Images from the last couple of days at work and a mention of a future plan.
INTRODUCTION
A decision to attend an evening meeting in the fine city of Norwich yesterday somewhat limited my computer access then, hence I am sharing stuff from more than one day.
AUCTION IMAGES
Here are some images of auction lots taken over the last couple of days…
The first of nine images I took of lot 390
This book warranted six images
The specs of two supersonic aircraft – fans of Matthew Reilly will recognize the top one as the plane that replaces the destroyed Halicarnassus (Boeing 747) at the end of the Five Greatest Warriors.
Another aviation book that warranted multiple images
Colour pics of the two supersonic aeroplanes.
Lot 393 – local interest as it is about one of Norfolk’s most famous families.
SOME NON-AUCTION WORK IMAGES
These images were required for use on Ebay…
COMING UP ON ASPIBLOG
On Wednesday I attended the AGM of the West Norfolk Disability Forum, courtesy of an invite that came from Councillor Squire by way of NAS West Norfolk branch chair Karan McKerrow. I hope to put up a post about this tomorrow but for the moment as an appetiser, here is a montage featuring the extraordinary upstairs window of King’s Lynn town hall…
A grateful acknowledgement to the Lynn News for their coverage of the Autism Awareness Cup accompanied by a minor ethical quibble and also some images from today at work.
INTRODUCTION
At the end of this post I will be sharing some images from work today, but it is mainly about the Lynn News (and, one ethical quibble aside, positive about them).
THANKS FOR THE COVERAGE BUT AN ACKNOWLEDGEMENT WOULD BE NICE
Before creating the blog post I had also created a facebook photo album about the event.
Having published the blog post I then produced this email:
For clarification of the intended recipients, here is a second image…
Today the Lynn News produced the following:
You will note that save for the misplaced while between cup winners and Holland every word of this article appears in my blog post. While I thank the Lynn News unreseverdly for printing a story about this event, which will be the first of many, I would have been even more grateful had there been some acknowledgement, and maybe a mention of my blog.
An account of the inaugural Autism Cup, played yesterday on the astroturf at Lynn Sport, which raised £75.55 for NAS West Norfolk.
INTRODUCTION
Yesterday saw the staging of the inaugural Autism Awareness Cup on Lynn Sport’s artifical pitches a mile and half from King’s Lynn town centre. The event was a great success, and fundraising collections on the day netted £75.55.
THE TEAMS
Five teams had entered, with names being selected on a European Championship/ World Cup theme. The five names selected were England, Holland, Italy, Republic of Ireland and Spain. The tournament was organised in two phases, a mini-league after which the top two teams would contest the final.
THE PRELIMINARIES
As well as our own NAS banners a sponsors banner was on display. We also had two tables set up displaying various items, including the cup and sets of gold, silver and bronze medals.
Event organiser Grant Cotton and NAS West Norfolk chair Karan McKerrow.
Local radio coverage – Grant Cotton with an interviewer from Radio Norfolk.
THE LEAGUE STAGE
None of Italy, The Republic of Ireland or England ever looked convincing. England managed a 2-0 win over Italy which also featured a penalty being saved (justice done – it should never have been given, although in fairness this was the only bad decision of the day) but this came too late to be of much value. In one of the final pair of matches (matches were played two at a time at this stage, side by side) Spain beat the unfortunate Italy 5-0 to confirm their position as league winners. They would face Holland in the final, while England secured the bronze medals.
Everyone taking part in the tournament.
THE FINAL
This was an excellent game, with possession fairly evenly balanced between the teams. The trouble for Spain was that Holland did more with their possession – while the Holland goalkeeper was never seriously tested Holland scored twice. Thus the final score was Holland 2 Spain 0. Spain as league winners collected the gold medals, while Holland became the first holders of the Autism Awareness Cup and collected silver medals for coming second in the league.
THE PRESENTATIONS
The cup and medals were presented shortly afterwards, out on the field. Congratulations to Holland for winning the cup and to Spain for winning the league element. Congratulations also to Helen Van Riel for assembling the Holland squad. Finally of course, massive congratulations to Grant Cotton for organising the event.
The Spain team with their gold medals.The Holland squad (having eight players at their disposal enabled a bit of rotation).
Welcome to my fourth post about Marxism 2016 (see here, hereand here), focussing on Sunday. Like the previous post, this one will be formatted slightly differently from my usual Marxism posts, again because I wish to focus on two particular meetings.
GETTING THERE AND THE DAY’S PLAN
It being Sunday I was even more generous than usual in allowing for transport problems. In keeping with Sutcliffe’s Second Law of Travelling by Public Transport I therefore had my best journey of the week.
A sculpture outside Euston station.
