Linky stuff

[vilakins]

Here are some links I've been accumulating for a while as you can tell by the first one.

Luke and Leia find the perfect father's day card

A cat and dog who meet each day for a walk

A baby on a swing with a cat as big as him; awww

The scientists who found the Higgs boson used the wrong font! I like the comment someone apparently made on Twitter: "If you don't like the font, go find your own fundamental particle".

One for quarryquest: a hamster discovers the usefulness of a phone

A German artist paints a bridge to look like Lego

Iconic images recreated with 'Star Wars' characters

And this one for sallymn (though 'Zugzwang' isn't unusual ro anyone who plays chess): Illustrations of unusual and rarely spoken words

'Yonderly' describes me quite well these days. :-P

Comments

[gwendraith]

Very cool links. I especially like the father's day card one :)

[vilakins]

That one and a couple of others came from George Takei's Facebook; always very entertaining.

[corvuscornix]

Aww, the cat and the dog...! Cross-species friendships get me every time...

[vilakins]

Somewhere I have an old photo of my brother's kitten curled up and surrounded by his dog's tail. I think it's one of the ones I got scanned this year; I should look.

I'm always a bit amazed by how well we get on with cats when we're so different.

[corvuscornix]

I don't know, I've always felt I could understand cats better than dogs... But then, the best 'aspie-in-neurotypical-society' metaphor that I know is the one about being a cat raised by a pack of dogs... (Which is not meant to be a slur on neurotypicals btw: I like dogs too. But it's a nice way of seeing how and why all the misunderstandings and complications arise, without having to put the blame with either party.)

OTOH perhaps it's just because cats are just different enough from us (communication-wise, in not being pack-animals) that we realise we can't tell them what to do, and so allow them the freedom required for coexistence between a a social and a solitary animal... Hmm. *thoughtful*

[vilakins]

I didn't just mean cats, but any other species. Cats have always fascinated me though from a very young age, so much so my parents got me a kitten when I was three.

The cat vs dog thing interests me in that different personalities go for different species (though our family always had both). People who don't like independent thought (managers, dictators - Hitler esp) love dogs; a lot of imaginative people like writers love cats. It's not a rule, but it's certainly a generalisation.

As for neurotypical, even though I test fairly normal, I find a lot of things hard like looking at people's eyes for extended periods, and smiling when I don't feel like it. I suspect the lack of smiles in social situations like saying hello to the annoying;y bossy receptionist when I walk past got me disliked by her (and maybe standing up to her bossiness). Ha. When i was a teenager I said exactly what I thought but I've grown out of that.

[corvuscornix]

Yes... But still, cats are special in being, I think, the only one of the domesticated animals that was not originally a social/pack animal. So in a way it is an even stranger companion for us than a dog or a horse...

Perhaps cats are the only animals that have domesticated humans. ;-)

I suspect that there are probably not as many truly 'neurotypical' people (as in "conforming to the expected cognitive/neurological norm" rather than just "non-aspie") as one would think - a majority, yes, but maybe not by so much. And of course, we are none of us static. I think I'm a lot less recogniseably 'aspie' now than I was only a couple of years ago (not to mention my teens!) and how much of it that's from adaptation and how much that is actual neurological change (or one feeding into the other) is really hard to tell. But I think this is probably not so different from how anyone changes with age (and societal pressure)...

Anyway, what I meant to say, I think, was that while putting names on these things is one one level very silly (and I absolutely understand those who would rather not do it at all), then on another level it can be incredibly important to be able to see how and why the differences arise. That's where the cat vs. dog metaphor comes in for me. Psychologically, there's a hell of a difference between being a cat among dogs or just a really bad dog...

lack of smiles in social situations like saying hello
Hehe, I have the opposite problem: I have a real difficulty in remembering to say 'hello' to people that I meet every day, in places where I expect them to be. (Even though I know I should, and have worked out what I think are the social reasons why, my brain's default setting still seems to be that greetings in such 'routine' situations are superfluous.) To compensate for that (and for other things, like the face-blindness) I tend to smile a lot at everyone to mitigate any of those hard feelings that may be caused by me not remembering to say the actual H-word, or for that matter, not recognising someone who thinks I should be recognising them...

...but I still seem not to be able to stop myself from talking too much once I do find something to talk about. :-/ *apologies for length*

[vilakins]

I have a hard time with "hello" too. I tend to only say it if someone else does and it's really hard to do the bright and happy one others seem to manage, Maybe it's just my shyness (applies to saying goodbye too when i leave the office), I dunno. I'd rather talk to them about something than just say hello, say something like "Man, it's cold out there!"

If we get onto a subject I like, like SF with the engineers over the partition, then I can go too. The stuff the people I work with doesn't interest me all that much, esp babies, so I just keep working.

As for cats being solitary but domesticated, I think they plain like us. They don't meow to each other, they developed that for us because we don't get the body and scent language so well. Clever little things! We had one guy who loved to sit and watch us work, e.g. cleaning the car.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

For some reason, that baby-and-cat-on-a-swing picture makes me strangely melty. :)

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Me too! The cat seems very happy about it all.

[linda-joyce.livejournal.com]

i love the dog and cat friends and the baby and cat made me go awww. I recognised most of those cloned pictures but not the first one, what is it?

re picture 1

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

It's the iconic VE in America day entitled The Kiss.

http://snarkybytes.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/VE_Kiss.jpg

Mind you I only recognised it courtesy of Warehouse 13.

Re: re picture 1

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I recognised it anyway, but when did Warehouse 13 do it? My memory fails me. During the past of those two old agents?

Re: re picture 1

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

When Pete and Myka were in a gallery, the artifact allowed them to step into the picture. They were being chased by someone but I don't remember which episode.

[snowgrouse.livejournal.com]

Comic Sans? Really? That's kind of hilarious. They'll probably spell out further findings with alphabet blocks. And do funny voices.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I know, right?

[ultrapsychobrat.livejournal.com]

These were wonderful! Love especially the dog and cat friends and the weird words. Hurrah!!

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

That friendship is just so lovely.

[lolmac]

I adored these! Thank you! Especially the link about the Higgs boson. I followed it to a wonderful bit with Stephen Hawking grinning because the discovery cost him a $100 bet!

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I heard about that! :-D

[imhilien.livejournal.com]

Great links, thanks. :) I loved the Lego bridge one.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I long for someone to do that to a motorway bridge or two.