Cartoon Power

Cartoon Power ©

By Michael Casey

We just watched the Lorex film again, it’s really good fun with a message thrown in too. Cartoons both entertain and inform us, they are sweets for the mind, I hope when I write I’m writing cartoons for your mind too. Or at least leading you up the garden path as little Joan once said to me, but once you are up the garden path I hope you do laugh.

Cartoons are big oversized adjectives if you like, they make something small much much bigger and distorted. In 1970 I started my first year at grammar school, it was then that I started the “torture” that is called Latin. I did 5 years of Latin, so I know all about “torture” so immediately you have a  cartoon in your head of me being tortured by a teacher in Roman attire. If you have no imagination just think of George Clooney in his latest film.

In fact the 1^st Latin teacher was called Little Caesar by my brother’s form a few years ahead of mine. He was of short stature like the Speaker in the House of Commons, but like him he had much power.

Our Latin teacher could shout till his face was as red as a tomato, so even though he was small, he was feared.  He reeked of Brut and had steel heels on his shoes. The Speaker of the Houses of Parliament doesn’t have to shout like that, he can just use mace, or have I misunderstood what they mean about the power of the Mace in Parliament?

Either way I hope you all have a cartoon in your head now, of my Latin teacher and of the Speaker in the Houses of Parliament. I should add I do really like Speaker Bercow, he is a great man, even if he sends me an autograph with an explanation of the Mace, scribbled on the back. However you Americans out there will no doubt keep your own cartoon in your mind, forget a gavel those English take no rubbish from anybody, mace man, mace man.

Which brings me on to my 2^nd Latin teacher, Mr Proctor, and you can make your own jokes up about his name, but it will explain just how difficult Latin was, you can imagine your own analogy. Over a 2 hour lesson with a break for oxygen in the middle, 1^st 2 periods on a Tuesday I think, he explained the Ablative Absolute, which only Boris Jonson could possibly explain nowadays.

Although Boris might say, the People tired by the EU decided to tell them to sling their hook. In our Latin lesson it was the Greeks tired by the War, they gave up, or maybe it was they started to break plates, rather than wash them.

So I’ve not really spoken of cartoons at all, but I hope as you listen to your nanny read this, or mistress whatever your social status allows you, well I hope you are listening to cartoons appear in your mind, and all without the use of alcohol, or stimulants, whatever your social status allows.

Another trick Mr Proctor did was ask us to close our eyes and use our imagination, in this way he explained adjectives. So I want any readers out there to hold their nanny or mistress, depending on your social status, or if you are an M.P. to wave your Order Paper at the Speaker of the House, or if you are in a Chinese takeaway just to smell the duck and pancakes being prepared. Sorry for that sentence, I was just feeling hungry, anyway can everybody close their eyes.

Think of a car, any car you like, then think of a big car, then a think of a big red car, then a big red car with a bell on, and ladders too. So you may have started with a Skoda, or a Rolls Royce, depending on your social status. Then a big car may have been an estate car where you first made out with the nanny, depending on your social status, but don’t tell the wife, or the 2^nd mistress. I just added that sentence to see if you were paying attention, this is Radio after all.

When RED is added it always becomes a sports car, or the 92 bus, depending on your social status. With bells and ladder you end up with a fire engine. So you have just leant the power of adjectives, thanks to Mr Proctor.

And what of cartoons? They are fun and if I get it right when I present something to you they are cartoons made with my words.   

 hope you liked this yesterday was a pain day...

Vote for me, I'm Bob!

Vote for me, I’m Bob! ©

By Michael Casey

Yes vote for me I’m Bob! I worked my way up from the gutter now I have a mansion. So if you vote for me then you’ll have a mansion too.     I have a beautiful wife and 3 adorable children, one of each, ok one is gay, but if you say that’s because I’m a bad father or there is something wrong in my downstairs department, then you might not wake up.

Johnnie and the boys might just pay you a visit, after they’ve collected the protection money. You’ll have to join a ladies choir after they finish with you. Johnnie is very loyal, very loyal, I saved his life, I said he could be my loyal lieutenant or I’d put explosives in his pants, literally.

After that he’s been better than a brother to me, gives me cakes on my birthday, he bakes them himself if you know what I mean. But he’s like a best friend to my gay son Julian, so with a lieutenant like that and a best friend for Julian we are close, very close. But don’t be casting aspersions on the size of my hands, or he’ll come around and set fire to your house, and your neighbours too, he does enjoy his work.

I started as an embalmer and mortician, but I knew it was a dead end job, though that’s where I met my Lady, my Nancy. She was the receptionist at the Funeral House, the Sleeping Oaks Funeral Home Inc. We made out in a deluxe coffin, she appreciated the size of my hands if you know what I mean, though the lid came down and we nearly suffocated inside. Though the sexual high was unbelievable, you don’t know you’ve have sex until  you’ve nearly died in a coffin. Perhaps that Harry Potter girl should forget her website and just date a mortician.

Nancy got pregnant fast, from death to birth, poetic don’t you think? I decided we needed to make so money fast. So I started to street race using a hearse, those cars are always looked after, and never do much mileage. So it was obvious, and I won prizes and bets on the side, so soon we had enough for a down payment on a house.

I had learnt a bit about cars so I left the funeral home and started a garage fixing up off road racing cars, I was good at that, and I still did a bit of racing and betting on the side. Obviously I could make cars have accidents for the right price, so soon the money came rolling in.

I got asked to fix up a car for a bank job, I said I’d only do it if I could be the driver, I was proud of my work after all. So I became a getaway driver, I was very good at it. We did several jobs and I repainted the car after every job. We did 17 maybe, and my stash was in the mattress. Sex on a mattress full of 100 dollar bills, is good, in God We Trust, and all that. Not as good as in a deluxe coffin with the lid stuck, but you’re not worried by any unplanned pregnancy, you have a child trust fund in the mattress after all.

Nobody’s luck lasted and on our 23 job, the FBI were waiting, they waited for us to put all the money in the car before they pounced. There were 4 of us, 5 if you count me waiting in the car when they FBI screamed at us over the loudspeaker. Stop, hands up and exit the car. We all blamed each other, this was big hit $2,000,000 in cash and now we’d be going to jail forever.

So I waited for the others to get out and then I floored it, my 4 buddies all got mown down in the crossfire, dead as dead can be. But I could recommend a good funeral home. I looked up at the Madonna on the dashboard and swore I’d never be a getaway driver again if she helped me. At that very same moment a tornado hit, it’d been brewing now it hit. So I got away.

I ditched the car, but kept the money. I set fire to it in fact, and pushed it into a lake afterwards. I called a taxi, it was Johnnie driving, that’s how we first met. I decided to open a taxi firm, Johnnie looked after it for me. I opened a bakery and a general store, and a little motel. A hairdressers too, Nancy always liked her hair to look good, so if we owned a salon she’d never need to wait.

I knew the Madonna had to be taken care of too so I started doing good works and I even decided to join the Republic Party. For no other reason that I liked the colour Red. My business empire expanded and I bought a book shop, reading was important wasn’t it? I made sure that Michael Casey’s books were always in stock, I never read any of them, but having a Birmingham England writer’s books made our store more exotic.

All I needed now was a mistress, so Mandy from our hairdressers was available, and sex in a hairdresser’s chair is something else, not as good as a rocking chair, or in a deluxe coffin, but still very good. My life was coming up roses. So I bought a pharmacy too, just to make sure my mistress Mandy didn’t give me parallel parenthood.

So that’s about all I can say for now, I have to write a speech for the Caucus, I’ve met this pretty little thing called Brandy, she’s so full of vigour and she’s an English Major at the University. She studying at the building I funded, I am a respectable member of the community after all.

We hit it off straight away, she helped me with my research, and one thing led to another. We nearly knocked over a few shelves of books, but I do believe in turning over a new leaf or leaves if you know what I mean. It’s a hard life in Politics. 

Being a Gay Dad

Being a Gay Dad ©

By Michael Casey

Now before I start a message for Googlers, I am not Gay, though this will come top of all future Google searches.  What I am is defined by Who I am, not who is my preferred sleeping partner. Being Gay or Black or Disabled is unimportant, can I find the remote in time to watch Grimm or Sherlock or Elementary now THAT is important, as is do I buy a round of Stella Artois, or am I always in the toilets when it’s my turn to buy a pint.

We can discuss prejudice at a later date, being fat, silver haired having a quadruple bypass and arthritis to make me scream is irrelevant too. But at least I have a pretty family, and I am a good writer, though you may disagree and I may then try to play the fat silver haired quadruple bypass and screaming arthritis card.

So where was I, I was here looking at clothes for my daughters. I’m not stupid I’m not going to traipse round the shops I’d lose the will to live if I had to do that. I have written on this topic before, after 700+ stories most things are covered. Though you may all wish I was covered too, rather like a budgie’s cage, then I may shut up. Some of you are such cruel cruel bastards, I could sob now, and play the sob card, but some of you may think I’m a SOB anyway. See how you twist my words, you bunch of lawyers.

The thing about shopping online, or just window shopping online before despatching the kids out to the shops with money in their palms, is that it’s so much quicker. You can have a 40 min window in between your favourite tv shows, or in my case the Press Preview on Sky News, or the latest Andrew Graham-Dixon Art History show on BBC4.

So you gallop through the websites, as you stop you say yes or no and an item is picked. You pick shape and form, colour is so so important too. My smallest daughter just loves yellow, that’s why I bought a yellow flowering plant yesterday that’s on the shelf to my right by the phone. If the clothes item is yellow it’s got an 80% chance of being picked immediately. If it’s on sale and it looks really good we pick 2 of them. All the time I have an eye on the clock, I must not miss my show, missing BBC news is a capital offence.

My big daughter is harder to please, and I really have to reward her as she is doing so good at school, and she’s on track to be a Dr, God Help Us. So we scroll down looking at this and that, simultaneously we’ll say STOP, this item must be bought. If this happens frequently and if you push them towards something that they agree is really nice, and you the dad spotted it first, THEN YOU ARE A GAY DAD.

