Episode Two: Roxborough, Muppet LEGO Figures, Ukraine Help

Life In The Ted Lane is a podcast for people who are interested in adventures, Hollywood, Broadway, The Muppets, puppetry, and what it’s like to be autistic. 

We talked about Taylor's Diner, field recording, Gorgas Park, Hilltown Tavern, Muppet LEGO mini-figures, Autistic people in the Ukraine, how to approach autistics, Ted's preferred terminology for describing people with autism.

HELP FOR AUTISTIC PEOPLE IN UKRAINE
https://www.autismeurope.org/what-we-do/areas-of-action/support-for-autistic-people-in-ukraine/

Hosted by Ted Harris and Lindsay Harris Friel

Music and sound engineering by Vincent Friel

Produced by 6630 Productions

https://6630productions.com/ted-harris-art-page/

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May your life be filled with magic!

Transcript

Life In The Ted Lane episode 2 

Ted: 

Thank you everybody. welcome to Life in the Ted Lane it's quite amazing to be here this is the Genghis next to my Khan Lindsay Harris. 

Lindsay: I am the what? 

Ted: So a guy wrote to me. So a guy talked to me the other day about great shows. And I said, does a one-legged duck swim in a circle, 

Lindsay: Does a one-legged duck swim in a circle?. 

Ted: And another guy said can I do great shows and great artwork.

So I would say does a fat puppy hate fast cars. 

Lindsay: (laughing ) 

Ted: but seriously, folks 

Lindsay: (laughing) 

Ted: we had some great fun this week. a lot of great laughs and all that lot had to go through. 

Lindsay: So what did we do? I see you have some notes there on your notepad. What was the, so this show is about what are the things that we talk about on life in the ted lane, 

we talked about Broadway and Hollywood news we talk about Muppet news, and we talked about, autism.

Ted: So we welcome your comments and all that that all people out there we welcome your comments. So. So we found out that, 

Lindsay: Which kind of news are we starting with today? 

Ted: So today we're starting with our adventures today, the other day we had had breakfast at Taylor's cafe, in Manayunk.

Lindsay: No it's not in Manayunk 

Ted: It's in Roxborough 

Lindsay: right. 

Ted: It's a delicious treat and all that. great place to visit, If you're ever in Roxborough you should visit that place sometime 

Lindsay: what's your favorite thing to eat there, Ted?

Ted: I like the pancakes, I love the burgers. I like the eggs pork roll that also have ice cream and cake and all that.

Lindsay: I've never seen desserts there. Have you ever had dessert there?

Ted: I might have.

Lindsay: Do you remember whether or not you ever did? 

Ted: No. 

Lindsay: Okay. But they do have very good breakfasts. 

Ted: Yep. they do. 

Lindsay: Very good breakfast. Very good lunches. They're open in the morning and they're open for lunch.

I think they close at three. 

Ted: Yeah, they do. 

Lindsay: Yeah. 

Ted: Also we walked, but against my better judgment: Lindsay! 

Lindsay: Why are you mad at me? Don't yell.

Ted: UGH. 

Lindsay: Don't yell nobody likes that. 

Ted: All right. We walked to Gorgas park and we did field recording there and all that 

Lindsay: Yeah. Can I talk about that a little bit?

Ted: all right 

Lindsay: So what we were doing was, first of all, we wanted to try to get some good field sound for the podcast, right? Yeah. And I'm going to turn the mic a little bit. So we wanted to get some good field sound. And another thing is that I work for a company called the podcast host.

And right now they're doing a project called the field recording challenge. And we want to get people from all over the world to send us their field recordings so that we can hear what it sounds like, where people live all over the world. Right. 

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: And we wanted to get. A recording of the diner, but what happened, Ted? 

Ted: The music got in the way

Lindsay: yeah, the music coming out of the speaker and the ceiling was a little too loud. 

Ted: My suggestion don't sit under the speaker with the music. 

Lindsay: Yeah. , that would have been a very good idea. The other thing is that there weren't very many people there, so you couldn't hear. Lots of cooking and activity and eating and stuff, because it was

Ted: Maybe we should go there for brunch so we can get a new recording.

Lindsay: We should try that. We'll try it this weekend. Maybe. 

Ted: Okay. 

Lindsay: How does that sound, and then we also went up to Gorgas park to the playground, but there weren't very many people there, but that was okay. Right. 

Ted: Best to go in the afternoon. 

Lindsay: That's probably a good idea. I think you may be right about that. I think that's a good idea.

 What else did we notice about the park Ted? 

