Sunday August 23rd 2026 "Friends, is there an awkward 'age gap' between you and YOUR current 'squeeze'?"

Yes, Friends, is there an awkward 'age gap' between you and YOUR current 'squeeze'? It seems to be fashionable at the moment, to judge from these 'showbiz' pics in today's Onion News, to put it mildly!

However, all of the above celebrity 'age gaps' have started tongues wagging in their time, and it's even leading to questions, now, about 'inappropriate' pairings in the Western canon of literature and the cinema, would you believe! And none more so than in the coupling of the then 23-year-old actress Laura Dern with her screen 'squeeze' T Rex in the original Jurassic Park (1993), which is now being re-examined, or should I say "rex-amined" (!) [No! - Ed] by so-called woke critics, would you believe!

Yes, 'woke' critics are now even questioning whether the actress-dinosaur relationship portrayed in the film was was entirely appropriate, and may have been the trigger for a lot of the current 'uptick' in 'age gap' particularly in Hollywood.

The Onion News film critic takes the view that there were clear 'power dynamics' in play in the couple's relationship, since the T Rex was a deadly apex predator, and clearly outweighed Dern by more than 15,000 lbs (around 7000kg). And the question was posed, "Why is it always the giant reptilian beast and never the human woman who is tens of millions of years older?" 

Racquel Welch (26) with leading monster T Rex (top right), exact age unknown,

as featured  in blockbuster movie "One Million Years BC" (1966)

I wonder....!

And the Onion News film critic's penetrating question certainly brings a thoughtful smile to the faces of me and my wife Lois here today, in leafy Liphook, Hampshire - no question about that!

my wife Lois and me - a recent picture

Our own much smaller age gap - of two and a half months - has troubled us at times during our long relationship: however, now both 80, would you believe (!), we'll be celebrating our 54th wedding anniversary in 2 days' time, which offers tentative proof at least that we've ridden the 'stormy seas' of our age gap with not unconsiderable success, to put it mildly - touch wood!!!!!

It's an age gap of a different kind that we're dealing with today, however, when our 19-year-old granddaughter Josie, a first-year maths student at Durham, drives over from her home just over the county line in Churt, Surrey to spend a couple of hours chatting with her "old-codger" octogenarian grandparents (!), Lois and me, here at our home in Liphook.

(left) our 19-year-old granddaughter Josie, demolishing a takeaway

in our living-room this afternoon, and (right) Josie (second left) with

beau Will, and some of their student friends from Durham University

It's a situation that's new to us - chatting non-stop for two whole hours with somebody who's literally only a quarter of our age (!). Of course we often see Josie around, but normally in the company of her parents and/or her two siblings Rosalind (18) and Isaac (16)., with all the casual, cheery 'banter' that normally characterises such encounters. So it's great today to get this unexpected chance to really talk to Josie one-to-one, or should I say "two-to-one" (!) [No! - Ed], about her life, her interests, tastes in music, and her hopes for the future etc.

And we try not to preface too many of our questions with and "Things were so different when we were at  college! You wouldn't believe how much blah blah blah!", and I hope we succeeded, without 'ploughing that furrow' too determinedly! At least Josie didn't run screaming from our house after the first 10 minutes, so we're quietly confident that we didn't bore her too much, at least! 

flashback to 1972: (left) me (centre) collecting my richly-deserved MA degree,

and (right) Lois posing in my cap and gown with borrowed glasses - the saucy wench!!!

flashback to the 1960's: Lois (front, right) crossing the English Channel

on a study trip to Paris with fellow-students 

Josie's currently preparing to start her second year at Durham, in great excitement, because she'll be living out of college, starting from this academic year, fending for herself with 3 other girls in an actual house, while beau Will will be in another house with 3 other boys. And they've all got their whole lives in front of them - can you imagine how that must feel?!

