DANCE YOUR WAY TO FUN AND KEEP OFF THE MULLED WINE

Gerald bought himself a new pair of dancing shoes yesterday.   Believe it or not, at the fanciful age of 87 years.    We were with a crowd of young and older members of the family at a hotel in Inverness for dinner, and to bring in the New Year.   There were thirteen of us and he was frustrated when the dancing started and he couldn’t dance properly.   His shoes were too heavy.   So while we were at the Sales yesterday he saw this pair of shiny, lightweight, black shoes, size 10, tried them on and bought them.   We have two weddings of grandchildren coming off in 2014, and he wants to cut a dash I suppose.   Can’t wait for these two dates, ‘Deo Volente’ as my old uncle used to say, or my old aunt, ‘If God spares me!’   Funny sayings some people have.   A colleague in teaching I used to know would sometimes say, “I was born a lady, but I wasn’t needed!”

Did you know that an awful lot of your health depends on your gut?”   I quote from an article in the New Statesman appearing over Christmas, by Michael Brooks, called “The benefits of eating bacteria.”   In it he says, “….your large intestine is host to roughly a hundred trillion bacteria, weighing kilos, and they can have a surprising effect on your health, and maybe even your behaviour.”   This is a massive area of research at the California Institute of Technology.  It seems that “mice demonstrating abnormal social interactions, obsessive behaviour and intestinal problems – all traits associated with autism in human beings – CAN BE CURED if they ingest the right type of bacteria”.   So there you go!   Now you know!   Watch your guts!   It is even suggested that mulled wine could be so toxic, for instance, that it kills bacteria that would otherwise keep you SLIM over the holidays.   Thank goodness I don’t care for mulled wine.   Still, what does a pink gin or more than one do to your constitution?   Pour me a whisky Gerald, while I think about it.

Anyway, this Sunday morning, Andrew Marr on his 9 a.m. Sunday Show announced, among other things that he was going to have a DRY January.   Well. Bully for him!   Marr, the Brilliant.   But it’s OK for him, he’s got a lot of other things going for him.   For a start he’s under 60 years old, he’s thin, and has probably got plenty of the old Kelly Boe, or Shekels, or stacks of dough, no doubt at all.

He spoke to David Cameron, or as I call our prime minister, Slick Dick.   There is no question on earth that you can ask the man that he does not come with a wonderful answer that somehow compliments his political party, his astute self, number one, the shining saint.   Any troubles the Conservative Party have got have been caused by the previous government.   He turns his defeats into triumphs, like wanting to go to war with Syria because of the use of chemical weapons.   When he was voted down in parliament, he made out somehow that it was his good-thinking that stopped the further use of chemical weapons and the threat of military action, of which we were all scared to hell.   And as for the administration preceding his coalition government, they’re responsible for everything that is wrong with Britain, and with France, Germany and all the struggling countries like Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece and even the USA.   There was no Global Financial Crisis affecting their Economies.   No, Stupid!    According Conservative spokespersons, it was the Labour Government of Great Britain that caused the world recession, don’t you know?

Today’s Sunday Observer’s leading article suggests that arguing about the economy between Labour and Tories is not what should be solely occupying the politicians.   What is really important is, first the care of the NHS which has been subjected to botched policies and fudges, totally against the tide of expert medical opinion.   Secondly, the newspaper states that a further overwhelming problem for leaders is going to be the care of the elderly in today’s world of long-living Homo sapiens.   The third grand puzzle for our intellectuals, the movers and shakers, is quoted as follows:  “What is the purpose of our universities and how they are to be funded.    Do we have to have our young people loaded with large debt for a lifetime?”

An American ragtime pianist, on reaching the age of 100, when interviewed, is quoted as saying “If I had known I was going to live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself”.   So say all of us.  

I love the resurrection of an old tune, you’ll find it on YouTube. 

     “Are you havin’ any fun?

      What’y gettin’ out of life?

      What good is what you’ve got

       If you’re not    Getting’ any fun!

