This 'A' Thing

here, shown here, is THE Michael Collins (sad to see him go), the definite article.

I am the indefinite Michael Collins, a Michael Collins.

This earthbound A. Michael Collins is Scottish by birth and Canadian by choice. Born and raised in Edinburgh he was one of the last of his kind to be force-fed Latin at school and can even sing a song in it.

Collins is well qualified to write about dust and dirt. A grimy tyke, (“Ye wee midden.” Mrs Gunn, two doors down) in his Edinburgh childhood, a scruffy oik through school, Collins’ early and close acquaintance with domestic detritus and dust would continue through several house renovations.

His further education was rudely interrupted by the emergence of punk music in the 70s, the effects of which still manifest to this day. The punk movement encouraged self promotion, the revived memory of which has stirred up Collins' enthusiasm anew for pitching his animated feature film.

As well as lots of punk and new wave music, there was some uni, some college, some art school punk time in Watford, then off to work as the lowest form of life (junior copywriter) in an ad agency in the posh, high ceilinged offices of Edinburgh’s Georgian West End. Became a card-carrying yuppie in the ‘80s. Did an animated commercial with The Flintstones but didn’t get their autographs.

Then

In 1990 Collins moved to Toronto, Ontario, Canada to do advertising for the telly. He worked on a variety of animated commercials from stop-frame to live action/cel animation blendos for diapers. He also started the Philly Angel campaign that ran in 18 countries for years and years.

Collins has been hired and fired by some of the biggest names in the ad biz – Saatchi, O&M and JWT

Collins has been hired and fired by some of the biggest names in the ad biz – Saatchi, O&M and JWT – so that’s the WPP Group twice.

In between searching for the next writing gig, he necessarily became almost competent in household renovations. He became an adept at dealing with the various species of Canadian crud found in the poorly lit and seldom visited corners of their semi-subterranean basements. The nucleus of the dust bunny story was probably created then. Freelanced around Toronto and taught advertising at Humber College.

Now

He now lives in somewhat rural Ontario writing frivolous fictions. He skis, he rides bicycles, he drives a car where they forgot to put any design in but it goes ok.

He looks a bit like this.

Collins likes reading about sciencey things because he isn't clever enough to do any actual sciencing himself. He enjoys being a science tourist gawking at all those lofty concepts and whatnot without actually having to do anything taxing like studying. Quantum entanglement you say? Yeah, I've heard of that.

His literary influences are usually drawn from whatever he was reading last night.

Mostly though it was the English Hymnal that got him interested in words, euphony and prosody. He liked the way the polysyllabic words bounced along with the music. Here he is (age 6) singing hymns in school assembly;

" 'Oh Lord inaccessible, hid from our eyes.' Miss, what does 'inaccessible' mean?”

"Shhh."