A neoclassical folly, Euston Road
To help explain both my schedule for the day and the rest of this post here is the timetable for Sunday, with my choices marked…
What I am going to do now is write briefly about meetings 1,2 and 5 before covering the two disability meetings in a bit more detail.
MEETINGS 1, 2 AND 5
My first meeting, Kate Hurford on White supremacy and the creation of “race” – where does racism come from? took place in Clarke Hall, which is on level three of the institute. The speaker was not well but still managed to deliver a very good introduction after which there was a lively debate.
For the second meeting I had chosen Shahrar Ali on How left is green politics? Although I am grateful that both he and Natalie Bennett were speaking at this event, and regret that a timetable clash prevented me from hearing Natalie speak I felt that there were important questions not dealt with, such as the roles of greens in office in various parts of the world (like the Aussie green party doing deals with the Liberal National Party, that country’s equivalent of the Tories). However, this caveat aside I enjoyed this meeting, and have no regrets about attending.
I will be covering meetings 3 and 4 in the next section. Meeting 5, for which I had chosen religion was an interesting meeting.
Kate Hurford and the chair just before the start of their meeting
Shahrar Ali and the chair of his meeting.Anna Gluckstein (right as you look) and the chair of her meeting on religion.
TWO MEETINGS ABOUT DISABILITY
Both of these two meetings, the first a panel meeting and the second the official launch of Roddy Slorach’s book “A Very Capitalist Condition” were excellent and in their different ways inspiring.
The first meeting started with a number of speakers talking about what they are doing, and about various campaigns before then being opened up for discussion.
Roddy’s meeting (we have previously shared a platform at a public meeting in Norwich) began with him introducing ideas that are contained within his book, which I have since read and enjoyed.
I suffered a double frustration because I had carefully planned contributions for both meetings (there are as yet no meetings at Marxism focussing specifically on autism, although this year the Silberman book was on display – if anyone involved in the organisation the event is reading this please take this as a hint) and did not get to make either although I indicated clearly on both occasions.
AN OUTLINE OF THE UNMADE CONTRIBUTIONS
I had planned two different but linked contributions, each tailored to the specific meeting in question. For the first meeting, which focussed exclusively on campaigns My contribution would have covered the following:
A full introduction mentioning my role at NAS West Norfolk and the fact that I am #actuallyautistic and giving details of this blog
A skate through some of NAS West Norfolk’s activities including a brief mention of the Positive Autism Awareness Conference and the upcoming launch of adult activities and the inaugural Autism Awareness Cup.
Finishing with an account of the campaign around the Fermoy unit and our role in it, emphasisng that the Fermoy remains open.
For Roddy’s meeting I would again have given a full introduction before going on to cover:
The envisaged but not yet fully realized sequence of: Awareness – Understanding – Acceptance.
Emphasised that autism is a condition not a disorder – it is not a malfunctiion, it is a different operating system .
Might have produced the line ‘nothing about us without us’
Planned to finish by emphasising that different is not a synonym for lesser.
I finish this section by re-emphasising that these were two excellent meetings.
THE LAST EVENING
I stayed fairly late after the end of the final meeting, and was delighted to make the acquaintance of several people involved in disability activism during this period.
Official posters for three important NAS West Norfolk events, with some accompanying text.
INTRODUCTION
This is a ‘pure autism’ post, prompted by me receiving an email containing official posters for three of NAS West Norfolk’s upcoming events.
EVENT 1: OFFICIAL LAUNCH OF ADULT ACTIVITIES
Like many other NAS branches West Norfolk was originally set up by parents of autistic children, and it was only with the arrival on the scene of two autistic adults that the branch started thinking about adult activities. In an effort to take things beyond the thinking stage we have organised an official launch, the poster for which I reproduce below (with apologies for its small size – it is as big as I could make it without iy being blurry):
EVENT 2: AN INFORMAL COFFEE MORNING
Unfortunately I will be otherwise engaged for this one as it clashes with an auction at which my attendance is non-negotiable. Nevertheless I advertise it as an opportunity for discussion:
EVENT 3: THE AUTISM AWARENESS CUP
This will be taking place the day after the official launch of adult activities, and I have mentioned it in previous posts (here and here):
Some of the highlights from the early lots in the July auction, and a few good links.
INTRODUCTION
Although the links I shall be sharing have nothing in common with the main part of this post, which is about the start of imaging for James and Sons July auction, there are not enough of them to justify a post all to themselves, so I am tacking them on.
THURSDAY: COINS
On Thursday the imaging I was doing was all of coin lots…
Lot 60, the lowest numbered lot that I imaged on Thursday (I scanned these lots at high resolution, a number of lots at a time – scan each face, and bolt together to make the main image……while keeping the individual images to enable viewers to see them in closer focus.
