From Shanghai to Birmingham

My girls are home at last after 8 weeks in Shanghai, so I'm no longer Home Alone. I'm not like the kid in the film, I'm a grown up, or so I'm told. My 2 small daughters plus the wife were in Shanghai visiting the Mother-in-Law, or Ma as we all  call  her. My smallest shed a few tears as she missed me so much. My big daugher as I call the other one discovered the joys of IM, so she could  send me messages. We did use the camera as well, and the voice aspect too. One daughter spoke to me while the other sent cartoons and silly things via IM, I got my big daughter to practice "the quick brown fox jumped over the lazy blue dog" as an exercise. I can remember my brother doing that 30years ago or more when he taught himself typing and Pitman shorthand. 

My parents could never dream of such modern technology, text, voice, and full voice and camera. If you saw a postman once in a blue moon, now that was something special, though that was back in 1920s/30s Country Kerry. Now the generations have moved on, technology is king. My kids went to the zoo and saw not 1 but 3 pandas and one was a baby panda. Something big to boast about when they return to  primary school in a few days time. They also went to the new beach by Ma's house. There wasn't one there 10years ago when I first visited, so they decided to build one and charge people 30RMB each to use it.  It looked nice on the photos they emailed me, however as its that part of the world you do have to be careful, because there are small sharks around. A great experience for such small children, they have come home speaking even more Shanghai dialect. They moved around too and spent time at various houses belonging to uncles and aunties. The Film uncle, the USA uncle, the Army uncle, the Taxi uncle, I cannot pronounce the names so we have shorthand to explain who is who. I have a Chinese name, Panzi, it means FAT FAT BOY, because I'm so big compared to the Chinese side of the family. They also saw Google cousin, because she and her husband work for Google. They did go to the Irish  pub and send me a photo showing them enjoying themselves, I think that should be classed as torture, there I was Home Alone while they were in the Irish Pub in Shanghai, its near the US Embassy if ever you are over there.They came home via Frankfurt, and 2 bags got lost because of equipment failure, but luckily the bags appeared, along with my wife/kids' treasure, shoes, a bag of shoes. I got a silk duvet, and that is a great great treasure, and what was the final treasure brought all the way from Shanghai, a big wok.

p.s. The house is so noisy again after 8 weeks of silence!

What makes me smile

We all have different views on what is funny. Americans seem to like custard pie humour, where the joke is telegraphed.Pie face pie face, custard pie in face.Say like Laurel and Hardy. Over here in England its a bit different. I can remember Monty Python  starting on TV, I was in 1st or 2nd year of  Grammar school. We had to explain to our French teacher what was all this "woody" business, Monty who? was his reply. Different styles of humour work in different different places. As you all know a baby can hear while in the womb. So why does our youngest daughter  have such a good sense of humour. Was it because of us her parents,her West meets East in her blood. you know what we think, while my wife was visiting she was 7/8 months pregnant, so the unborn baby heard her Chinese grandad making jokes and making everybody laugh. So that at an early age she is a mimic and makes us laugh, michaelgracycasey she calls me, putting on a deep voice and reciting what my prayer is, let my comedy book be published and can we have a bigger house, please god. And pumping up her shoulders too. This makes us laugh and is a natural thing, a 5 year old cannot be taught this. My own dad used to say "your ear is very near me", which was an implied threat, so it told us to behave. Me and my sister remember this and laugh, a 40year old laugh, I have told my own kids this and the smallest says it back to me in her deep voice. So it will pass down the generations, a remembrance, a prayer almost.

I was a concierge in a 4star deluxe hotel for 3years, this job gave me plenty of time to watch and learn from people. It also gave me a chance to practice my stand up while dealing with people. In the main I could make most people smile. It is a different art compared to writing or straight presenting, if you can do one it doesn't mean you can do the other. But if you smile at people they do tend to smile back, so if you start with a smile then you cannot go far wrong. 

 

Down my Street turn left to reach the world

They say that 100 years ago a man knew 2 blocks North, 2 blocks South, 2 blocks East and 2 blocks West. Or back in Ireland as far as the market and back to the farm. No doubt the same in England. World War One changed everything, their innocence was taken away from them, no virgin on a wedding night. But rape as the guns fired over no mans land. Men came home with tales of woe, tales of Paris and drinking by the Seine. Tales of Mud and Death, they never spoke of because it was too much of a torment.

