Over to you Mick..........you can go first.
WELCOME to the THORNE GRAMMAR SCHOOL Website, including Imported Blogs from the old Multiply Site, and the Complete Image Archive (see "View Gallery" below the thumbnails on this page).
WELCOME to the THORNE GRAMMAR SCHOOL Website, including Imported Blogs from the old Multiply Site, and the Complete Image Archive (see "View Gallery" below the thumbnails on this page).
Is it when you go to the oven to get the butter out?
ReplyDeleteOops I should have let Mick go first - sorry!
Tootle Pip
Ron
test
DeleteHello Ron, that's the idea. Keep it going will you?
ReplyDeleteI only said Mick first because I have so many that I wanted to think it through.
Even worse. You light the gas cooker to bring it to the required temperature for what you are planning to bake only to discover, alas too late, that is where YOU DID put the butter.
ReplyDeleteJ.A.L.
When you get in the car and tell your wife to drive on only to realise that you are in the wrong car !
ReplyDeleteI heard a commercial on TV where a doctor announced that 40% of men over 60 years of age had a reptile disfunction.
ReplyDeleteDave, I had a similar situation where I jumped in the back of the car and two strangers turned to look at me. Yes it was the wrong car but it wasn't age to blame. It was alcohol.
ReplyDeleteOn television I watched an 86 year old woman and a 91 year old man who stuck to their posts for hours through wind and rain to see the Tom Pudding, that had sailed all the way from Goole, chugging down the River Thames
ReplyDeleteOn the eve of the Pop Concert there was much disappointment when this admirable old man was sent to hospital with antibiotics.
His devoted wife wife soldiered on and went to the concert with earplugs.
In this land of hope and glory the Diamond Jubilee was
celebrated in great style.
The main players were elegantly charming the backdrop beautiful, sounds magnificent
tone respectful colours vibrant Spectators old and young were jubilant.
.
God save the Queen
.
Here's another one:
ReplyDeleteI used to glance up at the clock and say "Gosh, is that the time?"
Now I look at the calander and say "Gosh is that the date?"
Tootle Pip
Ron
The main question,Mick, is were they dressed as policemen ?
ReplyDeleteI can just accept that I am a great grandmother but I find it utterly inconcievable that I have a daughter who is a grandmother!!!! She is still my little girl for heaven's sake!
ReplyDelete......and what about going to the geriatric ( do these Drs know what they are doing???) clinic at the hospital for tests and failing the lot after I had run my usual two miles the same morning. The consultant was the same age as my grandson and he nearly got his ears boxed too.
I'm still a youngster at 61, but can relate to the comments! Short term memory the worst! Mislaid specs (and other things) a multitude of times a day. It's when you start saying "Things ain't what they used to be", and food just doesn't taste as good as it used to, clothes are such poor quality, everything's a rip-off, and what used to be a 10-minute walk is now a marathon! But - what's good about getting older......................?!!
ReplyDeleteSorry great grandma patabe - my comment about the walking doesn't relate to you, obviously! Well done for keeping fit!
ReplyDeleteWhat was the question again?
ReplyDeleteTootle Pip
Ron
There is a major pedestrian crossing near me where you can cross from north to south. Next you get the chance to cross from east to west. Finally there is an opportunity to cross north south, east west, and diagonally all at the same time. This last option is preceded by an announcement from a raised speaker"Walk like a dog for all crossings". I can't believe that they wish to erase one and a half million years of bi-pedal evolution but listen as I might I can't hear anything else. In fact it gets clearer each time I hear it.
ReplyDeleteOne day I asked a young lady if she could tell me what the message was but she just gave me a funny look and walked away. So far I haven't actually seen anyone crossing on all fours.
Roni I don't remember the question but the answer is in The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy. It's 47 or something like that.
Dave, not policemen. Two very large, very black, Jamaicans.
When the wife put sugar in the teapot, I said that's a good idea, saves me stirring the cup ? ! ?
