Danskcolin: Friday May 30th 2025 "Are YOU planning to have another baby - well there's no time like the present, that's for sure!"

Yes, friends, are you and your significant current "squeeze". Well, my advice to you is "Get on with it!" or is it "Get it on with it" - my medium-to-long-suffering wife Lois and I have been officially diagnosed as "clinically old" and we're not always sure of what the current PC (politically correct) "lingo" is, for this week (or for next week, come to that!!!) (!).

By the end of next week we'll both be 79, would you believe, and maybe we've hesitated too long to have our third child - it's nearly 48 years since our last "happy event", but your views welcome, as always !!!!

me and my medium-to-long-suffering wife Lois this morning:

yes, the rumour mill surrounding us here in Hampshire

is certainly working overtime at the moment, but could we really

soon be hearing the patter of tiny feet again, after nearly 50 years (!)

[No! - Ed]

Certainly Lois and I have been thinking about it, however, and all the current talk about longer paternity leave for hard-working dads has "set the cat among the pigeons", hasn't it, at least according to this morning's Onion News. Did YOU see today's "lead", potential mums and dads, before you got out of bed and dashed off to work on the proverbial "eight thirty train to Clapham" or whatever the current "PC expression" is ????

Bet you did!!!

Yes, it sounds like good news, doesn't it, the idea of longer paternity leave, "floated" recently by flagship UK business services company Deloitte, inspired by the views of the Princess of Wales no less!

And yet to some expectant mums, the prospect of having 'dad' around for longer certainly isn't all sunshine and rose-petals, to put it mildly, according to Lois's copy of "The Week" magazine, which gives a digest of the last week of news from home and abroad, and which "plopped" through our letterbox this morning, here in rural, semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire!

Step forward, a certain Ms Tilly MacDonald of Spean Bridge, up there in Spean Bridge, Inverness-shire, Scotland, who, in a letter to The Times newspaper confesses she is dreading the prospect of all the extra meals and afternoon sex that her husband will soon be demanding from her, during his enforced, extended paternity leave (!).

Here's how her sad letter starts - I've spared you some of the details !!!!

Poor Tilly !!!!!

And certainly, for Lois and me this afternoon, there's simply no time either for sex or even for watching "Homes Under the Hammer", clad in milk-stained bras or milk-stained anythings [sic] (!), because we're both "tied up" (not literally!!!) with our onerous duties as members of Liphook, Hampshire's "old codger" community, to put it mildly!

Lois is busy preparing a talk for her church's online "sisters' meeting" next week (about which more later), while I myself have got to chair another online 'zoom' meeting of the local U3A old codgers' "History of English" group, which I'm currently the leader of, "for my sins" !!!!

(left) Lois preparing for her talk to the local "sisters" at her church,

and (right) me chairing another stormy session of the local

U3A Old Codgers "History of English" group

In my case, luckily there are only 5 of us elderly "language buffs" online this afternoon, so it's easier than usual for me, as "chairperson" to keep order among this famously rowdy bunch! Hilary's allegedly "got something more important to do", and Peter is probably having trouble getting his 'zoom' up again - well he is well into his eighties!!!!

It's an enjoyable meeting, however, with Darryl showing his familiarity with many Mediterranean European languages, particularly French, Spanish, Portuguese etc, i.e. the languages that developed out of Latin, after the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century AD.

(coloured blue) the areas of Europe where people speak languages

that developed out of Latin after the fall of the Roman Empire

Darryl told us how the Latin word for "to speak" (loqui) was judged to be "too complicated" by the French, Spanish etc and how they found some simpler words to substitute for it, for example "parlare" in Italian and French, and "hablar" in Spanish.

I didn't know that "parlare" originally meant "to speak in parables" and "hablar" meant "to talk in fables". What madness, wasn't it !!!!

After that, I followed Darryl by discussing why so many tribes throughout the ages counted on their fingers, and hence came up with our current standard 10-based decimal system of numbering.

I also discuss how tribes who didn't wear socks used their toes to count on, as well as their fingers, and hence developed 20-based systems; and how tribes who wore virtually nothing at all, like the Oksamin people of New Guinea, who didn't really wear anything much at all, counted using a lot of other of their "appendages" (!), coming up eventually with a 27-based system.

the Oksamin people of New Guinea - developers of an

amazing 27-based numerical system based on their various "appendages"

If only the Oksamin system had caught on! Imagine all the benefits that would have accrued from a 27-based system, in terms of the development of higher maths and maybe the sciences too?

I wonder....! Although it might have been a bit chilly doing all that work with no clothes on, like Oxford Maths Professor Tim Crawford does, so it's swings and roundabouts really. I'm happy to stick with my fingers, but your views welcome, as usual !!!

Oxford professor Tim Crawford, "The Naked Mathematician"

[That's enough whimsy! And is that all you two "noggins" have done today, Colin - just a bit of afternoon work staring at computer screens? - Ed]

Absolutely not! We've also been doing a lot of "birthday-related" work. After our morning walk over Old Man Lowsley's Farm, our daughter Alison dropped by to pick up our present to her husband, an official "Tour de France Winner" yellow jersey for hotshot London lawyer and keen amateur cyclist, Edward.

(left) our daughter Alison drops by to pick up our birthday present to her husband Edward,

a hotshot London lawyer and keen amateur cyclist, and (right) flashback to the

2010s, and Edward with a friend in front of Buckingham Palace, on a charity bike ride

And Lois turns 79 next week, so I ordered my birthday present to her and also booked us a lunchtime table for two at Adriano's, nearby Beacon Hill's stylish Italian restaurant. Also Lois has done more planting in the garden. So this Friday has been "busy busy busy" all the way, that's for sure!!!

No peace for the wicked haha!!!

nearby small town Beacon Hill's cultural "centre of gravity"

- stylish Italian restaurant Adriano's, where Lois and I

have booked a lunchtime birthday table-for-two next week

20:00 We go to bed on this week's edition of Gardener's World, which is timely, because Lois has spent a lot of time in our tiny back garden today, not just planting veg, but checking on our little clutch of bumble bee eggs. She says they're still there, all 13 of what-we-call "our little babies", although they're really Elsie's, which is the name we've give the egg's "mum" !!!

The eggs are looking a bit more wizened than yesterday, Lois reports, but we'll keep you updated, that's a "Colin Promise", so watch this space!

flashback to yesterday: I toast the arrival of what Lois and I are calling

"our future family" of 13 little bee's eggs in our tiny back-garden in Liphook

That's why Lois and I are particularly keen to watch Monty Don tonight, TV's "Mr Gardening", because the programme's bee expert, Martin Dohrn, is due to be telling viewers all about the 60 or so species of bee that he's identified in his own garden: and yes, you heard right - sixty species of bee in one garden!!!

One of Martin's 60 species is the so-called "mining bee", which Lois and I have never heard of, but Martin tells us all about his own pet mining-bee-queen, which is nice!

Who would have known, eh?!!! And Martin keeps careful tabs on whether this little mining bee is at home, or whether she's gone out.

Well, Lois and I certainly know that feeling! We've only been living in our current home in Liphook for just 4 months, and when we're driving about this little rural, semi-leafy Hampshire town, we still use a roadside oak tree as our clue to know where we turn off the main road to get to our cosy little home!

Is Martin getting a bit too involved with his bees? It's a suspicion, because he seems to be "stalking" his little mining-bee's potential suitors or "gentleman callers", even watching them have sex, and - call us prudes if you like, but we think that's a bit creepy!