Category: Humour

Top March event Sport Relief 2016 discovered Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em still

Simple Life Reunion 2057
Gruhn creative commons

Sports Relief 2016 gave a platform for Michael Crawford to reprise his Frank Spencer character last played on TV 42 years ago.With an hilarious ten minute sketch Frank has several hair raising adventures on bicycle or roller skates in his typical physical comedy style.Although the sketch was widely acclaimed much comment has been made about the fact that Michael Crawford is 74 years old and, of course,considered to be a pensioner.What’s he doing all this for at his age? Many might say :Is he up to it?Wasn’t it all a long time ago when the series he starred in finished?

Apparently, this sketch was to be a ‘one-off’ in aid of charity.It took many weeks to bring to the screen.Michael might be a little stung by the age remarks.It seems he is not concerned.As in his earlier career, he did all his own stunts.Which brings us nicely to a wonderful web page featuring other senior people acting in most unexpected ways. Is it not time that the ‘old person’ stereotype was buried once and for all? Times they are a changing in our senior classes.Many people are not settling for retirement from life.They are embracing later life with both hands,working enthusiastically at remaining fitter for longer, and enjoying active and fulfilling lives.

So do spend a few moments here being entertained and amazed by a veritable ‘troupe’ of impressive people who are destroying age stereotypes.

Oh…and you can still donate to Sport Relief 2016 to support its work on projects for people in essential need in many places around the world.

 

 

 

Study shows men get happier as they grow older


So Victor Meldrew, beloved leading fictional character in a once long running  BBC TV sitcom series,’One Foot In The Grave’, should be looked on as much misunderstood.

According to a correspondent for the Kansas City Star newspaper : ‘the perception of the elderly as a bunch of wrinkled curmudgeons who mope around the house looking deflated and defeated is wrong. And that misperception has prevented many elderly from being diagnosed and treated for depression.

‘Apparently, men do not get meaner, irritable and more sarcastic as they get older. In fact, among the men participating in the Study of Adult Development — the longest longitudinal study of adult life ever conducted — men seem to get happier as they get older.The study has followed two groups of men for 68 years: 268 men who graduated from Harvard University and 456 men who grew up in the urban neighborhoods of Boston.

‘Depression in men, characterized by irritability and anger (and sarcasm is a form of anger) did not increase with age, according to the study ‘,carried out at the Department of Psychiatry at Brigham and Women’s Hospital of Harvard’s medical school.

Read more:  at kansascity.com -men get happier as they grow older

Graceful Women of Sixty

The following extract from the Pall Mall Gazette of circa.1890 gives us an interesting insight into the contemporary perception of the lady 60-lifer of those days:

“Old ladies in the ordinary sense of the word are getting remarkably scarce.I never came across old ladies’ bonnets,dresses,cloaks,or finery in any shape or form for old ladies at the shops. People tell me they don’t make such things. The fact is that women of 50 and 60 have ceased to make frights of themselves. They don’t wear their clothes (boots,bonnets, and gloves included) four time too big for them, like old ladies of past years used to. Less capacious garments are found to be just as comfortable.

“Women of sixty can and do dress gracefully nowadays. Those who have lost their own hair wear artificial ,and look all the better for doing so. With nice hair, whether real or otherwise,a woman of sixty can always put on a respectable looking bonnet. Ugly old ladies will have vanished altogether by the time the Princess of Wales is 60.”

Well, ladies, all I can say is thank goodness we are living in more enlightened times!

Why you should not thow your apple peel away

From Mike Paterson at The60LifeWeekly

14th December 2010

• Why you should not throw your apple peel away
• Hints to Wives on the Way to Charm Their Husbands
Hi,

The other day, I was thumbing through a magazine dated January 1891 (as you do) when I came upon some interesting headlines, including:” Hints to Wives on the Way to Charm their Husbands”, of this more later; and “The Deadly Cold Bed”- a dire warning never to sleep in cold or damp beds, given by Good Housekeeping magazine, which I see also recommended at the time the use of soda under “Soda Will Save You Soap”. It is encouraging that the latter advice is still consistently promoted, for cleaning sinks and washing dishes, on the Good Housekeeping website today, more than a hundred years later.

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Hints to Wives on the Way to Charm Their Husbands****************************************************************
As an example of written material that can be sourced quite easily by the frequent writer of articles or short stories, the above may seem rather outdated by some stretch for today’s society, and perhaps hardly rates as a potential best seller ‘How to’ publication. There is however an immense amount of potentially useful content available in the public domain.

The magazine content from which I took this headline is not protected by copyright, and thus can be used freely. This maybe is a route for you to explore. Apart from being a fascinating study, the information is often available at a modest price, or for free – the subject matter can be as ‘fresh’ and as useful for today’s consumption as it was when written. Just because something was written, say, over a hundred years ago does not necessarily mean it does not have value, or is lacking in good advice or ideas.

