If you are wondering (c)
By Michael Casey
If you are wondering how I go about amusing you, or is it bemusing you? Then I am all for patterns. A pattern or method helps things along. If its all random then its harder. I nag my girls about routine and getting out of my way so I can get into the bathroom. Otherwise its Midnight before I can get into the bathroom.
So if you have a routine you actually have more time not less. I worked shifts all my life so you have to be on time for the bus and go to bed on time so you can get up in time for the bus. Nowadays kids are on their phone all the time and Time just disappears, and then there is a log jam for our bathroom. Self discipline is needed too, yes relax and chill but if you don't Timetable things then the day or evening is gone and you have not done a thing.
No I'm NOT saying every second has to be ordered, what I am saying is that if you sweep like the second hand then you achieve more. So you come in from school and take the horrid uniform off and put you PJs or tracksuit on. Bags go up a corner and then you put the dinner on before you sit down. After a chill period homework is done. Then you can go back to your toys. But very important in today's world is encouraging your kids to read a book, an hour a day, either on paper or on one of those Kindles.
I already know readers out there are criticising me for being too harsh. If I told you our girls were not allowing video games when they were young. Crayons and pencils in the hundreds were what they got, which means they can draw, which is a great skill in itself. Self discipline is the key, or if you are parent you bestow it on your kids. Nobody is allowed to do what they want, we all have to do the stuff we don't like so that we can afford to do the stuff we DO like.
No I'm not a Fascist, people seem to want everything but don't want to put the work in. Years of crayons instead of video games means my girls are good artists. Being forced to hit the books at an early age means that later on they enjoy reading and have an imagination. They are not the Vultures from the Jungle Book who are bored and forever saying. What are we gonna do now.
Ok, enough of the methodology. When I write I look out the window and if I see something or somebody it can ignite an idea. This is because I did spend 20 years listening to BBC Radio4 BEFORE I started to write 30 years ago. So I have 1000s of plays and films I've watched, not forgetting 100s of books I read over the years and a deep interest in TV news, and Radio4 news reports. I also am like a vacuum cleaner and I suck things up, and later, ever decades later a word can make me vomit up a memory. No I don't have total recall, some things I wish I could forget, but generally I am a vacuum cleaner. A vacuum cleaner full of 50 years of memories, my memory goes back to 1963.
Yes that's how I write, I look in the Soup, and I ladle out a story. Nowadays because my health is a pain in my butt and maybe yours, I have good days and bad days. So I may dig out an old story and feed it to you all, while I have a day off from the page. But my work ethic is so strong I should be a Protestant, this is an old joke. As is the one about Rhythm Method and writing or is it drumming? You can work that one out for yourselves. I remember Dave Allen and now I look like him, or my hair at any rate.
I can write pure fiction, or just parody, with or without Vanessa our noisy neighbour. I may even come up with a poem. I don't like to restrict myself, you know what happened to the body builder who did that? I can have an idea, so that's like the dots in a colouring book, and then when I sit down I'm just joining up the dots for myself. So it can appear slow to me while I'm actually putting it down on paper. Or I have an idea and a style for a piece then as I start to write it changes. I am the ball in the pin ball machine, I can be knocked off course, or I can be expert and hit all the bells and buzzers.
It is only when I finish after an hour, they usually take an hour, when I read the whole piece that I can see if I have nailed it. Its a bit like a tapestry, I am looking at one side while I write. then I turn it over and all is revealed. If I accidentally delete the piece then it is lost forever, as I could never rewrite it, its not a recipe, everything is original. OK some of you dispute that, but the idea is that each story is unique. yes I may mention things again in another piece but generally everything is unique. If I were to write another full length book it would take a year of my life, or 3 months if I borrowed a legal secretary, so I stick to my one hour pieces. On this tally 1400, including repeats.
Ok that's your lot I have to collect more heart meds and pain killers, at least you know the background to the story telling. I may never have a Monet on my wall like Jeffery Archer, but its something that brings me pleasure. And yes I know you are all thinking of your own pleasures now...
