Creative Writing Group on Daily Telegraph

I just noticed people were joining the Creative Writing Group at this time of night, are we all night owls?

 

I used to listed to Radio4 in bed with my brother 40years ago and more.  THe World Tonight with Douglas Stuart reporting, following by The Book at Bedtime, I even remember THe Ghost and Mrs Muir. It was thanks to 20years of religious listening to Radio4 that I lost most of my Brummie accent, it also meant that when I started to write I had heard a lot of writing previously.

 

Writing a story is having a baby, of course your baby   is beautiful, how dare anybody say otherwise. However you have to be honest with yourself, you also have to tell the whole world GO **&$&^ because you must always have faith in yourself. I have faith in my play Shoplife, I have faith in The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker which on Leap Years Day 2012 will be 24years old. I never bothered looking for a publisher and then finally I did, but thats another story. From Leap Year to Leap Year the story of.... I can hear the byline being typed.

 

It would kill my writing if somebody told me how to type, I meant how to write, but writing is more than typing, its al about ideas. You are a writer because you write, not because you type. Its a thought process, its having ideas, not the physical action of typing. Here's my idea from this evening at Mass. The Arch Bishop was having a Visitation at Saint Mary's in Harborne, so I wondered what it must feel like. It is like having an Ofsted but for a church, so as I left I asked the Arch Bishop as I shook his hand "YOU must be like the Mother-in-Law", the Arch Bishop still shaking my hand laughed and said that he was more like a cousin visiting.

 

Now that's what writing is all about, its about ideas, sometimes  they come when you should be paying attention at Mass, but ideas always come, even if typing doesn't.

Through My Letter Box

Through My Letter Box ©

By Michael Casey

 

I don’t know about you but I’m sick and tired of junk mail coming through my letter box. Where we live we have tons of fast food outlets, maybe 15 all  within a ten minute walk of the house. A young man’s delight no doubt, not to mention 3 pubs, and it used to be 4 pubs.

 

Now  if the junk mail, or should I say leaflets were for local fast food places it wouldn’t be so bad, but it’s for places you have to catch a bus to find them. Can I borrow the Sat Nav love? I’m going to buy some chips and a pizza, its only 99p at the Truly The Best Chip Emporium Ever. So clutching the leaflet I’ll set off to find this chip heaven, walking not driving either, I cannot drive after all. You cannot drive and eat chips at the same time after all, well legally you cannot, but don’t get me started on all the illegal driving companion activities, are they all just trying to kill me while I cross the road. When you get there it’s so far away they have a different English accent, so you point to the sign on the wall, it would have been better to go to MacDonalds. So why do they put their rubbish leaflets through my door?

 

Recycle bins are ugly, we have 3 huge ones in our back garden, no wonder we have so many burglaries, thieves just stand on them to break into peoples’ houses.  I suppose after eating so much fast food, as advertised by all the leaflets coming through all the letter boxes; the thieves only break in so that they can  raise money to go to health farms. At the health farms young girls wearing plastic gloves squeeze out all the spots created by eating all the junk food as advertised by the junk food leaflets coming through my letter box. I feel like a victim and have a complex, why me, why me, why do I have to suffer from sick letter box syndrome, sob, it’s too much for me.

 

I did think of getting a crocodile that was trained to eat the fingers of junk mail deliverers, I wouldn’t need to feed it either as finger food would be enough. But the children want a cat so I suppose we’ll have to get a cat. But it will be an evil cat who will scratch any junk food leaflet deliverer.  Or perhaps I should get some Chinese scientist friends to develop a sensor that pukes back any junk leaflet all over the leaflet deliverers, and it would spay a scent of puke all over the deliverer.

Now that’s what I’m tempted to do, but instead we have an overweight recycle bin that’s covered in spots, thanks to all the junk food leaflets inside it. If the Council did some market research perhaps they’d be a byelaw stating “NO JUNK FOOD LEAFLETS” Global Warming would be sorted in one fell swoop too.

 

TSPS. The Secret Prayer Society

TSPS. The Secret Prayer Society. Now what is a secret prayer? Its when you see somebody in need of a prayer and your heart jumps towards them, its like trying to catch a baby when they are about to fall. Its instinctive, its natural, its normal, its the best in us leaping out to help others. Its not based on Creed or any other thing, its me or you or all of us, just jumping from the heart. Those we pray for may never know they are being prayed for, its an act of love, I suppose just as our God loves us, its like breathing, a natural thing. You can do a deal with a friend, you pray for me and I'll pray for you. I did this as a child, I prayed for an old man with Parkinsons and he prayed that I pass my exam for grammar school. I met another prayer friend last night, so if good comes it will because of her prayer for me. I'm praying for her too and it feels all right. So why can't we all give it a try. It can be in secret, we can pray for anybody and everybody, for the football team, for the baseball team whatever you like. Of course you can go to church and pray, go to temple and pray, or just sit on the subway and pray for the poor downcast man sitting opposite. He doesn't know you are praying for him but God does know. They say the humblest prayers are the best, right now in my own life I could say the only way is up. All of us all over the FACEBOOK  world can impact each other via FB, but we all have much much more power though prayer. So join The Secret Prayer Society today.

What If

What If (c)

By 

Michael Casey 

What if Today wasn't the 1st day of a New Year but the last Day of Your Life.

Who would you hug, who would you kiss, who would you miss.

Who would miss you, do you have a clue, and do you know why?

