The Insanity of Excessive Explanation

There is a practice known to parents and professionals of special needs to always explain everything at all times regardless of the context. The person with the disability has no say of when to ask any follow up questions, because by default, the professionals or parents just explain things that are the obvious.

What do I mean?

Let’s use say a follow up statement to what is typically an unmentioned topic as the low level information; and the general idea as the high level topic. The higher level topic is something that should be adopted through general knowledge or experience. So a further example say picking up the clothes off the floor in the bedroom (the higher level topic) will often be explained such as:

Johnny, pick up the clothes because you could trip!

By default, it’s known that they’ll say the because assuming the individual will ask “why”. Because should be the breaking point of the low to high level thinking.

Another example recently was my mother telling me this, low level is in boldface

I left the downstairs light on because I saw other lights in the office for you to turn off.

Obviously?

Essentially I cut people off when I hear the “because” without a challenge/response mechanism. Taking a page out of of computer security, a human if they are unaware of any unintended consequences would typically give some form of authentication to get further information such as a puzzled look or the childlike “why?”

But this doesn’t happen. I’ve seen this too many times where people just automatically talk at the low level, basically explaining every little detail that doesn’t need to be mentioned out loud. Any “statement” after “because” is basically causing people with a developmental or intellectual disability to further halt growth. The ability to learn from mistakes, or learn the obvious that is from a normal person’s eyes typically is left out for people with various intellectual disabilities.

As a result from constant communication, chatter, and bajillion references of “because” annually, many people won’t be able to have any intelligence and information processing because “the adults in the room” are too busy instructing these people all the time. When someone is being “instructed” its akin to having training wheels on ones bike forever because they won’t be able to use a natural intelligence based on their experiences riding on bikes to know when to break, when to fall over with grace, etc.

And as a result, people with a legitimate case of “special” needs are basically being treated like they are bubble wrapped human beings, and is basically treated like a machine because only machines (up till about now with AI) are the ones that have to be told how and what to do.

The halting of the logic of low and high level information processing is the reason why so many people (like your’s truly) has been unable to succeed, because we have been treated like machines.

Sadly I do not see that changing with the current establishment running the various advocacy and leadership processes.

Decoding Autism: Stop Coding The Condition!

As I have explained a number of times, autism is a condition that impacts people. Not boys, not just kids, but adults too. Some develop later in their childhood years, and some apparently from the routine MMR vaccines and classify that as an “injury”. Or you have some nit wit of a celebrity who uses every semantics similar to a person with a cancerous condition of “beating the odds, my child is cured!”

Continue reading

Parents of Severely Autistics Vendetta Towards Finding their “Voice”

Some days, I feel like I am in the middle ages, or the middle of the 20th century with backa– agendas against any or all autistics.

Because I understand the spectrum of the autism spectrum disorder, its diversity and complexity, I’ve always kept a netural tone. I’ve been a strong advocate towards inclusion of all members of the ASD world; and steal a page out of the playbook from the worlds of Down’s and the deaf and blind. They don’t want a cure. They want better treatment and better QOL standards. By no means, have I ever endorsed the “hip” nature to be autistic. I always kept a sensitivity to the “lower functioning”. But I’ve never spoke for them, and I don’t expect anyone should speak for me. In fact no one should speak for me – PERIOD. I can speak for myself.

I can speak for how being told about my autism destroyed my entire life. I’m a talking and functioning guy saying how being told my autism destroyed my life.

Continue reading

Autism/Political Regression

The Autism rights movement is very non-existent in my area. I do not see any changes effecting my state related to me. I had been active in some self-advocacy in the past. There are too many older people of elderly age who have their views on “developmental disabilities”; and their views are not up to par in the 21st century. We also have too many direct support professionals who are in the institutional mind and skillset but yet we are supposed to be out in the community all day long because being exposed and being seen will fix all the intolerant issues. Sadly I know enough conservatives who do not tolerate my group at all.

I have spoken to heads of state agencies, to bureau heads, to department employees and they have refused to take my concerns into consideration other than generic acknowledgment  type of statements. I tried to show people in my own county for an example what autism can be for all, not just some limited restrictions for whatever excuses the older generation wants to believe.

Autism Awareness will always be the month to denote the signs, but we will never, ever, EVER be appreciated or accepted. I will be treated like a wallflower, just a voice that wants to only be heard in their minds.

I’ve accepted the facts that I will not be respected like any other thirty year olds in this circle. It is politically incorrect to be high functioning and be part of various special needs support circles, they want to only support the ones who allegedly cannot speak for themselves. Some are threatened by me because I’ve broken some glass barriers to the point they’d be laid off because a little known fact is that some families can speak for themselves! Which means some family advocacy groups could be out of a job, but they blame me for speaking truth to power; but they can be as  crass as they want to be. (This is the concern of the power addiction that some Concord types have a problem.)

Continue reading

Londonderry NH’s Payback: “AL” Baldasaro Pic Removed from Google Search

I can’t help to say payback is a bitch.

