Living with Autism

Pinched from Candi at Looking for Blue Sky.

You just copy the list and bold the ones you've done.
I'm going to bracket the things I did that were close enough to count.I have a terrible memory so will be double checking with Mr Hammie later, maybe emboldening a few more...


Started your own blog (x 3)

Slept under the stars (most memorably on a beach in Sengiggi, Lombok)

Played in a band
(wrote a song that was recorded by a band in a studio and shook a tambourine, I think)

Visited Hawaii

Watched a meteor shower

Given more than you can afford to charity* (totally worth it!)

Been to Disneyland

Climbed a mountain (Carrauntuohil, Co Kerry, Croagh Patrick, Sugarloaf)

Held a praying mantis


Sang a solo (frightening for all concerned)

Bungee jumped

Visited Paris


Watched a thunder and lightning storm (duh! lived in Brisvegas for 4 years)


Taught yourself an art from scratch

Adopted a child

Had food poisoning

Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty (closed due to 9/11 so I went heavy security eleva…

 Remember Joe Behan?  Well here's another politician with chutzpah:
Letter of Resignation from Senator de Burca to Party Leader John Gormley February 12, 2010

Dear John,

I am writing to inform you of my intention to resign from the Green Party Parliamentary Party and from Seanad Eireann with immediate effect.

It is with great sadness that I tender my resignation, having served as an elected member of the Green Party for eight years on Wicklow County Council and for a further two and a half years as a member of Seanad Eireann. During that time I have worked faithfully on behalf of the party to try to advance its political agenda in order to put this country on a more sustainable path.

I regret to say that I can no longer support the Green Party in government, as I believe that we have gradually abandoned our political values and our integrity and in many respects have become no more than an extension of the Fianna Fail party. 

I have had a number of conversations with you as Party L…

In order to teach our kids to interact with us and others, we have to demonstrate our value to them - by becoming a rewarding person to know. To do that we have to become associated with the things they like and need. And we need to be needed ALOT. To do this you have to make some changes to your home environment, but I promise it will be worth it.



Mand City - or People Who Need People Are the Luckiest People in the World



Had a little feedback meeting with some parents this week who were trying out the Grace App for me in The Good School.

One of the parents said that she felt, she needed more opportunities to get her son to need her, in order to really get the benefit of showing him how to use the App.

And I couldn't help but wonder...

How many parents fall into the trap of giving their kids independent access to everything they need, and miss out on the opportunities to create and increase the frequency of their kid's  "Mands?"

The inverted commas are deliberate as Mand …

Had a little feedback meeting with some parents this week who were trying out the Grace App for me in The Good School.

One of the parents said that she felt, she needed more opportunities to get her son to need her, in order to really get the benefit of showing him how to use the App.

And I couldn't help but wonder...
How many parents fall into the trap of giving their kids independent access to everything they need, and miss out on the opportunities to create and increase the frequency of their kid's "Mands?"

The inverted commas are deliberate as Mand is a madey uppy word coined by the king of behavourial science and madey uppy words B.F. Skinner.

Now don't run away, I promise the science ends here.

It is short for comMAND and deMAND and we must ensure that our language or learning delayed children have the ability to make a lot of Mands appropriately.

Why? - because it is the basis of almost all communication for someone who isn't naturally socially motivate…

A while ago, the lovely La Belette Rouge tagged me for a Scrappy Do - or a little me ME about myself.
There are also a few "sevens" going around in the blogworld so consider this hitting two birds with one stone. Seven useless things about me. (as if you were interested?)

1. I own several bras with a pink ribbon on one side that says "Push up."
These are meant to be removed upon purchase but I left them on and when I wear them I pretend I have just won an award for "great boobs."
Who would present this award and pin it to my bra? I don't know, maybe the mayor. But it gives me a "lift" (ha ha) most mornings and I don't want to take 'em off. Call it an affirmation.

2. I buy most of my clothes in Charity Shops and Recycled Clothing Stores where previously rich but now ever so slightly broke people sell their clothes on consignment.

I do this because
A) I'm a tightarse and I refuse to be exploited by ridiculous retail aspirational ma…

Just watched "Working Girl" - one of my favourite films, and not for the hair or shoulder pads.




Firstly, it's about breaking free of where you are told you "belong"

Well, as much as I love my family and I have come to love my "home town"
I was never going to stick around and take up the safe and steady job in the Commonwealth Bank.

In fact on the day of the Aptitude Test, I got a Spiral Perm instead. (it was 1986)

So like Tess I crossed the water to the big city. For Tess it was the Staten Island Ferry. For me it was QF1
which in those days went Singapore, Bahrain and then London. No stopovers.

I used the education I had, and made the most of it. I have never been to night school like Tess. But I did do a few weeks of Japanese and a First Aid Certificate. When I wanted to be an Air Hostess. (it was the early 90's, it was a glamorous job in those days)

But mostly I just learned as I went along, took on extra responsibility where it was offered and …