Thursday July 10th 2025 "Retirement - you can do courses on it now apparently! What madness, isn't it !!!!"

Pensioners - do you remember your last working day? There was a kind of a magic about it, wasn't there - the feeling that you won't have to make that perhaps difficult "commute" ever again, getting up at the break of dawn. Now you'll be able to luxuriate in bed till maybe 6 am (?) and then spend the day doing the things you really want to do! 

My medium-to-hard-pressed wife Lois and I chose to retire on the same day, on Yours Truly's 60th birthday, back in March 2006. And in those crazy, far-off days "retiring" was a totally undocumented process, so we were literally "flying blind" when we "took the plunge" and decided to do it! 

flashback to March 2006, my 60th birthday, and the day my

medium-to-hard-pressed wife Lois retired

How different it is today, now that so many studies are being done on the subject to help the people Lois and I call "youngsters in their 60's" navigate the sometimes stormy seas of retirement! Like this landmark study from just down the road from us, at Basingstoke East University - did you see the story in this morning's local Onion News for East Hampshire, perhaps?

"On

Just imagine - if only Lois and I had known all that, back in 2006!!!

And in a funny kind of a way, today is another "last day" for us, certainly our last completely quiet day for us, here in our new home in rural, semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire, because our two-person idyll is going to start to be rudely shattered soon by the arrival of our dear daughter Sarah (48), who's going to be taking off tomorrow from Perth Airport in Western Australia, and flying into London's Heathrow Airport early Saturday with husband Francis and their 11-year-old twin daughters Lily and Jessica. 

They'll be coming for a two-and-a-half week stay with us.

Lois and me - our "quiet life" is coming to an end,

and no mistake !!!

Yikes! And this quiet little house of ours is going to be ringing with laughter and the patter of tiny-to-medium 11-year-old feet all of a sudden!!! Not to mention Sarah's 48-year-old feet, plus husband Francis's feet which are even older, we believe, but we're still waiting for his birth certificate - it may have got "destroyed" in the great fire at Somerset House in 1915 haha  (!). 

Lois and I have been preparing for their visit for  literally days, sorting out the guest bedrooms etc - and today we're working on the finishing touch - a flatpack bedside table for Jessica (or Lily), which we've got to spend the morning puzzling over and half-putting together, although it seems a bit "wonky" - probably because we haven't read the microscopic font of the instructions quite right, I shouldn't wonder !!!

Silly old us !!!!

[I wouldn't trust you two "noggins" to put a flatpack ballpoint pen together, Colin, much less a bedside cabinet. Just saying! - Ed]

Well we are 79 now - we retired at 60, back in 2006 - you do the maths haha !!!!

It's so different in Denmark, where "Life begins at 80" according to my daily news feed from Gentofte, the suburb of Copenhagen where our other daughter, Alison, lived with her family for 7 years, from 2012 to 2019.

flashback to April 2014: Lois (centre) on the Copenhagen waterfront,

with our daughter Alison and her husband Edward, plus their

three kids: Isaac (4), Rosalind (6) and Josie (8)

Lois and I picked up a smattering of Intermediate Danish while visiting Alison and family during their 7 years in Copenhagen and still today, "for our sins" (!) we run the local U3A "Intermediate Danish for Old Codgers" Group, and we manage to navigate another stormy meeting of the group this afternoon, which keeps us busy, to put mildly! Do write to me, incidentally, if you're an 'old codger' and  interested in learning Intermediate Danish, and I'll put you in touch with your nearest group - and that's a 'Colin-promise' (!)

As joint group-leader with Lois, we still get a "feed" of Gentofte news, just for old times' sake, on my smartphone, which is where I get all these annoying "Life Begins At 80" stories when Lois and I are in bed having our afternoon "nap-time" - well, we are 79, you know (!). [Stop saying that! - Ed]. 

Lois and I haven't been in bed 5 minutes, before my Samsung

starts "diddling away" under the bedclothes again - what madness !!!