ReplyDeleteEveryone seems younger than me, I get helped across the road, doors are opened for me people talk as though I am deaf and feel obliged to add dear or my love or sweatheart when I am in a medical situation and since I spend most of my time camping around the British Isles travelling and visiting our wonderful heritage and country side I have accepted these tokens of help as kindness.though I suspect they are sorry for me.Age hit me full ahead at the recent meeting with brother John Gregson and his family so many Great aunts great great aunts and greatgrandparents flying around I was overwhelmed. Finally I Ihave not been ont his site for some time as I "forgot how to get on"
ReplyDeleteI used to be the fastest walker passing everyone on the sidewalk. Then I started to be passed by a few. Then by a lot. Then by almost everybody. Today, returning my library book, two older ladies breezed by like I was standing. Enough is enough says I and went into a higher gear but failed to narrow the gap. Taking advantage of a fortuitiously timed stop light I managed to draw level and by accelerating away reached the corner where I turn off for the library a few steps ahead. Resisting the urge to throw my arms out to breast the invisible tape I let the film of Rodger Bannister cracking the four minute mile play through my head. Getting old means taking your victories wherever the opportunity, be it ever so humble, and enjoying the humour in reliving, or telling, the story.
ReplyDeleteI was a lot older than my computer but in slightly better shape,so there being no complete body and mind transplants available i settled for a new computer,a small netbook light enough for a feeble old fogey to carry on his worldwide peregrinations (mostly imaginary nowadays).
ReplyDeleteDoes anybody remember the ritual accompanying our first achievements in the realm of expanding our connection with the great wide world. first you dug a deep hole at the bottom of the garden and inserted a pole about 20 foot long,not forgetting to attach a wire to the top.This was the aerial, and the other end of the wire was attached to your 3 valve receiver. There was only one station,the BBC Home Service but that was a good beginning.There were two batteries, one had to taken to the petrol station once a month for recharge. Nowadays the only recharge you get is a load of gasoline for which you pay at least a month`s 1945 salary.
You will know that you have joined the cohorts of the aged when your pharmacist (we used to call them chemists) no longer gives you your monthly supply of pills in separate cardboard containers but in four separate booklets, each booklet containing four columns labelled Morning, Midday, Tea time, & Bedtime, with the appropriate dosage in each. They assume that we are still able to read since we were at school in the days when the staple diet of the elementary school was Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. They also assume that the people will do as they are told being born a long time ago.
ReplyDeleteJ.A.L.
That is,i think,a dangerous assumption. I always assumed that education was intended to show you the ways of avoiding doing as you are told but escaping the consequences.
ReplyDeleteOf course you dont get that kind of education at schools but there are plenty of other sources from which you can learn what you really need to know.
Ron,
ReplyDeleteI certainly remember the regiment of aerials stretching from the school entrance up past the Bidmade's and Boyalls towards Harling's shop, usually with a row of sparrows, or an individual errant pigeon swaying perilously in the breeze, waiting to be tempted with corn to return to it's coop. But the aerials had all been erected by the time I became conscious of them.
We were obviously one step ahead because our "wireless" (the term "radio" was not then in general use in our household) ran off the the mains. All our electrical devices ran from a connection to the ceiling light. The electrical supply to Broadway in those days was a simple "twisted pair" for lighting purposes and did not have the necessary third line for grounding. So another feature (I don't know how general this was) was a wire that fed from the back of the receiver through a small hole drilled through the window frame to a large iron bolt in the ground below the window. It was termed "the earth".
I also recall that those 3 valve receivers did sterling work through the thirties and into the forties, and there were domestic crises when a valve failed during the war years because replacements were not readily available. On one such occasion we discovered that a certain failed valve could be made to temporarily resurrect itself with a judiciously aimed thump accurately delivered to a certain point on the side of our cathedral window shaped Bush "wireless". A little more experimentation demonstrated that the resurrection was permanent if the "wireless" was laid on its side. It adopted that recumbent posture for the "duration" as we used to say in those days.
Happy memories, despite the trials and tribulations afflicting the world at that time.
.
.
ReplyDeleteRow Stewart asks (her message 6 June): "But - what's good about getting older......................?!!
There are some compensations - e.g:
- when slender, attractive young ladies stand up and offer you their seat on the Tube (at least they've noticed you) and the even greater satisfaction of politely declining and proving that you are not that decrepit.
