A Talent to Amuse

A Talent to Amuse ©

By Michael Casey

A Talent to Amuse was the title of a book I read 20 or 30 years ago, it was written by Sheridan Morley and it was about Noel Coward. We were watching the Italian Job on TV when I thought about the book, one thing connects to another and then hey presto you have a memory reload. So today I’m going to talk about what amuses us, we have amusement arcades and they are supposed to amuse us, but they just take our money for nothing, which is a name of a song too, but that’s another memory connection.

We find in our house that our youngest daughter amuses us the most, why, because she is spontaneous and so inventive. I think she must have come out of the womb with a Blue Peter badge already in her hand. She can make things out of paper and old cardboard boxes, she was given a dolls house for her birthday by her aunty, so that inspired her to make more dolls houses out of shoe boxes. Your own daughters probably do the same, our daughter is a comedienne too, her Chinese grandfather was always very funny, so we believe she inherited from him. She was actually in the womb, in Shanghai,  listening to him before she was born, sadly he died 9 months after she was born. However such a talent to amuse must have come from somewhere, so we thank him.

Children mimic and exaggerate their parents’ and uncles’ and aunties’ mannerisms, this always makes families laugh. However come the teenage years it’s the parents who imitate the sulks, the  moans and the its not fairs as teenagers slam doors and go to their rooms. Thankfully our daughters have not reached that age and stage, for it is an act, so I have something to look forward too.

Back to amusing though, at the concierge desk 10 years ago I had a minute to deal with a guests query, to sort them out and to keep them happy. You can read a guest by their body language, the trick is to know if you can be quick or be slow, are they happy or are the hurried. By keeping the guests happy they will come back and the hotel will be successful, which in turn is good for you. It was a new build hotel, a 4 star, we actually opened the hotel as they say in the business. We were known as a happy hotel, Roger, Jim and me were  the 1^st point of contact so it was up to us to break the ice and give guests a good experience. We’d crack a joke as we greeted the guests, this is important, why, because nobody wants to come into a funeral parlour, people like to have a good feeling wherever they are. Our manager once went to another hotel and stood there to see how fast the front of house team were. Twenty minutes later he was approached and welcomed, at CPNEC when I was on duty it would be 20 seconds, I was Employee of The Year, very 

close runner up after all.

Back to amusing, it’s not hard to lift an atmosphere, how do you do it? Smile, just smile and you will feel happier yourself. Imitation works too, as well as mime, or even Irish dancing. I have a teacher friend who does a jig if the students are turning off, then once she’s got their attention she goes back to the lesson. Actually in Teacher Training they ask what kind of teacher you are, Lion tamer  or Entertainer, as well as other styles. When I’ve done Esol English teaching I’ve been an Entertainer to get them interested, then you go through the work, but you have to like a boat on the water and react to the wind so to speak. Mix and match to circumstances, some even said they’d never forget me, I just told them to forget me, but remember their English.

Amusement does work as a tool, but you have to balance it out with knowledge. I wrote a play called Shoplife which was called “Spakling, very real, great fun, hilarious, we could not stop reading it, we hope to produce it, not this season but next” it’s on Amazon Kindle  by the way. Now that’s an out and out comedy which I hope somebody will pick up some day when they cancel Trollied perhaps.  Now on a Laugh and Learn basis, you can teach customer service by getting staff to read the play. Shoplife is a comedy and the customer service in it is terrible, that’s why it’s so funny. So you break the play down and say what customer service disasters can you see, what health and safety rules have been broken. All very amusing, but, as a  teaching tool far better than a boring list. You could package it with a dvd and  health and safety material, and yes I’ve thought about this for years, so that people are amused and they learn. Then after that perhaps in reverse order the play  finally gets on stage. John Cleese did have a training company once, so I can follow in his footsteps.

A Talent to Amuse is a great book it may be in a library somewhere, so please go and read it. As for me I’m no Noel Coward, but I do hope that like him I do have a talent to amuse.