Lois and I didn't know that one idea Josie has for her future career is as an actuary, and when we're talking to her, we pretend to know what that's all about, and we have got a rough idea (!), but we google it later, after she's gone home, just to be sure! Certainly her family members - dad Edward, and his siblings, and their close friends, have all trodden the "profession" route: lawyers (like dad Edward), surveyors, doctors, you know the kind of thing!

Of course! We remember now, haha!!!!

Josie's visit this afternoon has come as a pleasant surprise, and a chance for Lois and me to unwind, if briefly (!). Because this Sunday, as always, has been packed also with - like - a billion other absorbing activities (more probably!!!), and it begs the question, "How did we ever find the time to go to work, back in the day!!!!" 

Dubbed by neighbours as "possibly Liphook's busiest-looking retired couple" (!), earlier today we zipped over to nearby Petersfield for Lois's church's Sunday Morning Meeting, where we get the chance, after the meeting, for a quick word with Chief Elder Richard's wise-cracking brother-in-law and professional-Yorkshireman (only kidding, Philip, if you're reading this!!!) the always amusing Philip, and then, later, another word with our friend, noted archaeologist Grahame, friend of TV's Alice Roberts and TV's Raksha Dave of Time Team and, like, a billion other documentary series (!).

(left) the village hall near Petersfield, Hampshire, where Lois's church holds

its Sunday Morning Meeting, and (right) us in the back row, with, in the

background, noted archaeologist Grahame, friend of TV's Alice Roberts

There isn't too much time today for chat, however, before we find ourselves zipping home for a hurried lunch and our weekly Sunday catch-up video call with our daughter Sarah in Perth, Australia, and with her 13-year-old twins Lily and Jessica, who are currently preparing, excitedly, for their school's annual camping trip in 10 days' time, when they'll be doing "kayaking, rock-climbing and team-building etc etc" up the Swan River.

What madness -  the little scamps !!!!

us today on our weekly Sunday "catch-up" video call with our daughter Sarah (49)

and her 13-year-old twins Lily and Jessica: dad Francis is out doing something dad-like (!)

Busy busy busy!!!!!

21:00 And before finally collapsing gratefully into bed tonight, we somehow even find the time to see the first half of a 2-hour documentary on the free-to-view Sky Arts channel, all about French film star Brigitte Bardot, who died at the end of last year at the grand old age of 91, so a really good 'innings', to put it mildly (!).

The programme opens, tellingly, in the middle of this interview with straight-laced BBC presenter Geoffrey Johnson-Smith, back in 1956:

Johnson-Smith, however, isn't willing to take this answer at face-value, and he presses her further, beginnig to dig deeper into Miss Bardot and her attitudes, which turns out to be revealing!

Is this satisfying to Bardot personally, however? And at this point, Johnson-Smith presses her even further, which is even more revealing!

Kudos, "BB" !!! That must have given old Geoffrey Johnson-Smith something to "put in his pipe and smoke it", and "in spades" !!!!

And there are plenty of other surprises in store for Lois and me during the first part of the documentary that we have time to view before dashing "bedwards" (!) at 10 pm: firstly how unlike the later "blonde bombshell" Bardot was in her childhood, with her glasses and dark-to- mousy-looking hair and an awkward, ungainly way of stumbling about, as filmed by her movie-camera crazy dad Louis, very much the "ugly duckling", compared to her cleverer, and prettier sister.

BB - "My childhood was quite unlike my life now"

We also learn how Brigitte's troubled relationship with mum Anne-Marie fuelled the feisty attitude she showed throughout her movie career, refusing to wear high heels, for instance, preferring the casual  look with flat shoes and comfortable clothes, resenting the fact that women in the movie industry were required to make sacrifices not asked of male stars. She was so popular with audiences that she boasted that she never had to sleep with anybody just to get a good part. And we see also her preference for "trading in" her personal  current "squeezes" for newer models, every few years etc etc! 

But more later on this, when we've had the chance to see the second half, so watch this space!

[I can't wait! - Ed]

Will this do?

[Oh just go "bedwards"! - Ed]

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