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Wednesday 31 May 2017

Historical Marseilles



                                                      BRITANNICA



                                                                   



                                                           

Monday 29 May 2017

HISTORICAL MAPS OF EDINBURGH




                                                                                 



                                                     BROWSE BY CATEGORY  (1560-1928)


                                                                                   
                                                                           



                                                        HISTORIC MAP OF EDINBURGH



                                                           FIND BY PLACE

Wednesday 24 May 2017

KNIGHT OF THE HOSPICE AT SOUTRA (EXCERPT)


                                       






                                       
I have completed 40,000 words of this novel, with help from Jonathan Stone and the Scottish Poets James L.S. Carter and Scott F.  Here is a draft excerpt.



                                             CHAPTER 1: TRIANGLE OF LOVE

I am Vanessa, the White Witch of the Esk Burn and a reader of minds for Catherine, the All-Seeing Eye, who resides with Fortuna, the Roman Goddess of Chance and Fortune, on the Star of Vespasia. The Etruscan witches of Lothian originate from Cramond, and their European forbears pre-dated the Roman republic. They worship nature, and collect herbs and spices to cure the animals, the birds, and the people. Many Christians persecute us and say bad things about us, because they want to control mankind while abusing nature.
I bring you a comic tragedy of a saga which focuses on the Christian knight, Sir Richard de Liddell. It is about the kaleidoscope of enigmatic souls who entered hither and wither into the contrasting phases of Richard's life, which move wither and hither between the high ground and the deep depths, and about the manner in which his fortunes were affected by divinely inspired chance in ways that will make your hair bristle in horrence.
Beware, ye citizens of the future, of a dire warning from the Vates themselves! Do not feel tempted to visit the scant remains of the House on the Holy Trinity on Scotland's Soutra Hill under any circumstances. Why not? Because the black eschar dust which causes the dreaded sheep's sweat is still mixed in the soil. The black eschar dust which killed so many patients in the great medical hospitals on the Soutra remains there until eternity. waiting to destroy any poor soul who might besmirch his hands with it.

Sir Richard De Liddell adored his wife the Lady Ingibiorg who he met outside St Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall on Orkney in 1430. Ever since that first stroll around the ancient stones of the Ring of Brodgar, he'd adored the way she walked, the way she talked, and the way she stalked through the gardens of Hungus House hunting the mice, grass-snakes and ferrets.

Sir Richard cherished his squire Cedric de Porthos who he met while on a tour of duty of
Gascony in 1435. He cherished the way he rode, the way he strode, and the way he recited rich ballads from his childhood in the Pyrenees.
Lady Ingibiorg loved her husband Sir Richard for his manliness, his prowess, and his dedication to the Scottish realm. She cherished Cedric for his impertinence, his dedication to his friendships, and the way he leapt feet-first off his pony Augustus onto her doorstep.
Cedric loved Lady Ingibiorg for her kindness, her beauty, and her willingness to cook cakes and dainty pastries to tempt his palate and his mind. He adored Sir Richard for everything he was.
Such was their Scottish-Orcadian-Aquitanian triangle of love, a love which transcended all human desire, a love of which all the ancient gods, whether Greek, Roman or Viking, would have been envious.
During the Summer of 1436, the passions became more intense, and the Roman goddesses banqueted on their gilded couches and held their breathe. 
'Twas during the early hours of St. Achilleus's Day during September 1436 that Sir Richard set off southwards astride his battle horse Xanthos for the evocative slopes of the Soutra Hill, from his higgledy-piggledy, curiously designed house on Queen Maud Walk in fair Embro. Sir Richard was accompanied by his French squire Cedric de Porthos who was riding his new pony Augustus with the eagerness of precocious youth.
At age twenty-six, sandy-haired Richard was now becoming a touch more brawny and thickset, but he well remembered the Halcyon days when he was as lithe and clean-limbed as black-haired Cedric. Richard was such a prankster in those days. He once spent a night in the Canongate Tollbooth, after decking Squire Mackay's clothes line with petticoats and pretty knickers. This caused an almighty radge between the worthy squire and his wife, and a riot among the ladies in the street.

