Ugh... I haven't been sleeping well, and have had a lot on my mind, so today was pretty much a complete waste. I've been having to take a few Neurontin just to shut my mind up enough to sleep each night, and even then, it's not much better than a doze. :-( I wasn't even sure exactly which day of the week we were on.

I was planning to go get cat food/litter today, but that just didn't happen... At least now that I'm using Wanderer, my shoulder doesn't hurt when I use the computer, though. :-)

I've gone through all of Passing For Normal now, and I can see the parallels, now. I was particularly unnerved when she explained her problems dealing with getting things done during school, particularly not taking notes and just absorbing as much as possible (in my case, quite a bit) by half-listening to lecture. Other aspects, like the father attacking her for his own traits, I couldn't quite grasp, because I am lucky enough that my own same-spectrum father is very supportive and taught me a lot about getting on in the world with our neurological oddities. :-)

The main thing I objected to, all the way to the end, was the lack of acceptance for people that aren't totally "normal." That is, she openly advocates behavioral therapy rather than acceptance, even to the point that she won't accept her friend with Tourette's. She also is clearly in favor of medicating herself (or others with differences) to the point that they're so dulled down that they fall asleep all the time, thus reducing the behaviors simply by tiring the people out too much to perform them! Creepy... Seems to me they'd all be happier if they just accepted themselves and got others to accept them as well.

Okay, I'm tired out again, I *hate* stress/anxiety... I need more sleep, but if I crash right now, I'll wake up at some bizarre hour and have to just sit there, not knowing what to do next until the sun comes up or until I take more Neurontin. :-p I need to go to the store tomorrow to get the things I failed to get today, so I'd better make sure I have enough sleep to get up early enough in the morning!

I'm trying to put one "task" (or should we say "long overdue task") on my Clie agenda for each day, to motivate myself to actually *do* them. So I look at the list of (usually non-existant) appointments and see what the day's "task" is. It worked today (actually I got a *few* things done) at least...so there's hope. :-)

The major thing was that I managed to get some federal loan paperwork filled out and ready to be mailed. That's a bigger accomplishment than it sounds as, I should have done that several months ago! :-/

What else...ah, I got around to mailing Parrish a package and card that I've been failing to send for several weeks. (That might count as two accomplishments: actually writing in the card can be a challenge for me on quiet days.) Also stopped at the grocery store to pick up the things I needed that the drug-store didn't have last night.

Did a bit more work around here (things my arm doesn't protest at) and now I'm relaxing for the first time in a while. Kyle is giving me impromptu Tori Amos appreciation lessons. I have to wonder if he captures the attention of his students with comments like "listen to this, it's really obscene" as he does me! If not, why not -- well, aside from the potential legal issues? *grin*

To help me get going in the morning, I brought a hot water heater into my room so I could heat up a mug of chai when I first get up, rather than sit here waiting until I have it "together" enough to go downstairs and brew some. (Does one brew powdered tea? I don't think so; one doesn't brew cocoa after all, and they are quite similar in instant form!)

Anyway, so I brought the heater in here, and since then have had great luck until the past few days, during which I've been too out of it to even get *this* much right. First I forgot to refill my large water-container and drank all the water in the middle of the night. So I refilled the container mid-afternoon... Then I forgot to bring a mug and spoon in here for the next morning. Then, having remembered the mug, spoon, and water, I somehow failed to notice that in making my late-evening drink, I used up the rest of the chai!

So yesterday, after finally dropping my laptop off at CompUSA, I went to Borders and picked up a nice big tin of Vanilla Chai. (I requested a sample to make sure I am not allergic, because their Spiced Chai turned out to make me feel quite sick!) Came back home, looking forward to a nice hot cup of Vanilla Chai this morning...

...but I forgot the mug, spoon, and the water! Arrgh, I can't win! *snicker* Tonight, I'm going to make sure I have ALL of them, blast it! No more chai-deprived mornings!

I lent my brother an OS disc that could boot late last night for a system reinstall, and was curious whether it had worked...the resulting conversation would be "what happens when you don't understand nonliteral expressions and have a sense of humor." ;-)

[02:31] Denise: did the CD boot?
[02:31] Brian: does the pope sh** in the woods?
[02:31] Denise: lol
[02:32] Denise: are you sure your system is set up correctly?
[02:32] Denise: because I know that disc is bootable
[02:32] Brian: it did boot, and the pope does sh** in the woods
[02:32] Denise: oh
[02:32] Denise: I rather thought the pope would sh** in a toilet
[02:33] Brian: nah, woods all the way
[02:33] Brian: he likes the outdoors
[02:33] Denise: lol...likes that special scratch of poison ivy on his ****?

Reminds me a bit of a creative phrase I horrified somebody with online a while back -- "sucks hairy things." As he pointed out, no matter *what* hairy things you're talking about, sucking them doesn't provide very pleasant mental images!

I just posted this to Amazon.com and thought I'd also add it here for those that might be interested. :-)

*five stars* Wonderfully accurate -- as an autistic, I should know! :-)
Reviewer: moggymania from Northern Bay Area of California, USA
As an autistic, I have a special interest in reading works that feature autistic main characters, partly to see how neurotypical people think our brains work, but partly just for the joy I feel when somebody "gets it right."

Mark Haddon absolutely "got it right" in this book. From descriptions of how overwhelming the man-made world is for us on a sensory level, to frustration with a society that expects us to learn how to recognize neurotypical facial expressions based on simple drawings -- I'm really impressed, everything really does reflect how many of us experience life. Even the way he'll be talking to an adult one minute and they'll suddenly lose their temper at him, or how his mind digresses to his perseverative interests, and his belief that animals are just as good (if not better) than humans, is exactly what my life has been like. It was like reading something written by my own brain. :-)

Parents and friends of autistics can also learn a great deal about how to interact with us in a way that makes us comfortable from the book. Christopher's parents are rare in their acceptance of his needs; instead of forcing him to learn to hug or maintain painful physical contact to fulfill *their* needs, they learn to communicate their love (and to let him communicate his) by gently but firmly touching one another's fingertips. He turns out to be a wonderfully well-adjusted, happy, secure boy that does far more than anybody would expect of an "autistic" as a result.

There is much more than that to the book, though. The story itself is filled with innovative twists and turns that bring it far beyond the "mystery" category -- or any other genre. Every chapter, I found myself wondering eagerly what would happen next, whether Christopher was trying to figure out how to navigate the train system to London or having a meltdown in his bedroom. In addition to that, there are many points where Christopher does what I know (from being taught) is "naughty" -- usually what neurotypicals are tempted to do but naturally refrain from -- and I was quite tickled by him actually breaking the rules!

I've read thousands of books in my lifetime, as reading is *my* big perseveration, and even earned my bachelor's degree from U.C. Berkeley's English department. "Curious Incident" is, in my opinion, absolutely one of the best I've experienced, and I dearly hope the author writes a sequel. :-)

I wanted to share this letter I wrote to AutAdvo in response to two adults with AS that were claiming that autistics demanding to be themselves are just making up "excuses."