- the freedom to be as rude as you feel when annoyed, knowing that the target of your ire is unlikely to punch you on the nose, as he would have done when you were younger, but will just mutter "silly old buffer".
- the freedom to sleep till nine, then spend all morning on breakfast, showering and shaving (in that order) while others are running the rat race and earning the funds that pay your pension.
- the time to waste on nostalgic reveries about wireless aerials, ant hills, how good food used to taste etc.
Any more?
.
There is a minor peril to sartorial elegance brought on by waistlessness in old age.Now up to the age of eleven you have no waist,then the circumference of your chest and hips increases and you have no problem keeping your pants up (except in Australia where every trouser wearer has to wear bike clips to prevent them falling up).
ReplyDeleteSo up to the age of you eleven you wear braces. In Standard 3 of my elementary school ,for the May Queen festival, Miss Mckendrik said we should all wear white shirts and,she said,"I don t want to see any braces or belts. Wear your braces,but under your shirts. Get your mother to make and hem some little slits just above the top of your shorts to thread your braces through and attach to the buttons"
So we went home and delivered the instructions to our mothers,and they said "To hell with that,I buy you shirts to wear,not to cut holes in"
On the day of the fete we went to school in our white shirts and our hands in our pockets and when the display of dancing started,we put on a fine show, prancing around but pausing to hitch up our pants every three seconds.
Well,unless you become a fat slob feeding on fried food and beer,wearing your belt under your belly,you revert to the waistless figure you had when you were ten.But if you are a self-conscious sort like me,you don`t want to be seen wearingr braces,so you wear a belt,at your peril.When you board a plane for instance you stretch up to put your flghtbag on the rack abd suddenly feel that something is about to give. You save yourself by a Queen of the May tug to avoid being known to the other passengers as the man you showed his underpants.
Well, a cerain UK prime minister wore his underpants over instead of under his shirt.He was sknown for that, and for an"inapprpriate relationship" with a woman who was an expert on rotten eggs,and not for much else,though he couldnt avoid being an improvement on the previous one,that would have been impossible.
Some would say things have been dropping in UK ever since.
Some would also say that it`s a good idea to wear both braces and belt, but surely that would be a violation of th ideal to VIVE Audacter.
There is a minor peril to sartorial elegance in old age.Up to the age of 11 you have no waist, then your chest and hips expand and you can comfortably wear a belt.
ReplyDeleteUp to that time you wear braces. In Standard 3 Miss Mackendrick told us "you will all wear white shirts for the May Queen Festival but I don`t want to see any braces or belts.Wear your braces,but under your shirt,tell your mother to make and hem little slits to thread your braces through and fasten to the buttons on your shorts.
So we went home and delivered the message and our mothers said To hell with that,I buy you shirts to wear,not to cut holes in.
On the day of the Fete we went to school in our white shirts,with our hands in our pockets. We gave a fine display of country dancing,but as we pranced around,we had to pause every 4 seconds to hitch up our shorts.
Well,unless you become a fat slob living on fried food and beer and wearing your belt under your belly,you will find you revert to your to your waistless figure of long ago,straight up and down,and if you are a self-conscious sort like me you don`t want to be seen wearing braces.So you wear a belt and hope for the best, but when you board a plane and reach up to put your flightbag in the rack, or assist a lady in reaching for a book on the top shelf at the library, you suddenly feel something give and have to save yourselv with a Queen of the May manoeuvre to avoid being remembered by the other passengers as the man who showed his underwear or by the lady as a lothario in a hurry.Well,a certainUK Prime minister wore his underpants over instead of under his shirt.He was known for that and for an "Inappropriate relationship" with a lady who was an expert on rotten eggs and for not much else though he couldnt avoid being an improvement on his predecessor,that would have been impossible.
Some would say things have been descending in Uk ever since. Others might say Wear braces AND a belt,but that would be a neglect of the ideal of Vive Audacter
Sorry,folks,for repeating myself.It`s a thing old fogeys do.I don`t make drafts of what i have to say so when something seems to have disappeared I have to remember and try again. with a few inevitable changes. I am also not used to my new computer and couldnt find the Delete to get rid of one of the versions when I saw that the first one had gone.
