Minnie’s Musings

She would kill me if she finds out I am posting this… but Whizz Kid has been outed. Hurrah!

No, not that kind of ‘outed’.

Her new work colleagues have discovered that she is really good at Maths. She can do sums in her head at lightning speed. Well perhaps not lighting. But bloody quick.

Which reminds me that she doesn’t do them in her head. She does them in a cloud above her head. Like a cartoon think cloud.

A friend observed this when she was in Year One. Whizz Kid gazes towards the heavens and does the sum as though she is writing on a whiteboard. It’s amazing to watch.

As an advocate of positive attitudes towards Maths I like to celebrate anyone who finds a way to do it. I frequently tell my students that counting on your fingers is fine. Who cares?!

Mini Me used to duck under the dining room table to count on her fingers and then pop back up again to jot down the answer. She eventually progressed to doing the arithmetic in her head and got herself a top grade.

His Nibs was an adherent to the rules of Maths. Well, sort of. His teacher taught him to add using fruit loops. If he added the sum correctly he got to eat them.

Then they started on subtraction.

Having the literal bent that those with autism are known for, he decided that if the Maths needed to work for him it needed adjusting. So he changed all the subtraction signs to addition and ate the fruit loops.

Back to Whizz Kid. She is now cursing that her secret is out. Everyone in the office is now asking her to check their figures. Am very proud.

FFS That idiot is going to cause the deaths and disablement of children with his unfounded claims relating to paracetamol and regurgitation of unfounded claims about vaccines.

More damage can be done to a foetus by a fever that can be brought under control by paracetamol than by a pain killer that we regularly dose our teething babies with (Calpol, wonderful stuff).

Because we have vaccines infant mortality due to measles has fallen from our collective memory.

Because we have vaccines male infertility due to mumps has disappeared.

Because we have vaccines pregnant women and their unborn children are protected from rubella.

And now thousands of women all over America (and perhaps the World) have yet another thing to worry about (on top of every glass of wine consumed before the thin blue line appeared).

When friends with children on the spectrum have looked back on their pregnancies not one of us have a similar story. And some have no story. Because nothing was consumed or done or happened during the whole nine months that clearly points to potential damage.

Autism happens. It is on the rise because the definition has broadened to absorb a vast variety of previously differentiated conditions and the label at the high functioning end has changed. End of.

If there is a crisis it is one of funding. Because there isn’t enough in the system here or across The Pond to create schools which can afford the smaller classes, more in-depth training and specialist resources to support young people who are square pegs rather than uniform, rounded models that produce straight As and sports trophies. They have always been there, their parents are simply more aware of what will help them get through the education mill and are prepared to fight for it.

Before I got waylaid by fond memories of a sunny stroll… was I wonder whom Donald Trump heard using the phrase, “I am very disappointed in…”. Perhaps his much lauded mother in her Hebridean brogue.

Speaking of familiar phrases. I am now never going to say “Yum, yum” again, thanks to the Dark Prince. Yucky, yucky, yucky.

And I have literally just had an epiphany – no, really, in the last 10 seconds.

Having spent part of our train ride listening to America’s and hearing the ever delightful Sarah Smith and Marianna Thingummy joking about discussing the fashion choices of Melanie and Kate, I was initially “so disappointed “. Haven’t we spent decades wanting to be recognised for our brains not our choice of shirt-waister?

But now I think, “why not? “. Why not discuss frocks and hats. It’s what we women do, frequently. We collectively spend millions on fashion and there is a special place in many a woman’s heart for that expedition where you go and buy a frock and a hat with heals to match in the certain knowledge that you are highly unlikely to wear it more than once, twice at a push.

It is so good to hear two women secure and confident enough in their hard one positions to express this interest in frocks and hats knowing that the only people who will slate them for such girlie chatter are people who merely aspire to their achievements. Without the talent or drive to emulate them.

Hmmmm… DT considers his trip to WC an upgrade on merely being a guest at BP. He is the only POTUS to receive this honour.

So, he is hemmed in by a medieval castle in a very large and very secure field outside the M25 i.e. not in the capital itself, heaven forbid.

