The shopping channel calls to me
It wakes me up at night
To sell me things I do not need
Nor would buy, if I was right
But apparently, there's something wrong
My brain should be re-wired
I only purchase things on here
When I am really over-tired
I have a room specifically
For things bought on TV
I've ginsu knives and shredding blades
And juicers!!!...ninety three!!
For some reason the kitchen things
Just seem to catch my eye
Especially at three a.m.
That's the time I need to buy
I've magic bullets by the score
Processors,  I don't need
But, if I ever put them all to use...
An army I could feed
I've got socks for diabetics
Things to make your ******* stand out
I've got exercise machines galore
I've got three things that help gout!
My credit card's at the limit
I know the numbers off by heart
The post man knows me by my name
I even have my own **** cart
To deliver all my purchases
They just load it and deliver
It almost comes here by itself
It's enough to make one shiver
I don't know how it started
I think the countdown clock...ah, yes
I thought it meant the game was ending
I phoned in and bought a dress!!!
I've got jewellery by Joan Rivers
George Foreman grills...they fill my den
I've got perfumes for the women
And lots of things that make you men!
My wife cannot contain me
She's sent me off to get some aid
But, if they sell it on the telly
I'll buy it sure as getting laid
I've bedazzled all my clothing
I eat dried fruit and jerky too
I get Christmas cards from Ronco
I'm a shopping ****** through and through
Each month we have a garage sale
I sell off some of what I've bought
But, then I go and buy it back again
Without a second thought
My friends have all but left me
I rarely go out of the house
I just sit here and go shopping
I don't even see my spouse
Set it and Forget it
That's a phrase I love to say
But wait, there's more...is another one
That helps me through the day
I used the last one on my wife
One night while having ***
She told me "Set it and Forget It"
I'm off to dreamland Tex!!
My shopping's an addiction
One I hope to beat some day
But now, the operator says...
I have to get my card and pay!

His Down's Syndrome makes
His age a tough guess, I'll
Say eight to ten.

Wide eyes on machines,
Ice cream dripping on the
Pavement outside the

Construction site.
I wanna work like this when
I grow up, he says in

Young enthusiasm to a mother
Whose eyes well up with
Gratitude when I approach

And kneel down in front of
Him. So you want a job,
Buddy? I ask him with a

Wink. He suddenly remembers
His ice cream and bites into
It shyly. Nods, glancing at the

Tools in my belt, the scratches
On my arms, the brick wall
I've been attacking with a

Wacker jackhammer. Nods
Again. Well, I'll see you in a
Few years, I say with another

Wink, this time to his mother,
Who'd look her young age if
Her eyes weren't as tired,

But you can start with this
And get some practice. I hand
Him my Stanley Fat Max

Hammer. His ice cream
Hits the ground as he
Recieves it with both hands,

Looking to his mother for
Confirmation that it's ok.
Oh, it is. She mouths a

Thank you SO much...
They walk away, his chatter
High pitched and fading

Around the corner. And I
Head over to the foreman to
Report that I lost my hammer.

Don't ever employ me.
I can work a good game, but
I'm too soft around little heroes.

When my father was a boy,
in the County of Tyrone,
His father owned a quarry
and he worked the fields of stone.

My Dad grew lean and hard
As he excavated stone
Yielding granite for stone carvers
And gravel aggregate for roads.

His hands grew strong and powerful
He had a muscular physique
He couldn’t read or write
But no one dared to call him weak.

When my Dad was in his twenties
He was working in the mines
Excavating British coal
at Newcastle on  Tynes.

Later on in life
He was living in the “States”
Working in landscaping
on large Gold Coast estates.

When my Dad was in his fifties
He was digging graves by hand.
Once again in Fields of stone
a hard working Union man.

Each morning he’d rise early
And walk two miles to work
He never had an office
And he’d never be a clerk.

He rose to be a foreman
Working in that field of stone
And when darkness overtook him
It became his earthly home.

Now when I go visit him
I kneel and pray alone
Beside his Celtic Cross
standing in the field of stones.

