Babyboomers are go!

Take a look at this from the online Daily Telegraph today. Viagra is the most widely dispensed medication on Saga cruises. OK, just stop sniggering there at the back. Aside from the widely publicised medical risks for anyone with high blood pressure or heart problems taking Viagra, this story perhaps illustrates the outlook of a generation who grew up in such a rapidly changing world after the somewhat staid post-war fifties. We are the generation who broke the mould in many ways, as we were the ones who were launching ourselves on an unsuspecting society in the magic sixties. This was the age of the 'Pill' which, in itself, heralded fundamental changes in attitude and morality. Granted, the much trumpeted 'Swinging Sixties' complete with drugs, free sex and continuous partying was perhaps more in the mind than in reality throughout much of the country, but changes were afoot. For women, particularly, there were choices available in their lives and certainly, the argument can be made that these choices were the forerunner of women trying to 'have it all' and ending up exhausted and unfulfilled but at least they were no longer expected to assume the role of the little woman at home. We are the ones who have consistently pushed back the age boundaries over the years. 'Fifty is the new forty' soon became 'sixty is the new fifty' and we'll keep on doing it.
We refused to disappear into the invisibility of grey-haired middle age, we'll keep dying our hair, sporting our jeans and being just as outrageous as we want to be and we'll keep on doing it into the old age that we refuse to acknowledge.
And when the unthinkable does catch up with us, we'll be the ones organising chariot races in our wheelchairs - so there!

Early summer?

"Summer is here!" the weather forecaster proclaims. "Hottest May on record forecast!" say the headlines. The weather for the next few days, that is, the weekend and into next week, mark you, is set to be hot and dry and sunny.
Oh yeah? So would someone like to explain the wet stuff that's falling very forcefully outside chez Jennyta?
Back to the artificial tan, then. :(

Day tripper?

I was on my way to Chester yesterday, bowling along the A843 when, coming in the opposite direction, I spotted a green Routemaster double decker bus and, if the destination board were to be believed, it was on its way to Patchway.

A further coincidence is that Patchway, which is in Bristol, is quite near where I once lived as a child.

So this bus was going along the A483 to Patchway, Bristol. Taking the scenic route, obviously, and it might explain all the long, frustrating hours I spent in my youth waiting for non-appearing buses. They were late because they had gone via the A483!

Bombing down to Bristol

I've been on a quick visit to see Dad in Bristol, but now I'm home. The house was (fairly) spotless and tidy, the dishes had been washed. It just shows - he can do it when he has to..... except for bedmaking, apparently, and boy! I wouldn't like to have been in that bed when the Hunny Monster came, grabbed all the bedclothes in one handful and scattered them all around the bedroom.
He didn't seem to have noticed, though.

Lunching again

I was in Chester yesterday for lunch with my friend and, when I had managed to drag myself out of M&S in time to meet her, I passed the town cryer, surrounded by a large crowd of onlookers and welcoming people from France, Italy, Germany and Scotland. Yes, I wondered too, but of course Scotland and Wales are now the only countries on the mainland of Britain, poor old England having been quietly and surreptitiously reduced to 'regions.'
Oh and I was at Chester University the day before, at an interview for a place on the MA in Counselling Studies.
They said I can come!

Let's play doctors and nurses

Well, here it is, folks - the new Keith-mobile!

Flirting - the new health treatment

On my morning trawl through the internet, I have just come across an article on flirting.
Did you know that there are 52 ways of doing it, of which the most widely used is what they call the 'hair flip'. I will take suggestions as to what the other 51 are, but remember, this is a family show, folks!
Whatever the other 51 are, feel free to indulge because flirting is actually good for you. It increases your blood cell count and therefore boosts your immunity and makes you more healthy. Could there be any better reason?
Not enough time in the day? No worries, folks, you can do it in the car on the way to work. 62% of people bat eyelids and flip their hair at someone in a different vehicle on their journey. Personally I have a problem with this. On my journeys to work, it used to be more about planning a painful death for the idiot in front who had just cut me up. Was I unlucky perhaps?
However, if the journey to work doesn't provide adequate opportunities, get online and get flirting via email or instant messenger or grab your phone and start texting. (See, there's always a way.) But if you're female, beware, as it appears that men often mistake friendly overtures for flirting. (You know the score - men are from Mars etc...)
And finally, when you are doing all this flirting, take comfort from the fact that you are not alone.
Birds, animals and reptiles do it too. OK so can someone tell me how a snake bats its eyelids and flicks its hair?