ReplyDeleteI was hot in Cyprus last week but when clothing is brief the older woman must keep her cool
ReplyDeleteGroggy, writing on June 8th. reminded me of an event that followed my Mums 80th. birthday. I may have told this story before but one of the advantages of old age is that I can tell it again ,seemingly for the first time, and we can all read it again, seemingly for the first time?
ReplyDeleteAfter celebrating Mums birthday at my sisters in Cheshire we drove back to Hampshire only to find we had left her walking stick behind. Next morning I went to the second hand shop on the high street where I had several sticks to choose from. Selecting one very similar to the one left behind I was faced with how to carry it back to her flat. They don't fit in shopping bags, or in your pocket, and under your arm feels contrived. The only thing is to walk with it and actually, after a few steps, it felt quite comfortable. I had a list of items to pick up at Waitrose on the way back and loaded them into the supermarket shopping basket as I walked up and down the aisles. There was a short queue of ladies at the check out and the one at the front waved towards me," You come to the front of the queue dear.". I thought there must be some poor old gaffer with a walking stick and a heavy basket of groceries behind me . When I turned to check I was last in the queue.
That was the first time that age had an impact and I blamed it on the stick misleading the lady. In very short order after leaving Waitrose I had a car brake rapidly to allow me to cross the road and then, in the newsagents, when all the cellophane wrapped magazine inserts slipped out of the weekend newspaper and onto the floor, the cashier rushed over to pick them up for me. I was starting to think that I must look like I needed the stick and was quite happy to get back to Mums flat without further incident.
Last Friday I was in the fishmongers and using plastic to pay.Accidentally I dropped the card and before I could pick it up an elderly gentleman, flexible as an elastic band, ducked down,retrieved the card and handing it back to me said,"You dropped your card SIR"
ReplyDeleteI have two daughters,born two years apart,and two grandaughters,also born two years apart.How do I get the names right? I usually have to be corrected at least once.Every time I want to speak to,or about one of them,there are four names to choose from,two beginning with C and two beginning with M.
ReplyDeleteRon,
ReplyDeleteWith three sons, I simply start at the name of the oldest and go down the list, stopping when I see a glimmer of recognition in the eye of the person I'm addressing. But nine granddaughters pose a more serious problem, and I generally refer to them as "you" face to face, and by their ordinal number when addressing a third party.
K
My father also had two daughters born two years apart and I remembee him referring to "yon lass" and "t other one"or, when he wasn`t pleased with them (e.g. for staying out later than 9 p.m.- this was in the nineteen thirties), as "that article" and t`other article. Of course,being a lad, from the age of fifteen I could stay out as long as I liked.
ReplyDeleteSometimes when speaking directly to any one of mine I pause and say 'What's your name?'...just for the heck of it.
ReplyDeleteI used to address two of the girls by the collective name of 'Salaine'
I never forgot their correct ages though. The trigger word was 'No!' and the response would be ' Mum! I'm fourteen years old!' /sixteen years old! .... (whatever)
Nowadays if I'm asked their age I'd have to make an educated guess.
.
I had a bad day last week....age related, I think so!
ReplyDeleteIt began in the morning when I got up and couldn't find my cat. She is very much an indoors cat, and in ten years has never has a night out. But what I didn't realise was that she'd slipped out the night before when I was in the garage for two minutes. We had torrential rain all night, which flooded my drive and garden, and when I opened my door, a drowned rat flew in, but it mewed!
Later in the morning I couldn't find my car keys, so I finally took the spares to my car which was parked on the drive, and I was surprised to fine it unlocked. I had a bigger shock when I was inside to find my lost keys in the ignition!
I went to the hairdresser and Sainsbury's at Thorne, was out for about three hours, and came back to find I hadn't locked my door!
Three stupid things in one day.......age related....or absentmindedness?
