Tag: people

AbleGamers, helping the disabled to connect!

I’m fortunate to be fairly healthy and active. I know that if I couldn’t enjoy my sunshine-filled walks, meeting friends–if I had severe mobility difficulties–I would become seriously depressed. That’s the way I’m made.

Knowing this, I was excited to learn about AbleGamers today at San Diego Comic-Con. AbleGamers is an organization that fights social isolation by making it easier for the disabled to participate in gaming. Here’s their website.

AbleGamers has been around for around 20 years. They have helped countless numbers of people find more joy and connection in their lives.

Their mission:

Creating opportunities that enable play in order to combat social isolation, foster inclusive communities, and improve the quality of life for people with disabilities.

Their website explains it better than I can:

With your help, we are working every day to make sure people with disabilities have the same opportunities as everyone else for positive experiences through play. With our two decades as pioneers in inclusive play, thousands of hours working with people with disabilities, leading developers and engineers we create opportunities for players to find inclusive places to play and connect with family and friends.

AbleGamers partners with various organizations, including hospitals and rehabilitation centers, to reach more people with disabilities and provide them with a nearby location to assist in setup to enter the world of gaming.

No matter how severe the disability, today’s technology allows anyone to fully connect with other gamers. Gaming controls are made in such a way that even those without use of their hands can join the online community, having fun. Many of the major video game developers work with AbleGamers to make play more accessible.

I hope you are as inspired as I am. Please check out The AbleGamers website and perhaps help these good people in their mission.

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If you’d like to view my coverage of Comic-Con so far, which includes hundreds of cool photographs, click here!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

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Photos along San Diego Embarcadero before fireworks.

Today, in the mid-afternoon, people were gathering along San Diego’s Embarcadero to watch Fourth of July fireworks. Families were camping in grassy spots and setting up lawn chairs and blankets in strategic positions next to San Diego Bay. After dark, four barges on the water would be launching synchronized fireworks during the 9 o’clock Big Bay Boom!

I enjoyed a long walk, observing the activity. As time passed, more and more people arrived until a good crowd was milling about on the Embarcadero’s boardwalk.

These photographs begin near the Hilton San Diego Bayfront, proceed through Embarcadero Marina Park South, then head up past the Marriott Marquis Marina, through Seaport Village, through Embarcadero Marina Park North, past Tuna Harbor, the USS Midway and the Broadway Pier, and end a short distance north of the Maritime Museum of San Diego.

It was a sunny afternoon, with barbeques out and kites flying–another perfect day in America’s Finest City!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

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Photos of Flag Day Parade in La Mesa!

The 26th Annual Flag Day Parade was held late this morning through downtown La Mesa. Hundreds of residents came out for the patriotic Flag Day spectacle.

Flags lined La Mesa Boulevard. Families gathered along the sidewalks in anticipation. At ten o’clock, the big parade, a beloved La Mesa tradition, began!

There were marching bands, equestrian groups, politicians, scouts, local schools, churches, clubs and organizations, waving queens, costumed cosplayers, cool cars . . . even tractors! It appeared to me the entire community had come together.

The Flag Day Parade this year celebrated service organizations who work to improve lives in the city. Grand Marshalls were the La Mesa Kiwanis Club, the La Mesa Lions Club, La Mesa Optimist International, and the La Mesa Rotary Club.

Most of my photographs were taken a bit away from the crowd, which mostly gathered in the center of La Mesa’s historic downtown. At the end of the parade, I followed the big flag held by volunteers, and I took my final photo with hundreds of flag-waving spectators all around.

Ready? The big parade is starting…

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

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The Santee Food Bank needs your help!

Will you join these smiling young ladies and help the Santee Food Bank?

During my visit to the Santee Street Fair today, I learned that the Santee Food Bank could use your assistance fighting hunger. They’d love to welcome new volunteers, contributions of food, and reusable plastic bags that can be filled with food for distribution in the Santee community.

If you have it in your heart, please visit the Santee Food Bank website by clicking here.

Life is tough enough. Imagine going to bed hungry.

Your contributions–even modest ones–directly help people. Those people might be your neighbors.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Artist creates beautiful hats and poetry!

I met an artist in Balboa Park today who creates beautiful crocheted hats and heartfelt poetry. Her name is Espi Love.

Espi had many different colored hats that she has crocheted, and with her typewriter she was composing poems for passersby. She wrote a poem for me about her hat.

It’s about whimsy, silliness and being unafraid. It concludes: we should all be brave as a playful child

I can definitely identify with silliness!

