Hello. My name is Scotty N. I am also from Alberta, Canada. I am 41 years old, and recently found out that I have AS. I was diagnosed from a battery of tests. Some of my AS traits are as follows:
1. Exellent rote memory. I can remember lots of trivial and non-trivial facts.
2. Literal thinking. I take everything I hear and see, very literally.
3. Difficulty understanding jokes. I get What is said, but do not understand the meaning. For example, if someone said, " Get off your high Horse", I would tell them that I am not on a horse, so theres no need. It encites Laughter at times.
4. Exteme repetitive obsessivness with a parochial range of interests. In my case, it is an abnormal interest in fly fishing for trout. I have a collection of hundreds of fish photograghs, and I ramble on and on about this subject. I am also an artist, and when I work, it is almost impossible to break my focus or concentration. I can focus on working at a painting for months at a time. Never stopping until I am done. Countless hours of work go into my Art.
5. I am a very good mimic, and I imitate what others do in social situations qiute well.
6. I tend to avoid eye contact with most people. When I do make eye contact, I stare at people inappropriately too long, which invariably elicits a hoatile response.
7. I have messy handwriting, and walk rather stiffly.
8. I lack empathy for others. I find it very difficult to feel what other people are feeling.
9. I am almost always ignored in any social setting. And I prefer not to be around people.
10. My speech is abnormally loud sometimes, and I tend to speak without emotion.
These are just some of the traits I have. Apparently, you need to be diagnosed with 80 or so specific "aspie traits", in order to be defined a true asperger syndrome candidate. The reason is that most people have a few of these traits, but only one person in about 4,000 will possess enough of them to be labeled Aspergers syndrome.