      Are you getting any laughs?

      Are you getting’ any lovin’?

      If other people do,

      So can you, have a little fun.

Happy New Year Everybody!   Have Fun!

  

ALL OVER THE PLACE – a guest blog for Christmas and the New Year

Margaret Dunlop, proud owner of this blog site, is too busy preparing for Christmas.  That means endless cooking and baking, decorating the house and tidying up after her husband.  So she has asked her husband, that’s me, to write a blog for Christmas – and that is likely to be all over the place.   Don’t expect literary prowess as I am only used to writing scientific papers and a couple of textbooks (animal breeding, genetics and my favourite “the Yak”) and that style of pedantic writing is miles away from the novel – never mind chicklit.  Sadly, I also lack the ability for the subtle humour of my significant other – but read on.

Here are some of our thoughts for the year that is nearly past.  Let’s leave out most of the personal stuff which includes our gratitude to our National Health Service (a hint here!), frustration at airports, incredulity that nearly everybody, but especially the young, have their mobile phones glued to their ears most of the time, or on their laps - texting.  That of course leads effortlessly to other areas of surprise such as the appropriation of lovely words in the English language to mean something entirely new – or at least skewed.  The latest of these is the craze for “selfies” referred to by Margaret in her last blog.  The word actually means a photo taken of oneself  by oneself (I took one of myself in a mirror to remind me how horrible I looked with a moustache before shaving it off – and that was in the 1950’s!).  Now they tell us that it has to be a photo of oneself taken with a mobile phone with arm outstretched.  No doubt mobile phone manufacturers are rubbing their hands with glee.

On a more serious note, we (that’s both Margaret and this scribe) are sad that the world seems not to be a better place and the end of 2013.  There are still wars, ethnic and religious strife, sectarian hatred, hunger and disease for many, climate change deniers, several natural disasters from hurricanes, floods, earth quakes and catastrophic droughts, gross inequality of living standards both within and between nations – and all in a world that should be crying out for peace, tolerance, good will, caring and fairness.

With a disclaimer from Margaret who thinks it’s not a topic for Christmas, I want to add that politicians, the supposed leaders in our societies, are not helping much as they seem to be concerned with the short term only, with putting their opponents to disadvantage (irrespective often of the merits of the case) and with staying in power.  Our own government (that’s the one in London, not the Scottish one in Edinburgh) is now pretending to think long-term by making promises for 2020 and 2025 – how credulous do they think we are?   And the Scottish National Party government in Edinburgh hopes to persuade us that manna will come again from heaven if only we were a nation independent of the rest of the UK (how credulous ... ?).

None of this sounds very cheery or as seasonable as it ought to be at this time of year when many of us celebrate Christmas with its deep underlying meaning and when most in the world look forward with hope to a New Year – even if it does not start on “our” January 1^st for all.

So here are some things to be cheerful about:  there is the potential from science and technology to transform lives everywhere for the better if the will and understanding can be mobilized.  And we can feed the world if we are willing to accept changes to food production and reduce waste.  In politics, someone like the late Nelson Mandela showed that it does not have to be conducted in the way it usually is.  Culture and scholarship flourish, millions of young people are still enthused with idealism and not yet infected by the cynicism of many of their elders.  As Margaret Dunlop (owner of this blog) is also an author we can marvel at the explosive expansion of self expression through indie publication.  Large publishing houses no longer willing to support unknown authors, without an assured market and profit, have been effectively bypassed by the e-book trade.  The only downside perhaps is that it becomes ever harder to sift the grain from the chaff – so to speak.

And on a cheery note, we marvel at a Hollyhock in our garden – in Inverness, a part of the country where the climate is not good for this “English” garden plant.  Well, two days from Christmas and after cold, frost and even some snow, it is still flowering five months after it started to do so.  That surely is a sign of the marvel of nature and an omen that good and beautiful things are here to stay.   And with that, we (Margaret and her temporary scribe) wish all of you who have been able to read this screed to the end a very happy festive season and a Good New Year.