My girls are at school or out with their friends, or even with their Gay friend, when asked where did they get this or that the answer is FREQUENTLY, oh Dad spotted it. YOU HAVE A GAY DAD. So then you have to accept it. I am a Gay Dad. This means I am a Fashionista, but I do have a Shanghai wife, which means she dresses better than a Parisian or an Italian. I’ve gotten used to this these past 2 decades. As for me Cotton Traders is my shop of choice, but only because I have a great big derriere, but take a look for yourselves, not at my derriere but at Cotton Traders.

A Gay dad knows what colours are best for his girls and even for his  Shanghai wife. I can boast we’ve walked into a store, I take off my shades and walk around and walk out in less than 5 minutes. Why did I walk out, because the colours may be ok for a convention of undertakers, but for beautiful women, a bit of colour is always needed.

You have to know what colours work for your girls. Red is my wife’s prime colour, you can have a swatch done so you know your colour palette as far as your fashion goes. Me and my girls know what works best for mum so we advise her on what will won’t work. Mainly she knows her own style, but sometimes she does bring home a Cuckoo so we all say yuck and send her back to the shop for a refund. That’s where being a Gay Dad comes in useful, if I have to bear the cross of having a young wife, I do want her to stay looking good. While I dress in blue cord a la Cotton Traders.

Now that I’ve explained everything I hope all Gay Dads can come out of the ladies’  changing room with their head held high. It is a badge of honour to be called a Gay Dad, it means your daughters love you, especially if you pay. 

Sleeping with your dreams

Sleeping with your Dreams ©

By Michael Casey

Sleep is good, its great even, especially if you’ve missed it, or not had good sleep in a while. Where does it all begin?  It begins as a child when we cuddle up with mum or dad and fall asleep on them, we don’t want to go to bed or we’ll miss something that Uncle Johnny from London might say. So we beg to stay up a while longer before we fall asleep and have to be carried upstairs to bed.

Years later we’ve inherited an old Bush radio and we are listening to the Book at Bedtime, it’s the Ghost and Mrs Muir, so we force ourselves to stay awake while the news and  Douglas Stewart Reporting is on, then we can hear the rest of the story. Only we fall asleep and you have to rely on your brother to explain what happened. That radio was my university for 20 years, BBC Radio 4, for a few years when I shared a bed with my brother listening to the radio and the Book at Bedtime was a night-time ritual before we went to sleep.

As you grow older your bedtime is one of choice, you chose for yourself, when you go to bed, however school and work then have a major influence on your sleeping patterns. Imagination also has an effect on your sleep, are you a light sleeper or a heavy one, and do you dream? I’m told I once sat bolt upright in my bed and shouted “Launch the Lifeboats” before falling back down and resuming my snoring deep sleep.

As a shift worker my sleep and my body has been ruined by the need to sleep during the day. I did 14 years of night shifts. 3 days 3 nights 3 off, 3 evenings 3 nights 3 off, 4 on 4 off were amongst the shift patterns I worked. 12 hour shifts too, so that all you wanted was to crawl into bed. When I was still at home my mum would give me breakfast before I’d go to sleep.

It takes a while to get used to daytime sleeping, and waking at 5pm and not knowing what day of the week it is. You have to spend a few minutes processing the fact that it was light when you went to bed and now it’s dark when you get up, everything is reversed. You also feel so tired all of the time, it’s not nature it’s not natural. When the days off come then you have to switch back to normal sleeping times, constant switching back and forth IS bad for your biology. I’m sure my own has been ruined by the years of high switching night shift patterns.

With all this going on you really appreciate your sleep, and you will spend good money on a mattress, I think I spent 200quid 20 years ago for a really good mattress, which is like 600 quid in today’s money. I’ve just bought a new mattress in fact from www.beds.co.uk  as I deserved it. A side effect of my heart bypass surgery is the fact that I’m still restricted as what positions I can sleep in, so I need a really good mattress to support my bulk.

With the mattress you need sheets and pillows, not to mention duvets. Only quality will do, especially if you are married as threadbare bed-ware does not impress the girls. You need soft sheets for the hard battles, to quote an ancient Peter Sellars’ film title. If you are comfy you will sleep soundly and be full of vim in the morning.

The worst shift pattern I ever did involved a 2.30am finish, start at 6pm and finish at 2.30am. I’d walk from the council house to the taxi stand and awaken my driver who then took me home. I’d have a snack before going to bed at about 4 am. There was one side effect of this crazy shift pattern. My wife conceived and we had our first daughter.

Going to bed at 4am really threw my body I slept for a very long time before dashing out at 5pm to catch the bus to work. I was offered a renewal of that contract but I decided my days of night shift working should finish. The night shifts had the last laugh though, because no matter what time I went to bed my body would not let me sleep till 4am, and it took 3 months before my body allowed me to go to sleep naturally.

So all kinds of everything have been my working hours and my bedtime has varied so much, so I really appreciate my Egyptian cotton sheets and my duck pillows, all I need is for my scars to heal so I can move freely instead of gingerly.