Mishi's Journal of Stuff

So, it's a week since the time the YMCA promised they'd call me. The Village People didn't know what they were talking about. The YMCA is not fun to stay at. Not if they take this long to get back to me.

Meanwhile, in order to kill time, and because Coach Maddy keeps saying I haven't 'accepted' my asperger's diagnosis, whatever that means, I joined this forum for people with Asperger's and Autism, called "Wrong Planet". I don't really like this site. It's too big, and too full of the same kind of stupidity so prevalent on regular forums. The irony here is that it's a forum for people with autism and Asperger's syndrome, and people like us generally prefer smaller groups. But this site is huge and it's typically 'aspie' of me not to like that. Then again, it could also be culture shock. There's this whole 'aspie' subculture going on here that I guess I don't really get. Of course, it could also just be me being pissed off at all the people who say that 'neurotypicals' (people without disorders) are mean/stupid/shallow/sheep. I mean, jeez, way to insult my entire family, my friends and my mentors and teachers.

So on Wednesday I went to see Coach Maddy and I explained my plight to her, and she pointed me in the direction of Giant Steps, where I might perhaps volunteer. Giant Steps is a non-profit organisation for autism which has its headquarters a few blocks away from my house. They've got a school for autistic kids with a waiting list of 600 people. So I checked out their site, and their home page had this to say about their students:

"...ces enfants tout en éclats de vie et de talents, frappés d'un invisible mal, qui voudrait les retenir captifs, l'autisme... Tout gain fait reculer l'autisme. Des petits pas, mais contre un tel ennemi, des pas de Géant..."

>: ( Not cool, people. I'm not possessed or held prisoner by my Asperger's. Autism isn't some evil monster you have to vanquish, it's just a name for a collection of my qualities and quirks. It's part of who I am. Get rid of it, and you get rid of many of the things that make me ME. HELP ME, by all means, but don't think of me as a victim.

The rest of the site seems okay, though. Their methods include behavior therapy, music therapy, games therapy, speech therapy. It all seems quite benign, except for that offensive home page.

I'm new to this whole aspie subculture thing, but it's hard to ignore all the press it has been getting lately, mostly about a conflict between freaked parents who only see the downsides to autism and autistic adults who are pissed off that the aforementioned freaked parents think of them as damaged, empty soulless husks. Largely, I've had very little support for my disorders until recently, so I'd been looking at this conflict from the sidelines. It didn't affect ME. Now it does. This place is three blocks away from my house!! O_o

Now, the question is: should I volunteer for this organisation anyway and try to fight this kind of thinking from within, by being a good role model for the children and showing the adults and parents what's what, or should I boycott it?

So, the women's chorus were practicing with Kerry at MWOS tonight. At "For he is an Englishman," Kerry tells us to wait till the last minute to sing the last 'shman'. We spent the next five minutes complaining that we couldn't do any more practicing without the 'shmen' because we had already gone over all our material and since most of us were paired off with 'shmen' we couldn't do any dancing if we didn't have our 'shmen'

Then, at the end, the men's chorus practiced their rendition of 'A British Tar', which included a lot of fancy footwork, and finished with the Cancan as a joke. Ben, our pianist, even obliged with appropriate music.

funfun

So, I just got back from another MWOS rehearsal. We're sharing the spotlight with the Kanawake choir again. It could just be my ego talking, but I don't like it. Or maybe it's just the sinking feeling I got when I realized how few songs were in our X-mas binders this year. After two years of working hard to learn each new Christmas carol, and finding out we only get to sing the boring versions of the shorter carols and half the number of long ones we usually sing, I can't help to feel disappointed. 

Especially since those Kanawake people only sing kitchy American songs

My ego- it aches.

This journal post is directly addressed to Ari. I post here because when I tried e-mailing you, I failed, and I KNOW you check your livejournal.







I recently scanned these sketches for you. If you're still interested in the RP you did these for, it'd be great if you sent in a profile. We really don't have many people. Here's a link: http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27083455

There once was a student named Mishi,
whose doings were sometimes quite fishy.
One day in a slump, she got off her rump,
and wrote up her paper just peachy.

Keep fighting Mishi!
Never say die, Mishi!

Okay, so I broke my promise: more MWOS stuff. During rehearsal today, I discovered that I am going to be a milkmaid. This means that I am going to walk onstage carrying a yoke on my shoulders with a bucket at each end. Wonderful.

I vaguely remember a folk song, you know, one of those that take place in the merry month of may and are about sex, starring a milkmaid. Or maybe that was in Monstrous Regiment. I'm going to Paris the week after school ends, to see my cousins there. Dad, in a Tamaki-esque flight of fancy, doesn't think it's such a good idea, considering it's Paris in the springtime, and I'm sure to fall in love with some French artist and then he'll lose his precious daughter.

Springtime is conspiring against me. And it hasn't even arrived yet.

Signed, Mishi the Milkmaid

Yesterday I went back to MWOS and had a lot of fun. Peter and Nathan were really having fun with the scene we practiced today. Their characters at one point are arguing about whether some dead guy sank like a stone or like a lump of lead, and it was pretty funny to watch. Our stage manager is this british guy whose name I can't quite recall and who is a real hard-ass, but when Peter did an absolutely brilliant add-lib, he said that the stone/lead thing was perfect that way, and it stuck. I'm not exactly sure where I'm supposed to be since I missed the rehearsal during the opening (which is understandable since I was singing the wisdom teeth blues) so I'm kind of confused, but I expect I'll be cleared up soon enough.

Pros and Cons of MWOS

Pros

-Four part harmony: need I say more?
-Strumpet jokes
-Amusing Victorian words
-The ego-inflation of being on stage
-really awesome costumes
-the profits go to worthy causes, so not only am I having fun, but I'm helping people too
-Eric and Nathan: handsome and fine gentlemen. Well, maybe not gentlemen. At least in Eric's case

Cons

-Too many old men (actually, we still don't have enough men for Yeomen, but I wish more of what men we did have were younger)
-What young men we do have are either taken, or STILL too old for me
-My mother and Jette do fitness classes together. I suspect that they talk about me
-No people my age
-it's do-it-yourself stage makeup

MWOS is sort of like going to visit my extended family that I barely know. I mean, I get along with my uncles and aunties, because I generally get along with old people, old women especially. Either I have a soft spot for them or they have a soft spot for me. In any case, they have a way of making me feel comfortable. It's a little awkward with my cousins, though, because the girls are all talking about things that I haven't done yet, and the guys, well, I think the guys are pretty hot, but one of them is taken, and they're both kind of old for me. And although I think they're very witty, I'm still wary of them.

Oooh, and guess what happened today? I got a note from Tacto and he's gonna give me a free account on Wirepop so I can continue reading and commenting on his comic! I love Tacto, he's the coolest!