--
I am physically disabled, autistic, and proudly open with everybody in my life about both. I have no choice, as I can't "fake" a normal body or a neurotypical brain. I also have a wonderful life partner, bachelor's degree from Berkeley, plenty of people IRL and online that seem to really like me (though I choose to not have "friends" as it is too stressful), a career path that will lead me towards a job compatible with my anatomy/brain. Anybody that treats me badly as the result of my autism gets a fight or kicked out of my life; any organization that will dare try to discriminate will quickly find that I am an empowered person and will use the court system to push them to conform to the ADA. The only time I feel like a "second-class citizen" is when I fail to be an open advocate for my kind and cower pretending to be something I'm not in hope that somebody else will come along and change the world for me. That is the attitude I grew up with as a disabled female, and I am very happy for it.

In no other disability, visible or invisible, is the escapist "pretend being normal" attitude the norm. People with diabetes, AIDS, cancer, VATER, Downs Syndrome, Spina Bifida -- all of us live not only with bodies that are dangerously malfunctioning, but do it openly even when they could hide it. The "able-bodied" community has gotten used to giving these individuals support, and most importantly, we have high self-esteem and are happy. Yes, that includes people that even had severe brain injuries (the most stigmatized form of impairment) -- one of my coolest professors at Berkeley didn't even *start* college until he almost died in his early twenties from being hit by a car. After years of rehab, he applied to some big-name university in his home country of Australia, was totally open about his disability and the accommodations he'd need, and so impressed the campus that he earned a scholarship straight through to his doctorate as well as fellowships all over the world!

Other groups have overcome even more. Gays, blacks, women -- all faced incredible acts of violence and even murder when they started fighting against their second-class citizenship. We have some bigots that call us names, but we don't have formally organized groups out to beat, maim, or kill us. Look at how far those groups have come...it wasn't done because they pandered to bigots, that's for sure!

Given everything I've seen disabled people do to earn our independence and civil rights.... What I see as "Excuses" in the autism world are all of the ACs that use excuses to justify hiding while brave individuals like Frank Klein, Amanda Baggs, Larry Arnold, and so forth do all the work. What's funny to me is that the NT-fakers don't even really fool anybody (having a boyfriend, close friend, and multiple family members that are AC, I should know): you're still clearly not "normal" in some sense, you simply won't tell people *why* you're so different.

Bah. I couldn't sleep until after dawn for some reason, my brain wouldn't shut up long enough. I wouldn't have been able to rest at all, especially once the "lack of sleep" neuro-pain set in, but at 6am I took some Neurontin (for both pain and sleep) and napped until my usual auto-awakening time of 7:30am. This post will thus be quite disjointed. :-(

I "went to bed" around midnight, but then didn't feel tired enough to sleep, so I started reading Temple Grandin's first autobiography, Emergence: Labeled Autistic. That became disturbing after a while, because all of the comments about her, as well as her second autobiography (Thinking In Pictures), had made me think she's among the most severely autistic -- only to find in Emergence that it's not the case. Her autistic traits are uniformly weaker than mine are.

So I put that book down, and turned my Clie to my ebook copy of a very funny novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon. I forget exactly how I heard about this book... It's a humorous "murder mystery" novel by (iirc) an undx-Asperger's man with a HFA son, and the main character is completely written accurately from a HFA/AS boy's viewpoint. The result, as he persistently does or says precisely what NTs do not expect (or appreciate!) is entertaining in a cathartic sense, and having it written in the same mental "voice" that I have (but usually conceal from others), with the same feelings, is engrossing as well.

However, I also realized, as with the earlier book, that this child understands concepts that I only figured out a year or two ago. White lies, for example, made no sense to me, seemed no different from full-out lies, until I was about 24.5 years old. (The sense of power and mischief in using them amuses me now.) He also explains other things I still didn't realize about communication that he is taught by his aide, such as that the speed and amount of air one expells audibly through one's nostrils alters what it means, and that raised eyebrows (as well as virtually every other gesture, I suspect) can similarly mean multiple things.

I had a short conversation with my mother yesterday -- short because I was overloaded and hiding. She told me about a commercial that was meant to be funny, in which a growing male does a number of dangerous things throughout his life, and his mother keeps saying "I don't know how he'll live to twenty" only to have him become an adult, produce a girl, and say the exact same thing about her. I told her that it didn't seem funny, it seemed like an example of incompetent parents failing to keep their children out of danger. She responded with, "no, that's just the kind of things kids do." I paused a second, thinking back on my childhood, then responded "I didn't." To which my mother sighed and answered "I know."

It always used to seem ridiculous to me that the government had decided that I am too "permanently" developmentally delayed to function in society -- because all I have really known, until the past several months, is that I am highly intelligent, the sort of person that gets an "A" on both junior and senior theses at Berkeley with little effort. What I didn't realize, but evidently others in my life did, was how severe the delays outside that particular intelligence were. It makes more sense that they consider me permanently delayed, I just wish I knew beyond one test how they figured it out.

I read several months ago that spectrum females in relationships tend to become so stressed just handling it that they shut down otherwise. I think that this is happening to me -- I am always tired, too blah to stim, keep losing interest in things instead of being perseverant, my executive function & general tolerance of life are more problematic than in the past -- but I don't know what to do about it. The only option would be to not be in a relationship, but I don't really like that idea. I wish I knew how to be myself, or feel like myself, have all of my autistic hyper-energy strengths and also be in a relationship. Maybe when things are not as stressful in my life I'll be able to handle it better, and I just need to wait?

Enough rambling now, I am hungry and my neuro system is tingling/hurting all over because I didn't sleep enough... I need to have some breakfast so I can take more Neurontin -- at least that way even if I'm too relaxed by the medication to accomplish things, it will make the neurotorment go away.

Well, I guess my body/brain decided that they've done enough for the moment. *chuckle* I noticed yesterday afternoon that I was tiring rapidly, so I stopped working, but I guess I'd already asked more of my brain than it felt like giving -- I fell fast asleep mid-evening in the middle of writing an email, and didn't wake up until my notebook startled me awake at 4am by an incoming email from Parrish.

Today I'm in a fun middleground between functioning and not-functioning. I can write in the stream-of-consciousness sense, but I'm too tired to actually think about what I'm saying; my respiratory & gastro tracts are responding by misbehaving, as they always do when I'm overloaded. Bah. :-p I'm supposed to exercise tonight, but unless I feel better in a real hurry, that's not going to happen.

I'm too tired to read, which really bothers me. I'm at the very end of a six-book series for the first time that I love -- there's perhaps 15 pages left -- and I can't make sense of the words. Luckily most of the major plot threads are tied up, but there are little things I want to find out about what happens.

Still, I've managed to get up, take care of my cecostomy, shower, and even bake biscuits. Keep in mind, though, that I use the world's easiest biscuit recipe, so that's not exactly impressive... *snicker* For anybody interested, it is "dump random quantity of Bisquick in mixing container. Add some water and mix. Form balls and cook at whatever temp you want until the results aren't raw." You can use the exact same recipe, in fact, to make pancakes or doughnuts, if you prefer. You can also customize it by adding random amounts of virtually anything -- sugar, liquid chai, cinnamon, flour. (I add sugar, chai, and flour all the time now.)

I've been given jury duty yet again, and I'm trying to decide whether to take it or not. :-p I could use the (pitiful amount of) money, but I'm not sure whether I can make my body/brain cooperate. Any other auties have experience with jury duty? Should I try it or duck out (which I've done before, it's fairly easy)?