Londonderry, New Hampshire the town I once resided for many of my early years is a very diverse town, just that the diversity is limited to ultra conservative cultures, like minded people and anyone who makes over two hundred thousand a year. However, this narrative is fitting for my thirtieth birthday and finally some payback to the most scummiest people on the earth.

For a while, if you googled my former town, the “Knowledge Panel” according to a Boston.com story featured a 2013 wedding picture of a man named Representative Al Baldasaro; who has been active in the community for many years. He was born and raised in the People’s Republic of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Middlesex County but is well known for his ultra right agenda. This story coincidentally occurred after my post on the New Hampshire agenda against the “welfare” system.

Continue reading

The Big Three-Zero Wish List

I’ll be turning thirty within the next month. Excuse me while I puke my guts out in disgust of getting old.

Anyways, its a big deal. I break up my wish list in to three sections (Reasonable, Storage, this may break the bank and Vintage)

Reasonable Wish List:

  • Xfinity DVR box. Not too hip into X1, but it needs to be a Ci$co box because our network runs off the ol Scientific Atlanta. (this is really wish request to the family. When we upgraded to X1 it came with a basic DVR to rewind up to 20 minutes of a single channel. Consider this checked.)
  • a Specific 720p HD LED TV set that will also act as a monitor for return video for the Xbox 360 and Mac (video editing, media playing, etc.) The mother knows. (For the record, this is the first time I had actually put a TV set in a wish list ever.)
  • iPod Nano! I can’t believe I can still get a model with a UI resembles pre iOS 7. Of course it uses it’s own OS and it functions like an old school iPod (meaning you could use such devices to boot Macs like an Apple Genius!)
  • Final Cut Pro jog shuttle. This basically controls the video playback or the media clip that is. It’s basically a mouse with the sole purpose of having scrolling. This is a must if you’ve worked in video editing for way too long.
  • Standard gift cards to Barnes & Noble, A.C. Moore, American Eagle, Aeropostale (opps that’s a joke!) Always can take reload to my Starbucks!
  • Memory Max to my MacBook, and Mac mini
  • Storage!
  • (I could use some more storage solutions in my closet, but no this is computer storage.) Hard drives. I cannot have enough of them with the data going through the roof! Mostly for media storage. I guess I can make this into sublist
  • 2.5″ SAS Hard Drives: (Link is for reference only) This stands for Serial Attached SCSI. They look like SATA laptop drives, but they use SCSI. For consumers this feels like a trip back to 1992 with Desktop macs. It’s not. I use a Proliant Server to store virtual machines. Due to the technical physics SCSIs, they tend to hold less data. I have 146 gigs, but would love a couple or more 300GB and move them off site and swap them every quarter for disaster-proofing purposes. Appropriate 2.5″ caddies would be needed.
  •   500GB ATA hard drives. These are the maximum the ATA series can hold, and most likely will have to find them used and/or new old stock. I use this for my Power PC Xserve, as my directory and file storage and sometimes an app server. ATA Xserve caddies would be nice, but not needed at this time
  • FireWire hard drives. I love the Lacie drive I got a year or two ago. They don’t sell the FireWire version anymore (thanks to Apple depreciating their own technology) but after being in the modern Apple craze for a decade now, I still use the technology, and just started to in the last couple of years.
  • SD cards, can’t have enough. I use SanDisk HDSD cards
  • A large stuffed teddy bear, you know the 4′ ones. I know go ahead and laugh…

Telephony

You wouldn’t think a big list wouldn’t include telephones right? You thought wrong!

  • Avaya 302A or B Attendant Console. this is the bad boy that would complete my Definity experience.  This serves for operators to take or place calls and monitor the general health of trunks and lines
  • PUSH BUTTON Telephones! CallDirector, 10 line, 20 line etc.
  • ComKey – the first electronic telephone system in  small setups by Ma Bell
  • Merlin Telephones. Any of the original 5 button, 10 button, BIS, etc.
  • The Western Electric 302 metal telephone (not to be confused with the operator console)
  • Who would not want to own a Snoopy and Woodstock AT&T telephone from the 1970s?

Vintage

(because I am getting old, that I will be OLD so what happens when you GET OLD – you want vintage stuff!)

  • Always a sucker for a DEC VT-300 series terminals, most notably the VT-320. I could take a VT-220 terminal, that was cute looking
  • Alphastation computer workstation based on the Alpha CPU. Would love to run VMS for the hell of owning one!
  • The grey metal based MacPro, since Apple is probably calling the first gen towers from a decade ago “Vintage”, but you know how I get “vintage” tech to work…
  • My first Apple love was a ether a Macintosh II or an LC II (can’t remember which came first). Any of the two CPUs I’d take in a heartbeat. (LC III/475 – not interested)
  • SCSI CD-ROM Drive. Old School SCSI. To throw model, Apple CD-600E. Something so I can install apps onto the old Macs because I had an SCSI drive or two and tossed them.
  • SCSI ZIP drive. Again for the Macs in the vintage world
  • The Fisher Price Telephone. Awww, does it dial back to your childhood? 😛 For the stupidest reason, I junked mine and same with my mother!
  • A Pay telephone, because what telephone enthusiast wouldn’t want one (5 cents to call internally, 10 cents for a page and 25 cents for a local call and 50 cents a call for long distance?)
  • Switchboard. Not kidding, those old fashioned switchboards, more of breadbox for the hell of making calls in the house!
  • A Mickey Mouse Telephone
  • A couple of “Insulators”

