Planning my next camp...

 

So the first therapeutic camping trip went great, so much so, in fact that I stayed an extra night when it became clear the campsite was new and wasn't going to fill up (despite being the last bank holiday of the summer break)...it was both relaxing and liberating... 

Now school holidays are over I can start to have a look and see what the *normal* costs of camping are going to be like around here and what sort of facilities are to be had now the kids and parents are back on the school run...

I'm going to play it really safe again this time - within about 30 minutes from rescue - electricity from the pitch (that sort of thing) - and it would have been nice to have some sort of shop (just in case I had kicked over the vegetable oil or something silly like that)...I'm sure it will all be fine again.

I can see this working it's way towards more off grid, tarps and hammocks, fire pits etc. I want to learn how to make yakitori (for example) and I want to get some sort of solar solution going before I get completely off grid...but softly softly catchy monkey...

Some images from my first solo camp

 

Therapeutic Camping (for one)

So between my psychiatrist and that part of my mind that deals with all things external facing and apparently self-conscious, we settled upon a interesting and slightly unexpected treatment plan that - 

a) gets me out of the house
b) is fun and gives me something to aim at 
c) takes good organisation and management
d) makes me take on at least some of my nastier symptoms like agoraphobia and photophobia 

e) might involve speaking to people but a hiding place is provided
f) doesn't feel like a step too far
g) is inexpensive

So this is the first draft of the list of camping stuff - 

Got - to pack

• Tent (4 man blackout tent - for obvious reasons - it even has a blackout vestibule which is unusual)
• Suitcase Cooker
• Butane can x 2
• Electric Cooler
• Portable rice cooker
• Electric Hookup
• Cooking set (2 x pans, 1 x kettle, 2 x bowls)
• Camp Bed
• Folding Chair
• Outdoor giant bean bag
• Sleeping bag
• Duvet (check forecast)
• Pillows (check forecast)
• Spork x 2
• Plastic Bowl x 2
• A book (currently a UFO book)
• Chargers
• Can opener
• Washing up fluid and cloth/sponge
• Warm hoodie/Jumper
• Novelty Hat
• Bin bags x 2
• Toilet roll x 3

Tech

• Headlamps x 2
• Mini fan
• Power Inverter / big battery pack
• Mobile Telephone
• Chromebook/HP Envy

Comsumables

• Small veg oil
• Small butter
• Fresh water
• Tea (Earl Grey)
• Skimmed milk
• Rice (pre-mixed with cardamon pods, nigella seeds, cinnamon bark and a spot of seasoning)
• Beers
• Beans
• Cans of good quality chicken curry/chilli beef (one of each)
• Jalapenos, sliced in brine 
• Noodles (Indomie Mi Goreng)
• White loaf (sliced) 
• Grated Cheddar cheese
• Bacon, smoked
• Eggs, free range
• Chilli sauce (either Baron's, Frank's or Nando's depending on my mood)
• BBQ/Ketchup
• Snacks (Crisps, Biltong)
• Branston pickle

It was fine, I definitely should have taken a couple of pillows - the giant bean bag was waaaay too big for the inflatable mattress and was just a bit too thin (I could feel the ground through it even when freshly inflated) - so next time I'm taking a proper camp cot and chair...

It was nice to only really have to please myself - for example one morning I had hot chicken curry for my breakfast.  It didn't hurt anybody and it made me happy - I think these little things are what is going to end up making a difference - if I can establish a bank of small "happiness" events where nothing bad happened, I didn't get voted down or ignored, and maybe I can up the chances of not immediately feeling guilty or stupid...

Autism Diagnosis - Masking for 53 years

 So here are a couple of difficult to deal with (and mask over worthy) little attempts - during this life thus far - 

