Well looks like someone is after my job!

Just a quick update that may cheer (some of) you up during lockdown, especially if you know someone with a limited diet. As a wee bit of background to this post I have to tell you that I hate salad. I mean I really, really hate salad. I have never eaten it. Ever. Today I put salad on my veggie burger. And this is after going to the shops to buy it specifically to eat.* Cos I thought, what the hell I'll go for it. And guess what? It was lovely. Rho is currently very pleased with me. And I must admit I'm very pleased with myself. Well a wee bit. *I must add that I mad a point of choosing a leaf-type that I thought/knew I'd like as I tried a piece of spinach recently and could handle the crunchiness of it.

As part of the whole home schooling thing, Amelia's been busy learning the important comic art skill of inking this morning. She'll soon be after my job!

Coming into week 5 of lockdown here (with at least 3 more to come) and whilst the podlings aren't getting too fraught they've been having their wee ups and downs as have some of their friends. Oh yes, and me too. Well this got me to thinking, we've done our best to put routines and schedules in place for them (we actually spent the first week almost as a holiday, talking to them about when they'd be doing schoolwork, when we'd be going out etc as to ease them into it), as I've said before it was way more important to have them settled first and then work on routines and the like for me later because, well I'm an adult. Mostly. Remember when we could go to the park? Anyway over a month in and we all know day to day what's happening/expected - we do shopping trips, work on the garden, do school stuff, chill out a fair bit and the like but still trying to make it loose enough that it doesn't get too stressful (you HAVE to do exactly 4

Loads of short, sharp posts right now (as you can imagine it's a wee bit mad at the mo) but noticed quite a few posts like this online: Just the thought of getting stopped/checked whilst shopping really scares me. As you can probably imagine, my normal routines/schedules are shot right now so I'm kinda attempting to hold on to the ones I have left. For example shopping daily/buying the same things is something I have to do because in order to be able to have any chance of functioning properly. You see, the act of doing the shopping and buying goods 'as normal' is actually more essential to me than anything else. A tub of got2b Glued spiking wax might not seem an essential lockdown purchase but trust me, I need to get it every two weeks because that's what I do. Deal with it.

Random Autism/pulp sci-fi post of the day......possibly.

It's that time of the year again where I drag this out for its annual airing. Enjoy. In those dreamy pre-Coronavirus days, I'd spend the time between drawing stuff for a living and wandering around meeting various folk to find out what they actually want me to draw (it keeps me off - well on - the streets I guess) I spend most of my time inanely blogging about films. Now I just do that constantly obviously. You can find my ramblings here but beware as it's frequently not safe for work according to Google. And it's probably not safe to read at home too. Especially if you care about the proper use of grammar. Anyway thought I'd share one of the rare (semi) serious posts I do occasionally over there as it seems fairly relevant. You see a few years back I got into a discussion with my partner in crime (and token NT person in the house*) Rho about how most films dealing with Autism are pretty turgid affairs full of struggle, heartache and defying the od

Oddest thing about the whole homeschooling lark is when you realize how many of the questions (and by default education in general) is/are geared to non-autistic brains. There's either way too much information or info that's so vague (to us) that you don't actually realise the point of the question. For example one of the questions today was - Ruth bought an ice cream for 12p.  What coins could she have used to pay for it?  Embeth and I were on about our 12th variation when Rho came in and pointed out that it was a simple addition question and not an actual how many coins/coin variants you can think of! Gah! How do you work with so few rules?!!? As a plus point if nothing else Rho now has an idea of how and why I found school so frustratingly complex. Good night.

Who'd have thought that being on lockdown would be so exhausting? Not really had time to post anything of any worth here recently - tho' some folk would say I never do anyway - save for random rants regarding NT shopping habits and autistic pizza posts so gonna make a conscious effort to finally but on (virtual) paper some of the stuff we end up discussing after the podlings have gone to bed. Our house - Friday nights. Fact. It was during one of this (slightly alcohol fueled) Friday nights that the conversation got around to the autistic idea of having to meticulously 'map' or plan our lives - from day to day routines to traveling places, I've mentioned before how I need things to be precision perfect if I'm going anywhere/doing anything for fear of the unknown causing stress-induced meltdowns. For example late last year I had to travel to London and seeing as it was a place I rarely visit (I've been 4 times in 50 years) I had to plan everythin

“Aprils have never meant much to me, autumns seem that season of beginning, spring.” ― Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany's