Pain Hurts Like Hell

Pain Hurts Like Hell ©

By Michael Casey

I don’t know what I’m going to write till an idea presents itself and then I throw the bucket down the well and we all see together what the day has brung. That’s the way I write and talk to you. Today Pain has come to the top of the list, and if it was a person I’d have thrown the bastard down the well and drown it.

Many people have Pain, all sorts of people and even children too, which breaks our heart, we would willingly take the pain on their behalf. Somebody I love had a major operation 2 years ago, my prayer then was “I’ll take the pain, let her not have any pain” And guess what? I had the pain and she did not. My Arthur turned up unwanted and unannounced 2 years ago and boy oh boy did it hurt, but the one I love, she had no pain.

So was God a Literalist? Did he have a sick sense of humour just like the song Blasphemous Rumours, the Depeche Mode song? And when we die we’ll meet God and he’ll be laughing. I used to sing that song at the top of my voice on the night shift in the computer room. Little did I know God would have the last laugh.

Now I’ve just had a triple heart bypass, and you get months of pain afterwards as your body recovers. One doctor on the surgical team said my chest would be tender for up to a year. So I’ve been taking up to 4000mg of Paracetamol a day for months now. I’ve been reducing it as the pain allows.

Sadly recovery is not a straight line graph. Some days I can get away with just 2 painkillers, which is great. However on other occasions once you go to bed the pain monster awakes and makes sure you do to. Then just for fun other parts of your body join in, such as your scars on your legs, a sharp scream inducing scream. Or you roll over in bed,  or not even that, the sheet brushes the scar on your chest, that makes you scream and frightens the pigeons off your bedroom roof.

My Arthur, my arthritis decided to get in on the act too, so you have a spasm of pain from your back and hip area. Now is this God having his Depeche Mode Blasphemous Rumours moment. Am I a sinner who deserves all this pain? Some schools of thought do believe this old school stuff. Yes, you do pray, you do scream in prayer when you are in pain, perhaps priests should beat us to make our prayers better.

Again I don’t believe in this Medieval school of thought, as I talk to you my shoulders hurt and I’m getting a spasm from my ankle. My chest scar is a foot long I suppose and the scars on my legs go from my ankle to well above my knee. I have to spread my legs in bed so that my scars don’t rub each other, or my neighbours would hear me scream.

Last night at 2.20 I came down for a pain killer and some peppermint tea, Totoro our new kitten decided  to get frisky so I had to make sure he didn’t attack my bare legs. Wrapping my dressing gown around me for protection I put the kettle on. I then had to get the fake fishing rod out so I could entertain our kamikaze cat, he does have a Japanese name after all. Peppermint tea in one hand and fishing rod in another, me Michael Casey the overgrown garden gnome, fishing for a kitten in a living room in the middle of the night.

I

t was nearly 3am when I went back to bed, my pain subsiding and the cat finally settled. Kittens are like the balls in a pinball machine, they bounce around everywhere. This morning after the school run I have to rub painkiller on both shoulders, my Arthur has spread to there now, it may be due to the restricted sleeping positions.

I think if I could get a free trip to Malta at the Hilton the sunshine would help no end, so Paris if you are reading this, a family room would be perfect, plus breakfast. There is an underground supermarket nearby too, so you could push a trolley for us. Saint Julian is the bus stop I seem to remember.

Well I made myself smile then, Paris Hilton in heels pushing a trolley around for me in a subterranean supermarket. Seriously though folks, do go to Malta if ever you get a chance, its great and best of all they sell Deep Heat painkiller spray.

The Cat's Miaow Heralds Christmas

The Cat’s Miaow Heralds Christmas ©

By Michael Casey

Yesterday was 9^th May 2015, a day of celebration in our house, Christmas had arrived early, over 7 months early. Yesterday was the Day of the Cat, or Totoro Day, forever etched in our memory. Yesterday my 2 daughters finally got their cat. They had begged for a cat for years but yesterday was the day they finally got their wish, their hearts desire.

I had to have my Triple Heart Bypass before I relented, now the cat had landed. It was a confluence of events, a friend of my big daughter had had kittens, or rather her cat had had kittens, four in fact. So she asked my big daughter did she want a cat. So I agreed, so long as it was a boy cat, a Tom as we say here in England. One reason being that I wanted another male in the house, I have been the token male in this Shanghai/Birmingham family for years. Now with a Tom cat the number of males in the household would be doubled, girls 3, boys 2.

I also did not want lots of future kittens all over our house, so a Tom cat was better than a girl cat. He would never be neutered either, I don’t want to give my wife any ideas. So Saturday 9^th May arrived, the collection day. We had bought a cat box or jail, so at 11am prompt both my daughters skipped merrily around the corner to the friend’s house, the cat box swinging in their hand, they did bang it on the front garden wall, but Totoro was not inside yet.

Around the corner the kitten was placed in the mobile jail and transported back to our house, my girls singing Elvis’s Jailhouse Rock as they carried Totoro to his new home. Once home, our house is his home now, 7 weeks old and now he is adopted and has a Japanese name, he will hear plenty of Chinese from my Shanghai wife. He was going to be named Maomi, which is the Chinese for cat but our small daughter overruled us. Totoro is his name, after the fat cat from the Studio Ghibli films.

Totoro sniffed around the house, we had his basket ready, a wicker one that was ½ price from B&Q. Inside was an old rugby shirt of mine, then 2 blankets, so he would have a soft bed, a 3^rd blanket arrived from my sister when she came to view the new kitten. A scratch post was ready in a corner, it’s a bit like a pole dancing post for strippers, only its cat size and covered in rope. At the top is a wrecking ball with marbles in, though no Miley Cyrus attached.

We’d been shopping for cat food, we had Aldi tinned food ready, the girls decided to top this up with cat treats and Whiskas, which is the top brand here in England. The girls also bought cat milk, how on earth do you milk cats, perhaps elves or fairies go from mother cat to mother cat and steal the milk while they are asleep.

Whatever magic is used all I know is that in our fridge is a tiny bottle or two of cat milk, if you listen carefully as you pour it into a saucer you can hear it go “miaow.” As for Totoro when he eats he makes a noise like a machine, an eating machine.

As for the girls their joy is something to behold, Xmas really has come early. I told them they must ring their uncle and thank him, he gave them a large donation of pocket money which came just in time to allow them to splurge on the cat. So Totoro Casey the cat is now a member of the family, it was a big job getting the girls to go to bed last night.

In the middle of the night at 4.30am or so I came downstairs for a pain killer and to see how Totoro was getting on; he was happy, burrowed under all his blankets. I was concerned that he hadn’t done his pooh yet, or pee, even though he had been fed and watered. I had a slice of toast before going back to bed.

I was glad Totoro hadn’t activated the burglar alarm in the night. So I switched the alarm back on and headed back to bed. Only I did something wrong, and the alarm went off, making loads of noise. Totoro looked up from his basket, he didn’t need to say anything, he knew humans were morons total morons, didn’t I know cats need their beauty sleep, 16 hours a day of it.

It was 5am now, I went back to sleep, my pain assuaged. In the morning when I got up it was just me and Totoro in the house, I was home alone, plus cat. When my wife came home from church she told me that Totoro had done his business in a corner of the living room.

Our small daughter had cleaned it up, it was our coalition like deal before cat. I was relieved, not as much as the cat but I was relieved, the kitten of the family had made his first pooh at our house. Then Totoro decided to show just how clever he was, he peed in the corner where hours before he had poohed. I laughed, didn’t they know cats like corners.

So that’s the beginning of Totoro’s life with the Shanghai/Birmingham Caseys, the cat with the Japanese name who’ll soon be bilingual. Miaow. 

Social Media Will Win This Election Tonight, Alright?

Social Media Will Win This Election Tonight, Alright?

By Michael Casey

Ok, so here is the plan, we are gonna party tonight, better than 1999, ok, alright we gonna change the Election result tonight.

My friend, you know who, but you know who I mean don’t you? 

Anyway he said he didn’t believe in anything but in fact he does, he believes in money, MUNY as John Wayne used to say. So here’s what’s moving on up and getting on down. WE are going to have synchronised parties everywhere, all over the country, 23 of them, or is it more I don’t know the paper got stuck in the fax machine.

So while we have everybody partying away they will forget their own name in a drunken orgy of political tea parties, and I don’t mean those Americans either. We have the Mother’s Union make all the sandwiches, and Mary watsit off the telly has baked cakes, we told her it was for Charity, she was so accommodating, she even wanted to come. But I stopped her, it’d blow her brains off the kind of party we are having, I’ve injected some plant food I bought off the internet into all the cakes.

Lord Dodah from the house of Lords had donated 100 crates of 80 year old malt whisky , he has a friend in Old Forge and Singing Anvil who has a pub, don’t ask me where he got the whisky from but its good stuff. We’ve got the Sibling Brothers to do the music, don’t ask me what kind, they’ll just send a link and we rig it up to the music system, with a usb stick as backup.

So while we have these rave parties all over the country in swing seats the punters will be totally but totally off their heads. The parties will be all night sittings just like in the Houses of Parliament. They won’t have the energy to get to the Polls to vote.

So our party will win, 23 seats, that’s all they need to be a government. Or was it 88 seats, the paper got stick in the fax machine. What? Which party is our party?  Whoever pays the most, LabToryLibKip, I haven’t got a *&^% clue, I’ve been trying Mary Watsit’s cake, God she’s such a baker. Oh yea, I did inject a bit of plant food into it.

Now all we have to do is post the message on social media and then everything is ready. What time does the Library shut? We have to hurry or all  plans will come to nought.

The Library closes early on Wednesday, so we cannot rig the result of the Election. Can’t even catch the bus to Birmingham and the brand new library, the biggest in Europe, that’s closed as the council cannot afford to keep it open. Let’s go to the chip shop instead. 

May is full of memories

May is a month full of memories. ©

By Michael Casey

 Tomorrow my wife is 33, so its happy birthday to her.Next Friday, one week after her Birthday its the 10th anniversary since my mum died 2 months after that, my dad died, my brother did CPR and saved him long enough for the doctor to come injection straight to the heart.  Dad had died , but was revived. He was given a week to live. I sat in my sister’s house a few hundred yards from mine and we picked hymns for dad's funeral.

 But he came back, read Padre Pio and Me for details www.michaelgcasey.wordpress.com  

Later in May just 2 years ago my wife's dad was killed in an accident in Shanghai. I rushed home from the hotel, my eyes full of tears. Only he agreed with me and said I'd been right to send JJ back to China with the message to tell her parents all my bad points. Now still young he was dead. He died a few days before his granddaughter's 3rd birthday, his 2nd granddaughter was still only 7 months old.

 Two deaths and 2 Birthdays that’s what May brings. Every May brings the promise of Spring and Happiness that Birthdays bring. But it is balanced by 2 deaths. Death of a mum for me, and death of a dad for my wife.

 Eternal balance and equilibrium. I remember my mum standing by the fridge in her blue and white smock, that was the last time I saw her, apart from in her coffin when I kissed her ice cold cheek. So much warmth now it was all gone. My sister went back to her house one day a few weeks after the funeral. There were flowers growing everywhere, white daisies growing everywhere. Our mum had sneaked up to my sister’s house on the 82 bus, then she'd planted seeds. Their scent was her memorial.

 Always loving her children, her 6 children, now the flowers were her smile goodbye.

I had put my wife on the first flight to Shanghai, I rung the hotel and said I'd be back in 2 weeks, I was left holding the babies, while my wife dashed off. Her dad was not quite dead when she arrived in Shanghai, he was on support and still warm, JJ had time to kiss him goodbye. Then she had to arrange the funeral.

Now I wear my Chinese dad's best watch on my wrist, I have always loved watches, now I have a good one , all because somebody had died. May is a time of celebration in China and the East, the Spring Festival and so forth. For me May reminds me of my blessings, a mom who gave me such a deep Faith, as deep as I need it, and we all know that can be very deep indeed especially in time of need.

 My dad survived because of a miracle and I am not abusing the word. My prayers were heard and now I have 2 daughters too when then I had no clue what the future would do. May moves me and I hope it moves you all, none of us can predict the future, no matter how hard we try but I know my ma and pa are looking down from up there in the sky.

