A Good Stumbler

A Good Stumbler ©

By Michael Casey

Well its 2am on 18/6/2017 and I’m up with pain, tooth ache this time, I chipped a tooth at the upper back of my mouth, makes a change from my arthritis I suppose. I have a mouth full of toothpaste in my mouth as I talk to you all. The theory is that it will protect me from the pain by washing over where the chip is. Ok Its stupid but do YOU have any better ideas at this time of the morning?

I could rub my Movelat on my face but that would be a stupider idea, its for my joints when my arthritis kicks in. What has all this got to do with being a Good Stumbler? Well Mark Harris, who H though had Charisma, was the one who said I was a Good Stumbler. He wasn’t on about me tripping over Barry’s long legs while we had a pint in the Queen’s Tavern either. Just giving them two a name check should they stumble over this.

So what exactly is a Good Stumbler? Well I suppose its me, its my whole life. In Slumdog Millionaire the guy’s life gives him all the answers so he can win the quiz. My own life has been just like that, one thing has led to another even if at the time it was a painful or even very painful interlude. I must go and spit out this toothpaste now. It is a trick to whiten your teeth as well, provided that you can stand the taste for so long. Ok, in USA you bleach your teeth but that is not natural at all.

I just stumbled over the cat she is participating in a blood sport, no not fox hunting, though we did have 3 foxes simultaneously in our garden one night, the are just up the road after all and dustbins are foxes takeaways. No, she, Totoro was chasing and eating flies and moths attracted to our yard light. I did offer to let her in but the blood sport was a bigger attraction than sneaking in at 2.20am, like a dirty stopout of a cat.

As you can see I stumbled over that last paragraph, and we both have benefited from it. So pray for my pain, this Sunday morning. I could mention that our local priest also does a bit of Editing on the side. Though I would never let anybody touch my words, priest or no priest. What is writ is writ as somebody once said to a load of priests.

One take or nothing is my motto, how Jeffery Archer goes through up to 13 rewrites with his Editor I could never know. It was be so soul destroying, and boring, it would kill the story for me. A stranger forcing you to have an English Literature class on your own creative spirit, yuck. Mind you he has a Monet on his wall, which is worth 100 times the value of my house, but no not even for a Monet would I led people touch my words.

So I stumble along writing my stories, stumbling into ideas here and there, such as have all my books at 2.99 USD in a vain effort to get you all to buy them. I stumbled into that idea 2 days ago after I read a piece in the DT about a KDP writer. He’s rich now, I am not, so I thought about lowering my prices to entice you all to buy my 13 books and 4 translations. A Stumble has led to that.

The cat is still out and I’m wondering what other stumbles I can mention, such as the dog Peeing on a house and I looked up and noticed it was for sale. And this is where I’ve been living these past 30 years. Marriage was a stumble too and having 2 daughters when we thought we might not have any children is not a stumble but more of a Blessing.

Though I did used to work the Graveyard shift at SMBC council computer room. So I got home at 3am or so. And one thing led to another, ok IF you are having trouble conceiving then try 3am to 4am and see if it works for you. Or I could just be very fertile, or together we have stumbled on peak fertility time. I can picture it now thousands of Michaels and Michaelas named in my honour, in Ireland it was thousands of John-Pauls instead of Patricks.

Its both strange and humorous how things happen, turning that corner at the right time, or God intervening, the only place he goes is the Old People’s Home to see his dad. He only goes to the fishing tackle shop, he’ll never meet anybody,he’ll be a sad old bachelor. So he goes in and knocks all the poles over, this does not mean Polish people, a pole is what a professional angler calls his rod. As he stoops to pick up all the poles the owner’s daughter appears and its love at first bite. Without any bait, and the scruffy man gets the shop as a dowry. They have found each other, and she uses a white fish net as veil and train.

Well its nearly 3am now and Totoro our cat is still out, she is worse that a teenager,and I have 2 already. I hope if you have stumbled over this piece you decide to come back and read some more stories from me. I have now written 1100 to 1200 stories, or 1250 if you count the ones I reloaded to my blog here. I’m going to try and go back to bed now despite the heat and pain. If I’m tired enough I can sleep through anything.

Wait. I hear a noise I though the cat wanted to come back in. No just something else, not unless it was the moths banging on the windows. Turn that bloody light off, that cat of yours is eating us alive. Stay happy wherever you are, and if you can’t sleep then make love, don’t waste your time reading my stuff.