CASTLE DE ROUEN

                                                                         

Castle de Rouen, Constructed by Philip le Magnifique during early 13th Century after he conquered Normandy, from the grasps of King John




Tour Jeanne d'Arc[edit]

Formerly known as the castle's donjon or "Grosse Tour", this tower is part of Philip's 1204 phase. It housed one of the sessions of Joan of Arc's trial le 9 mai 1431, one in which she was shown the instruments of torture, to which she replied "Truly, if you have to pull my members and my soul from my body, I shall say nothing else; and if I say something to you, I would always say to you afterwards that you made me say it by force.".[1] She was not imprisoned here but in the now-lost Tour de la Pucelle, whose foundations may be seen at 102 rue Jeanne d'Arc. The pointed roof was added in restoration works beginning in the 1870s. During the Second World War the tower was camouflaged and turned into a bunker by the occupying German forces. It is now open to the public.


                                                                            

Tuesday 23 May 2017

IN DEFENSIVE OF NEURODIVERSITY (UPDATED)






                                                 IN DEFENCE OF NEURODIVERSITY
                                         


I understand that autism diagnoses may be reduced under an NHS plan. This fuels my fears that 'conditions' on the spectrum may yet again be airbrushed and swept under the carpet..

      SEE ALSO: WERE PEOPLE WITH A.D.D, VICTIMS OF A HISTORICAL PLOT?
                   

Greumach MacFothaidh By the same token when I was on the government working party to revise the Mental Health Scotland legislation there was a political decision to delete drug and alcohol problems from mental health and label them anew as social problems, thus saving a lot of NHS money and burdening LAs with the problems.


                         SCATTERED MINDS: INTO THE INTERIOR OF A.D.D. (Dr Gabor Mate)



To cap that, my mental health campaigns no longer run parallel to those of the Drop the Disorder Facebook group organizers which I believe to be too narrowly focused to the point that many of the concerns affecting those of us who are neurodiverse and genuinely 'on the spectrum' could even be swept under the carpet. It is important for all of us to be encouraged by the professionals to seek appropriate holistic treatments regarding our neuro-physical symptoms. Be careful to check that your medical advisors know more than diddly.Some psychotherapists and neurologists don't. Your comments please!

   IST, JUNE 2017, I SUSPECT THAT THE DTD ORGANIZERS MAY, ALBEIT UNWITTINGLY, BE CONTRIBUTING TO AN N.H.S. AGENDA AIMED AT RADICALLY REDUCING THE SERVICES PROVIDED TO PEOPLE WITH MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES IN GENERAL AND PEOPLE ON THE SPECTRUM IN PARTICULAR--------


  3rd, June 2017: My most popular blog read. It seems to be making lots of impact around the world. Contains some critically important messages e.g. for the Tory government, the Drop the Disorder Facebook group, and anybody who is working in combination, I defy the bullies on behalf of neuro-diverse people everywhere and call them to answer to their fallacies.




                                      EARLIER:       From my group Facebook Page
            MY OPINIONS ABOUT THE DROP THE DISORDER (DTD) FACEBOOK GROUP,

       (WHY DON'T YOU RESPOND TO MY OPINIONS BY A COMMENT TO THIS BLOG POST, GUYS, RATHER THAN TRYING TO BULLY ME WHEN I CIRCULATE THEM ON FACEBOOK?)
I have felt much more supportive of this group since the organizers clarified to the effect that they are opposed to treatment by toxic psych meds, But I  disagree that BPD is a description of effective normal behaviour, I agree that neither schizophrenia nor bipolar disorder are properly definable in any medical or scientific sense, though many of the symptoms including the symptoms of psychosis are very real, I however think that many people associated with DTD have naive attitudes towards conditions on the spectrum (I do not regard these as disorders but rather as expressions of different normalities)
For example many people genuinely suffer from symptoms which are regarded by many consultants as describable in combination as Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD).The totality of such symptoms include but are not limited to (1) all of the neuro-physical symptoms of dyspraxia (2) A propensity to think in the subconscious, (at times brilliantly) while remaining effectively blank in the conscious (3) repeatedly blurting and tangentialising during conversation (4) All of the attention deficit symptoms first observed by Sir William Crichton during the late eighteenth century (5) Thinking backwards (6) taking a while to sort out thoughts and perceptions in a rational manner (7) experience severe difficulties looking after themselves and their living space, I personally suffer from all of these symptoms, By remaining supportive of crass statements like 'ADHD is BS', the organisers of DTD demean the suffering of the many thousands of people who experience some subset of these symptoms and face bullying and rejection from Society because of them.
As I have always emphasised and campaigned about, millions of children and elderly people have been falsely diagnosed with ADHD and made to suffer from the terrible side effects of medications like ritalin and adderall. It is however essential to distinguish between this issue and the previous issue i.e. that many people genuinely experience a bundle of these symptoms. I think that the organisers of DTD have failed to distinguish between these issues. While I agree that many mental health symptoms are explainable by previous trauma, I do not believe that this is always true for 'people on the spectrum' e.g. people who have been categorized by consultants as 'suffering from ADD. Autism. Dyspraxia, or Aspergers', I call upon the organisers and members of DTD to consider these issues much more carefully before encouraging everybody to jump to false conclusions,
Two leading leading psychologists in the DTD group (Jo and Lucy) have intimated to me they have little experience and knowledge relating to people on the spectrum, That it all very well, but it means that they shouldn't be advocating treatments for patients who might be more neuro-diverse than experiencing a trauma-related condition, and they shouldn't be campaigning for a myriad of changes in mental health care without taking these compelling issues into proper account.