Starting Over

03/06/2013

Starting Over
Well there were a lot of posts on this site so I’ve copied them off and you can read them as
Shorts 2013 by Michael Casey on Amazon Kindle. Best of all you get 1st chapter of Tears for a Butcher included, which will be my next comic novel once I get around to finishing it, AS a bonus too you get Chapter 9 of The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker which has my comic slant on Politics. I will be writing more comic shorts on this site, so watch this space.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Michael-Casey/e/B00571G0YC/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1

The Gift by Michael Casey

The Gift ©

By

Michael Casey

A gift has several meanings, the first thing that springs to mind is a present, for a birthday or for Christmas. If you remember The Bishop’s Wife, with Cary Grant and David Niven, where Cary Grant is an angel called Dudley, well at the end the bishop reads a sermon that Dudley has written. It talks about the nature of gifts, a pipe for an uncle, in those days cigarettes were the norm remember, so you always have to think about context and culture. We make lists and  find appropriate gifts for family and friends, though nowadays it’s the Secret Santa and gifts come from Poundland. Gifts and cards because we love each other, though they can become meaningless because we have too many “friends” so the gift can lack honesty.

Another gift can be the gift of the gab, or salesmanship, forgive me if I don’t say salespersonship, I think that genderising if that’s the correct word, is bastardising language. WE know a woman can be a chairman etc. Now I wonder how many people or is it just women, are offended by my choice of words, if they are they can always translate my words into PC words, or just banish me and my words entirely.  But I have great faith is women, they are better than men after all, and yes I really know that.

Salesmanship is a gift, the gift of the gab puts food on the table, you sell stuff and you earn your pay and get a bit of commission too, which feeds your family. Now there are problems with salesmanship, look at all the miss-sold payment protection insurance. This is where a gift has been misused and ordinary people have lost out, sadly it creates another industry of ambulance chasing lawyers and agencies who fill up your answer machine with adverts for their services.

Gifts come in all sorts of packages,  it can be singing, or art, or bricklaying or carpentry, bending it like Beckham, anything you can think of. A gift is exactly what it says it is a “gift”, people are shocked and pleased when they discover other people’s gifts. He can really sing, it’s a pity he’s blind they say. She’s so beautiful it’s a pity she is in a chair, he writes such beautiful poetry, it’s a pity he is so ugly. People really do say such things, and think such things. Gifts do require a bit of work too, I can remember a school report where the French teacher said I had a flair for the subject, I was good and getting over 80% because I did my homework and worked hard. So some think a flair for something, and flair is another word that is used, is because it was handed to the person on a plate at birth. Yes it can be, but there is work involved, Beckham practised, Wayne Rooney improved his heading skills, by practice, the list goes on in sport. Look at Lady Gaga, she needed an operation because she worked so hard at all her moves that she over used her body, so it needed repair, just as an over-used machine does.

So there is a contrast between perception and reality, yes gifts can be total gifts, like the way we look,  that’s why a beauty should be humble because she did nothing to get those looks, they are the product of her parents’ love, literally. Now talking of love a saleswoman is a kind of midwife to love, how, because when the salesman sells something he observes the love between the couple as they buy their first house, or buy their wedding rings, or just buy their first double bed. The sparks between the buyers are observed as they are encouraged in their purchases, their purchases for life, starting with a ring for the wife.

A poet can be a fat man, with white hair, wearing shades, dressed with a bright orange polo with a polo scene printed on the polo. So when people read this poet’s poetry they may say incredulously, him, he wrote that.  As if this poet was something unpleasant, stuck to the bottom of their shoes. They love the  poetry and may even use it on their Wedding Day, but did HE, did HE really write it.

This brings me to my conclusion, why are gifts given out the way they are given out? Is it a lottery? Yes I do believe it is, its God’s lottery. It’s to remind us that gifts are given for a reason, we should treasure  them, we should nurture them, in ourselves or in whomever we know. Because one day there will be a knock on the door which is our life and we will all be asked. And how did you treat the gifts I sent you?

Faces in the Stars

Faces in the Stars ©

By Michael Casey

I said I was listening to Vangelis to CS on FB, in reply she posted a video of his, the video was of starry starry night, followed by space images. Together it was a great video. As I watched and enjoyed the music I noticed something almost hidden amongst the stars. I could see faces.

I tend to do my writing between 10pm and later, much later, perhaps that’s why there are typos. But the faces were amongst the stars, at first I thought it was just because I was tired, then as the music played on I noticed more faces half hidden amongst the stars. We have the plough and the bear and other such things high in the sky amongst the stars, but in this video there were faces.

