Autism Speaks

I would watch the "Autism Every Day" video.


http://www.autismspeaks.org/index.php

Tale of an Idiot

Once upon a time... I believe it was around 3:30 on a Monday afternoon. I was sitting in my apartment in my recliner, looking out the window and drinking a glass of water. I noticed something in the sunlight a little ways away. It was the 300 foot tall woman. She was looking particularly lovely today. I never really noticed her before. She had always been there, I guess. Not very much of a surprise. I saw her often, but today... Oh, I don't know, today she looked different. Standing there on the corner of 42nd and Vine streets in the lot where the old McKasky building used to be. Just watching her made me feel happy. Love? I don't know. I shall have to do some acting. It took me three months to fill my cup of courage enough to talk to her. At the end of the third month, I drank. Did recon. I walked past her as fast as I could, my head down, my eyes looking at my feet, my heart pounding out of my chest. I walked right by her and kept on going. About 20 feet from her little toe, I stopped. Oh, screw it! The drink kicked in. I walked back and tapped the tip of her little toe. Curiously, she looked down, squinting because her glasses were not on her person. "Hi" I said. What else was there? She knew me. I knew her. It was a small town. She bent over and picked me up by the back of my shirt with her fingers. I rose all 300 feet and became level with her face. She stared. All at once a look of shock and recognition came over her, and a big smile krept across her face. "Oh, it's you!" While 300 feet may not be a whole lot in her big world, it is quite a distance in my puny little one. It took me several seconds to fall the whole way. As I fell, thousands... nay millions of things went through my head. Faces, places, friends. Past, present, future. Family, chances missed, mistakes made, failures done. I splattered into the windshield of a passing car like a bag of wet cement. In that instance, I recall thinking:"Women can't help being women. They're just born that way, I guess."It is a tale told by an idiot to himself while he wallows in self-pity.
Written by me. 01/18/1995

The Human Instrument...

The computational power of the human brain is difficult to ascertain, as the human brain is not easily paralleled to the binary number processing of today's computers. For instance, multiplying two large numbers can be accomplished in a fraction of a second with a typical calculator or desktop computer, while the average human may require a pen-and-paper approach to keep track of each stage of the calculation over a period of five or more seconds. Yet, while the human brain is calculating a math problem in an attentive state, it is subconsciously processing data from millions of nerve cells that handle the visual input of the paper and surrounding area, the aural input from both ears, and the sensory input of millions of cells throughout the body. The brain is regulating the heartbeat, monitoring oxygen levels, hunger and thirst requirements, breathing patterns and hundreds of other essential factors throughout the body. It is simultaneously comparing data from the eyes and the sensory cells in the arms and hands to keep track of the position of the pen and paper as the calculation is being performed. It quickly traverses a vast, interconnnected network of cells for relevant information on how to solve the problem it is presented, what symbols to write and what their functions are, as it graphs their shape and communicates to the hand how to make accurate and controlled strokes to draw recognizable shapes and numbers onto a page.

This is also a spectacular demonstration of the human body as an instrument. It sometimes amazes me that the human mind and body can accomplish such phenomenal tasks. We are all truly special.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iimMKWF7SK0&feature=related
Thank you for your consideration.

