Monday October 12th 2026 "Does one door open for YOU when another one closes? Annoying, isn't it - especially in winter!!!!"

Yes, Friends - in our house, our doors can be annoying with their "confounded" (!), and simultaneous, opening and shutting! The draughts in here are "something wicked", some of these autumnal evenings!!!!

One thing's for certain - you just can't keep doors out of the headlines! And just glance at this morning's Onion News if you want chapter and verse!!!!!

It's all a bit mad, isn't it, if I'm honest! 

But these stories, and others in the paper's popular "Door News Supplement" (!), certainly bring a brief, but broad, smile to the faces of me and my wife Lois today, here in semi-hospitable Liphook, Hampshire - no question about that!

my wife Lois and me - a recent picture

For sure, however, the whole subject of 'doors' is very much on my minds today, no doubt about that!

We're entering, like, the fourth day without a functioning door-bell on our front-door, and we're tortured by the thought of how many people have looked at our front door and just gone away, maybe? Not to mention, wrestling with the question of how many of those callers would have been welcome, and how many were "the other sort", as we euphemistically call them!!!!

And it's crucial today, because we're expecting a visit from Matthew, our gardener, who's promised to clear the "jungle" in our tiny back garden, so we can get to our so-called garden sheds would you believe, which would be nice!

On top of that, tomorrow, delivery firm DPD is set to deliver our long-awaited new electric blanket, from Dreamland, their popular "Cosy Dreamer Superior Cotton Mattress Warmer-King With Dual Controllers" - bit of a mouthful, so Lois and plan to just call it "the blanket", for short, when we're, for example, saying to each other "Did you forget to put the blanket on again?!!!!". 

Makes sense to us!!!

Crucially, it's the sort of electric blanket you can keep on all night - at low level only, but it can be a comfort these cold autumnal nights, when the temperature outside in Liphook can fall to as low as 46F (8C) - brrrrr!!!!!

Dreamland's popular "Cosy Dreamer Superior Cotton Mattress 

Warmer-King With Dual Controllers" - bit of a "mouthful" but it does the job!

When Lois and I were young, back in the 1950's, if people wanted to start a nice roaring fire in the grate, or in a wood on a camping holiday perhaps, the Scout manual always instructed them to "rub two sticks together". 

And if you didn't have any sticks, you presumably had to "rub two scouts together" - and hence the expression used, when talking of relative income levels in those crazy, far-off days, that a couple down on their luck, "didn't have two scouts to rub together".

And when Lois and I get cold in bed during the night, we don't have any scouts around, so we definitely need that blanket!

I wonder....!

Otherwise it's a bit of a quiet day this Monday for Lois and me, which is a rare treat! Usually, it's just "busy busy busy - no peace for the wicked" sort of a day, all day every day!!!! 

Did I tell you that I'd recently received the gift of a very special mug - "Best Grandad Ever!", which came as a nice surprise. I didn't even know I'd been nominated, would you believe, so that was very nice! And yes, today, (see picture above, right) unbelievably, there's only one "job" on our calendar for once - see above, which is weird to reflect on, to put it mildly (!).

So Lois and I find ourselves, unusually, hanging round a bit today, Monday, waiting for our gardener Matthew to call, his first visit since May, which is mad! Then, when he calls, we have to open up the garage for him etc etc, and then we have to keep an eye on him, from the window, in case he signals that he wouldn't say no to a cup of tea, which is all mad too!

So once again, it's "Busy busy busy!" - and another non-stop day for us, as usual - so no change there !!!

Luckily, at least, we have just a very short-and-simple "to-do-list" for Matthew today, i.e. "Can you clear a path through our little 'suburban jungle' so we can get to both of our two sheds, if you please" (!). 

Our neighbours here in Liphook, who, privately, have dubbed us "possibly Liphook's busiest-looking retired couple" (!), often give us a bit of gentle "ribbing" about being "the only house in the street with more than one shed" (!). 

