Old Books

Old Books ©

By

Michael Casey

I was looking around the room looking for an object to inspire a story when I glanced over and saw 2 paperbacks abandoned on the piano, and that was enough, so tonight before the big snow arrives I’ll be talking about Old Books. The 2 on the piano were brand new, but sadly the print size was so small I could not even read them. So rather than waste them I told my small daughter to hand them into the charity shop she in volunteering at. You have to do a bit of volunteering to get your Duke of Edinburgh thingy. Personally I’d just go to Edinburgh for the Festival and forget the Duke, not unless it was a name of a pub. Having just said that I can remember there was a pub near my church that one of my old school mate’s dad was the landlord there, William Francis where are you now?

So back to books, why do we like books? We like books because of the story inside them. Though marketing people will tell you a good cover and plurb at the back will sell the book. The smell and touch of a new book is a great thing too, not as good as a girlfriend, not as soft or smelling as nice, but a nice feel to a book is always good, and you can drink in the perfume from the pages.

In Birmingham we had Hudsons on New Street which was a rabbit warren of a bookshop and I really enjoyed visiting there 40 years ago. Modern bookshops are nice but Hudsons was special, if ever you visit Birmingham bow down before where it used to be, then visit Waterstones.

Or go to our new super dupper Central Library with its pretentious title, which is so good and expensive that the council cannot afford to keep it open. The opening hours have been restricted. The purpose of a Library is to share knowledge not just to be a monument of modern architecture. If all it becomes is a monument and it is not open for as long as possible to share knowledge then something has gone wrong. You decide for yourselves. A simple design of an open book, with the spine housing lifts and stairs would have been one quarter of the price and allowed Knowledge to be Shared, not shuttered and closed.

I sidetracked myself there, but the book was a revolution which allowed knowledge to be shared, and for our masters not to monopolise learning. So books took away the power of the master, pity in Birmingham a Big Idea ruining the meaning of Library. A Library is to share books and learning, and it can only do that if it is open.

Where was I, old books we keep because we treasure them, if we have finished with a book we can pass it on via the charity shop, but a treasured book we keep. I will keep The Book Thief, Don Camillo, a history book given to me 50 years ago when I let Primary school. These are precious books. You may not look at these precious books, but they are part of you like family photos. They are part of the architecture of your life, they are building blocks that help form your character. I have reread Don Camillo a few times and was reading it when my Italian heart surgeon took a look at me 3 years ago prior to my bypass operation. Though originally my History teacher 40 years ago suggested I read it.  

The Graveyard Book is another favourite book that I would not throw away, though I would never throw any book away, they are too precious, share them or pass them on, or give them to a charity shop. It’s written by the guy behind Coroline, but you can google. I used to have 100 paperbacks in my collection after I grew out of Spring Hill Library. However when you move house you cannot take everything with you, so they were abandoned, though a few sacred books were spared. Sacred is the correct word, if the book has been so much fun or you enjoyed it so much then you will keep it. It is not a Holy book per say but to you it has great significance.

The Art of Coarse Rugby used to be a favourite book because I had reached grammar school and I played rugby, if its still in print or if you can find it in a charity shop its worth a read. In those days rugby was played by mainly professional people at weekends, so its a great comic read.

I also keep an AtoZ map book in my book collection, nowadays everybody uses SatNav or an app or look on the computer. So in the future if I live long enough to see any grandkids I can show them  map book, and show them how to look up an address. Though that would be classed as old school.

Books teach us and guide us and amuse us. The 15 books I’ve written so far in my life are meant to amuse, I don’t expect anybody to keep or treasure any of them. They are just pieces of chocolate to be enjoyed with a coffee. They are guilt pleasures to be enjoyed and maybe never spoken of or shared. Perhaps somebody might keep a copy of The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker because the title is at least good. Or they keep 300 and Not OUT because they thought it was a cricket book.

I’ll never know, that’s all in the Future, I just hope The Book survives the future, even if libraries are built like books in a very cheap utilitarian form and not as great palaces that are closed because councils cannot afford to run them.