The older we get the more cases of deja vu we see. Crooked business operations are so common that they barely raise any hackles at all. As business has gone global crooked business has expanded in lockstep. The scandal associated with the News Of The World has continued to expand like ripples from a stone in a pool. Recovery from the last bank induced financial crisis has been slow. The European bank debt crisis staggers from one band aid fix to the next. And today comes news of Barclays manipulating the LIBOR. This has the potential to expand enormously through the banking system even involving the Bank of England. Already two of the top Barclay executives have resigned and I imagine heads of several or all of the other 15 major banks who are involved in setting libor are looking over their shoulders. We already distrust many businesses, our bankers ,the police, and our politicians, and as this Barclay fraud explodes our trust in long established institutions continues to diminish. With the banks immense political and economic power and connections you already know that the investigations being initiated will be blocked, diverted, and diluted. When dishonesty, fraud and greed are perpetrated by a few at higher levels the results flow down and the costs are shared by many at lower levels.
ReplyDeleteAm I becoming paranoid about this? Was there ever an honest banker? Is my interpretation of events just another side effect of growing old? Or is it just one of those days ?
This morning BNN, the Business News Network, has had some coverage of the Parliamentary investigation into the Libor rate manipulation. Bob Diamond is in the hot seat and is getting a good grilling from the dozen or so investigators. The ex ceo is suggesting the problem was limited to a small group of rogue traders but the investigative committee is of the opinion that the problem runs much wider and deeper through the banking system and is not limited to Barclays. Diamond has said that Barclays is the bank getting all the stick because they are the ones who have been open about the issues and have dealt with them. The implication is that there are other banks where the involvement has not been disclosed-yet.
ReplyDeleteIf this is live on British tv it is well worth viewing. Also, it slightly ameliorates opinions expressed yesterday.
...grind slowly,but they grind exceeding small....
ReplyDeleteAn advantage of old age is that you,of course,you become wise and that without ever having to learn anything.In fact,wisdom (or is it culture,let`s say both),is what you have when you have forgotten all you ever learnt.I
When I was a chronically unwise youngster I just couldnt stand the utter boredom of that stuff they call physics.No Matter, I got along alright without it. And now we hear that it was all wrong anyway,No Matter we now have the real low-down,its `all a Matter of Piggs Bosun,and we chewed that into the ground here a couple of years ago. We know now that piggs B was there,or there would be nobody around and no things,No Matter at all.
.Also, since Piggs B is nothing but a particle, it must be something like a pork chop, but chopped so fine,ground up in fact that it`s smaller than an atom which is about as small as you can get. Why does it make me think of TGS dinners, good but so small,never enough?
MICK, i believe the trouble is all about investment banknig. The good old fashioned banking is about lending and borrowing and interest.
ReplyDeleteI have an account that will pay me 3% interest,so long as I keep 50 000 pounds in it. I also have a credit card,with the same bank that will charge me 19% interest if i don`t pay up at the end of the month.What could be fairer than that?
Missed the pun the first time through Ron. No Matter, got it now. About those dinners. By no stretch of the book were they haute cuisine, barely bas cuisine come to that but the dinner ladies probably did their best. However, after a Felix trip from Armthorpe, an assembly, lessons, a break and more lessons I was always ready for it come what may. The mashed spuds might have had lumps in them but served with mince I could polish them off in no time and scrape the plate. For afters I liked the rolly polly pudding but it was infrequent. That stuff we called frogspawn came up far more often, unfortunately. And what was that white stuff with a splodge of jam drowning in the middle of the plate. The best part of that was swirling the jam in. There was only one desert I didn't like at all and that was served when I was at Armthorpe Junior Boys. Figs. Of course they bore no resemblance to real fresh figs which I finally had the confidence to try some half century later.
ReplyDeleteA few students brought their own lunches and ate at tables next to the rest of us. At one point I became envious of them with their neatly packed red oxo tins so Mum started making me sandwiches which lasted about a week.The slices of tomato would bleed through the bread which would be soggy by the time lunch came around and I would be casting envious eyes, especially if it was mince.
When at the junior boys school, about 1947 or 48, a big event was the reception of several crates of apples. A gift from Canada to fruit starved and rationed English children after the war. The teacher told us Canada was far away and a vast and cold country. He should have been here this week. Tuesday is forecast for a high of 36!