A few days ago, we read about Gentofte-resident Grethe Kaspersen, possibly the world's oldest model, who turned 80 this week, but who has no intentions of retiring, after 6 decades [Danish: seks artier] in the fashion business.

Copenhagen resident Grethe Kaspersen, still a fashion model

after 6 decades in the business, seen here with her old "hubby" 

And today, literally "days later", another busy new Gentofter octogenarian "birthday-girl" has popped up on my news feed, Charlotte Grumme, who wears red glasses and looks about 12, but who will actually turn 80 next Tuesday, and - wouldn't you know it! Yes, Charlotte too has no plans to retire, let alone to "slow down" and start taking afternoon naps like Yours Truly and Lois, to name but two of us!!!!

What a crazy world we live in !!!

This is a bit of a rundown of Charlotte's busy life, according to the Zealand News reporter:

What madness, isn't it! And there are two questions in mine and Lois's mind in bed this afternoon: (1) what's it like being married to a "couples therapist", and (2) what on earth is "the Mythical Knot" that Charlotte is  "certified in". And this time we want answers, postcards only !!!!

I did some googling, and there's a YouTube video on Jytte Vikkelsoe and the Mythical Knot, but to be honest, we haven't had time to look at it, what with all the flatpack work we've been engaged on today (!) - see pictures below from the video.

Incidentally don't be put off by the "MAD" notice in front of the lecturer in this clip - it's not a judgement (!) - it's just a sign for the "snacks" table (!). 

You see, "mad" is just the general Danish word for "food" - it's related to the English word "meat" if you must know, which originally meant "food in general", hence the expression "meat and drink". And I should think her audience in that Danish woodland must be gasping for a bite to eat, not to mention something to drink - it looks as if it's late at night, but the lecturer shows no signs of bringing the session to a close. Still, that's the Danes for you!!!!

What madness !!!! [That's more than enough madness for one day! - Ed]

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!

Wednesday July 9th 2025 "Shopping for the cheapest possible product: not easy is it !!!!"

Shopping - it's never just a routine task is it, to put it mildly! And I see from this morning's Onion News that one local man has been having enormous problems, you would not believe !!!

"Poor Mark!!!!" is what I want to say, but at the same time I want to say "Welcome to the real world, Mark, my friend!". But which should I say first? And this time I want answers - postcards only !!!

However, at the same time (again), I've got to say, "Kudos Mark, for shopping online!" - Mark's officially the first "resident" in Lower East Hampshire to try this uniquely modern an bang-up-to-date option. And I can't blame him - the shops in Betty Mundy's Bottom are rubbish aren't they - there's a Greggs, and that's pretty much it. "Commiserations, Mark !!!!", should I have said that first?

Betty Mundy's Bottom's shopping centre with its flagship branch of Greggs

Not everybody in East Hampshire is as unlucky as Mark, however, thankfully!!! 

My medium-to-hard-pressed wife Lois and I live in a particularly convenient area of rural, semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire, within easy reach of the shops in bustling Grayshott, which straddles the Hampshire/Surrey county-line, and which rivals London's prestigious Oxford Street for its wealth of choice!

semi-leafy Grayshott on the Hampshire-Surrey county line,

which has been dubbed "East Hampshire's Oxford Street"

And particularly lucky for Lois and me, who are going on a bit of a "shopping frenzy" this week in advance of a visit by our daughter Sarah (48), flying in from Perth, Australia on Saturday with husband Francis and their 11-year-old twin daughters Lily and Jessica. 

Pork, towels, plastic patio tables - you name it. We've bought the lot this week, both online and "in store", would you believe!