Snow Limits

 Snow Limits ©

By Michael Casey

I’ve just watched a cartoon on the tv about The Snowman’s parents life. We have all seen the animation The Snowman, Walking in the Air being the music that goes with it. I had not intended watching it but I was overruled by the wife, Harry Potter film was recorded and not watched. I’m glad we watched the animation about Raymond Brigg’s parents Ethel and Ernest, it was very well made and reminded me of my own parents.

My dad came to England in 1944 and spent the end of the war fire watching and working in a steel works. Having a few beers was also in order, one of his friends was placed on a bench in Victoria Park Smethwick to sober up, and it was there that dad came tumbling off his bicycle, and got shouted at in the blackout by a policeman.

So watching the Raymond Briggs animation mirrored my dad’s life and brought back many memories. We had an air raid shelter too, Anderson shelter to  give it its full name. Ours was full of rainwater and stunk. My brother tricked me into going inside via a plank, and once I was on an inside on a ledge at the back he withdrew the plank and I was forced to wade through stinking black water to make my escape. So I have stinking memories of that air raid shelter.

In the Summer the metal of the air raid shelter heated up and was a favourite place for cats to sun bathe and for my sister to sit and read, this would be back in the late 1960s. Then dad decided to dig the air raid shelter up. I remember that my brother who had trapped me inside was tasked with digging it up. This is harder than you imagined as it had concrete foundations a few inches thick, maybe 6 inches. Finally when the task was done the shelter was moved to the family garden and re-bolted back together.

All these memories came back because of the cartoon I saw a few minutes ago.We also had a garden shed made from an air raid shelter, so when we had a new big wooded garden shed the old shed was dismantled and placed in the other garden where our lodging house was.  A bit like musical Anderson Shelters, no bombs falling.

Then our lodger decided to put a central floor inside his, so it became posh. I was close to the lodger he was like an extra uncle to me, so I copied him and laid a full floor in the original dug up air raid shelter which was now at the bottom of the family garden. I started by the fence which formed a wall to the side of the shelter. And moved towards the door. By pure chance this gave a camphor to the floor, I also ended covered in filth, the blue bricks were all neatly laid as I had dug the soil up to slot them into position. I suppose those bricks may be quite expensive now as they are 100 plus years old now.

The cartoon tonight showed the old style bread bins, I have ours under our kitchen sink it must be over 60 years old now. There was also a mangle for squeezing the water out of the washing, but you have to separate the rollers when all the washing is done or they stick like glue together. Mum forgot once and when dad was finally able to force the rollers open, and dad was as strong as an Ox, there was a bite left in one of the rollers.

So as you can can imagine many many memories came flooding back tonight, even the fact that his dad was a milkman. An old school friend whom I used to play rugby with in 1970s, because we were a grammar school, his dad was a milkman, and Benny Hill had a number one hit with Ernie, the Fastest Milkman in the West.

It was also mentioned about how special it was to go to grammar school. I can tell you something about grammar schools and Inner Cities. In my family 4 of us went to Grammar school, then 2 of my brothers went to Oxford and Cambridge. Our neighbour 4 doors up, 2 of his went to Grammar school, and then both went to Oxford, he was a mad labour bus driver.  A third child was sent to Elocution lessons.

Further up the same road we had a PhD in mathematics. And around the corner, the son of a nurse and a crane driver was a PhD and his daughter is a medical Doctor. What did all of us have in common, we all went to Mass at Saint Patrick’s and the boys were all altar servers there. So I don’t believe your environment dictates what you are. Hard work and love dictated what you can be.

I would love for my book The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker to be cartoonised or on the radio, or to be honest just for any of you to read its 600 pages. Perhaps you have to be famous first before that happens, it does start slowly after all and Americans especially love fast things, like food, cars, bucks and women. However they did like Lord of the Rings and if any of you need reminding, I am a Birmingham writer too.  

Cold Comforts

Cold Comforts ©

By

Michael Casey

Forgive me my Polish and Ukrainian readers, if 20cm of snow is called a lot of snow here UK. Cold Comfort is a phrase too, and there is Cold Comfort Farm the book, so that’s something for you to investigate if you think today’s piece is rubbish. Though I could say I’ve been snowed under, which as you know from your English teacher is another English expression.