The small world of the village was swept away. Buses came along and linked village to town, the railway too. A small world was changed into a bigger world. Radio was invented, the wireless as it was called. The world could reach into every nook and cranny of the isolated village.Was it the work of the Devil, this radio. Newspapers too, not to mention the fact that more people could read. Isolation did not exist any more. Then came the Cinema, the Flicks as it was called because the films flickered. Everybody's world was changed, everybody had a bigger and bigger world view. It was like a walled garden that had its walls removed. No longer a cosy world, but the winds of change, the winds of communication. The walls came tumbling down, the walls came tumbling down. You would need to be a hermit, or a monk hidden away on top of a mountain on an island that was lost at sea, then and only then could you have a sheltered existance. TV came along, black and white then colour. Then cable and satelite and then HD. Not to mention computers and Internet, perhaps living on the dark side of the moon is the only place to be, IF you want solitude. For my street is the world, and all its news.

The Invisible Diet

I'm big, my boss calls me "the big man". Some may say "fat", I'll stick with big. I am 3stones heavier than I look which I suppose is good. 3 stones is18 to 20 kilos, that in itself is the weight of a growing child, or one suitcase ready for international travel.                               My fat is  not wobbly fat, so I don't look like a jelly, its tight fitting fat. Makes me sound so glamourous, you can see my photo on this site so you can be the judge. Just big, or big boned as some fat people say. Me, I'm just big, so let's leave it at that, you don't want me to cry do you. I did have a compliment from my Chinese masseusse, she told my wife that all my skin was tight, so there you have it from a Phd a Chinese doctor.

Now what if I could share with you knowledge which will make you all lose 1/2 a stone, that's 7lbs is you are an American or 6 tubs of margarine if you are metric.

So how do you lose weight? You just don't try, and then as if by magic you lose weight. A Muslim friend at work SR, explained Ramadan to me. I said for Lent I'd just give up chocolate or something. Very easy compared to Muslim fasting. That was when I was a kid, now old age and so on meant...

So I agreed to give up Chocomilk from the company drinks machine. The drinks were free and we did work in a very hot print room. So I gave up my favourite drink for Lent. I still carried on drinking, but only the squash, not the nice and carolie laden Chocomilk. After a few days I did not miss my favourite drink, and the weight just fell off. Though another friend was quick to mention that M&S had just closed its sandwich shop near the office, so I was having smaller and not as nice snadwiches. That he  thought may be the real reason why my trousers were looser, whatever the reason, once my friend had come back from holiday with a new bride, he saw  the difference. Mainly with my thinner face.

So what is the moral of the story? If I can lose 1/2 a stone then so can anybody else, I did not look at any magazines or starve myself as girls do. It was the lazy man's diet and it worked. So here I am still Big but happier looking more and more like George Clooney.Look at my photo and judge for yourself, more photos can be googled.

 

Is serious news treated as a spectator sport, what do you think of Fox news style

Food For Thought
Think AS You Watch TV (c)

By Michael Casey   

As we sit in our armchairs watching the news , do we care what is going on over there , in some place hot , too hot to think about , or too cold to bear , ice and snow everywhere . Are we just waiting for the sports report , are we waiting to see was the battle hard or a walkover , did our favourite player score a home run , or 10 touchdowns , were the crowd , the audience behind him , did we win 100dollars from the bet we had on the side . In the interviews after the war was won , were we just watching to see the design on the teams shirt , is that a new logo , is that the same logo spruced up . Or is it a new logo entirely , does it make any difference in how the team played , or just another million dollars in the owners pocket , paid by us the audience , the fans , just so we can all look so identical . The reporters are screaming loudly , half excited and half in fear , they want to watch , they want to cover their eyes , but they are there so they must report . Are they in some arid desert , or in some cold cold place , pain and fear and hope etched on their face , are they in some war zone , or at the stadium , if all we heard were just their words , could we tell the difference , do we care , so long as we can switch it all off with our remote control .