Imagine we are a chemistry experiment, and the gods are looking down at us, what will they see? Will they see a people striving for unity and the common good, or an experiment gone wrong and should be washed down the sink? Or are the faces in the stars our ancestors, are they the souls of our past looking down and urging us to do better? Could they be visitors from the other side of the universe wondering are we worth visiting? Are they ETs wondering whether they should have made that call? Are we just too primitive?

As darkness falls you can see shadows as they make faces on your bedroom wall, all manner of faces, and all manner of images. Our imagination sees things that might be, oh it looks like this, oh it looks like that. Just as photography can show us things from a different view, and can trick us until we have the full picture, so shadows on the wall do the same. They scare us when we are kids but they amuse us when we are big enough not to be scared.

I’m listening to Vangelis again its 18hours later,  I’m thinking of the faces in space, are they jealous of our small puny planet. Just think, lost sheep come home to view us and our planet, are we the only tv show in the whole wide universe? Did these faces amongst the stars lose their own home? Are they observing us, hoping that we don’t make their mistake, destroying the planet we all love?

Under the Influence

Under the Influence ©

By Michael Casey

I was wondering what would be my next piece I’d share with you, what could be my next short, I’ve decided to stop using   the word blog, I think short is better.

I was thinking and thinking then I thought what am I trying to do every time I write? I’m trying to influence you to share my opinion on the world or to get you to think for yourself. At the moment my latest tack is to persuade “Radio” that my shorts are worth broadcasting, yes I can see the Simpsons and “shorts” but I’ll carry on regardless.

As a dad, I nearly said as a “parent”, but that’s too formal and unloving, as a dad I have influence over my children. I can persuade them to fetch something, so I shout up the stairs to ask one of the girls to bring down my this, or bring down my that. As I write this sentence I can remember my mum saying “your legs are younger than mine” that memory goes back 40 years and more, I can remember the love, the raw total absolute love she had for us. She had influence and knew how to use it.

It seems to me that mums have the most influence, they care for us from the moment of conception till the moment we are separated at Death. We will all do anything for our mums, and they in turn will do anything for us. They will ask a friend of a friend to help us, so we get a paper round delivering newspapers in the early morn, as we cycle our bike around in the early morning mist. This is how love and influence is used.

At an international level statesmen will use their influence so that wars end and the starving are fed. Journalism can serve the same purpose, by shining a spotlight on disasters public opinion is made aware of bad and mad and sad things. Then people can chose what to do about it. It is when the Press is shacked that nobody knows what is happening neither at home nor abroad, then tin pot dictators can stay in their palaces abusing their power. You can chose your own dictator, sadly there still are many, even after the Berlin Wall has fallen, even after the Arab Spring, even after “fair and free elections”, and yes getting 100% of the vote proves just how good a leader the leader is, and of course even the dead vote.

Influence is better than power, if you have power you may have to use it, and with power comes pain and suffering, deep suffering. If I had influence I’d encourage everybody to read all my books, then I could take my girls to the theatre all the time, thanks to the proceeds.

Radio has influence, it introduces us to new music, like 6Music  here in UK,  or on some good radio stations elsewhere on the dial. Radio adverts encourage us to buy this or buy that, as do tv adverts. Our adverts are very funny and they are in fact an art form when done well.

Art itself informs us, such as Guernica years and years ago, photos such as the famous one of the child on fire from Napam, these influence us. These bring home the horrors of war, brave journalism from many a conflict, such as Syria at the moment, the page screams out at us.  Enough, so much blood, enough so much hatred, enough so much war, enough so much blood. Enough.

If I could have any influence I would scream Enough, please God let it end Enough.

Sing Songs

Sing Songs ©

By

Michael Casey

We had the Eurovision song contest yesterday on tv, it’s a song contest for the whole of Europe if you are reading this outside of Europe. As a child we used to love watching it on tv, some say it was a way of showing that European satellite technology worked, but for us kids it was a load of fun. It’s in it 58^th year now, I can remember how excited we were when the juries all over the place cast their votes, this was in the days before telephone voting. The sighs and groans as other countries beat us, it was a 3 hour extravaganza on Saturday night in Spring. Then the utter naïve joy if England/GB won, or the despair if somebody else beat us.