HIGH JINKS IN LONDON AND HOME TO THE SAME OLD POLITICS - and Christmas just round the corner

Well, I got back safely from London after having a wonderful time with Laura and Margaret.   On the Friday night we showed up at Ronnie Scott’s club, Jessica, grandaughter, and now working as an intern in the crazy capital joined us as we took our places at our booked table.   Three hours of great jazz, great singing, terrific atmosphere, all small, lighted tables.  We ate our meal and drank our drinks in a haze of unusualness.     At least for me, the older generation, it was a really exciting occasion.   So we three generations of Scots, out on the tiles – didn’t we live it up and have a ball!   Even paying the enormous prices for taxis (London is a big city!) seemed daring and amazing £l6 here and £20 there.   We didn’t venture on the Tube – in Glasgow when I lived there, they called it “The Subway”.   Alternatively you can call it “The Underground”.    I had decided we should celebrate in style and for three days we would be toffs and use London Cabs.

You just get in and give them the postcode of your destination and off they jolly-well-go!   Great fun!    We had dinner in an Italian restaurant with some Scots friends and relatives working in London, and from there we dashed off to see “The Bodyguard”.    This was an A1, ace, dramatic musical story of the singer Whitney Houston.   What a fantastic performer she was.   Her life story was so moving.   We cheered with the rest, and at the end the cast got a 20 minute standing ovation.   Then ….. to my astonishment, the audience burst into wild dancing and singing etc., etc.  This included my party.   I became a sort of embarrassed bystander at this point.   Don’t people have fun nowadays?   When I was young shows and films usually ended with The National Anthem and we all filed out gravely, showing what good people we were.

Otherwise, I picked up a hideous cold – an acquaintance, a lady vet, explained I didn’t pick up the virus in the Big Smoke, but on the aeroplane to Gatwick from Inverness.   However I got it, it was hellish – wheezing and coughing, probably my punishment for enjoying myself so much at my age.   I was dressed up in my new long black boots, and felt great when I was there, but I never got invited to any party!!  Well, you can’t win them all.   We went to the Tate Britain Gallery, and we got a free round of drinks at the Hotel St. Pancras because their service was slow that Saturday night.

Christmas presents all purchased for better or worse.   Terrible scenes of refugees in Syria and Lebabon.   Winter storm and dreadful privation.   I admit I have to turn to another television channel as I can’t watch these poor children in their suffering, and their poor parents.   What a ghastly world it can be for people.   We Brits are so lucky in 2013 about most things.   And old Nelson Mandela is gone.   What a shining light he was.  Glasgow should be proud of how they stuck up for him while he was imprisoned.   He was made a Freeman of the City of Glasgow when he was still in jail, and they changed the name of a street to name it after him.  Warm-hearted people as always.   They’ve had it hard themselves in the past in Glasgow, and know how to stand up for the underdog.

The Prime Minister, David Cameron and the Leader of the Opposition, Ed Milliband continue to shout at each other in parliament.   David makes one statement and Ed completely contradicts him.   Then Milliband  makes a statement about the failures of the government, and Cameron accuses the Labour Party of failures in their term in government, and so on, and so on.   Even Gerald and I, dedicated politics followers get cheesed off, and despair of things coming right for the tired, penny-pinching  population, that is 90% of our country today.   Compared to some areas of the planet we are privileged.   Caring people raise money for the charities that try to aid these poor people.   It is all we can do, it seems.   The instant communication of television is a double-edged example of progress.    We can be entertained and horrified within a few hours.

May the Christmas Season bring you and yours Joy and Peace.

SELFIES, ESCAPE FROM THE RAT-RACE AND MIDDLE-AGED DRUGGIES.

