MedWish International is an exceptional Cleveland-based non-profit dedicated to retrieving, recycling and reusing medical supplies (and what better city for that?) for countries that desperately need them. Monarch Center for Autism and MedWish work together (as MedWish does with a number of organizations) to provide vocational experience for Monarch denizens like Ben.

At the MedWish fundraising auction Saturday night, Ben received an award (in absentia -- he would have HATED being there!) for his work at MedWish! Ben had progressed so quickly, he's doing Quality Control! And they misspelled his name on the plaque (a missing "n") which is a blessing in disguise -- we'll hang the corrected one (when it arrives) on his wall, and we get to keep the flawed one for our wall. CONGRATULATIONS BEN!!! And a thousand Thank Yous to Gretchen at Monarch for helping him achieve it! It is hard to describe the delight we get from this.

Before the doors opened Saturday night. The MedWish event centerpiece represents the countries the organization has assisted with recycled medical supplies, September 26, 2015.

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Soaking up the love at Saturday's Medwish awards. Thank you to Gretchen for the pic!

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And a couple more pics from the weekend...

 Ben and Karen at Edgewater Park for a "picnic," which lasts as long as it takes Ben to inhale a couple of peanut butter sandwiches, which is why we're at a bench and not a blanket - not enough time to spread it out! Or as fellow autism dad (and writer about it) Bob Hughes has described it, "Flash Picnicking." September 26, 2015.

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Ben checks out my favorite anti-Semitic pr*ck, Wagner (hey, the creep wrote great music for a pre-Nazi d*ckhead. Or dichhead?) at Edgewater Park, September 26, 2015.

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 Either Ben mistakenly thought the camera was being handed to him, or he's just tired of the paparazzi. You know how award-winners can be...