The subtext of all this friendly "neighbourly banter" is, of course, a reference to the famous arts documentary - or was it a "arts mockumentary" (!), all about modern British composer "Gordon 'Two Sheds' Jackson", from back in the 1970's.

You know, the discussion that ended up with that notorious live "punch-up" in the studio - you must remember!

internationally famous modern British composer, Arthur "Two Sheds" Jackson.

being interviewed about his sheds during a BBC TV late night arts show

And here we see the moment when Jackson is ejected from the studio 

after ignoring all questions about his shed or sheds, and 

insisting on speaking about his music - what madness, wasn't it !!!!! 

However, if you saw the programme, back in the day, you'll  remember that Jackson didn't actually have two sheds, despite his famous 'moniker' - at that stage it was simply an idea. And Lois and I remind our neighbours of that salutary fact, every time they call either of us "Two Sheds" (!),

Whether Jackson eventually got around to buying and installing the extra shed, and whether he ever wrote his highly-anticipated "Second-Shed Symphony" or was it "Second Sympathy - The Shed", neither Lois and  I can quite remember (sorry, old age again!) - isn't clear.

But what a crazy world we live in !!!!!!

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

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

Sunday October 11th 2026 "Halloween only weeks away!!! Is YOUR costume 'sorted'? Bet it isn't haha!!!!"

Yes, Friends, you may not have noticed, but Halloween is a mere 20 days away, and most people have decided on their 2026 costume, so better 'get a wriggle on' !!!!

You can get plenty of ideas from the papers - check out their Halloween supplements! Do it now haha!!!

Here's a sample from today' Onion News, if you're still 'stumped' !!!!

It's all just madness, really, isn't it!

However, the stories bring a malicious grin to the normally impassive faces of me and my wife Lois this morning, here in semi-lovely Liphook, Hampshire - no question about that!!!!

me and my wife Lois - a recent picture

And we're laughing because the prospect of this year's Halloween is bringing a touch of glamour to an otherwise stay-at-home Sunday for us - you can't tell it from the above photo, but yesterday we got our his-and-hers anti-flu and anti-COVID jabs from our local surgery. And today - sure enough, and totally predictably (!) - our upper arms are aching "something ghastly", so fair enough not going out, that's what we say !!!!

Luckily, to cheer us, we've got our weekly catch-up video call with our "Australian family" - our daughter Sarah, who lives in the northern suburbs of Perth, Australia, with husband Francis and their 13-year-old twins Lily and Jessica, which is nice!

Halloween, we learn, is just as big in Australia as it is in the UK, and our rascally twin granddaughters are already working on designing and making their own costumes, would you believe - the little scamps!!!

This year they're going to be dressed as jellyfish, under transparent umbrellas which sport flashing disco lights inside, and colourful ribbons outside to represent their little jellyfish legs, so incredibly unusual - something we've come to expect from the twins.

Expect the unexpected, when it comes to our granddaughters - that's what Lois and I always say !!!! The weirdest thing, however, is imagining Halloween in the blazing hot Perth sunshine, because it's coming into summer down there, would you believe, which is totally mad! 

What a crazy planet we live on !!!!

flashback to 2021: our granddaughters in Australia, Lily and Jessica, 

then 8 years old, prepare to celebrate Halloween in the blazing hot Perth sunshine

- seems all wrong, doesn't it! What a crazy planet we live on !!!!

The twins plan to do their trick-or-treating this year not in their own neighbourhood - the houses are too far apart they say, which is a bore! Instead they're travelling with mum and dad on the 5-minute car-drive to nearby Eglinton, where "the houses are closer together", they tell us, which will maximise their candy-per-yard "haul", which makes sense to us !!!

Lois and I find the twins today bubbling over with excitement about making up their jellyfish costumes, although there's also an undercurrent of "oh dear, school holidays are over!" feeling, because, although it may be Lunchtime in Liphook (cue for a song title?), it's 8:30 pm in Perth, and their next school term starts tomorrow, Monday, after a 2 week break.