Did we go to the same school,Mick?No mashed spuds in my time (1935-42)
ReplyDeleteÌs that why I grew up feeling so deprived?
but i wonder whether the formality of the occasion was preserved- the white tablecloths (spill a drop of water,get fined a penny) we served ourselves from tureens, which meant that the smaller kids got the bit of meat sent down by the server but very often nothing else.They treacle pud,my favourite dessert,was beheaded by the servers and shared by them, the young uns got dry cake.
The price was 7 pence but many of us got it free,so you never complained and the great thing about youth is that you really don`t care what you eat so long as you are not starving.In the course of time you got to be a server (two for each table of 16) and then you could decide to become a greedy conservative or a benevolent reformer.
I have to continue. Ah,that treacle pudding! It had the shape of a mountain, a volcano exploding with syrupy lava coursing down the sides. The memory of the server taking his knife and slicing off the top and handing half to his co-server makes me weep even now. But I had my day too. When I was elevat
ReplyDeleteed to that noble rank I had 4 or 5 girls at my table, at the bottom of it of course, behaving themselves nicely.One day when it came to serving second helpings of the pudding, I saw Joan C shyly raising her plate. I rose and walked down to her,took her plate,served a large lump of pud and drowned it in hot custard. Of course I was slyly booed by the ravenous little rascals clamouring for more.
OF course this had nothing to do with the fact that Joan C was the most glamorous young lady in the 6th form and I was planning to ask her to go to the ATC dance with me.
Same school Ron. Different decades. You didn't get the spuds because the Incas were still guarding them whereas by 1950,( my first year and how I hated it) they had become quite common. The tureens were still on the go but the tablecloths had gone. I don't think the price was any different. Seven pence rings a bell. Perhaps they hadn't invented inflation yet? Deserts I seem to remember were handed out at the serving hatches that fronted the kitchen rather than being trusted to the first course servers at the top of the table.
ReplyDeleteAs a first former you sat at the far end of the table and gradually moved up towards being a server as you got more and more 'seniority'. The girls ate their dinners at the other end of the dining room not at the same tables as us. The earlier attempts to bring a sense of manners and decorum that you experienced were being eroded by the rude and uncouth standards that we brought to the table and to life in general.
Clarification,for the sake of historical acc futnfuturenfutureuracy
ReplyDeleteClarification,forthe sake of historical accuracy and guidance of future historians. we did get spuds W Raleigh had arrived,but boiled,no mash. The girls were on the other side of the dining hall, but some spilled over from their last table onto mine.No hatches,that would have been too proletarian.I don`t think we were any less uncouth in1935 than you in1950 but the school was smaller - about 400 so we were easier to impress and intImiDdate.
I think I ate potatoes every day of my life till I was 20 when a friend persuaded me to accompany him to Soho to eat an exotic new thing called spaghetti.Did you still have the show of hands ritual at the entrance to the refectory (palms first then backs,and get sent back to wash them if necessary- I think you certainly had the BENE
Just for historical accuracy:we had potatoes,W.Raleigh was even before my time,but at tgs they were not mashed. There was nothing so utilitarian or plebeian as a hatch,dessert was subject to droit de seigneur-serveur like everything else.This does not mean that we were any less crude and uncouth in1935 than 50,but we were only 400 thus easier to impress,repress and control than later on.Of course the girls had their own tables,but there was an oveerflow of a
ReplyDeletehalf dozen girls from their last table onto the last of the boys`.I hope this goes, i am having no end of typing truble with my new netbook,often losing a paragraph when i want to delete a letter.Is it the weather?
ReplyDeleteIt certainly is the weather. I'm not sure about your neck of the woods but the temp. here is close to 37(old record for this date 35.8) and very humid. I thought it would be cooler nearer the lake so went down to the boat. The apparent cool lasted until you decided to do anything that vaguely resembled physical activity. It's fairly windy, 20 knts. It feels like a thunderstorm is brewing but there is no sign of anything on the radar-yet.
ReplyDeleteGentlemen
ReplyDeleteA. N. wilson wrote an interesting article in The Daily Mail Tuesday July 17th 2012.
It's heading is 'Yes women ARE brighter.'