Bet you don’t know what a “Selfie” is!   I didn’t know a few days ago.   It is a new word to be put in the new Oxford Dictionary.   It means, apparently – “a photo of yourself which you have taken with your mobile ‘phone and put up on Facebook or the Internet”.   It seems it is an Australian invention.   It sounds like Aussie-speak.   They call relatives “rellies” and Marmite (the great Australian salty sandwich spread) “Marmie”.    Most Australians love it, and the few who don’t love it, hate it.

My age- group, between sixty and ninety years old have had to take on a lot of new words and concepts – such as the World Wide Web, Mobile phones, texting, chatting on Facebook and Twitter and so on forever.   My granddaughter, Alicia and her partner, Sandy have just bought themselves a 3D Television set.   And so it goes on.   My significant other, Gerald, even enjoys looking at tweets for a spell, most days.   He thinks about these strangers from all over the planet while I do the ironing or cook up a storm in the kitchen.

Just finished reading a book called, “No!  I Don’t Want To Join a Book Club” by Virginia Ironside.   Quite brilliant!   The narrator explains that she has just turned sixty, and is very happy to be able to sit back and think of all the things she doesn’t have to do or worry about now that she  has reached the start of her seventh decade.   Especially she doesn’t want to know about complicated things like relationships with the opposite sex.   Yes, and SEX itself.   She is glad to be rid of such activities for herself.   It’s a hoot!    She writes very amusingly and sympathetically.   I really enjoyed her matter-of-fact style, so easy to read.   Talking about style, my daughter, Mimi Martin (Margaret) has written and published a sort of children’s book called, “Jeremiah Buttons and the Hamlet of the Lost.”   She has written and illustrated it.   Her writing style is so quirky and original.   She is definitely a ‘one-off’, inventive, crazy writer.   Gerald started reading it in bed the other night and he has never laughed so much for a long time.   It is purely mad!

What about the new name on the block in GB. – Paul Flowers?   Craziness is everywhere.   First of all he is a Church minister, a respected pastor.   Also was a Local Government official.   He puts his computer in for repair, and it is reported that he has a store of pornography on it, so he has to give up his political position.   Then he is made Chairman of the Co-operative Bank.  He has little idea about banking and the bank is now in a serious position, having lost much of its money.   He was in the past week or so, filmed buying cocaine and crystal meths, whatever that is, but it sounds  as if it is very bad.     Are the oldies starting to go off their rockers?   Also he is pictured negotiating a session with a male prostitute (rent-boy) in London.   He is caught by the prying newspapers that set the story going.   You couldn’t make it up!

This overweight, middle-aged sinner, Paul Flowers, is matched by the Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford.   He has been caught on video smoking crack cocaine.   He has admitted to heavy drinking, and drink-driving.   Also he has made obscene remarks on public   television about his sexual habits.   And the council are having great difficulty getting him to step down from his post .   Who needs fiction when these goings-on are available on your news media every day?

Anyway, I’m a lucky oldie!   It being my birthday this week, my formidable daughters, Laura and Margaret, are taking me for the weekend to the Big Smoke.   Flying from Inverness to Gatwick (London), and then staying at the Marriott  Hotel at St.Pancras station, going to Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, and on Saturday night  to a show.   Also being taken to the Tate Gallery to see a show called “Painting Now: Five Contemporary Artists.”   And I hope to see the magnificent new staircase at the entrance built by the architects Caruso and his partner, Peter St. John.    Can’t be bad, say I!   So long as the wild girls don’t walk too fast for me.   So wish me luck as you wave me goodbye.

 I made some lovely tomato and cheese pizzas, home-made hamburgers and steak mince for Gerald for while I am away.   Hope he doesn’t go out on the town and forget the way home.      Have bought a new pair of black boots and a short black skirt with a purple horizontal stripe!   Bring on the Gin & Tonics, and what was that joke about the man who escaped the rat-race and went to live in Alaska?   He met a friendly fellow called ‘Lars’!   He got invited to a party!

SELFIES, ESCAPE FROM THE RAT-RACE AND MIDDLE-AGED DRUGGIES.