Now what has Eurovision brought us? ABBA in one word, so you can forgive Eurovision everything just for the sake of ABBA. My favourite ABBA song is “Like an Angel passing though my room” which was on an album that I owned, only I’ve lost it over the years.

Sing Songs used to be a  working class tradition in the pubs in England, before Juke Box became king, before monster tvs and football matches. People used to have a piano at home and they would all gather around and sing songs, having a sing song. Both my daughters are learning to play piano on the piano behind me, you may have seen the photo of me with my daughter on the piano behind me. So I hear a lot of live music at home, it will be a few years more before they can host sing songs in our house. They are in a choir too, their teacher for both is the same lady, so she is a big part of their musical life.

Music is the background to my life, but it really is so much more, saying it IS my life would be too melodramatic, so let me think of a better word. It’s part of my clothing, that’s the best word to describe it, just as we put on our socks or shoes before we leave the house or so that we are fully clothed, music is part of me it’s essential, just as clothes are. Now you get the picture. Everybody has music plugged in as they travel to work or to anywhere, Music is the Opium of the People, I’m sure Marx would say today.

Now what music do I listen to, I listen to Annie Lennox, her 17 album is a favourite so I must listen to it 2 or 3 times every week. 14 years ago JJ made me leave my copy of it in Shanghai, as a kind of hostage, so that I would not forget her. Now I play it often, because I like the sound and it makes me smile at JJ’s naivety all  those years ago. That’s just part of my taste in music.

What about everybody else? It seems music to deafen you is very very popular judging by what I hear on the bus, the whole bus does not want to share it. However  nobody can shout loud enough to discourage the listener not to share it. Then there are those lads in cars with the boom base and the shaded black windows, not forgetting the spoiler, and the huge exhaust, the ones with blood tricking down their ears as they speed on the road. Music or should I say BASS is the thing for them.

Yes a song is good if you find yourself singing along or whistling to it. It was called The Old Grey Whistle Test, it was popular as it passed the test, that happened to be one of the best ever music shows here in the UK. Now we have Jools Holland show, no nothing to do with the French President, Jools is a piano man and his show is totally eclectic, maybe 8 guests, all in different genres of music.

So as you sing songs and even have a sing song in your own home, remember Music flows, it moves, in all meanings of the word move, and if it doesn’t move you, and I don’t mean because the base is set on 11 either, then if it doesn’t move you it’s no good.

My wife the gardener

My Wife the Gardener ©

By Michael Casey

My garden grows/the weeds  conspire to take over/the weeds choke my bluebells/ but bluebells persist they are like that/suddenly there is a crash and a bang/ a Shanghai girl appears/ her house pyjamas are all rolled up/ she is more Japanese than Chinese/ she slings and swings open the store open/ out tumbles the strimmer and the lawn mower/ their silent slumbers are no more/ their plastic covers are thrown away/like the morning duvet in the morn when sleep is over/ another crash and a scream/ husband fetch me the wire and the don't electrocute me safety switch/ then she is off like a Formula One driver/ only she attacks the weeds and our grass/ the grass is getting its short back and sides/ the grass looks like a GI on his first day/ buzz and wooz and wooz and buZZ/ Shanghai girl attacks the grass/she must have a lawn/that little piece of England has entered her bloodstream/ wooz and buzz the machines cut the grass/ me I hide up the yard in  safety/ I have a chopstick artists brush to paint the gutter drain pipes/perfect harmony man and wife together in wooz and buzz with drip drip drip of paint/ then the wooz and buzz ends/ all is silent as the grass green as green can be is all tidied up and ready for picnic duties/ then there are barked orders/husband do this husband do that/ drip drip drip the Shanghai siren disappears with sharp things in her hand/ the small front garden will be attacked and tamed now/ she is a Shanghai dervish/ I slip into the kitchen for Polish toast and  my last green tea/ the gardens are tamed as I finish my green tea/ I promise myself never to buy it again even if it is good for me/ green tea fished/ I go out to the front of the house/ a trucker stares at my wife/ he has never seen a Shanghai gardener before/ she appears more like a rice sower than anything else/ then with a flourish she is done/ Shanghai has tamed Birmingham weeds by her heroic deeds. All is quiet on the Eastern front/ Mrs Casey from Shanghai has finished / just in time to nag me again.