These ‘cartwheel pennies’ were produced only in 1797, because it was discovered that the amount of copper in them was worth more than the face value of the coin. They were therefore removed from circulation, which had the effect of causing a coin shortage.
FRIDAY
Yesterday’s imaging was more varied, featuring a few more coin lots, toys and some militaria…
This is lot 151, and will start the militaria section – the four sets of medals that I arrnaged around the commemorative plaque were awarded to four brothers who served together.The first of five close-ups of parts of the whole.
LINKS
First of all, a link to an excellent in=depth piece about the murder of Jo Cox, written by kittysjones.
Introducing the Autsium Awareness Cup Facebook Page.
INTRODUCTION
First up, apologies to those among my readers who do not use facebook, although I do have some unrelated photos by way of compensation. Secondly, I will take this opportunity to congratulate Norfolk Country Council on being one of the local/ regional authorities to have given the disgraced legal firm Baker Small their marching orders. Some of you may recall that a few days I ago a put up a post about the inaugural Autism Awareness Cup, and this post is a brief follow-up.
So far five teams have entered, using European Championship/ World Cup themed names. I am happy report given current circumstances that no one has been tasteless enough to opt for Russia.
PHOTOGRAPHS
These windows are a feature of the building in which I am posting this – King’s Lynn Public Library
Poiinters to three posts I found today, some photographs and an important local vote.
INTRODUCTION
This post will share some stuff I have recently been impressed by, and showcase some of my phographs, but it starts with a request…
VOTE NAS WEST NORFOLK FOR SAINSBURY’S LOCAL CHARITY OF THE YEAR 2016
This is for people based in or close to King’s Lynn. We are on of the nominees for the King’s Lynn town centre store. Look up Sainsbury’s Charity of the Year on the web, make sure that you are looking at the nominees for the King’s Lynn town centre store and vote for NAS West Norfolk. Results qwill be announced on July 11th (potentially making three successive huge days for us – official launch of adult events on July 9th, Autism Awareness Cup on July 10th and the final result of this vote on July 11th).
A TREMENDOUS TRIO FROM THE WEB
My first link is to a piece on the EU Referendum on Vox Political, which makes use of two The Sun front pages, one from today and one from 1989 to make its point. In the original piece, which can be viewed here, the two front pages are one above the other, but I present them here side by side, with today’s on the left as you look at it:
My second offering is also in the same theme – a rather more detailed analysis of why we should be voting to remain in nine days time, courtesy of anewnatureblog.
My this and final offering in this section comes from atheist republic, and is a highly amusing counter to arguments of the “Pascal’s Wager” type. To read this piece click here.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Herring Gull mugshot – this one may be guilty of the heinous crime of killing a duckling (at least one of King’s Lynn’s herring gulls is)
Anna recently put up a post with a snail as its centrepiece.
An introduction to the Autism Awareness Cup, a couple of important links (please follow up on both), and a classic infographic with a link to the original post in which I found it.
INTRODUCTION
This post is about an event that has been organised by a young man named Grant Cotton as a fund-raising autism awareness event. I have also included one of the finest autism related infographics I have yet come across.
A SIX A SIDE FOOTBALL TOURNAMENT IN KING’S LYNN
The tournament will take place on July 10th, using the artificial pitch at Lynnsport, 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometres) from the centre of King’s Lynn, and each team will have the name of a country (England, Holland and the Republic of Ireland have all been bagged already). Reproduced below is Grant Cotton’s poster for the event, which can be seen in its original setting by clicking here:
A COUPLE OF IMPORTANT LINKS
My first link, courtesy of my friends at DPAC, is to details of a court case which will impact on the enforcement of the law regarding wheelchair bays on buses (this law is not open to misinterpretation – it states clearly that if a wheelchair bay is not in use the driver has discretion to allow a non-wheelchair user to use it, but the needs of wheelchair users come first – a non-wheelchair user in a wheelchair bay is legally obliged to move for a wheelchair user). I urge anyone who lives in London or who can travel there on Wednesday to be at the court to make our presence felt. I have already shared this story on facebook and twitter and pressed a link on my London transport themed website www.londontu.be.
My other link comes courtesy of NAS, and concerns a new Too Much Information film which will be showing at various shopping centres over the next few months. Of reasonably local interest are the showings that will be happening at Chapelfield, Norwich on August 27 and 28.
A GREAT INFOGRAPHIC
I spotted this on blondemomsense this morning and had to include it. The original blog post from which I extracted it can be viewed here:
The creation of my friend and fellow NAS West Norfolk committee member Callum Brazzo, Spergy is online resource created specifically for the use of autistic people. I urge you to visit it using the link below and register asap, as I have:
aspiblog 