• Highly limited connection with any humans other than a very small handful of people who exhibited no signs of judgement (and low risk of violent, thoughtless, noisy outbursts) - goths, punks, NMA brotherhood, the odd person from Plymouth.
• Filtering out deliberately stupid people - Oh I don't need to know about that...I feel like, I feel like a vast potential and willingness for understanding and enlightenment has just been glibly tossed in a ditch along with the contents of a nappy bag belonging to the rear end of your dangerous dog.  People who have no interest in learning are totally beyond all understanding. 
• Bullying - all the way through - I'm a big guy so people don't expect this - but it's a combination of innocent trust and meeting people who don't even have anything tangible to gain - but just feel a whole lot better when they are making somebody else's life into a tale of misery - there are many of these people.
• Trying to juggle forced social situations - boardroom presentations to 50-150 people - huge responsibility -  seeing others when already out of gas to deal with people.
• Not having enough money - having my bus pass, train ticket, bank card confiscated by "family" repeatedly - not for any logical reason - just to make my life more difficult  - this is the first time I have had any control over any of my money for almost twenty years - it's a difficult thing not scraping around the floor for pennies every day just to find my train fare to the office - I still expect to find my belongings scattered and lost when I go to go out and about...I had to work so hard to fit in, that was made impossible
• Asking for time off to attend a scan when Thomas was on the way.  I'll never forget this - first son - "I'm just asking - but what's the point in going to the scan?  It's early days, the baby will probably die before you get there - what's the point in putting it in our calendar?" - what is the point in even telling you?  Under what circumstances would I like to hear my children are going to die?

Alienation - Autism diagnosis after 50

What is it, and where does it come from?  

From my perspective - 

• A profound sense of innocence and innate level of trust (often misplaced) - hesitant around new people, noisy places - hey, look how shy this guy is!
• An overwhelming sense of a need to help out (asked for or not) - this can really help or really fail depending on how welcome the offer of help is - it's impossible for me to know before asking
• Lack of a contextual filter - odd comments, behaviour (Will, Geography field trip)
• Eidetic memory and great enthusiasm for extremely narrow/fringe areas of interest - the number of people I must have bored to tears waxing lyrical about trilinear mip-map filtered interpolation...
• Using my intellect to solve perceived issues but sometimes in nasty, unwanted ways
• Miscommunication - I often approach new people with caution, but this can be read as being deliberately distant and awkward...

It's a double edged sword - from society's perspective - 

• He doesn't pay attention
• He's more interested in his own agenda and/or lazy
• He doesn't appreciate the gravity of the situation
• He is aloof
• Why can't he turn some of this energy into something positive?
• Such a nice guy, but just can't follow instructions or stay on mission
• Such a nice guy, so how is he always upsetting one person or another in the office?

But what has led me here?  Last thing I knew I was managing to just about masquerade as a functioning member of society (being a recurring theme in this story).  Typically - one or a number of these scenarios can manifest - 

• My brain is very noisy - sometimes I cannot talk to you - I'm busy just processing - I'm sorry, I'm not sure what your brain thinks is so important - trust me - it isn't - but I bet i'm coming across as being super rude to your special friends and family right now
• Social cues and relationships are very difficult to correctly read and respond to - responding can take days/weeks of thought/contemplation - writing and rewriting until I think I understand
• Some normal people are extremely hard work - just being around them - sometimes even knowing *of* someone that is potentially exhausting is quite enough.  Most of the time people aren't looking at the six inches in front of their noses and are bound up in an in inescapable resignation of self to the miserable present - I cannot exist around you - even the tiniest flea should be able to summon more satisfaction from existence just by "being" - if you cannot - and you think you found your nice place in society then you are wrong
• Strange places can hold solace - even if they do not exist - my happy place is in the world of Harry Potter created by J K Rowling.  It could have been written for me - I also find solace in the quiet corners of the earth - the ones I find by myself...the corner seat on the train, the spot on the platform where the door always opens - an illusion of control over the seemingly untameable
• Sales people and Autistic people are thrown together by maths problems that involve finance.  These two groups of people are incompatible - sales people are paid to be enthusiastic, noisy, use alcohol and various groups of stimulants to meet objectives - only really care about the bottom line - deliberately shallow - switch off the second they have what they want - 
• There is always a sword of Damocles - eyes are always on - you can make small gains, but the crushing blow has always been waiting - and it can fall at any time - Doom is literally hanging there
• It doesn't matter how long, or how successfully you have managed to mask yourself from the muggles - they are always present - and always ready to ridicule you - even when the illusion of holding control seems plausible 
• Amazingly - There are other people like me.  Unfortunately - these other people are like me - unlikely to socialise, nervous around others - I found a bunch when I was young, but a typical ASD guy is not rushing out there trying to bond with new friends...unless there is some acceptable social crutch in place that helps with crippling social anxiety brought on by ASD (there is, but it brings it's own problems). 
• At the end of the day - it's just normal life for every single person you know to either lose interest in you or betray you to a greater or lesser degree - every single job will - at best - politely put up with you, as soon as some sort of error crops up then we are sacking you - this is the reality of the situation - better get used to it.  It doesn't stop the hurt and confusion but it does go some way to helping to understand the decisions that found me at their centre.