However, we manage to cheer the little scamps up, by reminding them that it's far worse for the teachers, whose hearts will be, almost but not quite literally, "in their boots" tonight - no question about that! And this cheery reminder seems to do the trick for the twins, and the video call ends on a happier, and a palpably more triumphant note, which is nice!

Kids rule OK haha !!!!!

19:00 And this evening, Lois and I, feeling a bit more refreshed, revive our memories of Hungary, a country we visited several times in the 1990's and in the "noughties", when I was learning the language., by listening to a BBC Radio 4 programme, "Grandchildren of the '56 Revolution".

This month it's the 70th anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, when the people of Hungary incredibly tried to set up a democracy, and for a few glorious weeks, even defied the Russian tanks that Nikita Krushchev sent to crush them.

(left) tonight's BBC radio programme "Grandchildren of the '56 Revolution",

and (right) flashback to 1998, Lois (3rd left) and me (rightmost)

arm in arm with some of our Hungarian friends - happy days!!!!

It's nostalgic for Lois and me to hear this programme - we were both 10 years old when the revolution took place, and we both remember clearly what a sensation it created in the West at the time. We also remember the influx of Hungarians fleeing their country and moving to the UK in the years that followed. 

This BBC Radio 4 commemoration tonight proves to be a somewhat chaotic programme, nonetheless, with lots of confusing, intercut recordings of witness statements, crowds chanting, bullets flying etc, but Lois and I find it fascinating to be reminded of the uniqueness of this event, an event which still casts a long shadow on Hungarians today.

Russian tanks on the streets of Budapest - the 1956 Hungarian Revolution

In 1956, this cataclysmic event split families, of course - we hear tonight from witnesses who had both resistance members and government officials in their families, and we hear about the strange conflicting results that that brought about. We also hear about how, in the capital Budapest, many of the key sites of the Revolution, like the former city radio station, look neglected today, with tarnished commemorative plaques etc falling into decay. 

The most astonishing thing is that, for 30 years after the crushing of the Revolution, under the Moscow-backed Janos Kadar regime, Hungarians were forbidden by law even to mention the event in public - an astonishing silence. Imagine anything like that in the UK - for example, being forbidden to even mention World War II until 1975 - it's hard to imagine, isn't it!

Janos Kadar (right), who prevented Hungarians from 

even mentioning the failed revolution of 1956, seen here

in Moscow meeting Russian leaders

And there are some other puzzling conundrums. The man who was the country's long-term Prime Minister from 2010 until August this year, actually cozied up to the Russians, incredibly. Intent on skewing the constitution in his party's favour, and eager to increase his personal wealth and that of his family and "cronies", Orban also needed an "adversary", many say, to make himself look like a hero.  And for his adversaries, strangely, he picked the democratic West and the European Union. 

heroes and villains: astonishingly to Hungarian leader Viktor Orban

Putin was his hero, and the EU's Ursula von der Leyen was his villain

Fortunately Orban was unseated in this year's Hungarian General Election, and, in tonight's programme we hear how, incredibly again, Hungary overnight became a totally different country, suddenly becoming relaxed and friendly again, like it used to be. 

Nice to get a real "feel-good" story for once, isn't it !!!

flashback to August: (left) the Hungarian elections which unseat former Prime Minister

Viktor Orban, in favour of (right) opposition leader Peter Magyar

What a story though!

And, in its conclusion, a nice one for Lois and me to go to bed on, so that's all good!!!!

Finally, here are some of mine and Lois's memories of Hungary, Lois with a broken nude (!), at a sculpture park near Budapest, and me with my friend "Magyar" Mike, sporting our "excellent worker!" medals from the Communist era, which we bought second-hand at a Hungarian car-boot sale - happy days!!!!