The DTD group organizers declined to post an item I shared with them on the basic history of ADD since the eighteenth century, and one of the organizers has since apparently tried to bully me as a sufferer from ADD with an insightful viewpoint,

Mr, Sidley. I have been among the first people to campaign against the misdiagnosis and maltreatment of people with ADHD, As far as your strange second point is concerned: if you are considering a pool of inpatients then some will often be on the spectrum, If you follow the approach advocated by Lucy Johnstone in Edinburgh then some of their conditions may well be overlooked, Therefore all the conditions and symptoms have to be considered and DTD cannot sidestep some of them. I will continue my non-parallel campaign on my Mental Health Discussions Edinburgh Facebook page and only occasionally comment on this page because of the narrow and politically motivated approach which you are suggesting

Here are some further comments from Mental Health Discussions Edinburgh:



Clayton James Johnson Unfortunately, the two extremes will probably always exist, including among the trickle down/ satellite industries (ie social services etc). The one extreme advocates that everyone on the spectrum should be medicated (they believe it worked for them or someone in their family). The other extreme denies that the spectrum exists. These are like two flip sides of a coin in the stigmatization of people with disabilities.

Reply
1
13 hrs

Thomas Leonard I'm beginning to see this very clearly, Clayton, We're either swept under the carpet or obliterated by toxic psych meds, I've been lucky to survive the twain

Samantha Hugger Hmmmm well this is a conundrum. Do you know what the current statistics of children diagnosed with ADHD is Thomas Leonard?

Reply36 mins
Thomas Leonard No Samantha, but I am sure that many of them are falsely diagnosed because of their hyperactivity. However those who are correctly diagnosed because of their attention defectiveness and so on should receive social recognition of their condition together with appropriate holistic care and advice, I know of two or three children like that

Reply
1
32 mins
Samantha Hugger Yes of course but the conundrum is the dsm and even other diagnosic test can easily get the diagnosis wrong leading to over diagnosis and improper treatment. I guess the answer lays with 6 months to a year of occupational assessment and therapy to rea...See More

Reply6 mins
Samantha Hugger I say OT for 6month to a year because it could actually aid a child what ever the causation instead of being falsely put on medications

Reply4 mins
Thomas Leonard Of course, I would. Samantha. I don't like the DSM at all, A leading Scottish neuro-psychiatrist discussed the list of symptoms I describe in my post, and made the (tentative) diagnosis based upon his professional experience, I'm not into brain scans either

Reply
1
2 mins
Samantha Hugger Yes so if champaigning is being done I think long OT assessments and treatment for up to a year before a child can be giving a script would be the write direction to go in.

ReplyJust now
Thomas Leonard Yes indeed, a child I know of was able to handle his symptoms within two or three years after appropriate guidance from his foster parents

ReplyJust now
Thomas Leonard You're totally on the ball Samantha Hugger

ReplyJust now

Samantha Hugger Yes this is right, enviroment plays an important role as does the parent, guardian, carer, mentor, or professionals skill set

ReplyJust now




Clayton James Johnson More broadly, you seem to be moving in a direction of firmly acknowledging the existence of spectrum disorders, while also recognizing the role of what some broadly term "differential diagnosis" (eg emphasizing that some people find alternatives to bio medical treatments, such as cognitive therapy, psychotherapy etc.). At the same time, I've seen you affirm the interpretation that neuropsychology needs further studies and evidence before it can be considered as "proven normative." In that light, you might find a home in the Adlerian Community, based on the psychology of Alfred Adler. There are also some related Facebook pages. Carl Jung is also very good, but is not accurately reflected in much of the pop psychology that uses his name to try and gain credence. In actuality, Jung's central emphasis was individuation, resembling other humanist modalities such as those of Alfred Adler and Viktor Frankl. Carroll Ray Thomas. This may be of interest.