Yes, Friends, to be more specific (!), when you're reading your daily copy of Onion News print edition, do you take the time to scan their popular "From the Archives" column? It's well worth the [max] 15 minutes it takes, so check out today's - it's a real "doozy" !!!!
And it's actually the first bit of the paper that my light-to-moderate wife Lois and I usually turn to as we scan the paper in our lovely bed first thing this morning, here in grassy, semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire, I have to confess !!!!
And a public execution in a churchyard certainly doesn't compare with a Gregorian plainchant - who would argue with that (!), say Lois and I, as we wander, on our morning "constitutional", which today takes us through the graveyard of the little St Peter's church in nearby rural Lynchmere, Sussex.
You may have missed Gregorian-fan Hans's story this morning, however - it was somewhat "buried", on page 94 - no pun intended!!!!
It's always fun reading gravestones and memorial plaques etc in a churchyard. It's a reminder of our mortality too, which is no bad thing, on a lovely summer's morning! Sadly the oldest inscriptions are mostly illegible, due to weathering, but we saw this one on the path to the church door:
one of the oldest inscriptions we saw, and almost trod on (!) - H.B. 1769 ????
I've nevertheless picked out a few more recent, but more poignant, ones to showcase to you. Here's Colin's "pick of the poignantest!", if that's a word! [No! - Ed]
Colin's "Pick of the Poignantest" in this old country churchyard
Yes, Svetlana Sutherland's memorial gives Lois and me a bit of Russian to tax our brains with - the lat words of her inscription read "We remember and love [her]". And apparently, James Fairbairn liked "a quip and a glass of rosé", which sounds like he must have been a nice man; and the Foords (Jimmy and Elizabeth) were "pioneers in education". it seems - Foord is a local Sussex name, but I can't find these two "noggins" in google, which is a pity!
Most poetic of all is old Ben Horne's - "Let your soul and spirit fly". Nice one, Ben!
Ironically, as we leave the churchyard today, Lois and I almost miss possibly the only memorial here dedicated to somebody really famous, at least famous to mine and Lois's generation: BBC journalist and commentator Richard Dimbleby CBE, famous for his wartime radio dispatches from all over Europe, including Battle of El-Alamein, the D-Day landings in Normandy etc.
After the war, Richard hosted the BBC's flagship political weekly programme "Panorama", and became the BBC's "go-to" commentator for all big state events, like the Coronation of Elizabeth II (1953), Churchill's funeral (1965) etc, and two of his sons, David and Jonathan, followed him into the world of journalism and TV and radio news broadcasting.
Richard Dimbleby's memorial plaque in the churchyard of St Peter's, Lynchmere, W Sussex
Rest in peace, Richard, and let your soul and spirit fly, as old Ben Horne had it!
After our churchyard experience in Lynchmere this morning, Lois and I continue our walk through the fields around the parish, eventually getting stuck in the bracken somewhere. You know what we're like, we're a couple of real "noggins", even "numpties" sometimes haha!
our walk this morning starting at semi-grassy Lynchmere, Sussex, this morning,
eventually getting lost and thoroughly stuck in the bracken (ringed) - what "noggins" !!!
Yes, any churchyard experience reminds you that we get born, and later we die - always in that order, I've noticed haha!!! And sometimes we get married in between - if we can spare the time, that is haha !!!
[That's enough haha's! - Ed]
This evening, however, when we turn on our "telly" we discover that if health expert Michael Mosely has his way, we'd just get born - period! End of story! And there'd be no funeral directors, and the idea of gravestones would be well-and-truly buried - no pun intended !!!! [You've done that one already! - Ed]
Stefano Piraino, a biologist from Sorrento University, Italy, has been studying the Turritopsis jellyfish, which he says is able to reverse its life-cycle, like a butterfly going back to its caterpillar phase. Starting life as a microscopic polyps, they slowly mature into the classic adult umbrella-like shape "medusa".
Unlike other jellyfish, however, the Turritopsis jellyfish, when exposed to stress or old age, it shrinks and falls to the bottom of the sea, somehow reducing its size and the length of its tentacles, transforming itself into a ball of cells.
And don't you sometimes feel you'd like to do the same, Friends, when stress or old age strikes YOU - go on, confess!
The Turritopsis basically transforms itself back to a little polyps, and waits for conditions to improve before growing back again into an adult medusa, and it can do this multiple times, which is a comfort.
It's a unique creature in the animal kingdom, says Italian biologist Stefano.
And strange though it sounds, scientists in Cambridge UK like geneticist Wolf Reik of the Babraham Institute, are starting to believe that human cells also could transform themselves in a similar way, and they're starting with skin cells. Wolf's lab is examining a technique called cell reprogramming, which makes cells measurably younger.
As we age, segments of our DNA which tell young skin cells to grow, gradually become inaccessible and are switched off. leading to wrinkles. If you add what are called "Yamanaka factors" this allow cells to access those rejuvenating bits of DNA. The key is that they stimulate collagen, which in skin is something that helps wounds to heal and gives skin its youthful elasticity.
It's all still at the lab stage, but the researchers are going to try the same thing on other cells that age us.
But if you can't wait - why not drop by your local pharmacist's and ask for a jar of "Yamanaka Factor" - it's usually next to the Max Factor and all the other "Factors" to be taken into consideration (!), which will save you time searching - just one of Colin's many supertips for you today! Ask me for my others if you like - postcards only!
see if your local pharmacist stocks
the new wonder anti-ageing Yamanaka Factor
- you'll be glad you did haha !!!
Sadly, as we now know it will have come too late for Michael, whose programmes have been so enthralling over the years.
But rest in peace, Michael. Or better still, "let you soul and spirit fly!", as old Ben Horne of Lynchmere, West Sussex, used to say!
Will this do?
[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzz!!!!!!
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