I think my latest batch of biscuits are cooked by now, so enough of this... Maybe eating will give me more energy.

Well, I took the Baron-Cohen Empathy Quotient / Systematizing Quotient Test again a little bit ago...

EQ = 5
SQ = 71

Of course, this might have something to do with the fact that my Wired Asperger's Quotient is 47 - 49 of 50 and that I'm actually High Functioning Autistic. *grin*

Just had another evening of trying to convince myself to write/chat, but not being able to. I felt really good after my workout at the fitness center, and was all ready to embrace the world eagerly, then I saw a rant by a neurobigot. Instant mood crash. Bah! I didn't have the energy to respond, and even if I did, he was obviously the sort of person that wouldn't listen.

I sat for quite a while, not getting anything done, feeling the energy from earlier drain out into an emotional lethargy. Then, somewhat out of desperation as I do have things that need to finally be dealt with, I decided to start out just by using Agendus to create a detailed To Do list, with multiple colors, priorities, and icons. *grin* That was surprisingly rewarding, so I did expanded to less-necessary things like sending mail to each individual friend and washing my car. Colored text and icons everywhere, whoo! *grin*

Lately I've been alternating between feeling totally overwhelmed at the work I need to get done and feeling intensely bored because I can't figure out what to do. My theory is that if I have this list to stick with, I'll be far more likely to know what to do when I have energy and thus do it. That in turn will allow me to write or chat with online friends without the feeling that I'm doing something horrible by not devoting myself to the other things I've been failing to take care of. Then, because I'll have something to be enthusiastic about, I'll have more energy, and in turn that will mean getting more done.

Let's hope my guess is right. :-)

I want to start off this entry all cool and collected, but I'm too excited. *grin*

I ran into Parrish briefly on IM mid-afternoon, and just before he left, he mentioned that he was listening to a song called Celestial Soda Pop. I figured that sounds about as strange as one is likely to get, so I asked he toss a copy at me when he got home. Sure enough, when I managed to get back to my computer a few hours later, he was on IM and the song was on my drive. :-)

So we hung out having the usual fun conversation, my just remembering in the back of my head to check the song out. There was a bit of a lull at one point, so I decided to queue up some music and include his odd addition to the collection for kicks. Much to my complete shock, what came up was a song I used to play all the time on my Apple IIgs about 12 - 13 years ago and have been wondering about ever since! *bounces*

Playing it for the first time since childhood brought back some neat memories -- I had a lot of emotion invested in that computer and often spent every waking moment at it. I'd come downstairs early in the morning, dump tablespoons of Nestle Quik into a glass, pour milk on top of it (*stirring* it somehow didn't occur to me) and head on down to my computer, cheerfully eating this as my breakfast. Unless I had a special story-writing project to work on, I would sit at my computer for hours, trying to figure out how to make the screen emulate the rippling colors that I saw whenever I listened to music. Repetitive music with a distinct interwoven beat between multiple instruments (how is that for a lame description?) was the most compelling to perseverate on; Celestial Soda Pop was my favorite, even though I had no idea what it was called other than something like "synth008" in the program!

So suddenly, many years after I'd given up hope, having my notebook start playing that song this evening was a seriously exciting shock. *grin* It still has exactly the combination of tones, patterns, and repetition to please my autistic brain after all this time -- I still feel the need to leave it on loop for several hours in row.

What was also pretty cool, after I told Parrish this, was that I was able to find a song he'd been missing for years, too! He played an arcade game back in 1983 that involved a penguin knocking ice cubes around the screen, and greatly enjoyed the tune used. After a bit of creative Googlesearching, I managed to figure out that it was an old Sega game called Pengo. (I admit I didn't think there was a chance in hell I was going to figure out what he was thinking of, so it was as much of a surprise to me as it was to him when I got it right!)

I told him the game title, and even before I could Google it myself, he'd tracked down the name of the song and artist! Hunting things down like that (and the startled reaction of "Holy sh**!" from him) was a lot of fun for me... I have to admit, too, that having grabbed a remix or two as well as the original, it does make neat repetitive background music too. So not only did I help him out in return for finding my "lost" song, I added something remarkably addictive to my own stash. *big grin*

From a letter I sent to my BF, who was wondering why I didn't write him last night before going to bed...
==
Something went wrong and I overloaded last night, I think. I got off the phone and went into full autistic shutdown. My body hurt all over, I couldn't stop moving, I couldn't think enough to know what was wrong... It took 600 Neurontin spaced out over a few hours to finally put me to sleep around dawn. I'm pretty much tired out right now, very sore (lack of sleep = neurological pain), spaced out (semi-shutdown)... I feel very upset with myself for letting this happen, I know better than to do that to myself, however it is I did it...

So, if I'm put on Prozac, take it for the right amount of time, so I lose my so-called depression and so-called social anxiety, I wonder if I'll also gain the lack of what few inhibitions I have...and thus be able to tell that damned doctor to pull his head out of his arse?

It's a pleasing thought. I just want to go take a nap.

My mother (who exclaimed "you're not depressed!" when I told her the tale) suggested I take the Prozac for a month as directed, then tell the dork that it did nothing for me. I'm tempted to agree, except I know this kind of doctor -- that will just mean putting me on a stronger dose/medication.

I HATE KAISER!!!!

Well, that explores how my appointment went. Grrrrrr...

I had a one-hour diagnostic appt. set up for this afternoon to get the stupid paperwork done for autism. Guess how long I actually saw somebody? TEN MINUTES. Gah! No matter *what* I said, he claimed it's a sign of "depression" then after about ten minutes of struggling, handed me a prescription for prozac and told me he'd see me in a month. I told him I looked up NVLD in hope of bringing things back on-track, but he just shrugged me off.

I mentioned that my partner is diagnosed as having Asperger's Syndrome, and that he has gluten reaction problems. The moron counselor tried to tell me that Parrish "probably doesn't REALLY have it" and that "there are lots of things that cause gluten reactions, he should be evaluated for those instead."

I was, as usual, too focused on emulating NT to feel anything. It wasn't until about halfway home that I let myself drop the act enough to react... I'm absolutely furious. I spent a couple of *hours* last night verifying my early childhood development with my mother, writing things down so I could refer to them during the session if necessary, and wasn't even given a chance! Well, at least now there's no doubt in my mind (not that there was ever much) that I am on the spectrum -- I asked her questions thinking that I would discover I'm on the AS/HFA borderline, but found out that I fit the description of the more "severe" forms of autism, even down to a serious regression of skills at the appropriate age, seeming deafness, being totally in my own world... That's just about the only good thing about this situation right now. I'm so angry!

Now I need to track down a non-Kaiser specialist to handle the legal-type diagnosis...ugh, what a PITA. I hope somebody in my area will have a clue where to go that takes Medical or whatever the hell it is I have. *grrrr*

Oooh! While cleaning under my small dresser, I found a cobalt blue fountain pen, and a marbled blue-ink rollerball! *bounce*

I don't think I've mentioned that my major "object" perseveration, from way back in school, has always been interesting-looking pens. *chuckle* I used to just take pens apart and see if I could combine parts from different types, but that eventually shifted to a special love for "decorative" pens in general. Promotional pens in weird colors and shapes are among my favorite.

