bore through it and create the nut. Exactly. And then went on to the next guy who put the threading inside in the nuts and then without the next guy who made it a hexagon or a nonagon or whatever size, shape nut was wanted. But again, like, visual vision issues arose some months on, and I moved on to work in a hardware shop that there I was kind of handling carpets and stuff like that. Two things happened around there. I began to realize that my own vision was going downhill, but my mother's also was. My mother's family were extremely tight, close knit in terms of. They would not talk about the eye condition.

Ah, okay, okay.

So it was closed shop.

Typical Irish family.

Yeah, very much Irish. Very much Irish, west of Ireland family. The other thing that happened me in those years was I met a guide dog owner, Tom Langan, I'm delighted to say Thomas still with us. Tom was the one who had gone through special school for the visually impaired in Dublin, and he had found employment and he was at that stage on the. What was then called the Council of Irish Guide Dogs of the Blind. In other words, nowadays, modern techniques would be. The board of Directors of Irish Guide Dogs. So he was one and I saw him literally, I mean, the word saw. Could see him enough to see the mobility that he had in terms of how he was getting around Galway and so on.

Did you use a cane yourself then, Tom?

Not yet.

Not yet. Even so. So you really walk slowly. Stumbled a little bit around or fell down. Stood up.

Yeah, the word was. I think they use nowadays, I was winging it.

Oh, yeah, that's a nice expression.

I had. My vision was reasonably good during daylight, but as nighttime came on, I was in big, big trouble. I Went to work as then in Ireland called a blind to leftist because this was now a post in the civil service that you could do with no vision. And Tom would have directed me in that direction as well. And that job led me to become a civil servant for over 30 years. And I had met my late wife in around 1977. I'd met her as well and we bought a home in Balbriggen where I live now in 1980.

Was your wife also visually impaired?

She was indeed. And she was a guy? Yeah.

Ah, already from that time?

No, no, she didn't come to own a guy dog until 1991.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. She would have had a congenital cataract which is a different type of cataract than what I had, but it was congenital cataract which would have generally would have come from through the rubella gene and her mommy becoming pregnant. And she would have had some loss of hearing and some loss of vision around those years, that time as well. The 70s I, when I got money into my own pocket, I went to a gentleman in Galway City who diagnosed me with retinitis pigmentosa.

Ah, double.

He was able to go join the family, he was able to go behind the cataract and he was able to see what was going on.

Yeah.

And then he said to me, that's £40 and you're going to go blind over the next 10 years and there's nothing I can do for you. I would suggest you wear a pig cap. It will help you in windows, bright lights on the or bright sunshine and maybe wet foot pat, that type of thing.

Okay.

That was, that was my diagnosis.

Wow.

Quite similar to ours.

Am I hearing that both you lads are RP as well?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I got my fellow charged me.

€250 to tell me. To tell me what?

He just.

What your fellow told you?

Yeah. For £40. That's. That's really cheap. You are bargained well, eh.

My vision then was going downhill and there was no training for anybody with a long cane in Ireland. So I applied to the National Council for the Blind for long cane training and I was told there was nothing like that in Ireland. And they said where? I said where was it? And they said in Torquay, in Nottingham. Sure, I would have to go there. So I, yeah, so I fought a battle then, one of the many battles I've had over my career to if they weren't going to supply the service, they were going to pay for me to be trained. So I forced the issue that they paid me My salary equivalent to what I was on at work. I got time off at work. Yeah, but National Council for the Blind paid from my six weeks away while.

You got long hang training and I.

Got long train training.

Six weeks. My God, that's a lot.

Six weeks.

Well experienced.

Yeah. So that took me home, back I had been. Now I was married at this stage as well. And I came back home on a very famous night, unfortunately, in Ireland, the 14th of February 1982. The 81, the night of the Stardust fired us.

Fire. This was a fire in a nightclub called the Stardust. And a lot of young people died that night, mostly because the emergency exits were chained up, people couldn't get out. And it was devastating for the whole country.

It's strange as well. I was a blood donor. And that evening I came home, naturally. But I would say I've been an Irishman, naturally. My wife and I had a couple of drinks that evening and the house phone rang to say, we want you. I wanted the blood, the generic blood that anybody can have. We want you into Pelican House for. To give blood, for the.

To give blood.