I'll move on to what it's like to be diagnosed next...although that is still really hard to grasp emotionally.

Working in East Grinstead...

...and so begins the next chapter in my commuting life, no more Dorking (fun as it was), new destination - East Grinstead!

There has always been something slightly broken in my mind which made me think that East Grinstead was just past Three Bridges on the Brighton (railway) line - probably the fact that they are quite near to one another as the crow files - I've stupidly boarded East Grinstead trains at East Croydon a few times mistakenly thinking I'd be able to figure out a quicker way back home during disruption (and then catching trains back again). When the prospect of a job came up working here I immediately made the same mistake again - "Oh that will be easy to get to" - but no. Also this move co-incided with the biggest restructuring of timetables in British railway history - and the inevitable associated cancellations and delays (4 cancelled trains so far this morning from East Grinstead) the *only* way to get here on the train is via East Croydon.

I've had enough of London commuters.

Thankfully, after a quick bit of Googling, I discovered that (and this is a miracle) there is a number 400 bus that goes from East Surrey hospital (practically on our doorstep) to the fire station 500 yards from my new office. So far they have been reliable and (pretty much) on time - and they are also used by a lot of kids to get to School (meaning they are highly unlikely to be casually cancelled). The only problem is there isn't a lot in the way of alternatives leaving me really only one direct bus in and one direct bus out meaning there is potential for a bit of waiting around at Crawley bus station (but that isn't the end of the world).

I'm one week in and so far it's worked very well - the cherry on the top? It only costs £22 per week for my bus ticket. I think that has to be one of the cheapest commutes on the planet (unless one walks to work)!

Squall hits Dorking...

...taken out the office window... :0

Rainy Redhill

...oh man...I am wet and cold...didn't help that I couldn't really get off to sleep last night either (being tired always makes me feel colder)...for some weird reason my brain was just locked in a loop of saying "Hey Google" and getting back unsatisfactory responses, finally gave up trying to sleep at about half past four - no idea how I'm going to get through today - with lots and lots of tea most probably...

Ceefax is dead...

Wow, and just like that, Ceefax is dead...

I had thought that this had all come to an end with terrestrial switch off back in 2012, but actually a couple of little bits kept on pinging out content - it's still not (quite) the end...

Back in the day, when teletext (with a small "t") launched, you needed a set-top box to decode it from the terrestrial signal waving around over our heads - I remember hopping into (probably) our Renault 4 with my Dad, with it's lovely creaky campsite style seats and heading somewhere into suburban London to find an independent retailer who actually had one of these strange new decoder boxes (you could also buy a decoder box for the BBC A I seem to remember)...

Anyway, even though this was in the days before tape-based video recorders became established in the mainstream (so I couldn't at the time have drawn the comparison) it was roughly the size of a VHS player. The RF/Coax cable went in the back from the aerial on the roof and another one hooked you up to the TV.  The "remote" control was on a 2 or 3 meter wire that plugged in at the back, so it almost reached all the way to the sofa.  Press a combination of 2 magic buttons and slide a big buff slider or two into "teletext mode" and suddenly words appeared out of thin air...!

I can only really liken it to a very, very early version of the internet (but all done with UDGs in migraine inducing primary colours held in a rigid format)...you could interact with the content in two marvellous ways - either type in a new page number, or hit "Reveal" to make invisible content appear. Amazing! There was one very nice feature though, pick a channel, invoke the decoder, then going to page 888 would "minimise" the "browser" window and display subtitles (where available)...

Even back then though I remember finding it such a pain to browse, if you wanted to go and visit, say, page 800 on Teletext to get some funny jokes or hidden pictures behind a riddle you had to wait while it ticked through *every* *other* *page* of the 999 available on the way before it would (hopefully) load...

Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, it's not quite the end...a few cable channels are still (apparently) keeping up text pages (Channel 5, Nickelodian, Syfy channel to name but a couple), and some bright spark has figured out that the teletext signals got recorded on VHS tapes and has worked out how to decode them from old recordings of It Ain't Half Hot Mum and Benny Hill. There is also the teletext archive here...if you are feeling particularly sentimental...bye bye teletext, gone, but not forgotten...  ;)

Rescued a Piplup...