Lois (above) with our Hungarian friend  Istvan and (below) Lois hiding 

behind a broken nude, topless statue in the Hungarian Statues Park

me with my friend "Magyar" Mike, sporting our Hungarian "Excellent Worker!" medals

from the Communist era, which we bought second-hand from a car-boot sale

Happy days!!!!!

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

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

Saturday October 10th 2026 "Brrrr!!! Yes, Winter's coming early this year, I'm guessing!!!!"

Yes, Friends, has YOUR house been noticeably colder this week? It can only mean one thing - that those stories about "Winter Coming Early" are coming even earlier this year, and filling the pages of our national press before they're supposed to - no question about that!!!

Onion News has three such "doozies" this morning, and it's only mid-October, which is mad!!!!

Oh dear! It's all madness, isn't it! 

But this "avalanche" of "early winter stories" (no pun intended!!!) certainly brings a flush to the cheeks of me and my wife Lois this morning, here in semi-picturesque Liphook, Hampshire - that's for sure!!!

With the temperatures this morning locally plunging to as low as 52F (11C - brrrr!!!!), Lois and I are determined to "hunker down" and wait for spring! We've even brought in some early emergency measures - little electric heaters, (1) one for the living room for our evenings, and (2) one in the bedroom for our afternoons - is just the first stage in our "winter 2026-2027 plan". 

And we're even thinking about trying to remember how to put the central heating on tomorrow morning, so we definitely mean business: no question about that!!!

[You old skinflint, Colin! - Ed]

(above) temperatures plunging in Liphook to a cool 52F (11C) this morning - brrrrrr!!

and (below) the two electric heaters we've brought in, as an early precaution

And it's not even the middle of October yet, which is crazy!!!!

For Lois and me, however, it's yet another crazy day, with our biggest job being getting our annual pre-winter COVID and flu jabs at our local NHS surgery, which turns out to be a delight! They've certainly streamlined the procedure - no queues of 'old codgers' snaking round the outside of the building any more, which is nice! 

flashback to autumn 2023 and the bad old days (!): the "old codger queue" for COVID and 

winter flu jabs finally snakes its way to inside the building, but when these pictures were taken, 

Lois and I were still about 16 old codgers away from the nurse's room  - oh dear!

This morning, by contrast, we just walk into the surgery, pick up our pre-prepared "forms" from reception, after confirming our names and dates of birth, and then we're ushered through by a volunteer to a room with 2 nurses, one doing the jabbing and one working the PC, and then, before we know it, we're out the door at the back. The whole thing only takes 2 minutes, if that! 

It's totally crazy !!!!

(left) our local NHS surgery, and (right) a typical jab being administered by a nurse

And here's another novelty....for the first time ever Lois and I find ourselves "doing it" standing up, which (obviously!) saves time too, which is a good idea! There's just a slight pause while we decide which way round to do it - eventually opting for flu in the left arm and COVID in the right. 

However, you probably have your own ideas about that conundrum (!), so we don't want to influence you one way or the other! But you might want to start thinking about YOUR decision in advance, if you haven't had YOUR jab yet - just saying!!!!!

14:00 Another peaceful afternoon in bed, to recover from this morning's "jab-trauma" (!),  and nicer then ever today, because we've got a cast-iron guarantee of not being disturbed by delivery guys ringing our doorbell this time, which is nice! 

a typical delivery guy ringing the doorbell, with [inset] poor Lois and me 

trying to get some rest during "statutory nap-time" - what madness, isn't it!!!!

"But how- come you're guaranteed not to be disturbed by delivery guys this afternoon, Colin?", I hear you cry!

Well, seeing as how you're interested (!), you see, our door-bell is a crazy modern "stick-on" one, which works by "wifi" or some-such nonsense (!) and, somewhat randomly, our stick-on bell came off this week and fell into the bushes. We stopped by Liphook's only hardware store this morning to get some "superglue", but, due to pressure of other work (!), we haven't got round to sticking it back on yet, which is mad! 

