I’ve written before about the importance of language in relation to disability, particularly about out-dated words that still sometimes crop up – words like ‘handicapped.’

But today my tics put a new spin on this unpleasant term:

“Handy-Cats”
“Am I handy-cats?”…

Fifty-eight years ago Jack Kerouac wrote On The Road on a single roll of paper and it became the bible of the Beat Generation. Yesterday evening I went to the Post Office with Will and on the way composed my own great Beat poem:

I scattered the stars like hundreds and thousands,
on Forest Gump’s bum.…

My support worker Will has a well-established history of playful interactions with my tics. He was with me today, and at lunchtime in a local café I noticed him playing with a pound coin. I looked away for a moment and when I looked back I saw he’d wedged the coin into his eye as if it was a monocle!…

Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson has been all over Twitter today after it emerged that he may have punched one of the show’s producers in the face. Leftwing Idiot and I were talking about it for a while earlier and eventually he got round to asking me what my tics had to say about it.…

For no obvious reason my tics love Aladdin, so when we decided to take Backstage in Biscuit Land to Edinburgh last year, I kept saying that’s what we were going to do it wasn’t out of character. At our first meeting with the people from running the venue were, Leftwing Idiot had to point out to the person taking notes that we weren’t actually doing Aladdin when he saw her writing it down!…

This morning my carer Anna pointed out that I’ve started ticcing the word ‘Salad’ quite regularly recently. This was making her laugh because it’s a much healthier alternative to ‘Biscuit’.

I’ve been ticcing ‘Biscuit’ for several years now and I say it so often it’s become part of who I am.…

January’s a time for health kicks, but the mid-point of the month is often the moment when resolve starts to flag. This morning my tics were well aware of this when they started quizzing the lamp-post about its wellbeing:

“Lamp-post, have you been to the gym today?”…

“Your mother was a testicle,
Your father was a bear,
Between them they had a lot of flowing facial hair.”

“Electrical testicle, tearing up the night,
Glowing brighter than a lamp-post in a knight’s 10-denier tights.”

“Imagine playing Tetris with the testis of an ant,
a soundscape made of rhinos and Satsumas for a glove.”

I had a really rocky ‘ticcing fit’ earlier today. Will was supporting me, and my work friend Kyle came to help as well. As the fit drew to a close and my speech returned so did my vocal tics (in a confessional mood):

“I haven’t fucked anything today or yesterday, except:”

“A door”
“A horse”
“Strip lighting”
“Some cabling”
“Kettering”
and
“Tenerife’s bins.”…

This’ll be brief – it’s late and I’ve only just got home. I need to have some dinner before heading to bed but I wanted to write down my first thoughts about the evening I’ve just had before they fade.

Over the first five years of Touretteshero I’ve come to appreciate the spontaneity and creativity that Tourettes adds to my life.…