Tuesday December 16th 2025 "Do YOU make a total 'pig's ear' of it, when trying to pay for things in shops?"

Yes, Friends, do YOU often make a total 'pig's ear' of it when trying to pay for things in shops? I think we've all been there, haven't we! And yet to some people, it's the most natural thing in the world, isn't it, which is weird.

Take this local guy in this morning's paper - the local Onion News for East Hampshire. Like many people with special talents, he's a truly modest guy and has asked to remain anonymous, which is a nice touch!

Kudos, that guy! 

His talent may be just 'genetic' but it's also possible that he learned, early on in life, how to do it, as a young boy. 

And reading the guy's story this morning brought a nostalgic smile to the faces of me and my wife Lois, here in semi-leafy Liphook, Hampshire, as we get ready to go out and spend a lot of currency ourselves, as part of our run-up to Christmas, promising ourselves that we mustn't "muck it up" when the time comes to "pay up and look good", as Lois's old dad Dennis used to say!!!

me and my wife Lois - a recent picture

In the old days, kids used to learn to handle money the hard way. And Steve, our American brother-in-law reminds us in an email today, of his own experience as a kid of 14 or 15, having a paper round and getting paid in loose change by his customers, taking the coins to the bank, and exchanging them for notes, which he says, "beat picking up soda bottles and beer cans from the roadside".

Kudos, Steve! And Steve meticulously kept all the pennies he got that showed his birth year of 1949, and he's still got a ton of them. Donald Trump has now called on the US Treasury to stop minting pennies, because they cost 2 cents each to mint - what madness !!!!

The last pennies ever minted are now selling for millions of dollars, but is Steve's hoard of 1949 pennies going to be valuable too? Steve collected a large number of them, effectively taking them out of circulation, so arguably they could be pretty-to-mildly rare.

I wonder.....!

Just to be on the safe side, when I get Steve's email I check mine and Lois's own "coin display" on our living-room wall. We've got a 1946 farthing, from our own birth year, plus a 1919 farthing from my dear late mother's birth year, as well as some other special coins, but I fear they'll never be valuable - a pity!

highlights of our coin collection, including our birth-year 1946 farthing, and another 

from my dear late mother Hannah's 1919 birth year, plus an 1863 Victorian penny 

we dug up in the 1970's when  gardening, plus some silver dollars etc we bought

from the US Mint in Denver during our time in the States 1982-1985 etc etc

'Farthing' is an interesting word. [You don't say! - Ed]

The old Germanic suffix "-ing" meaning a part of something, to my knowledge, survives only in "farthing" (a fourth part of a penny) and in "riding", as in the county of Yorkshire, which is so big that they had to divide it into three "Ridings" or three "third parts".

What madness, wasn't it !!!!!

What a crazy language we speak !!!!

[That's enough old words! - Ed]

Well, Lois and I certainly spend a lot of money this morning, and you don't get much change out of a farthing these days, to put it mildly!!!! We drive to Grayshott and Haslemere, just over the county line in Surrey, putting in our Christmas meat order at butchers Kaighin and Daughter's, plus picking up a bunch of CookShop ready meals, and in the middle of it all, recharging our batteries with some "sinful" cakes and coffee at Hemingways, Haslemere.

our morning - putting in our Christmas meat order at the butcher's, getting a load

of CookShop ready meals, and in between times, gorging ourselves on some

"sinful" cake and coffee in Hemingway's coffee shop, Haslemere 

How we laughed! 

But well, we're only old once, aren't we, so why not enjoy ourselves, that's what we say haha !!!! 

And after a quick lunch at home, our afternoon is the standard "going to bed for statutory nap-time", before finally decorating our tiny 3-foot Christmas tree and putting it in the window to impress our neighbours; then, finally letting our favourite handyman William into the house to put together an IKEA Baggebo bookshelf to install in our so-called "office", intended to carry our so-called "office books and papers", would you believe! 

And the Baggebo is only £25, incredibly !!! What's not to like !!!!!

What a crazy world we live in !!!!   [That's enough madness! - Ed]

after finally getting out of bed, we finally decorate out tiny 3 foot Christmas tree,

and let in local handyman William to assemble our shiny new IKEA Baggebo bookcase

in our so-called "office" - check it out in the leftmost corner in the picture above

- only £25 !!!!!  What's not to like haha !!!!!!

So, all in all, a bit of a "mad" day (!).

[You're are a one, Colin! - Ed]

And I'm going to be having 'a ton of fun' tomorrow, deciding what to put in my shiny new bookcase, no doubt about that! 

[You old devil, Colin, you know how to get your kicks, that's for sure! - Ed]

21:00 Well,  at least it keeps us out of mischief! And this evening, we watch a crazy Sky TV documentary, The Salt Path, about another crazy ageing couple, Sally and Timothy Walker, who, famously, didn't keep out of mischief, to put it mildly (!). 

The Walkers put on assumed names, before writing a supposedly biographical account of their struggles, both against financial misfortune and treachery, having their house repossessed; and also husband Timothy struggle against his supposed degenerative condition, the debilitating symptoms of which the couple said they had managed to reverse, thanks to long-distance walking along England's South-West Coastal Path.

Their book, published by Penguins Books, topped the bestseller charts for months, selling more than 2 million copies, and Sally became a frequent guest on TV chat shows.

Eventually the book was exposed as total fiction by investigative journalist Chloe Hadjimatheou. 

The couple had not been targeted financially by friends, as the book claimed. Quite the revers - Sally Walker (a.k.a. author Raynor Winn) had in fact stolen money from her employer, and from elderly relatives, although this money was eventually repaid. And Timothy Walker (a.k.a. Timothy "Moth" Winn) wasn't suffering from the degenerative disease CBD (corticobasal degeneration) or from anything else particularly, come to that.

Here's Sally/Raynor, "puffing off" her book on national TV, the BBC's prestigious "One Show", chatting with the BBC's presenter, Roman Kemp, and with celebrated actor Timothy Spall.

Penguin Books didn't do much serious fact-checking before publishing the book, and presumably they were quite happy when the book topped the bestseller charts for all those months. And it isn't illegal, evidently, to tell factual lies in a book, and there are no penalties for it, as long as you don't libel anybody. 

The worst thing about the book, obviously, was that it encouraged genuine CBD sufferers to think that they could reverse their symptoms by exercise and a healthy life-style, which is totally untrue.

On reflection, I think Lois and I will keep to our current way-of-life, even though it's not all that glamorous, and we're obviously missing out on potential millions, like the Walkers (a.k.a. The Wynns), who are still keeping their millions, fraudulent or otherwise !!!

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

Will this do?

[Go to bed! Do it now! - Ed]

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