Today is the first “Gray Day” celebrating the life and work of Alasdair Gray, on the 40th anniversary of the publication of his masterpiece “Lanark” and here is my humble contribution.   His portrait Frances Gordon, Glasgow Teenager inspired my collaboration with Glasgow Open Museum and guests of Glasgow City Mission in creating 'portraits' focusing on their interests rather than in a traditional style.   You can find out more here . Plus here's a piece on the project from an autistic perspective.   Enjoy. Portrait of Frances Gordon. (c) Alasdair Gray, courtesy of Glasgow Museums collections.

 For anyone who's interested....

As most of you know, this blog usually runs the gamut from funny to silly to sad to angry and back again with everything inbetween. It's been cathartic, it's been entertaining and at times it's been - hopefully - helpful. But now I feel is the time to be brutally honest.   So here we are almost a year into the ongoing lockdown situation due to Covid and I have to admit that I'm done. Far from the "We're all in it together!" narrative that's been banded around since last March I've come to realise that in the day to day running of things and as far as special needs families are concerned nothing has changed. Oh there are nods by governments and local authorities towards the issues we're having to deal with but at the end of the day it's all just empty platitudes and buzzwords. Yes, we all know that this has always been the way but to be honest right now it actually matters. And the lack of action and support is having effects that will be fe...

 Was interviewed (well I say interviewed but basically I just talked loudly over everyone) by Jackie Brambles on the BBC Scotland morning show today which was a fun, if fairly stressful experience seeing as I'm not feeling at my best right now. Feel free to play the violin. Anyway, after It'd finished I bounded into the kitchen to see how I'd done and Ro just nonchalantly said "Well at least you let the woman from Scottish Autism get a word in...."  Which is another reason Why I love her. And why am I telling you this? Well you can listen to it here if you so wish - for the next 29 days at least - it starts at around 1hr 37m. You're welcome.  Jackie Brambles trying to get a word in edgeways earlier today.

  OK, so I'm gonna bite the fright-fringed bullet (or is that mullet) and watch Sia's Music so that you don't have to. You can thank me later.  Warning as this review not only contains spoilers but also liberal uses of the 'F' word. "Look at the dog!" To be honest tho' the hardest thing about reviewing it isn't the cack-handed portrayal of autism, or the cookie-cutter bullshit plotting but having to decide if it goes here on my PG friendly autism blog or over on my no holds barred sweary film blog . Maybe I should do two? Tho' only if Sia does one. See what I did there? Music (2021). Dir: Sia (Oh yes and produced and written by her too...are there any ends to her talents?) Cast: Kate Hudson, Leslie Odom Jr., Maddie Ziegler, Héctor Elizondo and, bizarrely, Henry Rollins. There are actually loads of other folk but frankly I can't be arsed listing them.   Zu: I'm actually learning how to love, because I love her. Welcome ...

 As promised - or threatened - episode one of our podcast....enjoy!

 Been busy curating/illustrating a new online magazine - written by and for us autistic folk. And it seems to have gone down fairly well if this review from Third Force News is anything to go by... You can find out more here . Enjoy....and if you do then contribute!