Would your years of striving to be a good writer/teacher/cop or whatever still mean so much to you .

Would you miss making love in a tent high up in the mountains.

Would you miss a real good coffee and donut on 7th and 4th.

Would you miss the sales where you always bought nothing but shoes, shoes for work. But the fun you had with the girls was worth it , because pals are fun.

Would you miss Midnight Mass and Silent Night getting home exhausted and late and crying for your late mother.

Would you be too afraid that you'd not meet her again in the afterlife, or would that be the only hope you'd cling too as you watched the hands on clock sweep around faster and faster.

Would you rail at the world and want to get your gun and shoot those bastards who'd ruined your life in the past , even if all they ever did was steal your parking place, or would you be all sweetness and light, dying peacefully without a fight.

What would be your parting words, would anybody remember you, small kindnesses  remembered and rewarded. 

Remember thou art dust and to dust thy will return is the Ash Wednesday phrase

Is that how you want to be remembered?

Or he made me laugh, he made me cry but I was always was happy when he was around , I'll miss him yes , but I've not lost him because because a laugh lasts forever.

That is my hope, for the start of this New Year and new day, and everyday because we all should live like today is our last because one fact is certain one day it will be , so make 'em laugh , make 'em laugh, make 'em laugh

Happy New Year from this Comedy Writer Michael Casey

Christmas 2011

Christmas 2011 ©

by Michael Casey

This Christmas 2011 was  a great Christmas for our small but ever growing daughters, their uncles and aunties  spoiled them, treasure reached new revels. The girls had decided to set the family Christmas tree up in their bedroom, somehow the tree was taller than ever, they found a longer aluminium pole to insert, it now looks as if a giraffe has taken refuge underneath, so the tree was reaching for the sky. Talking of Sky our Sky Plus box had a fault, half the space disappeared, however a quick IM conversation  explained how to get the space back. Then we told the Sky Plus to record 8 things while we headed off to my brother’s for Christmas dinner.

For a change we were on time for the family feast, only my brother had managed to forgot to light the gas or was it electric, so we waited 2 and a half hours for the turkey, the turkey must have been thinking of tunnelling its way out, just like  in cartoons. Starvation descended upon the 10 of us, we had to have emergency Terry’s Chocolate Orange, lest we fall over, or lest our sugar levels went too low. Then finally the food was declared ready, ding ding, like wrestlers we stormed to the dinner table as my brother shared out  the turkey. Back in the old days when my mother was alive we would feed 5 lodgers first and give them 4 pints each before we could have our share.  The same love is there, I’m sure our parents look down and smile, the Casey family feast is shared. The turkey did not stand a chance. By the time the sharing was done I had finished as had my sister, so we gave up our seats so my brother and his wife could sit and eat.

I mixed pink wine with orange juice, it was nice, not very polite as far as the wine was concerned but I like the mix so that’s the way I had it, a poor man’s BuxFizz. Cake and pudding were also served, laughter and photos and love all mixed together. Dr Who followed, the nation’s traditional Christmas fare. Dr Who was all about Mother Love, as it should be on a Christmas Day, it all started with a Mother’s Love after all. Dr Who cried with happiness for a finish, and that’s how it should be this and every Christmas Day. So shed a few tears for those you love, this day and every day.

What is Poetry?

I was thinking what is poetry, then I realised its the sound of the home. My wife on the phone to her friends, two Chinese speakers sound like chickens, qok qok qok quar, thats how Chinese make the sound of clucking. Then there is the sound of the central heating gurrling away and then the clunk as it switches ityself off. Laughter as my girls run up and down the stairs, the rat at tat tat as I type on the keyboard, then the click as I switch on the speakers and start up the music to keep me company as I type. A splash outside as a car drives by in the rain, the sound of barking as the neighbours dog howls at the moon. Next door a child cries she does not want to go to bed, she wants to stop up and wait for Santa just in case he's a few days early. All this is the heartbeat of a home, even when its hard to think as my wife is two feet away from me  screaming down the phone in Chinese. This is my heartbeat, I hope yours is just as strong. Merry Christmas Everybody. Michael Casey www.michaelgcasey.multiply.com

Earphones

Earphones, what a lot of effort it takes to pick a pair.

Do you over the ear or in the ear, do you want plastic or metal, do you want soft rubber or memory foam. Its such a big deal  for something that'll only last six month, tops.I had a nice pair and with inline volume control, but they died as they all do. I had a hard plastic replacement to hand but I want a comfortable one read for when these die on me. So I looked on Amazon and Argos, read the reviews. Decided on what I wanted, a blue metal pair, then I read the reviews, 50/50 50 4star, 50 2star, so I decided, if in doubt believe the worst, so those were no good. Then I saw a pair with what looked like steel wire as the lines, and covered in plastic. Argos had them 1/3 off, then I checked with Amazon, the same thing for  more than 1/2 the price of the ones on on offer. Which if you've been following the maths means 1/3 of the original before offer in price. Or in simple language, not 15, not 10, not even 5, but 3.90, to those of you who spend a lot on your headphones, I cannot afford the really nice ones, why, because they just don't last and I don't have the money anyway. So I give Amazon my vote and hope that when they arrive they are not a pirated copy. And if you are wondering what I bought, "Kitsound KS1 Noise Isolating Stereo Earphones. If I were brave I'd wear HEADphones in the street and on the bus, but then I'd look a right Charlie, which is a very old figure of speech. The headphones would last, but that's another story.