There, in the corner, staring at his drink.
The cap juts like a gantry's crossbeam,
Cowling plated forehead and sledgehead jaw.
Speech is clamped in the lips' vice.

That fist would drop a hammer on a Catholic-
Oh yes, that kind of thing could start again;
The only Roman collar he tolerates
Smiles all round his sleek pint of porter.

Mosaic imperatives bang home like rivets;
God is a foreman with certain definite views
Who orders life in shifts of work and leisure.
A factory horn will blare the Resurrection.

He sits, strong and blunt as a Celtic cross,
Clearly used to silence and an armchair:
Tonight the wife and children will be quiet
At slammed door and smoker's cough in the hall.

On April 26th, 372 B.C. Plato was the first man to inflict injury upon his own dreams.
Not the forms casting shadows in his cave, his literal dreams.
At 6:35 a.m. the impish snarl of a water ***** crept into his Utopia of an
all-you-can-eat gyro cart overturned at the corner of his street and roused him
back to consciousness. The ingenious design of his Clepsydra quite obviously complete,
Aristotle came running with the awkward stride of a sleepwalking adolescent
to see what his master had done. When he arrived he saw flying,
two pots of water, an air-compressing submersible chamber and one water ***** reed.
Aristotle quickly collected the shattered pieces and noted
that this broken pottery was more real than time itself.

On September 21st, 712 A.D. a small village just outside the boundaries of
Chang'an, China came dangerously close to taking the life of the palace
astronomer/inventor/sleepyhead. Crowding around the door of Yi Xing, the
townspeople tore their robes and wailed for him to put a stop to the
incessant clanging. Xing, who had apparently overslept and was still
clinging to morsels of fading dreams about his young mistress, stuffed his
face into his pillow, muttering eureka, after first having chucked the
two clay pots, handful of stones and plate-sized gong out the front door,
much to the amusement of the assembly of drooping eyelids and torn pajamas.

In the year 1235 A.D. tortured residents of Baghdad began associating their
daily and nightly times for prayer with the ringing of their eardrums from
uninvited chimes.

In 1493 St. Mark's Clock-tower polluted the once-pure Venetian air with
hourly reminders that we are all yet one hour closer to our inevitable death
and the priests of the day called it humility.

Levi Hutchins of New Hampshire turned to a pine cabinet, brass clock and
mechanical gears in 1787, and for the first time gave himself the ability to
choose when he would hate the morning.

In 1847, French inventor Antoine Redier began making money off of people's
early morning auditory masochism.

Lew Wallace, the morning after completing his masterpiece novel "Ben Hur,"
awoke with a fiendish beeping in his ear and proceeded to invent the paradox
of the snooze button.

In Spring of 1942 the war in Europe raged and all U.S. alarm clock production ceased.

In the Spring of 1943 well-rested factory men, confronted by their foreman
upon arrival at 9:15, erupted the words "my alarm clock is broken,"
forever placing the excuse in the deep pockets of slackers
world-wide.

To all of these respected men of our history
Who have thought with their hands to create
The foundation of a society drowning in Starbucks,
I wish to express my sincerest ingratitude.

I lie awake in bed at night,
Licking the bitter taste of reality from my cheeks,
In the company of Plato, Lew Wallace and Yi Xing,
Wondering what dreams will be stolen from me.

befriended by the builders
a building site next door
they gave her little jobs to do
although she's only four

when friday came,they even gave
her wages for the week
foreman smiled at sophie's joy
and tweaked her rosie cheek

off she went, to spend her pay
there was no way of stopping
a working girl with hard earned cash
so mummy took her shopping

hello mr  sweetshop man
i've got cash to spend
been grafting with my muckers
an real job,....not pretend

are you working monday?
he passed her pick and mix
aye! if those  wankers from jewson
bring the ******* bricks