Ted: Well, it had the sway thing. 

Lindsay: Yeah, it was called a sway time. And what is it? 

Ted: It's a, it's like a Seesaw for people with autism. 

Lindsay: I think it's like a wheelchair accessible Seesaw. 

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: It looks like you're sitting in a rowboat.

Ted: Yep. 

Lindsay: What did you think of it? 

Ted: I thought it was pretty good. 

Lindsay: Yeah. It looked like a, like a round brown boat that you could sit down on and you sort of rock the whole thing back and forth. So that was cool. 

Ted: Yep. 

Lindsay: Yeah. So that was our adventure for yesterday. Oh, and where did we go for dinner, Ted 

Ted: Hilltown Tavern  it's a great Irish pub and all that. I think at one time it must have been the local soda shop at one time, but then somehow someone bought it and turned it in to a Irish pub.

Lindsay: Well, we don't know the history of the building, but it's a, it's a neighborhood pub. They have a jukebox. 

Ted: Yeah. They have tables and all that. They bring their dogs, they bring their kids. 

Lindsay: Boy did We see a lot of dogs. How many dogs do you think we saw? 

Ted: Five or six.

Lindsay: Yeah. Okay. So that was our adventure segment. 

Ted: So the latest Muppet news is Muppets are coming out with another Lego set. It's a Lego Muppet set that talks about the Muppet Show 

Lindsay: Wait a minute. It's- Lego is coming out with Lego mini-figures. 

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: Tell me more about that Ted

Ted: it's like, well, little mini-figures of the Muppets

you've got the play sets 

Lindsay: and the Lego website said when they were going to be available in stores. When was that?

Ted: In May , first 

Lindsay: and which figures, which characters are the figures going to be 

Ted: Kermit Miss Piggy Fozzie Gonzo Stadler Waldorf Swedish Chef Animal Rowlf and Janice agendas and a Beaker and Bunsen

Lindsay: and they're going to be fortnight well on the Lego website, it said that they're $4 and 99 cents each and they come in a bag, they're using a blind bag. So. So, what does that mean to 

Ted: you never know which ones you're going. 

Lindsay: Right. You might go to target and grab a handful of bags and get, you know, four bags for $20 and realize you got four miss piggies or four Kermit's or four beakers or something.

Can you imagine if you had four beakers all lined up? 

Ted: Wow. 

Lindsay: The first thing I would think would it be like, oh, look a barbershop quartet. 

Ted: (laughing)

Lindsay: Oh, did they make a video of that? A whole bunch of beakers singing, 

Ted: maybe.

Lindsay: Me me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me. All right. I should stop. So what is the next important news story? 

Ted: Researchers advocates rushed to.

Lindsay: Yeah. So that was, we found this out from the spectrum. Was it spectrum news.com, 

Ted: spectrumnews.com. 

Lindsay: It said that over 4.3 million children have been evacuated from the Ukraine.

And, 

Ted: and basically they're trying to find aid for all kids with autism in Ukraine to find health. 

Lindsay: Yes. This woman who is a school teacher who has an autistic younger brother, is trying to find help for autistic kids because as horrible and traumatic. Yeah. The Russian attack on the Ukraine. Is it just imagine how much worse it is for autistic people.

Ted: Wow.

Lindsay: Yeah. Can you imagine that, Ted? 

Ted: No. 

Lindsay: So tell this, do you want to tell the story about. So in the spectrum news article, they talked about this little boy, Max who's 11 years old, Ted, do you want to talk about, and 

Ted: he likes to paint and draw and all that.

He actually was wrapped up in a Ukrainian flag, and went up to a Russian soldier.

Asked when he's going to die. 

Lindsay: Yeah. Can you believe that that's very dangerous behavior? Isn't it?

Ted: I know, 

Lindsay: but I can understand why he feels that way. I can understand his feelings are very valid. What matters is how you express your feelings, right, Ted. 

Ted: Yep. 

Lindsay: And it sounds like Max needs a lot of help expressing his feelings.

Ted: Yeah.

Lindsay: What do you think would happen if you walked up to a Russian soldier and said that

Ted: I probably get shot? 

Lindsay: Yeah, that would be terrible. 

Ted: You know Gretta, Thunberg. 

Lindsay: Yeah. Gretta. Thunberg. What about though? 

Ted: She has autism.

Lindsay: I think that's awesome. Does she have autism or does she have awesome TISM 

Ted: oh, a little bit of both.

Lindsay: Yeah. Ted, which kind do you have? 

Ted: Awesometism. 