Bet you don’t know what a “Selfie” is!   I didn’t know a few days ago.   It is a new word to be put in the new Oxford Dictionary.   It means, apparently – “a photo of yourself which you have taken with your mobile ‘phone and put up on Facebook or the Internet”.   It seems it is an Australian invention.   It sounds like Aussie-speak.   They call relatives “rellies” and Marmite (the great Australian salty sandwich spread) “Marmie”.    Most Australians love it, and the few who don’t love it, hate it.

My age- group, between sixty and ninety years old have had to take on a lot of new words and concepts – such as the World Wide Web, Mobile phones, texting, chatting on Facebook and Twitter and so on forever.   My granddaughter, Alicia and her partner, Sandy have just bought themselves a 3D Television set.   And so it goes on.   My significant other, Gerald, even enjoys looking at tweets for a spell, most days.   He thinks about these strangers from all over the planet while I do the ironing or cook up a storm in the kitchen.

Just finished reading a book called, “No!  I Don’t Want To Join a Book Club” by Virginia Ironside.   Quite brilliant!   The narrator explains that she has just turned sixty, and is very happy to be able to sit back and think of all the things she doesn’t have to do or worry about now that she  has reached the start of her seventh decade.   Especially she doesn’t want to know about complicated things like relationships with the opposite sex.   Yes, and SEX itself.   She is glad to be rid of such activities for herself.   It’s a hoot!    She writes very amusingly and sympathetically.   I really enjoyed her matter-of-fact style, so easy to read.   Talking about style, my daughter, Mimi Martin (Margaret) has written and published a sort of children’s book called, “Jeremiah Buttons and the Hamlet of the Lost.”   She has written and illustrated it.   Her writing style is so quirky and original.   She is definitely a ‘one-off’, inventive, crazy writer.   Gerald started reading it in bed the other night and he has never laughed so much for a long time.   It is purely mad!

What about the new name on the block in GB. – Paul Flowers?   Craziness is everywhere.   First of all he is a Church minister, a respected pastor.   Also was a Local Government official.   He puts his computer in for repair, and it is reported that he has a store of pornography on it, so he has to give up his political position.   Then he is made Chairman of the Co-operative Bank.  He has little idea about banking and the bank is now in a serious position, having lost much of its money.   He was in the past week or so, filmed buying cocaine and crystal meths, whatever that is, but it sounds  as if it is very bad.     Are the oldies starting to go off their rockers?   Also he is pictured negotiating a session with a male prostitute (rent-boy) in London.   He is caught by the prying newspapers that set the story going.   You couldn’t make it up!

This overweight, middle-aged sinner, Paul Flowers, is matched by the Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford.   He has been caught on video smoking crack cocaine.   He has admitted to heavy drinking, and drink-driving.   Also he has made obscene remarks on public   television about his sexual habits.   And the council are having great difficulty getting him to step down from his post .   Who needs fiction when these goings-on are available on your news media every day?

Anyway, I’m a lucky oldie!   It being my birthday this week, my formidable daughters, Laura and Margaret, are taking me for the weekend to the Big Smoke.   Flying from Inverness to Gatwick (London), and then staying at the Marriott  Hotel at St.Pancras station, going to Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, and on Saturday night  to a show.   Also being taken to the Tate Gallery to see a show called “Painting Now: Five Contemporary Artists.”   And I hope to see the magnificent new staircase at the entrance built by the architects Caruso and his partner, Peter St. John.    Can’t be bad, say I!   So long as the wild girls don’t walk too fast for me.   So wish me luck as you wave me goodbye.

 I made some lovely tomato and cheese pizzas, home-made hamburgers and steak mince for Gerald for while I am away.   Hope he doesn’t go out on the town and forget the way home.      Have bought a new pair of black boots and a short black skirt with a purple horizontal stripe!   Bring on the Gin & Tonics, and what was that joke about the man who escaped the rat-race and went to live in Alaska?   He met a friendly fellow called ‘Lars’!   He got invited to a party!