I'm not sure whether this is because I never quite had enough pens as a teenager (I was afraid to ask my parents for more, so I'd *make* them out of spare parts) or because my father tended to bring nifty pens back from his business trips. They make some *seriously* weird pens for the chemical conferences, and they're great fun to dissect, stim with, or otherwise perseverate upon. Prescription drug pens are also often quite nifty, and most often come with sylized rubber grips, fancy-shaped caps, multiple bright colors, and so forth. *grin*

I've read intermittently about gluten-casein free diets lately, and after talking to another autistic online, became fairly sure that I'm among the casein-reactive population. According to the official research/theories out there, some autistics synthesize dairy products into opiates, with the resulting relaxed kind of "high" that would be expected and a strong tendency to crave milk products. Given I have both of those signs, I thought I'd perform a little experiment today.

I usually have a cup of milk or chai, and feel just a little better. However, that could be explained away easily as a psychological thing, as both drinks seem to qualify as "comfort" foods. So I decided to see what would happen if I drank powdered chai (which has concentrated milk in it) mixed with ice and heavy whipping cream -- an ultra-casein frappuccino!

Whooo! I think I've had a quarter-cup at most, but I'm *seriously* reacting to this stuff. I have the dazed feeling that one gets after being awake for a few days, and I'm so relaxed that I think I could fall asleep on the floor. I felt about the same when I was on three vicodin while recovering from surgery a couple of weeks ago -- conscious, but ready to go to sleep as soon as I get a chance. Yikes. The small amounts of this stuff that I normally have day-to-day are pleasantly relaxing, but having my brain shut off *this* much is very uncomfortable. It will be interesting to see how difficult it will be to interact if/when my mother comes in to talk to me...

Ooops. It appears that when I tried to "forcefully shove" the lawn mower over with the inside of my foot, I *broke* my anklebone. It hurt a lot for a split-second when it happened, but after that it didn't occur to me that I might have injured myself. It wasn't until a few minutes ago, as I was taking my socks off, that I realized that the bone is now in two distinct pieces, and is extremely bruised/swollen. Lovely. I wonder if I can still go use the exercycles at the gym and go out volunteering next week...

I would be shocked at not having noticed this, except I'm also the person that broke the kneecap on that same leg into two when I was 16 and then proceeded to hike two miles through the Sierra mountains on it. (Well, I did break it partway through the hike, it's not like I had a choice unless I wanted my father to carry me, which I adamantly did now.) That one didn't hurt enough for me to feel bothered by it, either...proof that at least some autistics have a shorted-out neurological system. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but I'm autistic so it doesn't actually hurt me? :-/

Oh wait. If I put ice on it to reduce the swelling, then it hurts a whole lot! Ow! Holy crap, that's more what I thought a broken ankle would feel like! I wonder if I am supposed to keep doing this, or if the pain is a signal that I'm doing the wrong thing? Googletime!

Unfortunately the nice start to my day was marred by seeing my ex out walking on the drive home. :-( This time there was no mistaking who it was, as he was wearing a certain odd shirt that had originally caused my then-best-friend and I to give him a certain affectionate nickname. The other times I've seen him didn't bother me much, but this time I felt seriously sick to my stomach, panicky, then depressed -- probably because of the memories associated with that shirt.

I admit, sitting here with all of these medical appointments piling up, feeling physically ill from the infections, worrying about what to do about my education or the next year of my life in general, and then seeing my ex on top of it makes me wonder whether things will ever improve. Everybody else has been slowly moving on to better things in one way or another except me, and whatever improvement I manage to make is only after a lot of effort.

I barely achieved my BA, while my agemates are 1 - 2 degrees ahead or at least have a decent "real" job, with a living wage. I've had two relationships, the first consistent with a junior-high romance, the second closer to a first-semester college freshman. My agemates have by now lost track of how many partners (in both senses of the word), how many "serious" relationships; some have married, raised children, divorced, own houses... Everybody else my age is an adult, and everything associated with the term doesn't apply to me.

Yet everybody around me seems to think that I should be trying to arrange my life so it looks like I am an adult. Play at getting a job for the short period until my body or brain betray their developmental age; pretend to have a relationship and hide the blatant signs that my brain isn't ready. Ignore the pressure/pain of people's reactions whenever they happen to notice my facade slipping...

Others say that adulthood is all just pretending, and yes, to a large degree I can see that is true, but it isn't the kind of "pretending" I have been trying to do since my ex started mangling my life. My "pretending" goes so deep as to include consciously emulating most of the abilities discussed on this page. Some I do have naturally, like the ability to imagine an object in my mind and (now that I am older) awareness in a faint way that objects exist outside my immediate sight, but most are no more an instinctive element of what I am than flying would be even if I had wings. (I know they say that one area of growth is supposed to come before another, but evidently nobody told my brain that, so...) I feel like I even "emulate" human language ability, in that as good as I supposedly am at writing, it's not my natural "inner voice" -- though explaining that would take another ten blog posts. :-p

It tells me a lot that I'm looking forward to the days I'll be "recovering" from the wisdom tooth removal, to be honest, because it will mean not having to fake-normal for a while. I think that I need to start re-evaluating what I am doing with my life that makes surgical recovery look like a pleasing vacation, and get to work on changing it. There's no reason for me to live my life as unhappily as I have been.

To put a slightly less happy reflection on the day... I feel bad because I was too out-of-it to remember social rules yesterday morning -- I totally forgot to tell my mother/brother that I love them and that I hope they'll have a good time. I'm worried that something bad will happen, and they'll die thinking I don't care or something. The 80s song "The Living Years" is permanently stuck in my brain, obviously. (If you've never heard it, I recommend finding somewhere to get a copy. It's really a beautifully sung piece, and has an important message.)

This is part of a very odd quirk I have. Both of my grandmothers passed on when my parents were only young adults. Nonna Gneri was murdered in a hospital just as she & mom were leaving the teenager-parent conflict phase, so there was a lot my mother never had a chance to say. "Bumbum" Mary died of colon cancer when my father was ~30; from what I understand, they were extremely close, but he had needed to focus on my health issues and thus probably wasn't there for her as much as he'd like. Plus both of my parents had the experience of losing a close friend to suicide after not being able to offer him support when he needed it.

So while I normally sneer at "emulating NT" stuff, in this instance I worry a lot that my autistic way of communicating means I am going to wind up with the same regrets that my parents have. Friends I haven't written back, family that I have trouble showing affection towards in a way they can instinctively understand... I knew this was a problem from early childhood -- that I wound up misdiagnosed as a sociopath says a lot -- but only in the last few years has there been a "word" for the difficulty.

This is one of those cases where I wish my family understood more about autism. For all my vigilance, there are still a lot of cases like Saturday morning, where I'm simply not able to compensate for the communicative barrier between us, cases where I temporarily fall out of touch with my father because I'm overwhelmed with life. Having them all be aware that it's not a lack of love on my part, but just not the way I naturally communicate would be a huge relief. I wish I had some clue of how to help them learn.

Okay, enough about that, I'm going to wind up depressing myself. I think maybe I will go "spontaneously" (well, for me -- meaning "I don't have a reason") call my father to find out what he has been up to. I don't feel up to exercising still, but it would be a good way to let him know I am thinking of him. (Especially as he called yesterday while I was out, and I haven't called him back yet.)