Yeah. And this might have been 2, 3 o' clock in the morning, something like that. And I said, look, this is what I've been doing all evening, which was the truth. And I said, we need you. No matter how bad it is, we clean it up. So they sent a taxi from Pelican House to Valbregen Farm meets and like 5, 6am in the morning and I got back into Pelican House and donated blood to kind of finish the family one for a second. My mommy, my mother had 14, 13 brothers and sisters, 14 family. And as life went on, I learned that nine of that family had retinoid pigmentosa.

Yeah, it runs in the family.

And I have two brothers with semi condition myself as well. 1982, in April of that year, thereabouts, I applied for guide dog. I waited two and a half years and again I had another battle. This time that my battle was with my employer because my employer would give everybody time off to do courses and pay them while they were doing the courses. But I was going for a guide dog and I wasn't going to get paid. And I had a mortgage. I had only myself working. I didn't have my. My wife wasn't working at the time. So I fought the battle with the government department, the civil service, and I set a precedent, if you like, that everybody that was going for a guide dog going forward would get paid. So that was another rattle. I Won in my life, got my guide dog in 1985 and I have never ever looked back. And I think that's why I've given the organization some 40 years of volunteering, because my mobility just went from. I would. I was reasonably okay with the long cane, but I would say it went from zero to quality. So I'm down to the old guide dog center, the farmhouse in Ballincollic, and my first day or so was, I thought, fairly good. I got on very well with the Simon Higgs, the trainer, and then come the wedding stare. Thereabouts, I broke down. I really collapsed. There's no other way to put it. I couldn't handle it at all.

Why? Why?

I think the mind took over and the mind said, you can't give your mobility to a dog.

The trust, you can't.

The trust wasn't there, Oren. And that's very well put. I could not see myself giving over my life to four paws to a dog. And he said, take couple of hours out, Tom, if you want a lift to the train station tomorrow morning, Thursday, I'll do it for you. But he said, have a think about it over evening again. There wasn't anybody there to talk it through with me, but I was very friendly with Mary Dunlop, the founder of Irish Guide Dogs, and Frances Jones, her sidekick and secretary of their organization for a lot of years. I rang Mary Dunlop and I told her where I was at. And she said, I understand where you're at, Tom, but she says, what are you going back to? And I said, I'm going back to look after my two children because Breach is in hospital in London. Okay, what are you going to do about mobility when Breach is back from Moorfield Hospital, you're going to be back with that white cane again. And what do you think? She reversed my thought processes, I suppose, to some degree. And then I went. Slept on it and kind of got up the next morning and said to Simon, give me another chance. And I worked through it and got there.

That you continued and had the courage to. Yeah, step up again. Amazing, Tom. Yeah.

Moment when. When you were training or even later when you said this is the right decision, because it's just clicked now, I think.

Oren. I was probably back at home and probably had gone to work in the city for maybe a week, two weeks. And the change I found was when I got home in the evening and fed my dog, had dinner, I could sit down with the children, go through homework with them, and I could go, I could talk with them, I could talk to bridge. I could talk to people. Whereas coming home after using the long cane, I was so stressed.

Yeah.

That I came in and I could. I might sit in the sitting room for an hour, but as my children would say today, I didn't really talk to them either. I talked to no one because I was so stressed and so worn out and so pleased that I actually got home. So it probably took that two months before I could say. And then the other thing, I was meeting people on the street in the town here that knew me struggling with the long cane and they would say to me, God, Tom, you look so confident with what you're doing. And they were the boosting comments that really and truly. And I was good. I was great in myself. I was physically confident in myself and I was getting. I was getting. There was a buzz coming into me heading for the train station in the morning and like my job wasn't particularly. It was a job, it paid the mortgage, but it wasn't. I wasn't going to work for the joy of the work. And I was enjoying the mobility and being able to go there and being able to come home again at this stage.

Your wife also had a guide dog?

No, she applied in 1990. In 1990. Late 1990. For a guide dog and got her first guide dog in. I think it was November of 1991. It was definitely 1991. Yeah, yeah.

And how did that work out with two dogs in the house?

Yeah, challenging, I suppose. And our house is not a big seven bedroom or four bedroom, let me tell you all.

Leon has one of those.

Yeah, yeah, it was challenging. But I suppose the thing was that what we both wanted was mobility.

How many children did you have in those? 2.