Lindsay: So Ted, I got a question for you. Um, some people feel that it's better to talk to it. Some people like the term people with autism better, and some people prefer the term autistic people better. And some people say autistic as a noun when it's actually an adjective, what do you think 

Ted: Probably autistic as a noun 

Lindsay: really?

So wait a minute, so when you talk about your friends that you grew 

up with, like from school and summer camp and social time and going bowling and all that good stuff, what do you call it? Well, I mean, obviously I think when you talk about your individual friends, you described them as individuals, right?

Ted: Yep. 

Lindsay: Yeah. But tell me about this terminology. What, what do you think is good? 

Ted: I've referred to them as, my autistic buddies. 

Lindsay: Yeah. So. You say that they're your autistic buddies, not your buddies with autism. So when people talk, talk about you, would you rather, the people say that you are an autistic person or a person with autism, 

Ted: um, person with autism,

Lindsay: really?

Lindsay: Okay. Cause sometimes you say, I really miss my autistics, or when you're talking about your friends, I think you use all the terms interchangeably.  cause, you know, it doesn't define you. There's a whole lot of you. There's a whole lot of you and autism is just part of it. Right. But it is something that's very interesting and that people don't understand and they can learn a lot about it from you. Right, Ted?

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: Yeah. So let's talk about this. You did, you made a video for, and also it's hard because a lot of times when people think of autistic people, they imagine white kids, right? 

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: They imagine like cute white little children. 

Ted: Yup. Yup. 

Lindsay: They don't imagine adults. And they don't imagine people of color, right?

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: Yeah. But you know, lots of autistic people, they come in all shapes and sizes and ages and also, you know, Asian, autistic people and Latino, autistic people and black autistic people. Right. 

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: Yeah. And you grew up with them and you guys all know each other. Right. 

Ted: we've e been best friends since the hospital nursery,

Lindsay: (laughing )you've been friends since you were little tiny kids. And I think that what happens is sometimes people see autistic people being disruptive and they don't know what's going on. So they call the cops, right? 

Ted: Yeah.

Lindsay: Yeah. And that's ridiculous. 

Ted: Yeah. 

Lindsay: And are they reasons that somebody should call the cops? 

Ted: No. 

Lindsay: Yeah. And what do you think police officers should know when they're approaching an autistic person? 

Ted: Approach slowly, carefully, not get loud. Not touch the autistic. Yeah. Um, not pull weapons. Yeah. And not tackle autistics and find out what the situation find out what the situation is first before or first.

Lindsay: Exactly. So you've had, what kind of experiences have you had with the police? 

Ted: Oh, one the time the Long Beach Island when . I was panhandling on the street. I was washing windows, cars, 

Lindsay: Why were you panhandling, Ted 

Ted: I was washing windows of cars 

Lindsay: Why were you doing that.

Ted: I was trying to raise some money for myself,

Lindsay: Ted, but you didn't need any money?

Ted: I was washing windows of it cars then? 

Lindsay: And then what happened? 

Ted: A cop came over, and made me they made me put my hands on the pole. I told him I was autistic. Uh, I tried to defend myself. They actually patted me down. They brought me to mom, dad and explain the situation and told me not to do it again. Yeah.

I've also had, 

Lindsay: You were very lucky 

Ted: yeah. 

At the Please Touch Museum took was taking pictures. 

Lindsay: And then what happened? 

Ted: Someone yelled at me because they claimed I took a photo of her kid, which I didn't do. I just said I was just taking pictures. 

Lindsay: So what are the, what, what are the rules of photography now when you and I are out and about 

Ted: Ask permission before taking pictures.

Lindsay: Yup. And also take pictures of what 

Ted: take pictures of things and plants, not people. 

Lindsay: Exactly. Yeah. And also. Sometimes, especially in museums, it's good to find out what the photography rules are before you take any pictures at all. 

Ted: Yep. 

Whenever I go to The Philadelphia art museum, we'll make sure the flashes off so that the paintings can't be damaged. 

Lindsay: We'll tell you, you know what? I think we've learned a lot today and we've been talking for a while. Haven't we? 

Ted: Yeah, I know and I'm getting tired and all that.

So it's just about, about wraps it up. Yeah. Yeah. 

Lindsay: Ted. I just remembered something that we forgot to mention. We were talking about autistic people in Ukraine. We will put some resources in the show notes if people want to help people in Ukraine. 

Ted: All right. 

Well, that's just about it. For another session, I hope you enjoyed it today. Quite amazing, I'm Ted Harris of Harris puppets and I hope you enjoyed today and hope to see you again soon. Bye.