Had a funny moment in the used book store... Kyle was browsing the California History area, and right behind him, I was going through the cat books. I saw a title that referred to raising the "perfect cat" and instantly reacted based on my autism perseveration instead -- "perfect cat?! they should just accept the kitty as he or she is, not try to force him/her to be something he or she isn't!" It took me a split-second to realize I was mixing interests, then I started snickering at myself and let Kyle in on the joke. The really funny thing is that I basically do let my cats be who/what they are by nature, interacting with them in their own language and enjoying their natural behavior, so what seemed like a totally irrational reaction at first isn't hypocritical after all. :-)

I just got back -- er, actually, I am at Borders, so "back" being online in this case -- from roaming downtown with Kyle. We went to Copperfield's used books; I didn't think I'd find anything because just about everything old enough to be "used" I already own, but much to my shock I found a copy of Buster and the Amazing Daisy: Adventures with Asperger Syndrome for just seven dollars! Considering it is about $14 new, this made me quite happy. I started out just buying informational/autobiographical books on autism, but the idea of a children's title intrigued me. I figure it will also make a nice addition to the digital lending library for low-income autistics/families I am hoping to start. (Still need to write JK Publisher about that.)

There was also a copy of Temple Grandin's Emergence: Labeled Autistic there, but I already have a copy of that. If anybody wants it and it's not readily available used elsewhere, I would happily go back and grab a copy for them, though. The price will be between half and 75% of full value, if what I was charged for "Buster" gives any hint.

Finding the books at Copperfield's made me very happy for another reason... I've been having a strong urge to buy new autism books lately, and hanging out in Borders is tough to do when I can't "let" myself feed my perseverations. Knowing I do in fact have something new to add to my library is quite pleasing.

For a while now, I've been thinking that a "code" based on the now-ancient Code of the Geeks, except focusing on the autism spectrum, would be really cool. It could be a shorthand for identifying traits like stimming, social delays, relationships, gender identity, strength of perseveration, and so forth that have been inaccurately associated with different "types" of autism -- so we can continue having an individual-group identity without using the one-dimensional criteria that so many hate.

So today I'm going to begin compiling a list of traits/qualities for the ever-evolving Autistic Code. I'll also start looking for a Code Generator (would Quizilla somehow work?) so people can create their personal codes without going manually through a huge list of traits.

If you have a suggestion for likely categories, please put it in the comments area! :)

Every once in a while, I hit upon a word that tickles my echolalia and thus find myself possessing a strong urge to repeat it or use it at every opportunity. Usually the word is "woobies" and to a degree still is...however, I now have a new one:

Asshat!

To be honest, I don't entirely know WTF an "asshat" is, just that it sounds highly amusing. I saw it on one of the LiveJournals on my LJ Friends list, promptly began snickering, and within ten minutes, was not only chanting "asshat" but referring to virtually every even-slightly-annoying creature or person as an "asshat."

I'll bet my parents are happy I didn't find this one when I was young enough to be their problem. *snicker*

I'm rather drained right now, and didn't even manage to email my boyfriend last night. (We send messages for one another to wake up to.) So, trying to motivate myself to write, I was thinking a few minutes ago about how people become uncomfortable/unhappy if a loved one doesn't interact with them in an affectionate manner often enough -- email, hugs, phone calls, and so forth... Then, just for the heck of it, I decided to see what kind of comparisons my brain would come up with if I needed to explain this concept to somebody else.

Somehow I don't think that I'll be using the comparison "romantic partners are like digital pets, needing regular interaction or they go into Sad Mode and fail to thrive" around a group of traditional-type NTs anytime soon, it would probably really irritate them. It certainly amuses me, though. *chuckle*

Ever tried to imagine what those "College Kids Gone Wild!" naughty videos would be like if filled with AC kids instead of NT ones?

"Yes! Gasp as bold Jessica dares to not read the whole chapter before doing her homework! Thrill as Adam is overcome by an uncontrollable desire to buy a new style of underwear! Be shocked when Pat buys a soda on the way to class instead of on the way back! Autistic college kids gone WILD!"

Whoever said I had to take myself seriously? I admit, though, it would have been more of a shock if I had read the books before doing the homework, as I couldn't bring myself to manage that most of the time. *grin*

Okay, this totally drove me NUTS. Some guy wrote an article lamenting the misery of people that choose not to embrace the tech world, how hard it will become for them to get along in the future, and outright states that society should work really hard to make sure that their lives don't become "unbearable."

I went to the discussion forum that accompanied the article, and sure enough, while a majority of people were rolling their eyes, a few were whining about what horrible elitists we are. Considering the 'net has made my life (along with those of uncountable other disabled folk) so much better, you can be sure that it got my hackles up and I posted a comment of my own in response... (I'm also leaving it in the extended version of this entry in case the site takes it down.)

"We need to figure out how we will avoid making life unbearable for them."

Why, exactly?

The Internet, and computers in general, level the playing field between those with disabilities and those without. With system access being present in public libraries, community computer centers, cheap newbie training courses, and systems themselves available for virtually nothing in secondhand classified ads, there really is nothing holding average-bodied people of average neurology back from being with the rest of us online. The only thing, as far as I can tell, that prevents them is a lack of interest, and that's *their* choice.

I've never seen anybody fret about ensuring that living in society isn't "unbearable" for those with physical, neurologial, mental, or cognitive impairments. To the contrary, there is a vicious drive to "cure" my kind by forcing us from early ages onto drugs and in traumatic "therapy" that teaches us to repress reactions to painful physical stressors. We don't come out cured, we come out repressed, like any homosexual person that has gone through similar therapies. It would take minimum effort to bring understanding to the community and adapt things to include my kind naturally without excluding the less sensitive average folk, so that we could (for example) grocery shop or eat in a restaurant without exhausting ourselves blocking out the sensory pain or restricting every physical sign that we're miserable. It wouldn't take much, as has been done in California, to ban smoking in buildings so the huge number of asthmatics wouldn't be harmed by it, but instead we're told to just take extra meds.

Having the 'net has been a godsend for us, because now we can remain in our disability-friendly environments rather than harming ourselves by going out into the world. I've *met* the sort of people that have "no interest" in going online, the people the author is so worried about protecting. They're also the exact same sort that tormented disabled/geeky kids in school, that sneer at asthmatics affected by their smoke, and that believe everyone with a neurological difference should repress/drug their natural reactions to painful stimuli, that vote to keep financial disability support (which is needed primarily because of prejudice and lack of accomodations for non-mobility impairments) for independent adults thousands below the national poverty line. They have made no effort to include the disabled in their communities so *our* lives wouldn't be unbearable, they're too lazy to empower themselves now that we have something resembling a level playing field, so I see no reason why we should devote resources truly *needed* by some to those that are simply too unmotivated to catch themselves up.

I was surfing around and found this interesting list of autism characteristics on LiteralGirl's LiveJournal...

List of Possible Characteristics of a Person with
Asperger's Syndrome (AS), High Functioning Autism (HFA) or
Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS)

NO ONE WILL HAVE ALL THESE CHARACTERISTICS! These are POSSIBLE characteristics! Some of the characteristics may also be seen in conjunction with other diagnoses such as Noonan Syndrome, Tourette Syndrome, OCD, etc.