[You don't say! - Ed]

Lois is worried that we're spending a lot of money on plastic patio tables, for example, but I say to her, "Look, this is Liphook - this is the town where we chose, last January, to move to, the semi-leafy East Hampshire town where we will live out our "twilight years" [You've gone past those now, haven't you?! - Ed], and we've got to fully equip ourselves - set ourselves up, if you will, for "Colin and Lois: the next 30 years", or in other words, more simply, "Colin and Lois - the next chapter" ! 

Makes sense, doesn't it, when you think about it!!!!

A place to gather our memories, and stick them, firmly, in our mental "scrapbook" !

(left) flashback to 1970, the first picture of us together, in a cottage in Shropshire,

and (right) us as we were in 2022: in our then home in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

We're often a bit of a timid pair in many ways, at our happiest either on the sofa or in bed, but we did once "break the mould", just a little bit, around 40 years ago, when we decided to try living in the States for 3 years, when I was "earning my crust" as a medium-to-top-secret agent, on the books "officially" at least!" of the British Embassy in Washington DC.

flashback to 1984: Lois and me with our two young daughters Alison (9)

and Sarah (7) touring the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, with me

sitting on the "wrong" side of the car and driving on the "wrong" side of the road,

not to mention confidently "driving round in circles" (ie on roundabouts!), just like the natives (!)

One of our vivid memories from those years was watching the Live Aid concerts in 1985, literally weeks before we came home to the UK, so looking at the scenes in Wembley Stadium, London, and thinking, "That's the country we'll soon be living in (again!) !!!".

You see, Yours Truly and "Mrs Yours Truly" as I call her (!), are quite good on geography, if nothing else!

(left) the QE2 with us on board leaves New York in a violent thunderstorm, 

as we view the then-undamaged Twin Towers getting smaller, and (right) Alison (10), 

as we pass the Needles en route to Southampton, and a country the girls scarcely remembered.

Memories, memories! 

And as an " 'omage" (!) to those memories of 1985 tonight, we're on the sofa again, for the second part in the BBC's 3-part documentary on those concerts, 40 years on.

Lois and I didn't know that, when London-based Irish pop-star Bob Geldof, the "Live Aid" decided to follow up his 1985 African-famine-relief charity single "Do They Know It's Christmas" with a charity concert at London's Wembley Stadium, he had absolutely no idea about which acts would be in the concert.

When interviewed at a press conference about his plans for the concert, he more or less "made up" a list of stellar artists, none of whom had at that point never heard of his concert idea, much less agreed to take part. He even invented a story that defunct rock band "The Who" had agreed to get together just for the concert, a story which was totally untrue.

What madness !!!!

Yes, don't forget the Boomtown Rats, Bob - that's your own group, remember haha !!!!

And he went on to list David Bowie, the Cars, Queen... etc, none of whom knew anything about the concert. Concert organiser Harvey Goldsmith tried to stop Bob, but he was in full flow, so it was difficult, knowing what Bob's like.

What a crazy world they lived in, back in 1985 !!!!

After the Wembley line-in had been finalised, it was criticised for not featuring more than 10%  black artists on the bill, but at the time, there weren't many really big black artists on the UK rock scene, and what he wanted was the biggest-selling artists, which would bring in the donations from the public. So "Fair enough, Bob!" is what Lois and I say, call us "racist" if you like haha!

 

A parallel concert was organised at the JFK Stadium in Philadelphia, but U2's "Bono" who kicked off the concert there, can't bear to watch the footage now, he says, because he has become embarrassed by his then-fashionable-for-1985, "mullet" hair-style.

Poor Bono !!!!!

And I personally know how Bono must feel, because, back in the 1990s, I too famously disgraced myself by sporting a particularly bushy "mullet" for a 1980's-themed dance evening at Lois's workplace, the  Cheltenham care home for retired vicars where she worked for 15 or more years.

flashback to 2005: (left) me in my "mullet" for the 1980's-themed party 

at Lois's work - and note the rolled-up jacket sleeves: cool !!!! [Not!! - Ed]

and (right) Lois in her more restrained, "ra-ra" dress

 

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzz!!!!!!