For your reading pleasure, an interview with (#ActuallyAutistic) artist Michael Richey White , the guy who produces Sam's artwork for Atypical.  “Ever since I was a kid, drawing was my preferred escape from whatever I was doing. My pencil is always with me in my pocket. That and my sketchbook are my security blankets.” I know some folk don't but I adore Atypical for reasons that anyone who knows me/knew me growing up will understand. So there. End of speech.

As is the norm around here (well at this time of year anyway) gonna start listing the autism friendly events around Glasgow this coming 'holiday' season. As ever, more to follow! Glasgow's traditional George Square Christmas Market is up and running and although they have a quiet area, no idea if they're doing an Autism-friendly day as last year, which is a wee bit annoying if they don't because inclusion and all that. Mmore to follow when/if they email me back. As last year The Irn Bru Carnival at the SEC goes Autism Friendly over two sessions on December 31 and January 7 for the third year running. Will add times when I get them. The St Enoch Centre has a dedicated Santa time slot for children with learning difficulties and sensory challenges and those dedicated 5 minutes slots are entirely free. Quiet Santa sessions will be held from 10am to 10.40am on Sunday the 1st, 8th, 15th and 22nd of December. Over at Braehead Shoppin...

Noticed that everyone is getting freaked out today by the fact that Greta Thunberg is actually a time traveler from the future 'sent back in time to save us' after spotting a picture of a very similar-looking girl extracting water from a well in the Yukon Territory in Canada in 1898. I know that we can't expect everyone to know everything about us but come on people, it's a scientifically accepted fact that the ability to t ime travel is one of the main aspects of autism.  It's partly why we avoid eye contact, enjoy repetitive tasks, dress oddly and sometimes speak in a strange and unusual accents mixed with large chunks of film dialogue. No, really. And you can read the full story here .

Baby-faced Poundshop Tony Stark, Elon Musk has announced recently that his AI-brain-chips company could 'solve' brain-related diseases like autism. And by solve I think he means cure. Which is pretty good seeing as it's not a disease. Hopefully his AI-brain-chip can cure ignorance tho'. We can but hope. Full story here . "Pull my finger!"

I always carry a messenger bag with me wherever I go (whether I need it or not, it's a kinda comfort thing) and I've got a couple of keyrings the podlings have bought me clipped onto the far side of it. So far so normal but stick with it cos the story does get - vaguely - interesting at some point. Honest. A bag of the kind any sensible almost 50 year old guy would have. This weekend the podlings got me a rather fab Star Wars keyring for on my bag which was particularly cool for two reasons: 1. It's Star Wars and 2. It's in the shape of the letter A which is my initial. See told you it was cool. Anyway I was really wanting to show this off so that they knew I liked it so for a change I moved the keyrings to the front bit of my bag so you could see them better which was all well and good until that is I was heading to the shops today and noticed that the slight bumping of the keyrings against my bag was really annoying and also meant that my w...

Had a really busy few weeks so far, between traveling to 'the London', drawy/scribbly stuff, reviewing Glas-GLOW and preparing to attend the 2019 Scottish Autism Conference I've found myself utterly knackered, both physically and mentally which meant that something had to give. And that something was not being able to attend the Cine_Excess festival in Birmingham this weekend. "I made this!" - and am currently available for hire. Just saying. It's rare for this to happen but when it does it kinda throws into sharp focus the mindset of, whilst it's really useful (and healthy) to know my limitations and look after myself it's also bloody frustrating when you have to miss something that you were so looking forward to - and was actually quite important from a work perspective - because of the way that your autie-ness affects you. I always used to use the Jenga analogy when explaining how absolutely draining all the daily pushing, explainin...

Spent an incredible - and rare - evening out with the entire clan at Glasgow's annual Halloween seasoned event GlasGLOW in the Botanic Garden yesterday so thought I'd share (with comments from the brood) my thoughts on what was a thoroughly fantastic - and inclusive - night. Running from 25th October until 10th November, with time slots every 15 minutes from 5pm, Glas-Glow promised to be a magical - and fun - interactive world (or 9) of colours, sound and light which it definitely delivered! The doorway to adventure! Fast-tracking was available to those who needed it with friendly and helpful staff to show us to the path leading to the first 'zone'. The lighting and music on the path was amazing and not too overwhelming really giving visitors a chance to acclimatize to the new surroundings, I must admit that for me this was my favourite part purely because the mix of blue and red hues coupled with the almost filmic musical score ticked all ...

...if only.

Well Blade Runner fans we made it! Yup, the movie is no longer science fiction seeing as from today it's set right here right now. Well it;s only really right here if you're reading this in Los Angeles but you know what I mean. Anyway thought that was as good a reason as any to repost this plus if enough folk leave me nice comments it may be the boot up the arse I need to finish it. Nothing like hinting for (faint) praise is there? Well at least I'm honest. A while back I submitted an academic paper on the fun filled idea of Ridley Scott's classic Blade Runner (1982) being the most Autistic movie ever made. Yes, I know I need to get out more. Anyway, turns out that although the folk concerned liked it the whole thing didn't really fit in with the conference in general so unfortunately couldn't be presented. Me not fitting in? Imagine that! To be honest tho' I've enjoyed the research and groundwork so much that I'm tempte...