Make Them Laugh

Make Them Laugh ©

By 

Michael Casey

Now as I begin I realise I have to tidy up my files they are a bit messy, so I’ve put this where it should be to start with then I’ll do my security afterwards. I was very disciplined but I’ve got untidy, so a return to discipline then I can find stuff. I think in three years here I’ve written 400+ new pieces. This does not include the Chats, which I don’t back up, I just write directly to the Blogger and Wordpress. Or write then copy and paste to share my wisdom with you all, ok my boring rubbish, but you do come back all the time, just to see if I am improving. I also have Translated books just to spread the pain worldwide. Here is the new house further up the hill, if I had realised how steep it was and how my Health would be, but I’m here a fool on the Hill. But in Korea 2500 plus downloads of Quick Stories in a short space of time, and 1000s more in other languages. Though when you read it you all may resort to bad language, is he really this rubbish, I don’t know why I bothered. Though Judging by the figures and maps, you must like it. Though it could just be good toilet reading while you are waiting.

So, I hope you are smiling as you read this whatever your position, or wherever you are in the world. In bed with the one you love, my words as a kind of foreplay, I have written more than 4 plays actually, love. It may just help you to sleep, but other methods are more fun, come here, throw that ipad away. Who knows, maybe just Drs. I had a fake scam email from a Dr today, the 2nd actually, the 1st was from a Korean WHO Dr, today’s from a Yank in UK. The Korean was more appealing but obvious fake. You can cut and paste emails and check them in seconds against a scammer list. That’s if you have 5 seconds to spare as you finish your tea, and you don’t  have to open them. But I’ve told you this already Dear.

Now to the point though there never is one. Making people laugh. How do you do it, show them a picture of Trump. I still cannot believe that USA GOP people are so stupid, it’s gone beyond a joke.  But back to the plot. You extend and exaggerate, you push sideways, I’ve started to think of Trump and his bedroom skills, but that’s because I’ve watched Politics for 50 years. Read Chapter 9 M.P. Married to a Person, Married to a People from The Butcher The Baker and The Undertaker, that’s my take on Politics from 30 years ago. Or read Tom Sharpe books, a PhD a real PhD introduced me to them, Blot, Porterhouse Blue, The Throwback, Wilt are some titles I remember. In places very course, but very very funny. Porterhouse Blue is set in Cambridge or was it Oxford, a tv series was made years ago, very very funny.

So how do you make people laugh?  It’s the way you tell them as Frank Carson the great Northern Ireland comic used to say. Roger drove him back to the airport and nearly crashed the van, he was crying with laughter. It’s timing, and letting the laugh out slowly. Americans Telegraph everything.  You have to be slow, and then spring the last word.   No I’m not a stand up Comedian,  and you have already thought of a joke because of the verb I just use. You just use words and lead people up the garden path, as Gill with a G used to say. I do hope she’s alive and still slapping people, Michael you are Awful, she’d say a la Dick Emery. That is such a fond memory I have of her, last time we met was in Hill Street, and no we are not Policemen nor Blues. So you use a word and it has associations already. 

If you talk to Lawyers and 400 of them know my name, no I’m not a criminal nor a thief, a law firm was my workplace. If you talk to lawyers it’s all about briefs, and no I never flash my knickers or flags. Though I do remember one girl did try to pull my pants down in the print room as a joke. I’d forgotten about that, not a regular member of the crew either. Again by my choice of words and sharing such information you are painting pictures. In truth we were too busy and hot, and no I don’t mean I was so sexy. I mean it was 90 degrees because of all the industrial size printers in use. Hence me going to Saint Philips cathedral to cool down on my lunch break. The Verger, who looked like Jeff Bezo, really, he thought I was Holy, but God knows otherwise, 3 years of lunch breaks, inside the cathedral or on a bench outside with a quick nip inside.

Again, I’m just sharing a story, but the phrasing makes a difference, the choice of adjectives, and finally the comma is King. That pause on the paper, or the lick of the lips. Then the wall of laughs comes down. Just as in Music you have a build up, then Bang. And you have made your own jokes up again, again and again. Oh, Sally stop it. I’m listening to Rendez Vous by JMJ, appropriately enough. Though in my head that music would be used as back ground music to a finale of one of my stories. But I gave you premature elation, yes you did stop to read that word again. What did he just say, elation premature elation. See you can take another bite of the apple, and get a 2nd laugh, though if talking and I say take another bite, you are ahead of me. Because it’s all in the mind. Phrasing makes a difference. 

Anyway, me and my friend Andy were behind the wall at the Front Desk, and no we were not kissing, an Andi maybe, but this was Andy with a beard, I wouldn’t want hair in my mouth, and we are both manly. You see Andy had a handicap, no he wasn’t a golfer, he had some horrible disease that twisted his back, and he had crutches too. He as our Switchboard guy, so I did Switchboard as soon as I came in, while he had his dinner. So, we always had a bit of banter, and if I wasn’t sent somewhere all over the Hotel, we’d chat. So, I’d feed him a line, or just accidentally, and then he’d put me down, slam dunk on the floor. I always remember the look in his eye and he’d purse his lips and then PUNCHLINE, we’d laugh and the receptionists too. You Walked into that one, Michael. And, yes I did, on purpose or accidentally, it did not matter. Only the Laugh matters. So be generous and don’t kill the joke, let it breath. Being mocked by a man in calliper and crutches is one of the greatest gifts I’ve been given. Because Laughter really does unite all of us, whatever our condition.