Boy and a girl. Yeah. Laura and Owen. So they were. So they were 8 and 9. So we were able to go to concerts in the school. We were able to go to places with them that we couldn't do previously with any comfort using a cane. But the dogs and ourselves, and we went as a big family, you might say, at that stage to all sorts of them. But it was the mobility that everything else, everything came down to mobility.

May I ask, Tom, because how was that with the following up with. Yeah, the following dogs. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think my first three dogs I had. Frank was my first dog. Bruce was similar. Cola was similar. I think it was my fourth dog. It was Sarge that the dog was brought to me at the house.

Okay.

Yeah. And. But also he was different again, unfortunately, in the sense that my, My dog after Cola, I Got a beautiful dog called Nemo. And where I live, we have the Enterprise train coming in from Belfast.

Okay.

And I was on the platform with PJ Hogan, the guide dog trainer, where we're doing. Going to go to an aftercare in the city. And an Enterprise train came in because it's traveling at something like 90 an hour. I think that's the word they use. The hooter went off. That has to happen. And it's coming in fast. And it scared the living daylights out of that dog.

Oh, gosh.

And PJ and I barely held that dog on the platform. That dog never worked again. That threw me for about three months. My absolute confidence would rattle. And one of the trainers, then a dog had come back into the training center that was with somebody who, for medical reasons, couldn't continue with the dog. And he rang me and asked me would I consider taking a dog that had been out before. And I said, at this stage, I consider anything. I hadn't gone back to work. Yeah, I was absolutely rattled.

Yeah.

And so Serge came along to the house. And to say it was like a hand in gloves, it was one of the most incredible moments in my life in that the dog just was. He was a gift, but he was natural. He had everything. He had everything. So he had. People saw Tom, me being very freedom, being very free and easy and walking up to the church or the local pub or comfortably strolling through the town with my children.

He was not allowed to drink at the dog.

Oh, that dog's a pioneer. Remember that. Now, you might know what that phrase means. No, but Oren can tell you later. He'll explain that one.

The dog didn't drink. Yeah.

So people came around me and said, tom, we have to do something for a fundraiser for guide dogs because of the freedom and mobility you've got with your dog.

Is that how you set up the branch, then?

It was. Yeah, it was. We would probably bring in, in the north County Dublin area about averaging about 50, 60,000 a year. One of the funny ones we did, I suppose, was we had a retirement party for my first guide dog. And we had 11 guide dogs in the local GA club in O'Dwyers GA Club. And we had cake, candles, the whole lot. And that was made out of biscuits. Not our biscuits, dog biscuits. I suppose what was behind that in many ways was it was the publicity that something novel like that would create. And in turn, that publicity brought in funds and created the awareness of the dogs. It's vital that the funds are coming in. But it's also equally as vital that the staff there to train the puppies, to bring the puppies through puppy walking and to bring them up to the standard of a guide dog standard and to give me and whoever else yourself mobility through those dogs. It's very specialized work. I don't believe any of them will be millionaires being trained trainers. They would get huge, I would think, job satisfaction because they'll see Tom o' Neill or whoever with huge independence and getting out there and having a life.

Do you think there's any popular misconceptions about guide dogs that, you know, amongst the people who don't really understand, you know, guide dogs and what their purpose is?

There's a conception out there, I think, that lots of guide us can pick up stuff off the floor for you, like open the door for you, nearly put the washing out in the clothesline for you. No, the one with the cooking goes quite funny. They're Labradors and their first love is their tummy. So they wouldn't dwell on the cooking aspect of it. They'd eat the food first.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

You know, there's those conceptions out there. There is a conception with some people that don't like dogs where if they run a restaurant maybe, or whatever premises they don't on the premises. And access, like, I would have been refused in the 80s, the 90s, you could be refused three times in a month, every third week. Yeah. And there would manage the battle in that one as well. I would have taken on and. But. And it was the only. It's the only way to do it. You had to take them on because staff weren't at the center in those times to take on those cases for you. Nowadays you have Lean Kennedy, the access officer, and Lean will take on that role.

Amazing.

I'm gonna ask you one last question. This is for the car. So either go home with nothing or you go home with a Ford Fiesta built in 1982.

What Fiesta? Peugeot 104. You know, that's what we like.

What has Irish guide dogs meant to. To you and your family?