My small daughter did mention in passing this morning, and in passing could be a very rude expression too. See how words attack your brain with multitudes of meaning. Ok, what did she say? She said English was supposed to be very hard to learn for foreigners, but for her and her sister languages seem quiet easy to learn.

Remember she also speaks Chinese thanks to mum. So she is hard wired for languages, though mum never taught me Chinese, so I speak a bit of French and Spanish to our daughters just to spite my Chinese wife. Speaking of whom she is in Shanghai enjoying a well deserved holiday seeing her own mum.

So while she is far away in Shanghai, I am Home Alone with our teenage daughters and Totoro our female cat. The Cold Comfort I have is that the weather is so cold that the cat does not wake me up to be let out in the middle of the night. My pigs, my daughters never hear her calls, so it is me who has to let the cat out. The cat can now almost say “milk” too when she wants more than the mountains of cat food we have for her. No only milk will do, before she escapes into the night to pretend to belong to several other owners. Apart from these past few nights, as 20cm of frozen snow is too much for even her own fur coat.

I’ve just had a warming coffee before I resume talking to you all, I could be sad as Christmas 2015 was when we decided we’d look for another place and then it was a while before we started to look, and now Christmas 2017 is upon us. Close but no cigar, 2 baths and 4 beds in our price range is hard to find. We did almost get there a few times, remember with my heart and kidneys location of bathrooms or 2^nd toilet is as important as the house location itself. Its cold comfort having 2 toilets if I’d have to climb the stairs 20 times a day to reach it. Cause of death, heart attack brought on by attempting to reach the toilet for his weak kidneys. Though the obituary would be amusing.

Laughter is a comfort always, do you remember when dad wanted to watch the film but did not want to go to the toilet all the time during the film? Yea, I remember. So he threw mum’s poncho over himself and used an empty Polish apple juice bottle to pee into while he continued to watch the film. Luckily he’d only just finished drinking the Polish apple juice, perfect recycling no doubt. But he caught his willy in the bottle, so had go to hospital to have the Polish apple juice bottle removed. No I’m only joking, dad is stupid, but not that stupid.

He filled the bottle up, and then he enjoyed the film so much he even filled a 2^nd Polish apple juice bottle up, with his cloudy apple juice pee. Then he fell asleep. When he woke up he got up too fast and tripped over the poncho tearing it. So he blamed Totoro the cat, he also thought he hadn’t drunk any Polish apple juice, he just thought it was cloudy apple variety. So dad picked up the 2 bottles, that had his own pee in, 4 litres worth and put them back in the fridge.

The next day we had carol singers. I did do carol singing once many a year ago,nearly 50 years ago in fact. Collecting for the Missionaries, but that’s another story. But as for today, when the carol singers came, dad had no change but thought they deserved something. Then he remembered the Polish apple juice which really IS nice. So dad gave the carol singers the 2 bottles of cloudy apple juice to share amongst them. And singing really is thirsty business, so they quickly downed the apple juice, which really was dad’s forgotten pee.

We never ever had carol singers ever again, we did wonder why, dad insisted it was because he’d been so generous they did not want to bother us ever again. And they never did, and dad never did pee in bottles either because in the Spring we found a new house with 2 bathrooms and an added downstairs toilet just for him. But that was cold comfort for the carol singers.   

A Joy, a Life

A Joy, a Life ©

By

Michael Casey

I ended up watching a documentary about Judy Dench, or M from James Bond you may remember her as. It was interesting and reminded me of when I used to go to the Theatre quite often. I was sitting in the good seats and my boss and his wife were in the cheap seats. I once remember seeing a local newsreading celebrity sat in the Hippodrome and wearing an evening dress. Nobody wore those kind of clothes any more, though in the past people used to dress in Sunday best when going to the Theatre, well in England anyway. I don’t know what they do in Brazil, I had a Brazil reader again today so hello to them.

