Note For Anyone Writing About Me

Guide to Writing About Me

I am an Autistic person,not a person with autism. I am also not Aspergers. The diagnosis isn't even in the DSM anymore, and yes, I agree with the consolidation of all autistic spectrum stuff under one umbrella. I have other issues with the DSM.

I don't like Autism Speaks. I'm Disabled, not differently abled, and I am an Autistic activist. Self-advocate is true, but incomplete.

Citing My Posts

MLA: Zisk, Alyssa Hillary. "Post Title." Yes, That Too. Day Month Year of post. Web. Day Month Year of retrieval.

APA: Zisk, A. H. (Year Month Day of post.) Post Title. [Web log post]. Retrieved from http://yesthattoo.blogspot.com/post-specific-URL.

Thursday, February 18, 2016

Artistically Preparing for April

April is autism all the things month, essentially. And the biggest organization around (Autism Speaks, please shush now because you suck in many, many ways) chose blue as their color because blue is for boys. No, really, that's why they chose blue. They do an event called Light It Up Blue each April, on April 2, which is World Autism Awareness Day because they went and arranged for it to be that day.

There are counter-events. There is Tone it Down Taupe, which comes from a friend of mine. They even managed to give a tablet or two to autistic people who needed them last year. I personally tend to go for wearing orange because that's as far from blue as I can get. Then there is Walk in Red.

I have no illusion that any of the counter-events raise awareness or anything of the sort, though Tone it Down Taupe has accomplished actual stuff in terms of giving away a tablet or two. I think it was two. However, it makes me feel better knowing that I'm as far away from the nonsense of light it up blue as possible, so I wear orange anyways. Or orange and red, as the case may be.

That's why I made the design I call Autumn on my Spoonflower! It's red and red-brown and orange and yellow-orange, all of which are far from blue and resemble counter-event colors. Then I bought some of it with which to make a new skirt. (This is actually my second home-made orange for April item, or it will be when it's done.) I also made the fabric available publicly for sale in case anyone else wants to be crafty, be anti-LIUB, and support an Autistic artist all at once.

Picture of my autumn fabric on the floor of my office, with scissors at the upper left and scraps to the lower right.


Monday, February 15, 2016

Many things going on (vote for me!)

The first thing going on is I made an account on spoonflower, which is an Indy fabric design site, and I entered a design of mine in their weekly contest. My design is called Lace, and my username is alyhillary.
Geometric lace pattern in pastel green, peach, and tan
Voting is on the community pages, herehttp://www.spoonflower.com/contests/340

You do need to have an account on spoonflower in order to vote in the weekly contests, and when you vote, you do have the option to favorite designs at the same time. The votes are the green checkboxes at the top left of the designs, while the favorites are the red hearts. (Obviously, I appreciate both/either of votes and favorites.)

I also ordered some fabric for my own use, which is largely going to mean skirts. Since the knit fabrics are pretty wide, I can make a long skirt with pockets out of one yard. Fairly high on my design list is making a nice pattern in red, orange, and taupe, since those are the colors I've seen used by counter-events to light it up blue. Why choose only one counter-event when I can choose them all?

So that's thing the most recent that's been going on. I've also been working on applications to doctorate programs, where I want to mix my engineering and math background with my disability activism and disability studies interests. What I think that means is funky approaches to disability-friendly design. I'm not accepted anywhere yet but I made the interview stage for MIT, which is super exciting.

And of course, I'm still a masters student and TA in a department where TA means I teach a class. That means I take two math classes myself, and I'm teaching a section of intro to college algebra this semester as well. Then I'm taking multicultural psychology online because I think it's interesting. Maybe I'll even start posting more regularly by way of sticking my writing for that class on here.