This is a short list, of really “wishful” things over a “need”. Additional lists can be seen on my Amazon, Etsy, and BestBuy wish lists

NBC Boston Is A-Comin’ (The Holy War of NBC and their non-owned affiliates, part two)

A major change to Boston TV will occur in the first time in nearly twenty-two years. NBC will no longer be affiliated with WHDH-TV Channel 7 beginning on New Years and will be moving to a weak digital UHF station in New Hampshire and a translator in the Greater Boston Area. Most of the cable systems will be on channel 10, HD on ether 710 or 810. Some of the stations that carried New England Cable News’ HD feed will be on that channel while NECN HD will be reassigned. (Check your local listings.)

Since my writings in January, I’ve learned more about NBC’s antics against large market affiliates not owned by larger entities. And the man who founded the largest fraudulent autism organization, may exhibit signs of Asperger’s Syndrome himself.

Continue reading

The Other Evil Empire: ASAN

The Autistic Self Advocacy Network is also another sin to the Autism narrative. As I have previously stated, ASAN is no different than any other organization headed by millennials. These rich Caucasians have believed in a dilliusion that autism in every case should be treated like a gift, and there is a zero tolerance policy of any cure of the disorder, even if its disruptive. They believe that every case should allow individuals to be themselves, even if they are disruptive per se.

Like all tax evading organizations, they are exempt from the rules. So they hire just autistics to speak on autism. And these many radical leftists that act at activists are preaching that April should only be Autism Acceptance Month instead. Apparently these upity, everything is awesome Millenials are so naive that there is still many people not aware or familiar with autism directly. ASAN pretends to not “get” or “accept” the harsh realities.

the super high functioning autistics also have mixed homosexuality and other pet causes into the autism narrative. Autism is not synoumus to the queer or African American community and should remain as such. More disturbingly most of these leaders live in cities and not in small towns and as I previously stated, they have lectured from 3,000 miles away in the form of a memo to the Arizona government and how they use Medicaid Waiver services.

Also, they have used vague but unconfirmed claims that Autism Speaks “portrays autism as a tragic burden” that latter two words has yet to be confirmed with hard facts. They dislike the puzzle as they claim to be a human, but they forget to google the history of the ASA version of the puzzle ribbon. Rainbows is for the queer community, sorry I have to be honest.

Walk in red is walking in anger. Also, that annoying hashtag “#ActuallyAutistic” makes you more weaker than stronger.

I know I don’t agree with many if not all high functioning types, you can’t be so rosey and attack an organization  that discriminates against autistics but also discriminate against normal people.

Vanessa

2017 Preface: I had memories of Vanessa, a former para of my high school program. I wrote this as I had developed a special friendship with a staff at my now former day program. She was my sister figure. My only sister figure – ever! Or at least I thought. When I left in November, she has not remained in communication. Vanessa I have not seen in years.

This post is about a paraprofessional from over 11 years ago. Her name is Vanessa and she worked with me over a decade ago. She was an awesome woman. A few years older than I am, kinda of a sisterly figure, a cute looking lady whom I would refer to her as my best friend if only things went a different way. Professionally she was cool, calming, would deescalate my anxiety and was able to have this peer-but-authorative figure only because I knew my boundaries (or at least that’s what I felt back then.)

Well we parted ways as she left GLEC about a year or so after I left my first program there. We had great chemistry and we both got along better than I did with the aforementioned teacher that I previously wrote.

For a while after I was very devastated, it was like loosing a best friend. It was a breakup only because the way GLEC operated wasn’t like other places upon transfers of good professional relations, they follow them. Vanessa was unable to follow me.

As stranger things had happened, it was a couple years ago where my mother and I took me to Manchester to the Mall of New Hampshire to acquire my Mac mini. As we left Best Buy to go and have lunch, we went by one of those photo places. Vanessa working there! But after lunch, we walked by to not see her again. She was working with a customer (a family you know) when we first went by. The following months, I’d try to do walk by. Her name tag and face matched, and she I believed lived in Lawrence.

I’ve known that some paras ether go out of the field altogether and go a 180 in the career sense. That may have happened to Vanessa a couple years ago. If Vanessa was able to follow me to the school to work program, maybe the 21st birthday debacle would’ve been less painful.

There is an individual that kinda meets the above profile in my current day program. I need someone like a Vanessa and I’ve been longing to find a day partner in crime with a multi-year relationship for decades. I hope ether that individual or someone else can fill this void.

It would be an underestimate to say I need someone like her in my day to day life.

🙁

DSPs, the Lack of Money and Passion

From the Grapevine from my undisclosed day program in an undisclosed location: I overheard some conversations of one staff talking about money and a possible pay raise (or something like that.) The unnamed staff said something like she isn’t there for the money. I hope she’s happy working with her clients.

Continue reading