No joyous procession up the Mall amidst cheering crowds, no address to Parliament (the mother of which is just down the river), no opportunity to freewheel a press conference at a full scale formal dinner, white ties and all, to which the strictest of strict protocols apply.

He has been flattered to deceive himself. Good-o. Cementing 10% tariffs in place rather than 25%, 50%.

And he is likely to have applied his notoriously agile ability to edit and rewrite events in his head or he completely failed to pick up the gentle reprimand on the environment subtly delivered by KC.

Gotta love the Royals. They did their duty 10-fold yesterday .

As did that horse.

So, I am musing on the prospect of State Visit No. 3. What could possibly be a suitable upgrade from WC. The Tower?

More and more I read and hear admired figures from public life (politicians, academics, commentators etc) bemoaning the state of discourse as more and more people declare themselves offended, are offended, cause unintentional offence, cause deliberate offence and so on, and on, and on.

It is a thorny issue; some genuinely held opinions are offensive in general or offensive to particular groups or persons. The degree of offense caused can be profound, trivial or somewhere in between. Context including the offender, offendee, time, place and tone is everything. The taking out of context is naughty.

However, listening to Radio 4 this morning I was struck by an item on freedom of speech on university campuses, the hoohah that happened at Sussex and problematic demonstrations in support of Palestine elsewhere.

What I found interesting that the office for universities or whatever it is called, said an important element was not what was said but how it was said.

This immediately brought to mind a central tenant of teaching: call out the behaviour not the child. In practical terms, if a student chucks a rubber across the room and it hits another student in the eye, you would say at worst, “That was a stupid thing to do.” (though silly is a better way of putting it. What you try to avoid is, “You stupid idiot. Look what you have done. You almost took her eye out.”

Nuance, tone, choice of words; use language and voice effectively.

According to the FB algorithm. I do love a baby elephant. But baby tigers are soooooo cute..

FB also knows I like monologues by middle aged people having a grumble. Frankly we’ve earned it.

I also get a lot of The Daily Show which I love but gives me the impression that all Americans hold Trump et al in complete contempt.

I also catch the odd TED Talk which lets me feel enlightened. Alongside the copious quantities posts rectifying the anonymity of the many, many women who have contributed to history and are only just being acknowledged.

Insomnia means I am watching a Jimmy McGovern piece in which Sean Bean is in drag. And Stephen Graham is about to trundle into bed with him. I think he is about to be murdered.

On which note I would like to segue way into saying how chuffed I am that Graham and his junior side kick have swept the boards at the Emmy’s. ‘Adolescence’ was and is an important piece of work. Like that Post Office thing with Toby what’s it.

They are currently having a bit of a tiff. And then Beany Babes goes back to quoting Tennyson to teenagers. Which I like because we did him for A’level. and my great, great aunt Chrissie was Tennyson’s companion, apparently. One of those ladies who went along to dinners and soirées so he could pretend he wasn’t a homosexual. An interesting pastime for a minister’s daughter.

I wonder if I have the number of ‘greats’ right.
Suspect I might drop off before I decide if he did it. Sean that is.

It’s a pity he looks like he’s going to bump off Stevie. I like Stevie. But I can’t claim that I saw him in a bar on Muswell Hill Broadway.

Love a claim to fame.

Of course the minute after pressing Publish I open up FB and find a post from a friend by an African- American professor outlining the plethora of issues this young man had waded into, with the vicious intent of shutting down all forms of progressive dissent.

It is a powerful diatribe filled with anger. And it made me a tad uncomfortable.

Would my blog lead some to believe that I liked this man, that I agreed with his politics, was a highly secretive white suprematist who would cheerfully undo the life changing and courageous choices of young people I care about? Far from it.

So if you are outraged by the previous post, refer yourself to the title. ‘Conflicted’. Because my response – my gut reaction – on first hearing the news bulletin was sadness. I just hope I feel the same degree of sadness when another young man is killed on our streets or young woman follows a romantic notion to a life of servitude and death in childbirth.