...very early this morning, abandoned and slightly run over (in the darkness and rain) in the car park of East Surrey Hospital (so this is definitely a rescue Piplup)...Luckily Piplups have a thick coat of fur and (a bit like penguins) are very happy in the cold weather, so it was really only the "being hit by cars" bit that was bothering him. He is sat happily on my desk at the moment, and I'll be making a snug nest of paper towels to bring him home to be looked after by the kids from now on...just hope he gets on with Litten Mittens and Beatrice!

Virgin Superhub - unable to connect - solution

It's fair to say that we've been struggling with a few problems with our Wifi recently. Actually, when I sat down to think about it, I realised that we've got into a routine of re-booting the router probably once per day for the past year. It all began when 3 new devices arrived in the house last Christmas (and they just keep on coming) - it seems to have turned into a bit of a conveyor belt of one device kicking another off or stealing all the bandwith until the poor old Virgin Superhub just can't cope any more and collapses in a heap (requiring the off/on treatment).

The solution - a shiny new router from Google - it comes with everything you need in the box, you plug it in (power-wise), use the included bit of Cat5 to go out from the "Modem mode" slot on the back of the Virgin hub (it's the bottom one - clearly labelled) and plug it into the little hole on the Google router with a picture of a globe.

Next it's installing a small app on your telephone, choose a google account, give the new Wifi network a name and a password - and that's it! Connect your devices up (this took by far the longest) and - fingers crossed - the wifi has been super stable ever since (and reaches effortlessly all over the house, as a nice side-benefit).

So if you are, like many people on the Virgin Broadband forums, struggling with their (not quite up to the job of running a modern home) hardware, give it a try! It also auto tunes to the quietest frequencies to give you maximum bandwith over the air and allows you to turn on safesearch just for certain devices (I set up a "Kids tablets" group) plus I was able to switch off all internet to the kids devices after 7pm on School nights. Next thing is to set up a guest logon (which you can throttle down so it doesn't eat into the family's performance).

Overall very impressed.

Redhill Platform zero is open!

...and it only cost fifty million pounds!  Are we still wondering why the rail fares have gone up again?  Actually, in my neck of the woods we don't actually have a fare increase this year, but this is only because we have been bearing the brunt of the increases for the last decade or so while everyone else got off lightly (comparatively) - so at least someone thought of Reigate and Redhill residents for a change... ;)

Anyway, I have already noticed a tangible difference to my journey, from now on we won't have to wait for the service that precedes my train (from Tonbridge) to pull in to platform 1 first, it now terminates on platform 0.  Although as a result the Reading train now goes a lot further up platform 1, so I will have to change the place where I sit!

Dorking Sunrise

The Pixel 2 XL camera...

...is astonishing in low light (it was black, and I took the shot while walking)...pin point and very little noise.  Amazing.

The Perfect Digital Marketing pie...

If you are running a website (or 5), as I do - you will know you need access to a lot of analytics.

There are a number of free products - One in particular everyone will know - the universally adopted Google Analytics.  GA can take you an extremely long way to a delicious conclusion.  Sadly, today it can't take you quite as far as when I first started with Blogger (back in the days when everything was transparent), but even back then, Google never got you all the way to the end of the story.  Some clever kitchen magic was required.

Using my Nigella voice - it is essential to source the finest ingredients, only then can you can start to bake the perfect digital marketing pie...So, once your website framework is in place -

Start your recipe with a few hearty spoonfuls of Sessioncam - Two of the most excellent features are the automatic error reporting (which handily includes the exact message - be it a 404 from a referring site or a "You must enter a valid email address" from one of your site forms, things you may never otherwise be aware of), a drizzle of struggle score - this is a fuzzy logic one, but so useful - where are visitors getting lost on the site, scrolling up and down looking for what they need?  Next - pour in a generous amount of heat maps, going page by page, not forgetting a sprinkle of scroll reach visibility and visitor focus over time, which objects do visitors just miss?  Which objects do they spend time looking at, which objects get the most clicks?  What are the most successful user journeys?   All of this is essential for raising page performance and improving usability for future visitors.