The thing is though if you find something that brings you joy and you can do it for you lifetime, then you are a very lucky person, just like Dame Judy Dench. I was of course a nude model in a female only art class, I could have done that for life but gravity came. And the girls didn’t want to photograph me nude with my scars after my quadruple heart bypass. I have a Pirate scar all the way down my chest, as well as scars down both legs from my naughty bits to my shin bone. So that career has ended.

It did get rather cold so sometimes I kept my socks on, just my socks. I kept a bar of crunchy in my socks, posing naked can be very tiring so I needed a sugar rush. My writing has taken over full time, though I can be found just in my dressing gown as I sit here and talk to you all. But enough of my real life posing, what about the rest of you?

Finding your Joy and turning it into your Life is a great thing. I can remember doing a bit of Presenting in the office over 25 years ago and thinking this is great, I even have a photo of me standing up in front of a blackboard explaining something. A decade later I did my one year as an Esol teacher. I could still do that if you are a millionaire and could afford my fees. Well in my imagination anyway. Not the fees, the Esol I could still do. I hope that all over the world wherever you all read this, you find the English clear and hopefully funny too.

I suppose being a dad is a job for life, my own dad still used to call me boy and I was over 40. Being a dad was the thing I always wanted, even more than women are supposed to long for family.So now I have a young wife and 2 teenage daughters, plus a female cat that sneaked into the house because I though Totoro was a tom. So you could say I have my heart’s desire. But and there always is a but being married with kids and a female cat can be very hard work. It is your life’s work trying to be a good dad, and teenage daughters can be a challenge.

Hey Brazil what do you do with your teenager daughters? Yes you send them to Samba school.If they are dancing they don’t have energy for anything else. I do sneak out at night to get some quality dad time. I am a pole dancer in a Gentlemen’s Club, well I thought the cardio-vascular exercise would be good for me. It also give the girls from the Art college a chance to catch me at my best. Hanging and sliding and gyrating from my Pole and all covered in Cadburys’ chocolate.

Do you need a bucket, the very idea of me naked and covered in chocolate and on a Pole, may be enough to make you sick. Then again I may just have proved to you that MY Joy and Life’s work is telling tale tales to amuse you all. Though Lech, Boris and Gregorgi are puking their guts up into a small bucket. Which is my revenge after they buried me in Warley Woods again. So goodnight everybody 2 tales in a day, that’s a lot, but best of all I can hear applause, well the sound of Lech, Boris and Gregorgi puking into a bucket. 

Influences and Choices

Influences and Choices ©

By

Michael Casey

I was looking out the window enjoying the Winter Sun from inside the warmth of our house, because it’s freezing outside, so I’ll enjoy the sun from inside. The Russian blast that is due hasn’t reached Birmingham yet, but its too cold for me already. I was thinking about what somebody asked me yesterday, can I write when I’m Sad, the answer is No. And I’m not talking about SAD, the disorder due to lack of sunshine. I’m talking about how mood or events influence what I can or cannot write. Because I wrote choices in the title I may go down that route as well.

If there is a tragedy somewhere it affects us all in one way or another, and if we have a connection then the effect is stronger. We say I was there only yesterday, or my uncle used to live there. How could this happen, or they are always driving too fast on that road. All manner of events and small or great connections to the place or the event. So if the connection is strong then you don’t feel like going dancing or to lunch because it wouldn’t feel right,or it puts you off your stride. So it is with me and the writing. I cannot write a comic piece about sausages if there has been a food poisoning in the news, though recently a butcher escaped being locked in his own fridge by using a black pudding as a hammer to escape.

You see I’m not a journalist who’s trained this way or that way, to write about all manner of things, including the terrible and the heart breaking. I hope I write funny stuff normally, as an antidote to some of sadnesses I have witnessed in life. I don’t want to bore you all about my pains, though I do mention them from time to time. I’d rather lead you down the garden path to laughter. I hope you enjoy my style, I could not write in the rubbish style of some publications, though you could all be saying, michael casey writes rubbish.