Just a little food for thought , you can read my Betting On Disaster

Education always reach for the stars

Education always reach for the Stars

Monday, August 10, 2009, 11:31 PM GMT [Current Affairs]

Where I was born and grew up, is only 2miles or so from where I live now. I was born in the shadow of a brewery and ended up working for a Market Research company doing research into alcohol sales and I was a shandy drinker. Do you want a girlie I was asked when we went to the pub, sadly the barman died early, so you can pray for him.My father, my dad was a blacksmith and my mum was a farm girl. Both from County Kerry, the best county, just you ask any Irishman. My dad was apprenticed to a Blacksmith in Rathmore, in 1995 we went back an rediscovered the very  place next to a new road. The blacksmiths had turned into a hairdressers and the store had been demolished. My dad always spoke fondly of the blacksmith. That blacksmith never had any children, but my dad was treated as family. Go out woman to the henhouse and see has the hen laid. This would be about 1935/6.It there were 3 eggs then they all had one. If 2 the blacksmith did without , and if only 1 egg was laid my dad got it. This is how "family" should be. In 1944  my dad came to England and the steelworks in Brasshouse Lane.  For 40 years he endured  the heat, 400degrees beside the furnace. You could lose 1/2 a stone a day in sweat. My dad ofter did 12hour shifts and sometimes 16. So coming from that he always wanted his children to do better, EDUCATION was the key and it still is. I remember asking him what subjects I should dowhen we did the 3rd year split. His answer was I don't know, but do what you like but do your best. Now perhaps that should be written on every blackboard throughout the country. My dad had a large family and he loved and encouraged us. So imagine his pride when in 1968/9 one son went to the best university in the land. Then a  few years later another son went to the opposition best university in the land. Today do kids listen to ignorant teachers, back at our grammar school we were encouraged. And mum always said you are as good as anybody. Me I'm the failure I'm just a Wordsmith.

www.michaelgcasey.multiply.com photo is my mums birth place and home till 12

My stories, my babies

My site, this site disappeared for a few days, a few thoughts passed  through my mind. Have I lost my "babies" my "work" my "stuff". For anybody that writes, be it me who writes simply hoping for a bigger audience once I'm discovered, or say for the Google Librarian in charge of millions of books. Worthy books and all kinds of everything, the one word passes through your mind "OH HOTDOGS" as the astonauts used to say. However I used to be a computer operator back in 78, yes 1978, I was still just a teenager then. And the "one thing" as  Glen Beck is fond of saying, the "one thing" I learnt was NEVER NEVER NEVER trust a computer, always but always have lots of backup.We were a very small outfit to start with but then we taken over. And in the beginning we flew by the seat of our pants as early pilots used to. So at work we kept 3 generations of backup, first of Magnetic tape then many years later on super8 video then data storage tape. AT home over  20 years ago when I first started to write I had not one but 2 photocopies of my book.  Then when I decided that a typewriter was old fashioned I moved to an Atari 520  which a few years later I updated to an Atari 1040, my friends were into games bigtime so that was their recommendation. I only needed a word processor but I took their advice anyway. It was very expensive 300pounds or 480dollars at todays exchange rate, and that was nearly 20years ago. Yes a fool and his money are soon parted. Our lust for writing soon means money departing. Now I had my own computer then, so did I have 3 generations of security. NO, I had TEN. My stories, my babies were the most important thing in the world to me, so I always too 10 copies on floppy disc and scattered them all over my house. When I finally finished my book The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker I even hid one in the family home. So if there was theft or fire I'd still have my back up. I'd leant from the antics at work, always but always have back up. Moving onto the Internet age, I hide/store/conceal/save whichever is the correct word, my writing is in Cyberspace so that it should survive anything as its on servers on the 4 corners of the globe. Which book would you chose to save in Cyberspace. On Desert Island Discs the Radio4 show on the BBC they ask that question in a manner of speaking. The Bible and Shakespeare is given to you and then you can chose a book. Would I be conceited and chose me own book. No, yes really, no, because you know your own book so well and you can create more windmills in your mind so easily as more pieces of the jigsaw appear in your mind that nobody would chose their own book, well perhaps some Hollywood types. So what would I chose. Probably a History book, I once wanted to be a History teacher, and my own History teacher did recommend Don Camillo to me, a comic priest tale from Italy.In some ways I hope my writing is like Don Camillo, a mythical place with comic, English meaning of comic, goings on, If finally somebody says my stuff is comic.Then then I have finally made myself understood

Thats all Folks as Bugs Bunny used to say or was it OH CARROTS