Stir into the mixture a generous serving of Leadforensics - probably the best IP database I have ever encountered, light on the page load, 99% accurate (across the globe) - always deliciously reliable.  Set up a series of trigger reports (very simple to do) for each of the Sales team members to fire an alert each time one of their clients visits the site, set up a competitor alert to spot them as they are coming in for a cheeky slice, and set up a trigger for keen new companies consuming a lot of pages.  Perfect both for nurture and hot new leads.  Make sure the mixture is light, fluffy and well blended, picking out those management macbook users looking at pricing and implementation pages just to put the cherry on the warming lead.

Finish the perfect digital marketing pie with a crunchy Salesfusion topping - Here we tie things together with cookies, either from opted in emails or form fills that, for those keen enough on the recipe to sign up for emails or white paper downloads we can start to get into the area of marketing automation...

I could go into more detail, but it's best if you just take a slice and discover the delicious taste for yourself...

Redhill Platform 0 latest news

So, latest update, over the weekend they have pulled back all the track ballast (perhaps it was just there to compress the ground a bit - but it doesn't seem to be required in most cases) and dug quite a way down into the soil - perhaps 2 feet - and now a whole load more ballast has arrived in little bags (so it is *just* possible they were wasting their time).  Also the mystery of the step access has been solved, the large pole on the platform now supports a railway traffic light system (all wrapped up in black plastic), and a shiny new set of stairs has come into being around the lift shaft...

Quite a long week...

So, I've just completed quite a long week - Last Tuesday Flyingpops finally went into Gatwick Spire to have a bit of corrective work done on her breathing tubes. The surgery itself took roughly the length of time it took me to watch one episode of Star Trek Discovery (about 50 minutes), everything went extremely smoothly, but it left her feeling dizzy and understandably a bit battered and bruised - none the less, we were discharged a couple of hours later and I carefully drove her home and popped her into bed - where she (pretty much) stayed for the rest of the week.

Having had prior warning that this would probably be the case, I had taken those few days off as holiday and thus suddenly plunged into the world of never-ending school runs, playgroups, shopping and swimming lessons. Yes...a nice, relaxing "holiday", the only respite was the couple of hours in the morning between dropping Annabelle at pre-school (and Thomas and Poppy at big school) and picking Annabelle up again at lunchtime - and even that promptly evaporated when Annabelle wasn't actually at pre-school, but had other activities planned.

This was not the worst of it though, when my holiday ran out we still had a few days to cope with where Flyingpops was still not allowed to drive and I had to put in my hours at work. Even though favours had been called in and arranged weeks in advance, as soon as Flyingpops knew the actual date of the surgery - everyone that had promised to help with the school runs ended up letting us down, just what we didn't need in the circumstances.   More (last minute) favours were hurriedly arranged and I ended up taking the car to work - seemed the only sensible solution at the time. 

However, the simple fact of the matter is - driving between Earlswood and Dorking in the morning and evening during the week has become a living hell.  It is a car park the *whole* way. I must have done something in the region of 60 hill starts on my way into the office yesterday, on the way back I decided to try skipping the main roads and the back roads are just as bad, the only section of road that actually moves at any speed at all is the tiny section through Buckland - all of Reigate, all of Redhill and certainly all of Dorking are just gridlocked. Ironically my train going through Betchworth (closing the level crossing) causes massive tailbacks there too.  Since I last did the commute this way it has become a super stressful way to start and end the day - so it was actually with quite a sense of relief that I picked up my ticket at Earlswood railway station this morning and sat down to watch a movie on my telephone, waiting for the train to take the strain...

...aaaand - it's winter!

Absolutely flipping *freezing* this morning...

Amazing Full Moon over Horley Bonfire...

A gentle introduction to RPGs...

So Thomas and I have started out on role playing games (in a very small way).  I decided that the best place to start was probably at exactly the same spot where I began,  which was with "The Warlock of Firetop Mountain" which I picked up in 1982 at one of the excellent school book sales at Bishop Gilpen Primary School in Wimbledon, probably while wearing a pair of grey shorts...somehow or other (and this astonishes me) that original book is still in one piece, and is still in my possession 35 years later (despite the hundreds of times I read through it) - so some thanks is due to Penguin for their excellent publishing.

We've only done a few pages so far, but Thomas has taken great delight in writing up his character sheet and drawing out the map (as far as we have got) and I have to say, his style is bold (practically fearless in fact), I will have to take this into account when we progress, the next steps will be Lone Wolf, then into AD&D...although a brief session of Call of Cthulhu would put an end to that behaviour almost immediately... ;)