Cognitive Learning

Excellent rote memory in certain areas
Unregulated fears; difficulty judging situations that create fear - may be overly fearful in safe situations, yet fearless in dangerous situations
Very detail-oriented
difficulty seeing overall picture or situation
applies same level of detail to every situation whether appropriate or not
May have exceptionally high skills in some areas, but very low skills in others, i.e., splinter skills, savant skills, or special talents
Prefers concrete, rather than abstract, concepts

Language

Pronoun reversal
Excellent vocabulary; may sound like “The Little Professor”
Conversational language may appear stilted
Speaks with stock phrases or phrases borrowed from other situations or people
Makes honest, but often inappropriate observations
Has difficulties adjusting volume and speed in speech
Problems with prosody; irregular accenting and inflection used in conversation
Literal language: difficulty understanding figures of speech, similes, parodies, allegories, etc.
Speech may have started very early in development or may have started then stopped for a period of time
Repeats last word or phrases several times (echolalia)
Difficulty understanding some language, i.e., directional terms easily confused

Emotions

Rage/anger/hurt may all be expressed in unexpected ways
Perfectionism
Easily overstimulated by sound, crowds, lights, smells
Inside feeling not matching outside behavior

Motor Skills

Difficulty with some skills requiring motor skill development
Gross motor skills - riding bike, swimming, crawling
Fine motor skills - handwriting, tying shoes
May have some advanced, age-appropriate skills while other age-appropriate skills are delayed, i.e., tying shoes before climbing stairs
Unusual walking gait or clumsiness
Difficulty with motor skills that require visual perception accuracy, i.e., walking through a parking lot, revolving door or turnstiles, participating in sports, guiding a shopping cart

Perseveration - “The tendency of an idea, experience, or response to persist in an individual.” Webster’s New World Dictionary
"per sev er a tion ( ... ) n. Psychology. Continued or repetitive activity or actions: 1. the uncontrollable repetition of a word, phrase, or gesture. 2. The spontaneous recurrence of a thought, image, phrase, or tune in the mind”
American Heritage Dictionary

Obsession - the fact or state of being obsessed with an idea, desire, emotion, etc.
Compulsions - an irresistible, repeated, irrational impulse to perform some act
Fascination with rotation
Many and varied collections
Redirection very difficult (changing focus or thinking from one activity or idea to another)
One emotional incident can determine the mood for the rest of the day; can’t let emotions pass quickly

Social Cues

Difficulty reading facial expression and emotion in another person
Difficulty understanding body language
Difficulty understanding the rules of conversation
Difficulty understanding group interactions
Too much or too little eye contact
Difficulty understanding others’ humor
Problems recognizing faces out of the usual setting or known context (face-blindness or prosopagnosia)
Stand-offish or overly friendly
May adopt others’ behaviors, speech or dress habits to aid in more fluid communication and social adaptation

Senses

Very sensitive or undersensitive to light, pain, taste, touch, sound, smell
May have injuries of which they are not aware
May experience physical pain from oversensitivity to light, sound, touch
Very picky eater, both in selections of foods and in the way they are presented on the plate
May crave specific touch, taste, smell, sight, sound, lights
Over-sensitive to change in surroundings, people, places
Over stimulation may result from too many verbal directions or instructions

Comfort Skills

Desires comfort items to produce calming effect - blankets, stuffed animals
May need external (outside) stimulation for calming - brushing, soothing sound, rotating object
Comforted by minor motor stimulations - rocking, humming, tapping fingers, toes, sucking, rubbing fingertips in circles or on seams of clothing
May need separate space or area to decompress
Unusual attachment to object
Self-stimulation i.e., rocking, tapping, humming, etc.,to increase concentration and attention or to calm down and relax

Neurological Function

Erratic neurological function
Attention difficulties
Irregular sleep patterns
Understanding and working with time concepts difficult
Sensory processing disorders (how the brain processes information it receives from the sensory organs)
Visual processing disorders
Auditory processing disorders
Sensory integration disorders

New Situations, Patterns, People

Rule-oriented
Prefers known patterns with little unexpected surprises
Prefers familiar places, clothing, people
Difficulty with transitions when changing activities
Difficulty making and maintaining friendships (especially peer friendships); more successful with adults than other children or young people
NO ONE WILL HAVE ALL THESE CHARACTERISTICS! These are POSSIBLE characteristics! It is suggested that this document be used as a check list to mark the past and present characteristics.

The “List of Possible Characteristics of a Person with Asperger’s Syndrome” is included in the book, Tap Dancing in the night. Copyright 2001 by Martha Kate Downey, published by Phat Art 4 Publishing.

http://www.mkdowney.com/characteristics.html

This was written to the aut-partners (romantic relationships) list by an NT woman married to a man on the spectrum... I was so pleased with what she said that I asked (and was happily given) permission to send it onwards to other lists. I think there's a *lot* that can be learned from this. (Click MORE to read it. :)

To: aut-partners
From: Janica
Subject: Re: [aut-partners] Re: hugs Re: have had to rediscover hubbie

>I believe in my heart that both parties have to make some concessions to
>be able to live harmoniously. It is when one party does all the
>compromising that relationships fall apart. Whether its an NT/NT or AS/NT.

I am interested in this entire concept of compromise in AS/NT
relationships. But I'm not sure that's really what it would be called or
if it is even possible. Compromise implies (to me anyway) that we are each
giving up some bit to get a whole that has parts of what each
wants. Michael cannot compromise on some things. Some rituals diminish
anxiety. Some obsessions "finish" a mental project that, unfinished, would
drive him as bats as dirty dishes on the counter would make me. Some of
his needs for quiet time or companionship in silence are to recharge
seriously depleted batteries after a hard day.

Regardless of what I have going, some of his needs are critical to his
physical, spiritual, and mental health. For me to ask for a hug when he
has a paramount need, even tho the same need would be far less important if
it were mine, would be disrespectful. Just because I don't need that space
since my NT brain can take on multiple events, people, and emotions in
succession, doesn't mean he is the same. He is not. His wiring is
different. He needs to pace his output so he can have enough staying power
to attend to life's needs - his life, my life, our life together. So I
have learned to read his body language (just like I learned from my dogs)
and I do respect his needs.

I call my friends for a chat, I go hug my grandbaby, I take a dog out for a
session, or I grab a dog, give him/her a huge hug and get a very sloppy kiss!

In doing so, I am telling Michael I love him with no words. It means I put
my own wishes (and they ARE wishes while his are NEEDS, very different)
after his well being. And, guess what? He is way more attentive to me
emotionally because it is becoming safe for him to do so and because by not
asking for what he can't comfortably give, his batteries are recharged and
ten minutes later he looks for me and smiles.

Dog, what a smile that is. So open and honest, clear, sweet, and a million
words in it. I am so glad I found y'all!

hugs, Janica

For anybody trying to learn about the spectrum, I've quickly compiled this list of what I think the best websites, discussion groups, and books are... (This was in response to somebody saying that she hopes to educate her family on AS. :)

Asperger's & Autism Advocacy
http://home.att.net/~ascaris1/

Autistics Organization (especially point out their "library"!!)
http://www.autistics.org/

Jypsy's Amazing Autism & Asperger's Info Site

Autism Network
http://www.scn.org/people/autistics/

This humorous site is great for educating NTs on what it's like to have your natural behaviors analyzed:
http://isnt.autistics.org/

If they're into interactive stuff -- that is, they're the kind of people that learn not just by reading, but by participation -- there are quite a few discussion lists that are full of people on the spectrum *and* NTs interested in learning more about our perspective. These are the two NT-AS groups I currently endorse:

Asperger's and Proud Of It Discussion Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AS-and-proud-of-it/

Autism Advocacy Discussion Group
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/autadvo

Books that are easy to learn from, highly informative, and often funny -- worth buying regardless of whether you're NT or AC!