In a world where myths were made real, there lived a king who had the terific ability to turn any thing he made contact with into pure gold. First this strange abilty often called the midals touch made the king so rich, so that he became the richest in the entire realm. But there was something missing, it was the ability to feel and touch affectionately. Soon this young king's eyes fell on Shauna; who was the daughter of a commoner in a near by town. She was the prettiest thing he had seen in the whole world, when she smiled it shined like the sun and even when she frowned, it was like the splendor of the full moon garnished with the stars. What such raw beauty.
The king Mica soon couldn't sleep; he had laid his eyes on his dream queen.  But there was a problem, a sweet bitter problem, a problem that first was a blessing, a problem that had given him all the riches he couldn't have acquired normally.  He then realized that not all blessings were not totally blessings but they were like a sweet bitter candy. Which when tasted has a sweet taste but before long turns bitter. But all the same he couldn't sleep and when the king can't sleep all those in the palace would not sleep.
before long he called for his Wisemen, three of them showned up in a flash bowing on their kneels.
'' what is it that disturbs your majesty'' , the Wiseman in the centre said avoiding eye contact.
King Mica signed and silence lingered.
'' we are the most Wisemen in the entire realm nothing is beyond our wealth of knowledge'' another proclaimed.
The king then turned to the one that hadn't altered a word as if waiting for his own speech. '' our ears are open to listen your majesty'', the last one said.
  "which one of you has the power to left this cause off my neck", the king said.
" my lord which cause do you speak of " one of the Wisemen replied.
"None sence!" the king shouted in anger as he rose from his royal throne.
The whole palace trembled at the sound of the king's thunderous voice. The Wisemen fell back at the rage of the king.
"All my life I thought that this was a blessing from the gods little did I know that it would soon turn soar." king mica said letting his emotions in.
The men was stunned with fear, they had not seen the king in this light before. There was really a matter that must have lead to this.
"but your majesty is the wealthest in the entire realm what does thou seekest which had not in thy possession already" the man to the extreme right gently said.
The king's rage surged as though the Wisemen words were anger catalyst. " you ( he pointed in the direction of the one that spoke last) dare say that I have all I have ever desired?  Look at the palace all gold, look at my throne, GOLD!, my vessels made of gold, no doubt I am the wealthest but take a long hard look at me, look at my hands convered with gloves." he walked forward towards the Wiseman that spoke last.  The man trembled at the manner of approach of the king. He took a step backwards.
" anything that I touch suddenly turns into gold and am very sure that you should know what that means." king Mica said as he slowly removed the hand gloves on his right arm.
"I need the ability to touch, the ability to feel like any one else." now the king was right in front of the frightened man. " I am very certain you understand what I mean."he lifted his bare hand to the face of the short man in front of him.  The Wiseman knew what was about to occured but there was nothing he could do. He knew that every time the king gets angry, a new possession is added to his libary of great golden artifacts and right now he would become the new arrival to the king's collection.  But he had to try to stay alive.
" but oh king we are here to hel....." the king interrupted him by lifting his bare finger to the Wiseman's foreman about a centimeter away.
" m.....y lord..... " the man altered in fright.but he slowly noticed that he was freezing, he was  turning into gold. The king's finger had made contact with the man's forehead.
" Ahhhhhrgggg........."   he shouted in vain it was already too late. The others immediately fell with their faces towards the ground and worshipped the king in sore fear.
The king turned towards his throne leaving a new golden possession behind.  
" I have falling in love with someone but with this cause that would not be possible unless both of you come up with a way to lift this from me"
Silence filled the golden chamber where they were.
"ANSWER ME!!!", the king rised his voice.
Then one answered," we will definitely come up with something but your majesty must give some time"
" what time! Allow me to make my self clear enough,I need a reply and I need it in the next twenty four hours from now." he said politely
" and if you can't provide me a viable solution to this, both of you will no doubt meet your colleague in hades."
The king sat and dismissed the men kneeling in his presence.they hastily fled from his presence like shafts in the wind. He very well knew that the chances of being normal again was very slim. But what had to done had to be done. He would try all that was in his reach to attain his goals which was to marry Shauna, his dream queen. In few hours he would know his fate and he knew this.

sneaky stan, the builder man,
who laboured on the site
wheeled a barrow full of straw
for two weeks every night

foreman feared some pilfering
and  searched it every day
he fumbled round, but always  found
now't below the hay.

but sneaky stan, a gardening man,
unhappy with wage rates
had stolen fourteen wheel barrows
and sold em to his mates