New Jersey 2018 Democratic State Committee Conference
- held in Atlantic City, at the Harrah's Resort & Casino. This was my very first time attending a large Democratic convention, but I have been a member of the NJ Democratic Disability Caucus, so I felt I needed to get to know more about the political process. Atlantic City is about 2 1/2 hours from my home, so I made hotel reservations there for two nights, driving on my own.
As always, everything is always about hearing - not always bad - but most definitely interesting. When I checked into the hotel, I made sure I had a room with visual fire alerts. When my cochlear implant (CI) processors come off at night, I am deaf and cannot hear alarms, so this was essential. They gave me a great room - 24th floor with a view of the bay. This room was equipped with other alerters as well - great to see them devote a desirable room for people with hearing loss.
I found the appropriate elevator (this place is BIG), hiked to my room, inserted my room key - and - nothing. UH-OH - I really didn't want to hike back to the front desk, so I looked for a house phone, and there it was, on the wall near my room. YES - I can hear on phones - YAY! I called the front desk, was told a security person would come to my room - and she appeared a few minutes later, opened the door, and said I could go to the front desk to get a new key, at my convenience. Oh - the joys of being able to hear on the phone. It just never gets old!
And yes - the room was gorgeous - newly renovated - with a spectacular view (for NJ.)
Now I was ready to head to the Convention Center, another long hike, to attend the first event - the opening reception with Governor Phil Murphy and Senator Cory Booker. I had requested captioning, and hoped that it would be provided - and it was!
BIG BEAUTIFUL CAPTIONS!
And the breakout session of the Disability Caucus was also captioned. 👌👌👌
I have been quite successful being able to "work a room" with my bilateral CI's. I have an "ULTRAZOOM" program setting that uses directional microphones to bring in speech sounds in noisy environments, and it has worked very well for me. So I was mingling among all these wonderful people, networking about issues impacting people with hearing loss - and political issues in general.
And I had some great photo ops, too!
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| Senator Cory Booker |
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| Governor Phil Murphy |
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| Me with Senator Bob Menendez |
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| Me with Senator Cory Booker |
I met a LOT of people and I came away with one
VERY IMPORTANT MESSAGE.
PLEASE MAKE SURE TO VOTE!
If you need any help registering or finding a polling place, let me know.
And please join me in voting a
straight Democratic ticket -
up and down the ballot.
Our lives and our country depend on it!