A life. A life of freedom and mobility.

Yo, Clodagh, got the inbox. She's the email queen reading out your messages. She's the go between. Tips, tricks, complaints, suggestions. Blind guys chat. Answering your questions. Yan Mo Oren.

They're bringing the.

Hit us with your wisdom or your wisecrack attack. BGC email, what you got to say? Blind guys chat at gmail. Send it our way. BGC email, we're ready to reply. Klodak Reads it out loud no message too sly so hit that keyboard, let your fingers tap we're waiting on your voice in this funky rap Rap.

It's still amazing. It is.

Jing.

Wow.

I still don't know the words, though. I should know the words, but. There you go.

But I now took the time to really listen and it was quite fun. Really nice. Nice memory.

Yeah, it's quite fun, you know.

Yeah, quite fun. Yeah.

Really fun. With your email.

Yeah, loads of emails, actually. I'm not sure we're going to get through them all, but I'll do my best. First thing, I want to give a shout out to Adriana Prokopenko, who is a new listener and she sent an email, but it wasn't for reading out. But I just wanted to say hello to her because she seems lovely.

Where is she from?

Don't know. I don't know anything. I just know she's a new listener and she needed. She had a question and I answered her question and that was good. So I just wanted to say hello.

What was the question?

That's good.

None of your business, Carrie. None of your visions. Okay, so our first email, we actually got three, I think, from Claire McLaughlin over, but I will. I've kind of amalgamated them and she goes, Happy New Year, Chloe. And all the blind guys, chat team. Hope you're settling into 2026 softly, which is a lovely Irish phrase. Love the new email jingle.

Yay.

So do we. Good. Thanks for all your support of Seen Unseen. I'm delighted to confirm a number of dates for seen unseen throughout 2026, and I look forward to catching up with you in person or online soon. We are starting off the Scene Unseen in collaboration with the Crawford Gallery, which is closed for renovation. This is down in Cork in the south of Ireland, to the F.E. mcWilliams Gallery in Banbridge County Town on Friday, February 20th. So that's in a month's time from when we're recording because it's the 19th of January now. Scene unseen will be collaborating with the Hugh Lane Gallery, also closed for renovation, and the venue will be confirmed shortly, but the date is Thursday, March 5th, so stick that in your diaries and we'll get details, I'm sure, on that soon. On Saturday, April 25, there will be a collaboration with IMMA, the Irish Museum of Modern Art, which I would love to go to because I love imma. Scene Unseen will travel to the High Lanes Gallery in Drogheda in collaboration with the Crawford Gallery down in Cork on Friday, June 19, and on Friday, October 17. They'll be back in Emma to explore another wonderful exhibition. And they'll also be collaborating with the Douglas Hyde Gallery in which I exhibited many years ago. And I will confirm the issue. Sorry, Claire's saying. I will confirm the autumn date for that in due course. The I exhibited was me, not Claire. Sorry. I'm butting in there, as I do.

Okay, okay, okay.

As is my way. For those of you shool followers. Su with an accent. Il or what we call a fada in Ireland. Shul means I in Irish. And I know nothing about shul. Do you guys?

No.

No. So it seems to be an event that has a different theme in a different location on islands around Ireland. And she's announcing the chosen island and dates soon. And once she has the discussions finalized and the funding in place. But that sounds nice. So they go. They basically go to an island for some art kind of a situation. And then they're doing the scene unseen. Goes racing like they did late last September. Yeah. Horse racing.

Oh, yeah.

They'll be doing that again. And then for those who want to join any of these events, she will. Claire will post you a tactile package in advance of the seen unseen event and share a zoom link with you Once you have registered all timings of the. All of the. Sorry. The timings for all of the seen unseen events will be 12. Will be 2:30. My brain is stopped there a while ago to facilitate our US participants. And each session will last approximately one and a half hours. It would be great if you could give these events a mention. We just have. And you're all very welcome to come along. I would love to go along to one of these. I haven't gone to any of them yet and I'd love to. To. We should do that.

Yeah. It's a big program.

Yeah, I think it's great. She's fantastic. She's. She's really. I really like her. She's great.

Yeah.

Give us one more. One more and then we'll.

Yeah. Okay. Well, the one more now is a long one, but it's. But it's. It's a good one because it's. It's from Gordon Anthony. We love Gordon Anthony Gordon.

