My Brother Nicky

The Autism Chronicles Week 3

Hey guys! This is the third week of the Autism Chronicles. I think there will be four more left after this. This week, we'll talk about my younger brother Nicky. Before I get to that, just four things I want to point out.

. I forgot to mention in the first blog, people with Autism like to organize their toys in unusual patterns. They don't play with toys the way other people do. They separate toys and put them together by shapes, size, color, etc.

. I viewed the "scary" Current Affair logo many times this week with the loud noise. I did not run away this time. I stood perfectly still.

. I had a dream, I was sitting on my grandparents' deck, watching the High Tension lines "a.k.a High T's." It didn't laugh or attack me this time. It just stood there at the side. The dream felt real. Lucky me.

. Speaking of High T's, there has been speculation that High T's could be the cause of Autism. They also say it causes cancer. It does make sense since Nicky and I lived right by the High Tension lines when we were younger. However, there are only a few Websites that explain the theory so it's not credible. And with cancer, there have been disputes explaining that High T's do not cause cancer. If High T's do cause Autism, it would be ironic since that was one of my unusual obsessions. Plus, my dreams would have symbolism that the High T's laughing at me would mean it's laughing at me because they caused me to have Autism. With all this symbolism talk, I feel like I'm a registered user from "The Sopranos" Message Boards.

Let's get to the subject.

My younger brother Nicky was diagnosed with Autism when he was 15 months old. He went to the same Elementary School I did, Bosti. In fact, he had the same teachers I did. As he got older, he was speaking a lot better. However, he has low-functioning verbal Autism. To this day, Nicky has special classes in High School. He will be there until he is 21. He is currently 17 years old.

Unusual Knowledge:

Nicky LOVES movies. He loves movies from Disney, Warner Bros, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Columbia Pictures, Tri-Star Pictures, RKO Radio Pictures but most of all, he loves movies from MGM and The Samuel Goldwyn Company. Not only does he love the movies he watches, but he can name all the actors playing the characters, the company that created the movies, the director, the year it came out, etc.

BREAKING NEWS: As I was typing this I called Nicky over to ask him if I spelled the "Samuel Goldwyn Mayor" company right. He pointed out to me that I put the "the" as part of the title and it's company not Mayor, it's company. I only listed a few movie companies at first but he read the list and told me to add the rest. Nicky: Wait! Also "Tri-Star Pictures, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, 20th Century Fox, Columbia Pictures, Tri-star Pictures...that's it."

He leaves. As I continue typing.....

Nicky: Wait! Wait! And also RKO Radio Pictures.
AJ: Got it! *Types RKO Pictures.*
Nicky: RKO-RADIO-Pictures!
AJ: Ooops! *Types RKO Radio Pictures.*

Okay back to original writing form!

I remember Nicky and I watching a film. It was called Aladdin and the Magic Lamp. We watched it back when we had it for VHS when we used to live in Long Island. We no longer have it. Nicky misses the movie more than I do. We found the theme song to it on YouTube but Nicky wants to find the whole movie in English. He's seen the movie recently on YouTube but it was in Spanish. He wants to watch it in English. I feel for him because today I had to watch the USA-Mexico soccer game in Spanish. It wasn't good for me because despite taking a couple of Spanish classes in school, I barely speak it.

Anyway, Nicky knows a lot about this movie. He misses it. Below in quotation marks, he types all the things he knows about the movie. He starts off with "I miss", and then.....

"Aladdin and the Magic Lamp 1982 Anime Toei Version starring the celebrity voices of Christopher Atkins, Kristy McNichol, John Carradine and June Lockhart. It was produced in Japan by Toei Animation Company, Ltd. and It was Distributed in USA english-speaking by The Samuel Goldwyn Company. The opening and ending music is called "Angel's Flight by Chuck Greenburg, Performed by Shadowfax. I remember watching on American Movie Classics in 1992. It was a lost United States animated film."