If I (?) had the expertise I'd reproduce it here but you can find it on line.
It explains why there were so few women teachers of note in your era.
And it arrives at a sensible conclusion.
As for the child, that'll teach them their table manners.
Shirl,
ReplyDeleteYou'll find the article by clicking on this link. I'll read it when I have time!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2174528/Yes-women-higher-IQ-men-thats-Ill-make-prediction-enrage-them.html
Keith
Shirl,
ReplyDeleteBut I agree with the conclusion in the article, and so does my wife, who points out that that is the way we agreed to organise our lives nearly 60 years ago, despite the fact that she had earned a better degree than I had. Don't you think that A.N.Wilson is late arriving at an obvious conclusion?
.
I have the feeling (or should I rather say,my emotional intelligence tells me) that you would have to have a rather high personal stupidity score to attach any importance to the unqualified quantification of "intelligence".IQ was used in the thirties already to judge performance in the County Minor examination,which brings to mind the old game of being blindfolded and trying to pin a tail on a pig.
ReplyDeleteAbility testing is a different,simpler and more valid thing.Oh,and I`m so glad my daughters and granddaughters who are extremely intelligent and able, are what they are, in spite of inheriting some of my genes.
I got older last year with a special birthday and couldn't believe I was still here to celebrate it. I also thought I had the wrong birth date, because I still felt about 21 inside.
ReplyDeleteI've just notched up another year....and I'm still here, living on my own, and coping.........and I still feel 21 inside.
I look in the mirror though, and my Mum is staring back at me............when she was in her eighties!
I look in the mirror and it's my paternal grandmother I see !!!!
ReplyDelete...on reflection
ReplyDeleteMirror, mirror on the wall
Do you have to tell it all?
Where do you get the glaring right
To make my clothes look too darn tight?
I think I'm fine but I can see
You won't cooperate with me,
The way you let the shadows play
You'd think my hair was getting gray.
What's that, you say? A double chin?
No, that's the way the light comes in,
If you persist in peering so
You'll confiscate my facial glow,
And then if you're not hanging straight
You'll tell me next I'm gaining weight,
I'm really quite upset with you
For giving this distorted view;
I hate you being smug and wise
O, look what's happened to my thighs!
I warn you now, O mirrored wall,
Since we're not on speaking terms at all,
If I look like this in my new jeans
You'll find yourself in smithereens!!
..author unknown..
Two letters to the Times this week:
ReplyDeleteI have found a foolproof way of getting help when I or anyone near me needs it. Ask for it. I'm in my mid-80s and I used to wonder why my fellow travellers seemed not to notice my struggles. I decided that if I change my behaviour they might change theirs. I started to ask for help.
The effect was magical. Muscular young men leapt to my assistance, apparently enjoying lifting my heavy case with a flourish; other passengers were quick to assist. Asking doesn't always come naturally, even at my post-embarrassment age, but it gets much easier with practice.
One lad on a bus offered me his seat and assured me that he didn't mind me chatting with him because he was"doing a project on old people". Two welly-laden girls on their way to Glastonbury left me rejuvenated by their response to my parting "Be good" with "You too". Buses and trains are just full of helpful people. They just need to be asked.
Meg Wilkes, Ellesmere, Shropshire
I am delighted that Meg Wilkes has found muscular young men ready to lift her heavy suitcase with a flourish. But I offer a word of caution to those young men. I travelled down to Didcot on a very crowded train, and as we stopped an elderly lady, perhaps Meg Wilkes herself, standing next to a heavy case by the the door said to me: "Would you help me with this case?" I lifted it with a flourish and followed the lady along the platform, down the stairs and to the taxi rank. As I handed her back the case she said: "It's not mine dear, it was just in the way". I then noticed the label on the case with a Cardiff address. I now offer my belated apologies through the Times to the owner, who was still on the train.
Dr David. A Harris, Harwell, Oxon
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ReplyDeleteMick
ReplyDeleteYou must have come up against the dreaded "Captcha", designed to protect the system from Spammers and other more evil people who aim to put the site beyond our use. This is a trial post, and if successful I'll tell you how I did it.
Keith