I hope you might see her next time you’re in Balboa Park. Look for her smile, and expect words of wisdom tapped out from her fingers. You might like one of her whimsical hats, too!

And yes! She has a website with lots of cool stuff! You can order one of her fun “Minky” hats online! Go to her website by clicking here!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Remembering the Holocaust in La Jolla.

The lead photo of this blog post is horrifying. It serves to remind us that we humans are capable of unspeakable atrocities.

An exhibition at the La Jolla/Riford Branch Library concerns one of those atrocities: the Holocaust.

RUTH: Remember Us the Holocaust, through words written and spoken by local Holocaust survivors, biographies, artifacts and photographs, serves to remind us that horrors like this must be forever remembered and resisted by ordinary, kind-hearted people.

One way to cement our need to remember is to visit the exhibition and experience what life was like for Jewish people and others in Germany under the Nazis before and during World War II. The irrational hatred, persecution, mass murder.

Why must people act this way?

Life is short enough. Why not simply be kind?

Why on Earth would anyone want to murder over a million children?

RUTH: Remember Us the Holocaust’s curator is Sandra Scheller, daughter of Holocaust survivors Ruth and Kurt Sax. She grew up in the South Bay of San Diego. She’s the author of Try To Remember Never Forget, and the creator of the documentary with the same name. Sandra’s TED talk, Keeping Memories Alive, has been used throughout schools as a learning platform for Holocaust education and TED Talk future speakers.

The exhibition is not only open to the public on the second floor of the La Jolla library, but many school children continue to learn an important part of history by visiting the extensive displays.

You can learn more about the exhibition and its Holocaust survivor speaker series by visiting the RUTH: Remember Us the Holocaust website here.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Holocaust survivors speak at La Jolla library.

You have an extraordinary opportunity. Holocaust survivors and their family members have been speaking all year at the La Jolla/Riford Branch Library. See the above schedule. The next speaker will be at the La Jolla library on Tuesday, May 13.

The second floor of the La Jolla library is currently hosting the exhibition RUTH: Remember Us the Holocaust, which recalls the horrors of a nightmarish period in human history that no one should ever forget.

I blogged about this exhibition several years ago when it was showing in Chula Vista. See those photos here. I’ll be blogging about the current exhibition in La Jolla (which is even more powerful) shortly.

Meanwhile, please spread the word. Holocaust survivors will continue to recall their personal experiences the second Tuesday of each month. Bring your friends. This is incredibly important.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Starting a cross-country bike ride in San Diego!

I met Dan Beaman today. He was with his bicycle at the Old Town Trolley station. His bike had an Iowa state flag, so I had to approach him and satisfy my curiosity!

I learned that Dan is biking all the way across the United States, starting in San Diego and ending in Daytona Beach. The ride begins in several days and should take about two months. He’s on a continuing quest for the best cookie in America! See his website and follow his progress by clicking here.

He had his traveling stuff in tow, including a tent. He told me he plans to ride a bit over 50 miles per day, and it’s mostly for the adventure of it. Taking a south route across the continent, he’s eager to see the Alamo, New Orleans and other fun places. He likes it warm and flat, so once he crosses our local mountains, he should really like the desert in Imperial Valley east of San Diego!

When I learned Dan is searching for really great cookies, I recommended he check out Uncle Biff’s California Killer Cookies in Hillcrest!

Hey readers, where is the best cookie in San Diego? Leave a comment!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Photos around Petco Park on 2025 Opening Day!

The San Diego Padres are playing the Atlanta Braves at Petco Park this 2025 Opening Day. As I type these words, the score is 4-3.

Before the game, I walked around Petco Park and through East Village and the Gaslamp Quarter breathing in the exciting atmosphere.

Padres baseball jerseys, shirts and hats everywhere. The media on the scene. A huge crowd entering the ballpark. Many smiles and thumbs up. Just before the start of the big game, a flyover of military helicopters…

Enjoy a variety of photographs!

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share!

Dancing to Boot Scootin’ Boogie at Seaport Village!

One reason I like to walk through Seaport Village on a weekend is the live music. There’s always a great local band performing on stage in the Lighthouse District. Today it was The Tradesmen.

The best thing is how random people descend onto the outdoor “dance floor” and completely let loose: moving to the music, swaying, arms lifted skyward, prancing about dizzily without inhibition. What a blast!

I paused for a while during my Embarcadero walk, to tap my toes to Boot Scootin’ Boogie.

No, you couldn’t make me dance like that in front of everybody. I’m chicken.

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I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or X.

Feel free to share this!