So today as I looked out the window I see 2 of our neighbours putting a plastic table in the boot of their car, outside the house where the other neighbour just died. Two separate events but to a writer, one can lead to another. Table and a death. When one of our lodgers died he left behind a brand new pair of shoes, so dad gave them to Billy one of his co-workers at the steelworks, this would be 30 years ago. Only the next day Billy told dad that the dead man had chased him around the table. That’s why you never put shoes on a table I suppose.

So just by looking out the window I was influenced by what I saw, and what I chose to write about. It unlocked a memory and as you know I have many many memories. Memory makes us. That’s why when you lose a memory you are losing part of your personal history, and that’s why any illness or disease that destroys Memory is a bad thing. And so is substance abuse of any kind, because it is taking away part of us and our dignity. And that’s why some things have so many memories attached to them, its not the thing, its the memory attached to the thing. That old chair belonged to granny and she used to sit in it and tell you stories. Or that sledge was the Rosebud sledge in Citizen Kane.

Life is full of influences, sex, drugs and rock and roll could be one path, one influence. Or percentages and mansions another path if you are the manager. The thing in life is to be free to feel all the influences, but then wise enough to chose the right one. Do you give in to the lust, or wait for the right guy, though if you are lucky it’s the same guy. Sometimes the choice is not yours at all. You just stumble along, and as Mark Harris once said to me, You are a good stumbler.

My brother said try computers, and I applied for one job, scrawling a note of application on half a piece of paper as I wrote on the old barn chair, the one I still have upstairs in my rubbish room. That was 40 years ago and I became a Computer Operator on DEC PDP 1170s, so by being influenced by my brother my choice led to a job that lasted 21 years. I stumbled into it. The dog peed on the garden gate and the dog’s pee led to me buying this house years later.

I never even thought of being a writer, I just loved words and listening to Politics with my dad. So once I had the house I wondered what next, so words chose me. I have an old shoe box behind the piano with my first efforts written in pencil behind me. I might dig it out and release those old stories, once I type them in. They are 30 years old and more now.

I can remember one story called Darth The Once Mighty, I may dig that one out. We used to have a bag of pennies to feed the coffee machine, so that ended up in the story, but with mystical powers, as did the coloured read write rings from computer tapes. Things influence stories that way, they become ingredients in a story. I only know if you all like today’s story, number 1600+ or whatever after I see the viewing figures. I may think you’ll like this one but you don’t. Or I may wonder why you love this story. Shakespeare is big in Poland it would seem, but I only found out after I saw the viewing figures and googled.

I hope my choice of words and stories influences you all for the good. Though Lech, Boris and Gregorgi say they are off to the pub, that is how I’ve influenced them today. Their choice is which pub, and once there they will definitely be under the influence, not of my words but 7 pints of Stella Artois each. If I’m lucky they’ll bring me back some Walkers cheese and onion crisps.    

Find me Fast 5555 5555 5555 5555

If you want to find me fast then just Whistle

The Windmills of Your Mind

It's my favourite song ever, but will have all guessed that if you are regular readers.

OR

Google   "michael casey fat silver haired writer in shades"

that leads to me and my words.

as does the link below

https://www.amazon.com/Michael-Casey/e/B00571G0YC

if you want to email then michaelgcasey@hotmail.com  gets to me if you use a funny subject line

Fences from 2013

Fences ©

By Michael Casey

I was on my way to Mass this morning and I was thinking about what I could write next. I’ve covered a lot of ground already with 500 shorts or blogs. They are on Amazon Kindle, but did you know you can also download to a PC if you don’t have a Kindle.

As I turned the corner I looked at the fence and that was it, I had the idea for the next piece of writing, and so here I am talking to you about Fences. Yes that’s how I get my ideas, I just see or hear something then away I go. An hour or so later you can see what I’ve produce on my  site. Then I share it with Wordpress. When I have 100 or so pieces of writing I copy them off as an ebook, in total I have 15 books now on Amazon Kindle.