Good man, Gordon.

So I'll read it out.

Okay.

Yay.

Hello to everyone at Blind Guys Chat. And happy New Year to you all and all your listeners. I know I've not been in touch for a while, but Elaine and I have been very busy these past few months. We've had some major renovation work done in the house and it felt like we've had trains been in nearly every day for around three months. God love you, Gordon. That sounds like hell on wheels.

But anyway, not easy.

No, not fun. Still, you've had that kind of stuff as well, Jan. Still, the work was finished just before Christmas and we now have two completely refurbished bathrooms and a newly decorated hall. This work was required thanks to a leak from our old bathroom which came through the ceiling in the hall. Well, that's not funny. There was other things done as well, and I can confirm that Elaine is delighted with the final result. I'm thrilled. I'm not so delighted by the amount of debt I've run up, but as long as the boss is happy, that's the main thing. Yes, I agree with you.

No more books, Gordon.

Happy wife is hey. And happy wife is happy life.

That's it exactly. Somebody should tell Oren.

Now. Oren, hey, listen. You should listen to a podcast called.

I know that I Get Away with It on the podcast and it wouldn't get away with with it in real life. Jan was. Jan was asking about Dundee United form this. This season. I have to say it's been patchy, Gordon, says the manager. What does it mean, patchy? Not great. Up and down.

Oh, not. Oh, okay.

Yeah. The manager brought in an almost entirely new squad this season and although we started brightly in the European competitions, we were knocked out in a penalty shootout. Our league form has been. Our league form has been very up and down, so we're sitting around mid table, but we've a lot of injuries to important players, so maybe things will pick up as the season progresses. I'm not hoping for very much though. Bless him. This is really interesting. However, there's one football related thing I ought to mention. One of my fellow United supporters, Jonathan Attenborough, is a mad keen football fan and he and his former guide dog, Sam visited every stadium in Scotland and were given an award by the sfa. That's, I presume, the Scottish football. Yes, it is. Oh, he even tells me, look, note for Oren. That stands for the Scottish Football Association. Not what you were thinking. Sfa. Oh, sweet feckle. Okay. Oh dear. Anyway, sadly, Sam, Jonathan's guide dog, passed away unexpectedly. But Jonathan now has a new guide dog who comes to the games with him. More importantly, Jonathan managed to get onto a test program to try out a new gadget called Give Vigilant. Give Vision. It's a headset with cameras, a bit like an Apple Vision pro, but it's specifically designed to help visually impaired sports fans. Jonathan Has a little bit of vision in one eye, but even that doesn't let him see much beyond arm's length. Wearing a Give Vision headset though, he gets an image projected onto a screen just in front of his eye and he has a remote control gadget which allows him to adjust all sorts of settings and to zoom in on whatever he's looking at. He's used this device at a few games now and is raving about it. He's actually able to watch a match without listening to the audio commentary that the club provide. Amazing, isn't it? Give Vision. So we've got to hear more about that. I think that's amazing. Gordon is saying there was a fair bit of media publicity in Scotland about Jonathan and this new gadget. And a D United fan set up a fundraiser to allow the club buy a couple of the devices for Jonathan and other partially cited fans. I'm not sure of the total raised, but it was just over 7,000 sterling just before Christmas. Even some of the players put money into the fundraiser.

No, that's great, isn't it?

He's saying, according to Jonathan, the Give Vision can't really be used when you're moving around. It's very much designed for sitting still and watching something.

Yeah, yeah.

But it would work very. It would work for any sport or even things like theatre or cinema. It's no use to someone like me who has no vision at all. But if you have a bit of sight left, this gadget could really make a life changing difference if you can afford it. I'm not sure of the exact price, but I believe it's more than 3,000 sterling per headset.

Blame me.

Yeah, okay, so Gordon says, right, that's enough for me. Keep up the great work and be listening as always. All the best, Blind Gordon. We love you, Blind Gordon.

Yeah, thank you for the informative.

Yeah, yeah, thanks so much.

Thank you so much.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

All right folks, that's as much as we're going to talk about today. We're gonna wrap it up.

He's had enough.

Had enough, man.

Come on. Please email us at Blind Guys Chat. Thank God, gmail dot com. Yeah, and we will be back to you in two weeks time.

Okay, bye bye.