If you are curious about knowing the” Hints To Wives…” you can go to my the60life.com where they will be posted very soon.
Or, perhaps you would like a recipe for Tipsy Pudding, or to find out about “The Modern Old Lady”! If you wish to find out more about the fascinating world of the public domain and how it could help you with research for your writing or to provide great ideas to profit from with your own information products let me introduce you to a leading expert in the use of Public Domain information, and someone whose products and resources I regularly refer to in my researches. He is Tony Laidig, the Public Domain Expert, and you can see an introduction to his Public Domain Toolbar , a remarkable research tool, at Public Domain Toolbar

Tony starts his introduction with an amazing statement about the Public Domain, in this way: “Most people do not realize it, but when the copyright or patent expires on a creative work (book, work of art, etc.), anyone may freely use that work LEGALLY in any manner they choose without the obligation of paying royalties to the creator of the work. This is HUGE…it’s like legalized stealing except that it IS legal.

“PICTURE THIS…Here is what is waiting for you RIGHT NOW in the Public Domain:

• Over 85 million books, many written by the greatest authors and thinkers to have ever walked the earth…

“…This is MASSIVE for anyone doing business online for one simple reason…

“It’s easier to create a product from something that already exists, rather than create it from scratch. You can read about this massive opportunity at Public Domain Toolbar

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Why you should not throw your apple peel away***********************************************************
If you are a regular follower of the 60life weekly, you will know that I occasionally’ throw-in’ a recent report on a health-related topic. Today’s Daily Mail has a short article about a report published in the journal Nutrition and Cancer that eating the peel of an apple can cut the risk of prostate and breast cancers. As one who has usually peeled his apple, and thrown away the peelings, I shall probably be eating the lot in future (well, maybe not the core!). If you want to read the article you can check it out at dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1284820/Apple-peel–secret-weapon-cancer

Do stay tuned-in! Above all stay warm!
Remember you can pick-up more tips and news at http://the60life.com

Yours,

Mike Paterson,
The 60Life Weekly
[email protected]
If you have missed earlier issues of The60Life Weekly – these can be found by scrolling down the categories in the right hand column at this page

Hints to Wives on the Way to Charm Their Husbands

How things do change even in a hundred years! This extract was found in a magazine of 1891:

How many a family quarrel a button missing from my lord’s shirt has caused; how many a man has found a dainty, well cooked dinner,with which his wife has really taken pains, all distateful,because she did not remember that he did not like onions in the soup, or oil in the salad!Unreasonable?Yes,and a little thing to put him out ,but who, dear madam ,finds the grain of sand in the eye less irritating because of its minutenes, and have not you yourself have all your pleasure in your new bonnet destroyed because the ostrich plumes and the ribbon wre a little different in colour? It was so little that no one but yourself probably ever noticed it, but nevertheless you hated that bonnet and felt cross when you wore it.

Men are luxurious creatures, and the wife nearest her husband’s heart is she who studies his comfort.Men may be charmed,tantalized by, infatuated with the beautiful,the witty, the cocquettish for a time, but it is the woman who keeps his hose darned ,who lays his paper on his plate ,remembers the eaxact number of lumps of sugar ,and the quantity of cream in his coffee, who avoids the subject of Jone’s success in the very undertaking he himself failed in,because she knows it is not pleasant – this is the woman who takes permanent possession of his heart, rules it through never letting him suspect she is aught but his humble handmaid, and when she dies is mourned and missed sincerely
-from a correspondent at the St Louis Globe-Democrat 1891
Of such little things a marriage was made!

Where Does Santa Claus Live?

The following is a seasonal piece written sometime around 1890. Hope you enjoy it.

“I fink Santa Claus lives way up in the noon”
(That was Anna’s opinion- aged four).
“So far,I’m af’aid he can’t come pretty soon-
Don’t you wis’ he was staying next door?”

“Pshaw! He lives just back of the toy shop in town”
(So said Willie, and he had turned nine);
“I see him most every time I go down-
How the things in his windows do shine!”

But Ethel, tall Ethel, had grown overwise
(“Fourteen years” has no need of a nurse);
She said, with a twinkle of fun in her eyes,
“Santa lives in our dear papa’s purse!”

Wide Awake, 1891

Are all older men stupefyingly boring?

Of course I don’t think so. But one of the most eye-catching headlines I have seen in a while that made me chuckle appeared in the Daily Mail recently.It was:
“Why are all older men stupefyingly BORING?”
During an amusing piece Liz Hodgkinson wrote: “…Alas it is the same story at every social gathering of ‘oldies’ I attend -wedding anniversaries, birthday parties,or,yes,funerals.The women will be chatty, lively and animated while the men are in a corner,shaking a few sad,last,grey hairs and staring into the distance ,looking at their watches forlornly in the hope it’s timeto go home…”

But, hey, fellas, whaddya say…? If you want to check out this amusing (if, perhaps, slightly partial) article you can at Why-older-men-stupefyingly-BORING

Lads, you can visit: The Grumpy Club for grumpy old men

Pensioners a breed apart?

Today, I thought we should have a smile. Some of life’s irritations, I find  are best dismissed with a chuckle. So here is one of those public signs or notices that can make you laugh.

This was recently taken from an advertising feature in my local free newspaper about a new business coming into the town:

“We welcome, everyone here – women,men,children and pensioners”

Uhuh? You sort of know what they mean. ’til next time soon.