But that can wait haha - it's a low priority! And the delivery guys can just leave our packages on the doorstep, so that's all good!!!!

Liphook's only hardware store - on Station Rd: see far right of picture,

where we buy some super-glue this morning, to stick out stick-on doorbell on with (!)

While in the hardware store, I also somehow find time to buy the latest Fackelman jar- and bottle-opener, in the store's special "old codger" department: look for the aisle on the left !!!! 

I don't have any trouble opening most jars and bottles, but it's the very small ones I have trouble with, just trying to get a "purchase" on it. I'm cursed with having big hands, as Lois often tells me - more out of sympathy, than disquiet, I sense!

(left) our "non-stick" stick-on door bell with our hardware purchases,

and (right) a typical tiny bottle of Lois's cranberry drink, which I struggle to open, cursed

as I am by one enormous pair of hands - that's my story and I'm sticking to it haha!!!

The perils of old age!!!

21:00 But at least tonight Lois and I can look back with nostalgia, watching BBC2's "1976 night", celebrating all the hits from that year, which is heart-warming!

 

And how fascinating also to see the little snippets of "fun facts" along the bottom of the screen, while those old hits are being played out - fabulous stuff!!!

And nice, also tonight, for Lois and me to remember that year with fondness - and taking our first child, Alison, with her smiley face, down to Somerset for her first ever holiday, and her first ever look at the sea. 

Awwwwww!!!

Awwwww (again) !!!!!

Happy days!!!!

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

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

Friday October 9th 2026 "Lakes are just lovely, aren't they! Have you dipped any of YOUR toes in one, recently?"

Yes, Friends, find a local lake today, and dip one of your toes in it - it doesn't matter which lake, or which toe, although, speaking personally, I like everything "writ large", and hence tend to favour my big toe, whenever a lake "hoves into view" - that's just the way I am, and I make no apology for that!

One thing's for sure - you can't keep lakes out of the headlines! See the joyously overflowing Lakes Supplement (no pun intended!!!) in today's Onion News, if you remain unconvinced!!!!

Heart-warming stories, all three! And 'warm the heart' that's very much what lakes tend to do, especially in summer, with their lovely limpid waters washing gently over a quiet sandy inlet! 

[Nice verbal picture there, Colin! - Ed].

[Thanks! - Colin]

And these headlines (and all the 29 other lake stories in today's Supplement, would you believe!) certainly bring an eerie gleam to the eyes of me and my wife Lois this morning, here in semi-idyllic Liphook, Hampshire - no question about that!

my wife Lois and me - a recent picture taken near a local lake (background, extreme right)

Certainly, lakes are very much on both our minds today, having heard the astonishing claim that Loch Ness, the UK's most voluminous lake, could, if necessary, fit the whole of the world's population in it 14 times over, would you believe!

What madness!!! But is it true? Who knows, one day the world might need to try it out for real, although heaven forbid! Yours Truly has never learnt to swim, for example, so I would have my reservations - the loch is on average 400 feet deep, we hear today, which is totally mad!

The Loch Ness 'bombshell' is the final story in today's edition of the BBC Radio 4 series, "More of Less", the series which, every Friday, tests the validity of the many fallacious statistics that are "floating around", when it comes to the subject of lakes (again, no pun intended!!!), and also to many other non-lake areas of life, which is nice!

Fortunately, one of the world's leading experts in "crowd science", Dr Keith Still, is on hand, during the programme, to test out the theory behind the astonishing Loch Ness claim, which is nice! Lois and I had privately expressed scepticism about the idea, believing it to be possibly a ruse by the Scottish Tourist Board to bump up the tourist figures, so we're all agog this afternoon, to put it mildly !!!

extract from the monstertheloch.com website

During this afternoon's programme, Dr. Still calculates that an average person has a volume of about 100 litres, while Loch Ness holds about 7,500 trillion litres, so on paper the plan to "flood" (!) the loch with all the world's people could work, potentially, given that the population of the planet is "currently" (!) only about 8 billion. However, to fully test the theory these people would all need to be liquidised first, because, if kept un-liquidised, people don't come in a standard shape and notoriously "bumpy" with lots of bulges - both unsightly and "sightly" (!) - according to Still's research, so fair enough!