****I wrote this a few years ago

Explaining Politics to Children

Explaining Politics To Children ©

By Michael Casey

Imagine you have to explain Politics to kids, what would you say and how would you do it? All Politicians are Liars and Bastards could be a good opening to begin with and grab their attention. Politics is all about Public Service, could be another line, just make sure you don’t say pubic service by mistake or you’ve lost your audience forever.

So what exactly is Politics, “the art of the possible” is one famous quote, you get a stale 2 week old Easter egg if you know who said that, no cheating on Google. Will kids in today’s world believe you if you said the Liberals were once a major force in politics and Labour is a new party, relatively speaking. Would kids have heard of the Whigs, and where exactly did the Tories come from as a name for the Conservatives, “nobody knows  Sir, they are just bastards” may be one interjection from Clegg at the back.

So you start by explaining what Democracy is, the kids say that this lesson is so boring and vote that they go and play football outside instead. So then you have to explain that teachers are dictators, so can they all sit down again and put the ball down. Such is modern day teaching, having taught myself this writer can vouch that it is even worse than that.

So you start the simple way, you’ll explain each party in turn. So you start with the Labour Party, so some wag at the back says it’s a party for pregnant women. So you reply that it’s an ever growing party as their numbers grow every 9 months. Then you talk about unions etc, the kids think this is so boring, until another wag says the students union is the best one, as the beer is so cheap, and he cannot wait to be a student. Was Tony Blair’s policy all about getting millions to drink cheap beer? I suppose in the end you do get a degree as well, I’m told 41% gets you an engineering degree, but the maths is so hard, could Prince Harry have passed engineering maths?

You try explaining Liberals next. The class is ahead of you and say they are all wear anoraks and smoke skunk, that’s why they wear sandals as laces would just be too much on shoes, besides laces become snakes if you take too many legal highs. As for yellow being their colour, it’s because they eat too many curries, but Birmingham is the best place in the world for curries, did Sir know that? Liberals like jointing things, such as Cameron’s government,  in fact they’ll join anything,  it’s the only way they can make friends.

Moving on to the Conservative, the clue is in the name, conserve, keep steady and not change too much. Aren’t they just rich bastards Sir? So you have to explain they have their own businesses and work hard, that’s why they move to nice areas. So they don’t have to mix with the likes of Smith and Jones, Sir, comes from the back. So you ask a rhetorical question, imagine you win the lottery, where would you go and live? I’d live in a nice house with those rich bastards the Conservatives, Sir.

UKIP, is next on your list, does anybody know what UKIP stands for? They don’t even know themselves , Sir, comes from the back. So you explain, United Kingdom Independence Party. And no they are not a Real Ale appreciation party. They are more than that, though judging by the leader, there is a large element of truth in that statement.

Scottish Nationalists, what exactly are they? Well they are Scottish and they are in fact a Separatist Party. They hate the English or so it feels, they are very clever because the educational standards are higher in Scotland. If only I could teach in Scotland bemoans the teacher as he kicks the football and it hits Clegg on the back of his head, but at least it makes Clegg pay attention.

All of the parties do have one thing in common, they love the sound of their own voice, they love being interviewed and getting a few quid every time they are on telly. The food and drink in the Houses of Parliament are great and cheap, that’s why a lot of M.P.s become alcoholics or just fat, that’s why they lean back and sleep in the chamber. The story of microphones bedded in the furniture is just a myth they are just a bunch of old sot

Now students I do hope I’ve explained the political system to you, we do have such a bunch of wonderful people ruling us. You can watch The Ruling Class the 1972 film with Peter O’Toole as homework. Don’t forget as you can now vote at 16, thanks to Prime Minister Miliband, don’t forget to go out and vote on Thursday. Now let’s go outside and play football.  Sir’s been smoking skunk again laugh the kids, Sir must be a Liberal.

This is me, this is what I look like

This is me, this is what I look like. 26th April  2015
Please buy a few books, I have 8 on Amazon
 Its 3 months since my unplanned Triple Heart Bypass Operation now

This is Totoro our new cat due to arrive on 7th May

This is me, this is what I look like. 6th April  2015