Asperger's Syndrome and Psychotherapy: Understanding Asperger Perspectives
by Paula Jacobsen

Asperger Syndrome and Long Term Relationships
by Ashley Stanford

Asperger Syndrome In The Family: Redefining Normal
by Linda Holliday Wiley

Living And Loving With Asperger Syndrome: Family Viewpoints
by Patrick, Estelle, and Jared McCabe

Just received notice that Amanda Baggs has posted a new article over at autistics.org exploring the abuse of "Tito" Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay and other autistics that is essentially being condoned by the Cure Autism Now (CAN) folks, as well as how they are conveniently ignoring the fact that many non-oral autistics wrote books before this kid was even born:
Rewriting History for Their Own Ends: Cure Autism Now and The Mind Tree
I highly recommend anyone even vaguely interested in disability rights, the autism spectrum, child abuse, or related issues check it out. Very interesting.

I'm sitting here alternating between falling asleep at my notebook and writing for very brief periods. Sound doesn't put me in any more pain than otherwise, but I am having issues with feeling extremely anxious/stressed for no real reason.

Now is one of the few times I really don't like having hypersensitive hearing. I can easily hear telephones ringing in houses three neighbors away and across the street, and my current tendency to be easily alarmed means I startle involuntarily every time I do. I think I'm going to put headphones in (earplugs do not sound comfy with the infection) and go to sleep...

I'm still on my little sub-perseveration on finding new blogs by people on the autism spectrum. Tonight I found two people -- one of them says outright in her topmost post that she is autistic, the second doesn't say so outside of her list of interests, but this
fun entry sure suggests it. I think this person would be a lot of fun to hang out with, to put it mildly...

So my mother just called to let me know that they're still wherever the @I%*! they went. I told her that she knows I can't handle changes in scheduling because of my autism, so I'm upset that she isn't here when she said she would be. She asked if I was worried that she was gone so long. No, I repeated, I can't handle fluctuations from what time I'm told things will happen, and I was told 4pm, but now it is 5, that's not okay! She told me there's nothing she can do as she is still there, three hours away.

"THREE hours away?!"

"Yes, we're near Chico, that's three hours away, so why don't you just relax and chat with your friends or something?"

I snarled at her: "I can't just relax, I'm autistic, I can't handle changes in plans or control how my brain reacts to them, dammit!" and hung up on her.

My ex-stepfather knows I can't handle this kind of shit, and has admitted in the past he does it to provoke me into meltdowns so I'll "learn how to handle things." I'm sure the motherfucker will use my outburst as fodder to reinforce his claim that I am a horrible abusive person, too.

I have little doubt, also, that where they are at is wherever he wants "us" (her and I) to move to. He wants my mother to trade our house for some shitty rental property he has out in the middle of nowhere so he can make cash renting *this* place out instead -- nobody wants to live on his lamearsed property, but this land is fairly expensive.

He knows I am not interested in moving out to The Land Of Shitty Weather And Crapulent Net Connections, meanwhile, so he is also using it to pressure me into going away. At this point I would happily do it and leave the two jerks to their life of "passionate" vicious arguing together, except I can't afford to go anywhere that will let me keep my cats. I hope my ex-stepfather is killed in some vicious horrible slow way.

I was just wandering through emails to the various autism lists I'm on, as I do every day, and taking note (as usual) at the proportion of people that post about problems about living in an NT society, versus those that actually take some time to help others or change things.

It occurred to me that what will allow NTs to destroy us in the long run isn't that there are more of them, or that we're somehow inherently weaker, but our own near-total failure to respond at all. As in most NTs, there is an attitude of "if it isn't happening to me, I'll just pretend it doesn't exist" in the adult autism community. Most people won't reply to a post even if they have firsthand experience dealing with an issue; they'll talk above and around it, focus on anything other than the problem itself, mention periodically that they are upset at the NT world, yet when push comes to shove, they don't care to give the effort to do so much as write a letter.

We're ultimately going to reach a point in time where the NTs will be able to force "cures" even on the adults. They'll be able to do it not because we're smaller or weaker, but because most of humanity -- whether AC or NT -- is too damned self-centered to care as long as they're not personally bothered at that instant. In other words, everyone has the attitude of "if it doesn't benefit me directly, I'm not going to bother" yet gets upset that there are so many obstacles left standing for us. It's not going to get better if nobody makes an effort to improve things...

I'm having (yet another) of those days where I just don't feel like dealing with anything. That is, I've got letters to write, comments I should post, calls to make, and whenever I go to do any of it, I become frantically stressed out. Very little of it is bad, but I can't handle anything at the moment. :(

Telling myself that I'll just call Kaiser, get antibiotics for this damned sinus infection using the usual memorized script, and then rest quietly in my room helps. I can probably get things done in there that way... I think the problem is a combination of being out too much yesterday, not feeling well physically, and having too many things involving human interaction hanging over my head.

Forgot to mention this... While I was at Borders today, I ran across a new release I'd only read about briefly on the web -- Asperger's Syndrome and Psychotherapy This really excited me, as one of my oldest perseverations is human behavior, and mixing two perseverations is like mental orgasm, LOL

I'll post a bit of a review or thoughts on it as soon as I've read enough to say. :) I'm really looking forward to this one, I hope that it is accurate or at least not a nightmare mix of nasty stereotypes.

I frequently hear from neurotypicals that we autistics should repress all of our "abnormal" behavior, even when we're totally alone. Why? Because it bothers them not only to see us being different, but to merely know that we're continuing to be different when we're not in front of them.

Meanwhile:
1) The NT kids in the neighborhood, are all being ridiculously noisy. If I stay in my room, I can hear the ones in front running around screaming, singing at the top of their lungs, or just generally shouting. If I go to the back of the house so I can't hear them, the child-shrieks from the swimming pool start to get to me instead.

2) There's an NT down the street that keeps inviting his friends over (I guess) to take turns on his gas-powered skateboard thing up and down the street every afternoon. That means, from 11am - 6pm, there is a *very* loud chainsaw-type buzzing noise ascending and descending in pitch every few minutes as they go past my house.

Both noises totally stress me out by driving easily-overloaded hyper-sensitive hearing nuts, so I keep having to go hang out at either the local Starbucks or the closest Borders (a half-hour's drive away) just to marginally relax. That is, I can relax if some jerk doesn't bring in noisy brats to drive all the adult clientele away. Which, of course, is exactly what usually happens on weekends.

Yet the autistics that do so much as chafe their hands are told to get intense therapy and medicate themselves so WE won't bother anybody. Fuck that.

This Brain Usage Profiler was actually very interesting and fun. There were the usual cases of "ugh, all of the answers are correct in different ways" but in this case I was able to prioritize based entirely on my preferences. The results (see "More") are interesting, and very accurate, imho.

