Black Holes and Revelations

A final explanation on what the hell is wrong with me.

So another year over, and a new one just begun. I feel like I should say something profound…

Ahem, Quomodo cogis comas tuas sic videri?

There we go.

The play test of Plyin’ the Black yesterday went really well. Matt was working and couldn’t make it, so it was just the three of us (myself, Ryan and Fabian). We played two games, and it all worked remarkably well – much better than I anticipated. We turned up a number of problems that needed to be patched mid-game (mostly that the Reaver attacks were way too easy to fight off, and you could trick out your ship way too much) but basically it’s just a matter of tweaking a few numbers and she’ll fly true.

Definitely the highlight of the session was Tranquility‘s daring flight through Reaver space to Miranda which earned Captain Connor enough Credits to win the second game. Plagued by multiple raiding parties, equipment break downs and (inexplicably) an Alliance patrol he still managed to complete the job and go to the rescue of some fellow space farers along the way. For this effort I officialy dub him “Fear No Reaver” Connor, Hero of the Rim (#Ryan, Ryan the man they call Ryan…#) 😀

After the game we went out for food, watched the last sunset of 2006 over the ocean, dabbled with calendar reform, and watched Firefly until midnight, which we (ie: Ryan, although with forward notice I would have joined in) celebrated by yelling “The Gregorian Calendar Sucks!” into the night sky (that calendar reform thing again).

So a pretty good New Years I think.

So onto resolutions.

For many years I’ve maintained that I’ve been keeping a New Years Resolution from years back – to never make another New Years Resolution. Well, this year I’ve broken it and made a few.

The most significant is something I’ve been meaning to do for a while, I just haven’t had the guts frankly. But I’ve decided to start the new year on a new foot and so forth and get it done with.

You see there’s a fact about me that I’ve been keeping to myself, one that explains virtually everything about me. Why I go my own way, why I act so weird so much of the time, why I’m good with computers and trivia, why I pretty much wear the same outfit every day, why I’ve been single for virtually my entire life (and partially why the one relationship I’ve had didn’t work out), why I hate Indian food, and why I can give you an instant three hour lecture on the history of Middle Earth, where you ever crazy enough to ask for such a thing. And the answer is that (as I discovered in late 2001) I have a neurological condition called Aspergers Syndrome.

I figured this out after stumbling across a website describing the condition. I read the article and was totally blown away because it basically described every single thing that I knew made me different to everyone else (I’d always known I was different, I just didn’t know why). I then got a referral to a clinical psychologist specialising in autistic spectrum disorders (yes, it’s a form of autism qantasnevercrashedqantasnevercrashed ahem sorry) and got the diagnosis confirmed. I am an Aspie.

I haven’t told anyone before now (with the exception of the parents, and Purdey – the girl I was seeing for a bit for those of you with short memories, I figured she should know what she was getting into) because, well I guess it’s like any major personal revelation. You worry that people will get freaked out, or turn against you or treat you differently. Admitting to a neurological disorder (oh wow, the autistic culture people are going to come down on me so hard for that 😉 probably isn’t quite as earthshaking as some revelations, but it still has major freak out potential. Mental illness (not that it’s a mental illness, but it’s kind of in the same conceptual area as mental illness) has major stigma attached to it, and you don’t know how people will react. But I figure I owe it to my friends and family to actually know the real me – not that I’m suddenly any different than I was yesterday, but you know what I mean.

(Oh, and since I’m almost 31 without ever having had any kind of committed relationship I thought I should do something to clear up idle speculation about my sexuality – c’mon I know there was idle speculation 😉

So yeah. Now you all know what the hell’s wrong with different about me (I’m going to go into hiding from the AFF Commandos now 😉

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