But what about Fences? Well my first memory is the hole in the fence, this allowed a bulldog to get into our back garden from the back streets behind our road. So we all ran and hid in the garden shed, only my brothers would not let me in , so I had to hide in the outside toilet. Nobody had indoor toilets in them days, 50 years ago. I could hear the bulldog barking. When he was gone I went crying back home to our house and the safety of my mum’s arms. She soothed me with fairy cakes, these were the cup cake variety which you make from a packet of ready mix.

Move on a few years and dad could afford to have a new fence built, one with concrete posts and slatted pieces of wood. Now the bulldogs could not come and get us. So peace reigned.

Well almost peace, our neighbour at the bottom of the garden had 3 sons and they loved  football. So my mum’s eternal worry was that they would break the fence. However sometimes they would kick the ball over the fence, so silence reigned. Sometimes me and my brother went to the other garden and had our own game of football with the borrowed ball. Or until Mr Q asked for the ball back.

Innocent pleasures, as was climbing over the fence to Mrs Dixon’s to get the ball when we kicked it over the side fence. She was posh and did not like us smelly boys climbing over the fence. Her son became a Policeman and actually made Sergeant, so he was Sergeant Dixon, as in Dixon of Dock Green the famous UK tv series. I imagine he was teased by his work mates, though I think he may have made inspector later on. He’d be retired now I imagine.

My other memory is the great storm in the 1970s, it really was immense. All our fences came crashing down, apart from the one at the back which was newish, have survived constant football, it stayed standing. The others were a mess, a total mess.

My parents would not let that stand in the way. So together my mum and dad built the 3 fences, we had 2 gardens you see, but that was an accident I’ll talk about another time. My mum went around all the building sites where builders were, and offered a few quid for timber which was going to be burnt. That’s the way builders worked in the old days, 30 years ago. No health and safety and pollution laws. If an Irish lady came with fivers in her hand of course  they’d give her the planks, and deliver too. They got beer money and we got timber, a perfect exchange.

The timber was thrown in a heap in the middle of what was the two gardens, a shipwreck of enormous proportions. A kind of Turner painting in the middle of our back gardens. A war painting that could have been hung in the Tate, made from planks galore, which had in turn had turned into a very good piss up for the builders.

Now how do you build a fence? One plank at a time. Dad got some concrete posts delivered and some supports. Then he dug holes and planted the posts in concrete about 18 inches deep. Once set the supports, the frames were attached to the posts. Then it was a question of nailing the planks to the supports.

I think he measured one plank, and cut it to 5feet, then that was a template for the others. It must have took a couple of weeks to build the fence, dad still had to go to Hell every day. Hell being a steelworks in Smethwick, where 400degrees plus was the norm.

So mum and dad built the fences, one plank at the time. Mum having to go in and start the dinner while dad hammered away. Now theses planks were from old floorboards from demolished houses, so they were ¾ inch thick or 2cms each if you know metric. This means they were as strong as girders.

On one side it was decided to make the fence 6 feet tall, it was only lower in the middle between our two gardens. So away dad hammered. I imagine I was sent around the corner with a jug to get a few pints from the off licence, a reward for all his efforts. I still remember the large lady who used to live there, occasionally we went there for sweets too.

So after a few weeks the fences were built. It was then I was allowed to chip in. I had to creosote the fences. Creosote is a brown thick and foul smelling liquid, it preserves wood. No Tom Sawyer could I be, I had to do it all myself. I stunk of creosote for weeks, or rather my clothes did, no matter how often you wash them. I had a green jumper I remember that, and it stunk.

Now I could talk of fences and walls between us, and so forth, and I did have that idea at the back of my mind as I was talking to you. But having come to the end of this piece, if you think about it, what have I really been talking about? I’ve been talking about love, the family of love I come from. In fact I suppose the first 500 shorts or blogs have been about that too. Now if only I could get them on the Radio, now that could mend fences.

Or you could all just buy 300 and Not OUT

https://www.amazon.com/Michael-Casey/e/B00571G0YC

I'll try and write something new later on so long as the cold does not get me. 25/feb/2018

 my total today is 1600+ pieces including repeats. Or 1,250,000 Words
with readers in 26+ countries. Pity is nobody wants to pay for a book nowadays, because they can read it here. 
So I am still a penniless writer