He typed that not me because I can never remember what he says exactly. He actually speaks that verbally too when he mentions the movie. Thanks Nicky for your help!

Unusual Talents! Nicky is a great artist. He can draw. He loves to draw. He draws both on the computer and by pen and paper. He draws characters from television, video games, parodies of those two categories, and even draws pictures of our family. Nicky is also really skilled at video games. He plays the Mario games, Sonic games, Monkey Ball Games, and even the FF7 games really well. He beat bosses in games even before I do. In Sonic 3 at the end of "Marble Garden Zone Act 2" you face Dr. Robotnik while in the air. Tails holds Sonic as he jumps to hit Robotnik's plane 8 times in order to defeat him. However, Nicky did something amazing. He beat Robotnik as just Tails alone with no Sonic. My dad and I thought that was impossible! I thought you had to be Sonic as well in order to defeat that stage. Even if you're playing solo as Sonic, Tails still shows up just for that one boss fight but Sonic doesn't show up if you're just Tails. Tails couldn't jump while flying so how did Nicky accomplish that? I never saw that but was stunned that Nicky was playing as "just tails" in the next level, "Carnival Night Zone Act 1." By the way, he showed me how to spell "Robotnik" right. He told me there's no ck in "nik." Just a k.

Nicky likes to make fun of characters. We both make fun of Toad from the Super Mario Bros. Why? Because he's annoying and I'm not just talking about when you beat the "decoy" Bowser in each of the first 7 worlds in "Super Mario Bros." and "Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels" a.k.a "Super Mario Bros.2" in Japan when the Toad pops up and says "Sorry Mario/Luigi but our Princess is in another castle." If you ever watched the Super Mario Bros. Super Show or the Super Mario Bros. 3 cartoon, you'll know what we mean. His voice is loud and obnoxious. *shudders.* In Paper Mario when we go to "Toad Town" and see all the toads walking around we freak out as if it's bizarro world. Donkey Kong is also the victim of "The Autistic Bros." parody because in Mario Party 1, he is a saw-loser. We laugh at the way he cries after losing a mini-game and are thrilled when he finishes in last place.

He knows all the channels that shows from the 1960's and beyond originally aired. Like yesterday, we were watching the Penelopee Pittstop show on the "Boomerang Channel."

AJ: I remember I used to watch this show in the mornings years back on Cartoon Network. I have no idea what channel it was on first.
Nicky: Boomerang.
AJ: I mean what channel it aired when it originally aired.
Nicky: CBS
AJ: WHAT!? How could you possibly know that?

Keep in mind this was a show from the 50's or 60's.

WAIT! I just asked Nicky what the exact year the show came out. As he was laying in his bed, he replied "1969" less than a second after the question was asked. Unbelievable!!

Every movie he loves, he knows which company produced it and the year it came out. He can also manipulate YouTube music with a different screen. Nicky showed me Paper Mario battling Bowser in the final battle while the "Safer Sephoroth" music from Final Fantasy 7 was playing in the background instead of the Paper Mario Music. He did this by lowering the Paper Mario video really low without muting it, opened a new web tab, played the FF7 YouTube soundtrack video, minimized it, and as a result: You have Paper Mario with FF7 music yet you can still hear the battle sound effects from the Paper Mario battle. Wow! Nicky is really talented.

He's also been getting into sports. Unfortunately, he likes the Mets, Jets and the Islanders. Luckily for me, I think he likes the Knicks. When the Yankees defeated the Mets on the Castillo drop, I was celebrating the un-earned win. A minute later, I heard Nicky from the other room say "Come on Castillo, you're suppose to catch the ball!" He's really getting into baseball and practices whiffle ball when we go to our grandparents' house.

That's all for this week. I wasn't the only one who wrote this. Nicky wrote some of this too. Have a good night guys!

"People always focus on the thins Autistic people can't do, but they never focus on the things Autistic people CAN do."