What I reckon is...

Building an Apple App used to cost a fortune – usually via an Elance contractor in India, the Ukraine or China. I did one this way, called iSmashit, and I haven’t got my investment back yet!    Apple ? Then I had a crack at doing it myself: I already had an AppStore account (courtesy of iSmashit ) and so I got an Apple Developer Licence and downloaded Xcode onto to my Apple (you need Lion OS for it by the way). I made pretty good progress, largely due to the excellent courses at Lynda.com. But I still ain’t no Angry Birds builder! Bloggers with vastly more experience than me, such as JohnChow (in my view, simply the best), have recently recommended app building programmes such as bloapp , which create customised apps for bloggers. But now we can go the whole nine yards and build fully-fledged Apple Apps for ourselves, thereby adding to Apple’s existing half million live apps! You could use Conduit - basic but effective. You can do the same thing with M

The delights of being a parent of someone with Aspergers Syndrome – an “Aspie” - are poorly documented. Difficult to believe I know – but let me try and outline some of them for you. I have argued with my son, Richard, who has Asperger’s Syndrome, since he first learned to speak and my debating skills are now honed to the level of a divorce barrister. Nobody betters me, I don’t give up - and it can all be attributed to Richard’s verbal persistence.  Me and Richard He can – and does! – argue till the cows come home, in fact, until they’re well inside the cowshed. He is unencumbered by distractions like, well, logic for instance and, as I am sure many readers could verify, is totally immune to emotional blackmail. A tearful response merely elicits the quiet question, ‘Why are you upset?’ So, I can now argue well! I am also the most patient person you can imagine – at least those of you without experience in these matters can imagine. The prophet Job could l

Yesterday I took my elderly mother for a hospital appointment. All went smoothly but the day started to fall apart on the way home. Despite my mother suffering from quite severe Alzheimers she was able to describe in graphic detail the personal nature of the invasive examination she had undergone. My appetite for the lunch I had promised to treat her to began to disappear. However, not wishing to disappoint her, we went to her favourite café. This local café – I will not reveal any more about it – is the epicentre of village life for the elderly (and pretty much most of the village’s population is very elderly). It’s where they eat, reminisce, whinge, and drink tea. The cafe owner is doing very well! However, the essence of my story takes place around a table in the café, where six of us were having lunch – including my mother and myself. I did not know the other four but they were obviously elderly mother and daughter, and elderly father and son. For no re