By Michael Casey
If you are wondering how I go about amusing you, or is it bemusing you? Then I am all for patterns. A pattern or method helps things along. If its all random then its harder. I nag my girls about routine and getting out of my way so I can get into the bathroom. Otherwise its Midnight before I can get into the bathroom.
So if you have a routine you actually have more time not less. I worked shifts all my life so you have to be on time for the bus and go to bed on time so you can get up in time for the bus. Nowadays kids are on their phone all the time and Time just disappears, and then there is a log jam for our bathroom. Self discipline is needed too, yes relax and chill but if you don't Timetable things then the day or evening is gone and you have not done a thing.
No I'm NOT saying every second has to be ordered, what I am saying is that if you sweep like the second hand then you achieve more. So you come in from school and take the horrid uniform off and put you PJs or tracksuit on. Bags go up a corner and then you put the dinner on before you sit down. After a chill period homework is done. Then you can go back to your toys. But very important in today's world is encouraging your kids to read a book, an hour a day, either on paper or on one of those Kindles.
I already know readers out there are criticising me for being too harsh. If I told you our girls were not allowing video games when they were young. Crayons and pencils in the hundreds were what they got, which means they can draw, which is a great skill in itself. Self discipline is the key, or if you are parent you bestow it on your kids. Nobody is allowed to do what they want, we all have to do the stuff we don't like so that we can afford to do the stuff we DO like.
No I'm not a Fascist, people seem to want everything but don't want to put the work in. Years of crayons instead of video games means my girls are good artists. Being forced to hit the books at an early age means that later on they enjoy reading and have an imagination. They are not the Vultures from the Jungle Book who are bored and forever saying. What are we gonna do now.
Ok, enough of the methodology. When I write I look out the window and if I see something or somebody it can ignite an idea. This is because I did spend 20 years listening to BBC Radio4 BEFORE I started to write 30 years ago. So I have 1000s of plays and films I've watched, not forgetting 100s of books I read over the years and a deep interest in TV news, and Radio4 news reports. I also am like a vacuum cleaner and I suck things up, and later, ever decades later a word can make me vomit up a memory. No I don't have total recall, some things I wish I could forget, but generally I am a vacuum cleaner. A vacuum cleaner full of 50 years of memories, my memory goes back to 1963.
Yes that's how I write, I look in the Soup, and I ladle out a story. Nowadays because my health is a pain in my butt and maybe yours, I have good days and bad days. So I may dig out an old story and feed it to you all, while I have a day off from the page. But my work ethic is so strong I should be a Protestant, this is an old joke. As is the one about Rhythm Method and writing or is it drumming? You can work that one out for yourselves. I remember Dave Allen and now I look like him, or my hair at any rate.
I can write pure fiction, or just parody, with or without Vanessa our noisy neighbour. I may even come up with a poem. I don't like to restrict myself, you know what happened to the body builder who did that? I can have an idea, so that's like the dots in a colouring book, and then when I sit down I'm just joining up the dots for myself. So it can appear slow to me while I'm actually putting it down on paper. Or I have an idea and a style for a piece then as I start to write it changes. I am the ball in the pin ball machine, I can be knocked off course, or I can be expert and hit all the bells and buzzers.
It is only when I finish after an hour, they usually take an hour, when I read the whole piece that I can see if I have nailed it. Its a bit like a tapestry, I am looking at one side while I write. then I turn it over and all is revealed. If I accidentally delete the piece then it is lost forever, as I could never rewrite it, its not a recipe, everything is original. OK some of you dispute that, but the idea is that each story is unique. yes I may mention things again in another piece but generally everything is unique. If I were to write another full length book it would take a year of my life, or 3 months if I borrowed a legal secretary, so I stick to my one hour pieces. On this tally 1400, including repeats.
Ok that's your lot I have to collect more heart meds and pain killers, at least you know the background to the story telling. I may never have a Monet on my wall like Jeffery Archer, but its something that brings me pleasure. And yes I know you are all thinking of your own pleasures now...
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