Rules of the game

Ya know... high school is a fun time. I was a nerd. Plain and simple. Geek, nerd, weirdo, etc. I was about 5'4", and slightly over weight. What can I say, I was ahead of my time. It seems nowadays that's the popular culture. And then there was gym class. They called me "Hollywood" because I had those self-tinting glasses, and when we would go outside, they got dark. Anyhoo...We were outside, apparently playing football. Everyone was on their little imaginary lines denoting, usually, the people that were good at sports, and the people that were going to loose. Ahh... life was simpler back then. So, when they kicked the ball, or hiked it, or whatever, I ran to a nice spot on the school lawn where no one else was. Bad idea. In football, that's where the best players go to catch the ball. I did not know this. So, the ball flies to me, and in a moment of angst, I caught it amazingly enough with my eyes closed and my head turned. Well, when you have the football everyone on the other team (the winners) run after you. Imagine the startled look on my face when I opened my eyes, and there was a whole lot of people coming at me at an amazing rate of speed. Quick decision time: OK, I have the ball. Everyone is running after me. Bad thing. What has changed? Why are they running after me? I am the same as I was, all alone out here, until the ball came. I have the ball. OK, the ball is bad. Get rid of the ball. So, I threw the ball to someone, anyone. The guy was on my team, so no problem. It really made no difference to me. Just got rid of it. Welp, the dude caught it, and everyone stopped and laughed. The gym teacher came over, laughing too, and asked me why the heck I did that? I asked him what I did wrong.
"You can't throw a football forward to someone on your own team."
"Why not?"
"Because it's football. Those are the rules!"
"Well, I don't know the rules. You, the gym teacher, never taught us the rules."
He laughed and we started playing again. I never did learn the rules until quite some time after. It seems to me that if you want someone to "play the game", you should probably tell them the rules beforehand, or at least ask the person if they know them.
Just seems like common courtesy.
So, now I'm 6'3" tall, still slightly overweight and publishers are calling me about publishing a book.
The gym teacher is still teaching gym.
I guess everyone's different.
I hope he caught on to that in time enough to not humiliate a whole lot of other people.
Thank you for your consideration.

The Wonder Gizmo!!

Methinks I'm going to create a program. Actually, I'm going to make a little "gizmo" that you can run all of your reciepts through. What this thing will do is copy all of your receipts down and send the information to a database. It will require the purchase of the "gizmo" for $59.99 and an activation fee of $29.95. It will also require a two year contract, with a monthly service charge of $19.99. Now, there will be little hidden fees, of course, like the fee for copying more then 25 receipts in one month, and any support services required to operate the "gizmo". So, what we have is a grand total of $569.70, plus 6% sales tax for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania for another grand total of $603.88.
Now, for this mere $600 price tag, this "gizmo" will record all of your receipts, analyze all of the
information, and produce a report.
What the report will tell you is who you are.
Sounds kinda stupid now, doesn't it?
Why do we base WHO we are on WHAT we have?
Thank you for your consideration.

So... we have pop up advertisements

A few pet peeves: If I click on a news story I'd like to read, I DO NOT want to re-read the headline again on another page of advertisements, and have to click on "read full story" in order to read the story I wanted to read in the first place!!

Also: those little pop ups that say "scroll over to enlarge" that are always placed just...so... and you end up scrolling over them accidentally, then you have to look for the little "close window" somewhere (usually written in a font that's only 1mm high) in order to uncover the window that you were in in the first place, as the pop up has now taken up the whole window!!

And: do these big companies do research about pop up ads? I'm sure they see numbers and figure the pop up ads will increase their revenue, but do they do research on the fact that I hate pop up ads? (probably not, as I am only me, and don't count for much in the American economy)

Also: people that aren't nice.

Where did I go wrong?

Mechanical Engineer Job
They need a mechanical engineer with experience with Naval design of valves.
Required: moderate degree of business awareness and passion for engineering discipline.
Job Functions: Understand the technical requirements of industrial and Naval customers, scheduling and resolving engineering design/assembly and test problems. Mechanical drafting work and involvement with shop environment.
Familiar with autocad and ASME standards, industrial and military specs for specialty metals, fasteners and piping, Naval valve design, stress analysis, fluid power, solid modeling, welding, and microsoft office, hydraulics, and pneumatics.
Perks: Great benefits, matching 401k, paid holidays/sick time, nice area, 2 weeks vacation after 90 days of employement and paid relocation.
Pay: $47,000 to $65,000 a year.

I've welded for about 6 months, built huge industrial machinery, have experience in operation and maintenance of various hydraulic pumps, valves, turbines, heat exchangers, distilling plants, refrigeration units, air compressors, ladder logic programming, industrial electrical wiring, installation of hydraulics/pneumatics, operation of machine shop lathes, horizontal/vertical boring machines, I have three years of experience with autocad, majored in psychology, and have experience in maintenance of Naval nuclear reactor plants. And I have my class "A" CDL.

I'm living off of about $14,000 a year.

Where did I go wrong?