Moggy's Brain Usage Profile

Auditory : 47%
Visual : 52%
Left : 63%
Right : 36%

Moggy, you are somewhat left-hemisphere dominant with a balanced preference for auditory and visual inputs. Because of your "centrist" tendencies, the distinctions between various types of brain usage are somewhat blurred.

Your tendency to be organized and logical and attend to details is reasonably well-established which should afford you success regardless of your chosen field of endeavor, unless it requires total spontaneity and ability to improvise, your weaker traits. However, you are far from rigid or overcontrolled. You possess a degree of individuality, perceptiveness, and trust in your intuition to function at much more sophisticated levels than most.

Having given sufficient attention to detail, you can readily perceive the larger aspects and implications of a situation or of learning. You are functional and practical, but can blend abstraction and theory into your framework readily.

The equivalence of your auditory and visual learning orientation gives you two equally effective sensory input systems, each with distinctive features. You can process both unidimensionally and multidimen- sionally with equal facility. When needed, you sequence material while at other times you "intake it all" and store it for processing later.

Your natural ability to use your senses is also synthesized in your way of learning. You can be reflective in your approach, absorbing material in a non-aggressive manner, and at other times voracious in seeking out stimulation and experience.

Overall you tend to be somewhat more critical of yourself than is necessary and avoid enjoying life too much because of a sense of duty. You feel somewhat constrained and tend to sometimes restrict your expressiveness. In any given situation, you will opt for the rational, and learning of almost any type should be easy for you. You might need certain ideas explained to you in order to fit them into your scheme of things, but you're at least open to that!

Not too surprising, is it? *snicker*



What Psych-Ward do you belong to?

Hanging out at home cleaning bit-by-bit, but generally being uncomfortable from some stupid virus I picked up...anyway... One of the biggest problems I run into when it comes to taking tests is not being able to figure out how the person that wrote the questions thinks, and thus not being able to know how to accurately respond.

This test on randomness has a perfect example of the kind of question that screws my scores up:

Pepper, Sugar, Salt. Which is the odd one out?
-- Sugar
-- Pepper
-- Salt

On the one hand, sugar is different from pepper/salt based on usage: you use sugar to sweeten, p/s to enhance. However, pepper and salt don't invoke the same tastes, and salt/sugar are common combinations in cooking, whereas pepper/sugar or pepper/salt are not. Also, salt/sugar are also similar in that they are both clear/white crystalline (rectangular, iirc) substances, whereas pepper is dark and includes multiple ingredients. Pepper and sugar are also both often used to enhance natural flavor, while salt most often is relied upon to add its own distinct "saltiness" to foods perceived as bland.

This is all the kind of stuff that goes through my head as soon as I see the question, regardless of whether it is a very simple comparison or even a matter of science. (In the case of science, I wind up coming up with a bunch of variables that aren't written into the question, and can't tell whether they're just part of the assumptions we're supposed to make or not!) So I end up with a variety of ideas about possible answers, but because I can't see into the test-writer's brain I have absolutely no way of figuring out what the expected response actually is.

Baron-Cohen's Mind in the Eyes Test

This test demonstrated something quite interesting to me -- look at this pattern:

The correct answers for the ones Moggy missed are:
14: accusing
17: doubtful
29: reflective
30: flirtatious
33: concerned
35: nervous
36: suspicious

When I was relaxed and able to slowly analyze every face, I got most of them right. I rely on logical analysis of the image and question -- for example, "eyebrow raised at outer edge plus furrowed in center plus squinty-eyed means upset, so obviously this person isn't any of the pleasant options."

As I tired out, my ability to analyze started slipping, and I had to rely increasingly often on instinct. The results above are fairly clear: with logical analysis and lots of time (I took 1 - 3 minutes per pic) I can interpret NT-style to a degree, but it tires me out. Once I'm too tired to analyze, I lose the ability to "read" faces at all. :p

Sometimes I manage to shock even myself.

I drew up a map last night of where I was supposed to go, and it was very, very simple: get off the bus at the usual spot, walk straight until Georgia street, turn right, and poof! there would be the bank.

Honestly. Check out the driving directions on Yahoo Maps for yourself. See where the road forks? That's where the bus stops. It really doesn't look that hard, does it?

Started out at the apartment this morning, leapt on the bus, and rode downtown as planned. Headed in the right direction and promptly forgot something interesting I'd noticed last night in looking at the map: there are two near-parallel streets that go from point A to point B which means I took the wrong one. At least, I think I did, because after walking about 10 minutes in the direction I had memorized, I found myself at 8400 rather than 8788. Oops? *looks perplexed*

While walking, I saw a really cool but weird mural of a tree sprouting rainbow feathers and eyes and mudman in the fire swamp in the business district. It strikes me as rather bizarre that California is supposedly a big liberal hippie haven, yet we have historical murals while Silver Spring has something so trippy!

The tale doesn't end there, though.

I figured out that I'd goofed, checked out which direction the numbers ran, and started going the opposite direction on Georgia, heading towards the mystical 8700 block. That part was easy.

It also involved walking past an apartment building with a name I don't think I'd see in my home state a couple of times. I can only wonder whether it was originally named that, or if they changed it as a memorial. I'm not sure which is creepier, in any event.

A short while later, I reached Bank of America. Yay! The first ATM, however, was dead, booo...no problem, I thought, I'll just use the one next to it! I sidled up to its sibling, put my card in, requested some cash (for the frappuccino that at that point I needed to combat the heat!) and...

We're sorry. This ATM temporarily is not able to dispense cash. Please come back later.

I calmly, patiently walked down to the next bank. Same thing: a "cashfree" ATM. WTF? Walked down to yet another bank -- the one Parrish uses, by an odd coincidence -- and finally was able to gain my money, though at a fee. Sigh.

Now here I am at Starbucks Silver Spring, by the Metro station. Hmmm, now what to do. I think I'll finish up my frappuccino and jump on el Metro to see if I can manage to get interestingly lost en route to Pentagon City.

Side note: I've been told my cats are all doing fine, the house has not burned down, and in general things are the usual back in California. So I had no nightmares last night, woohoo! :^D

Next update: the journey to Pentagon City, also known as will there be appealing people on the Metro, or scary weirdos trying to caress my leg? All that is certain is that there's a Borders and Starbucks there, which is really what matters, right? *snicker*

I was surfing around trying to find new blogs to become addicted to, when I found
A Different Reality by an NT parent of an autistic child. I'm going to write the parent a thank-you note for brightening my day with her (unfortunately rare) attitude towards autism.

You know what's fun about prosopagnosia? No matter where you go, your partner and/or best friend appear to be in the same building. Admittedly, the brain feels a bit perplexed when it realizes that they're changing shirts every five minutes...

Yes, this is the kind of thing that amuses me when I'm under great stress.

Posting this because I'm having a discussion with some parents of VATER children that just might be on the Autism Spectrum... I have sent out a slightly modified (or more accurately, "explained") form of Roger Meyer's extensive list of AS Characteristics to a few friends in the past, so now I am putting it on the web for them to check out. :^)

NOTE: these are a list of characteristics of people that are on the Spectrum. It does not mean that we all have all of them -- some are even contradictory, so it wouldn't even be possible! (For example, there is "difficulty in expressing emoti