(left) the position of Loch Ness in the UK, and (right) an artist's impression of

the scenes we may see if the decision is made to liquidise the world's population

of 8 billion and try to fit them into the waters of the loch

Yes, it seems like a crazy plan, doesn't it - but it might just work, maybe?  And Lois and I are very much hoping that, in the event of an emergency, Loch Ness is the chosen lake to hold everybody - Lake Baikal in Siberia is much bigger, we hear this afternoon, and could hold the world's population 40,000 times over, while the Caspian Sea is bigger still, holding 3 times as many people as Lake Baikal, would you believe. 

What a crazy world we live in !!!!!

However, Loch Ness is much nearer, only about 600 miles from Liphook, so would be far more convenient than the much-touted Lake Baikal option, if I'm honest!

I wonder.....!

It's all a bit crazy, isn't it, but it's been a bit of a crazy day for Lois and me too, with an afternoon appointment for Lois at local opticians Liphook Eye Care starting at 2pm, where a member of the shop's "hearing staff" is set to clear Lois's ears of any build-up of ear-wax, ahead of a test to calibrate her hearing-aids next week, so all critical stuff!

crazy scenes this afternoon at Liphook Eye Care, where Lois has a 2 pm appointment

for the clearing of any build-up of ear wax, prior to a hearing test next week

The timing of the appointment - 2 pm - is unfortunate because Lois and I are normally in bed at this hour, for "statutory nap-time", but luckily the ear-wax malarkey at Liphook Eye Care turns out to be a quickie job, and we're back home and in bed by half past two, so plenty of napping time still to be had (!), which is nice!

Plus, because she takes her hearing-aids out before getting into bed,  I can fully test out Lois's "unaided" hearing during our statutory 2 hour "session", and it seems much improved, I can exclusively reveal, so that's all good!

(left) some of Lois's early, relatively large, hearing aids, and (right) her current 'petite'

ones, here shown being charged up on our bedside table - what madness, isn't it!!!

21:30 Just to be on the safe side, however, we ensure that 'subtitles for the hard-of-hearing' are definitely switched on for our evening's viewing. This is a feature Lois and I both appreciate, due to the fact that people today will insist on "mumbling".

us watching TV - a recent picture

Either that, or, crazily, people on TV don't sensibly "up their volume" and never take the trouble to shout, even during passages of intrusively loud background music, which seems an odd decision to these two  'Lip-hookers', at least, as local residents have been dubbed (!).

Tonight we decide to go to bed on a smile, so tune in to this week's episode of Lee Mack's sitcom "Not Going Out".

An amusing episode. It's Lee's birthday, and his long-suffering partner Lucy decides to surprise Lee with a video message from his comedy hero Nigel Planer of 1980's sitcom "The Young Ones", a service offered by the Cameo website. The snag is that Lee assumes, from the video message, that Nigel actually wants to get to know him, which, for Lee, is a tantalising idea, but it all goes wrong when Lee accosts Nigel in a restaurant, introduces himself, and tries to take their "relationship" further - bad idea, Lee, because, of course, Nigel is totally mystified, of course !!!!

Lucy should have listened to her mum, who was dubious about the plan from the very beginning, suggesting to Lucy that she'd do better to go for the "sexy underwear" option to please Lee on his birthday. Here's Lucy sitting at a restaurant table, talking on the phone to her mum just before the "big event" (!).

Oops! Naughty Lucy's-mum-and-dad haha !!!!

Will this do?

[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]

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