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- Aug 7, 2001
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- 54,631
Three days to run 135 miles in 50C Death Valley heat. And he's 75
By Rob Hastings
Wednesday, 7 July 2010
Few places are more deserving of their name than Death Valley at the height of summer. The Californian desert is blasted by the sun and temperatures that regularly climb to 50C in the shade.
Incredibly, it is into this furnace of sand and peril that a 75-year-old grandfather from Rochester will run next week as he lines up for one of the toughest tests of endurance on the planet.
Jack Denness will take just three days to run 135, stamina-sapping miles in the Badwater Ultramarathon, billed by its American organisers as the "world's toughest foot race". And Denness knows what he's letting himself in for, having completed the punishing route almost a dozen times.
"You have to be mad to do it," says the school caretaker from his home, where he lives with his wife, Mags. "It's one of the conditions of the race. You just can't explain to people what the heat is like. Imagine opening your oven door and facing that all day long. The road temperature gets up to 140 degrees [fahrenheit] sometimes."
Denness, who is running to raise money for Cerebal Palsy Care, already holds the record as the oldest man to complete the course, securing it as a sprightly 70-year-old back in 2005.
Having completed "ultras" in Mauritania, India, Niger and Morocco, he's qualified to call the Badwater event the "hardest one on the planet".
Each of the 90 competitors from all over the world mad enough to make the journey to Death Valley must arrive with a support team, which trails runners with energy drinks and cold water sprays.
Runners must complete the course within 60 hours to be in with a chance of bagging a medal, but the clock doesn't stop for nightfall. Denness will usually sleep for no more than five hours during the entire race, keeping his energy levels up with dried fruit, nuts, energy bars and sports drinks.
Before long, the mind starts to play tricks and hallucinations are common. Denness says he looks forward to them, as they "break the race up a bit".
He adds: "One time, I was totally knackered from heat exhaustion and I could hear this fellow behind me. I looked round and it was the Devil.
"He was all red, he had the horns and the tail and the trident. I looked at him, he looked at me, and we laughed at one another. Then he'd jump behind a rock or a tree. It kept going for about half an hour. It was great!" 8)
etc...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/peopl ... 20112.html
"You have to be mad to do it" - can't argue with that!
By Rob Hastings
Wednesday, 7 July 2010
Few places are more deserving of their name than Death Valley at the height of summer. The Californian desert is blasted by the sun and temperatures that regularly climb to 50C in the shade.
Incredibly, it is into this furnace of sand and peril that a 75-year-old grandfather from Rochester will run next week as he lines up for one of the toughest tests of endurance on the planet.
Jack Denness will take just three days to run 135, stamina-sapping miles in the Badwater Ultramarathon, billed by its American organisers as the "world's toughest foot race". And Denness knows what he's letting himself in for, having completed the punishing route almost a dozen times.
"You have to be mad to do it," says the school caretaker from his home, where he lives with his wife, Mags. "It's one of the conditions of the race. You just can't explain to people what the heat is like. Imagine opening your oven door and facing that all day long. The road temperature gets up to 140 degrees [fahrenheit] sometimes."
Denness, who is running to raise money for Cerebal Palsy Care, already holds the record as the oldest man to complete the course, securing it as a sprightly 70-year-old back in 2005.
Having completed "ultras" in Mauritania, India, Niger and Morocco, he's qualified to call the Badwater event the "hardest one on the planet".
Each of the 90 competitors from all over the world mad enough to make the journey to Death Valley must arrive with a support team, which trails runners with energy drinks and cold water sprays.
Runners must complete the course within 60 hours to be in with a chance of bagging a medal, but the clock doesn't stop for nightfall. Denness will usually sleep for no more than five hours during the entire race, keeping his energy levels up with dried fruit, nuts, energy bars and sports drinks.
Before long, the mind starts to play tricks and hallucinations are common. Denness says he looks forward to them, as they "break the race up a bit".
He adds: "One time, I was totally knackered from heat exhaustion and I could hear this fellow behind me. I looked round and it was the Devil.
"He was all red, he had the horns and the tail and the trident. I looked at him, he looked at me, and we laughed at one another. Then he'd jump behind a rock or a tree. It kept going for about half an hour. It was great!" 8)
etc...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/peopl ... 20112.html
"You have to be mad to do it" - can't argue with that!
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Growing old? Need a new hobby...?
Thin grey line: Pensioners armed with spy cameras take on gang of drug dealers... and win
By Claire Ellicott
Last updated at 10:22 AM on 7th July 2010
When gangs of drug dealers and yobs descended on the streets of a small community, most residents decided it was best to keep out of their way.
But a group of fearless pensioners refused to bow to intimidation and have started a fightback against the crime ruining their area.
Armed with £15,000 of the latest surveillance and night vision equipment, they covertly film criminals going about their business and then pass the images to police – in an echo of the popular TV crime series The Wire.
The group of 11, aged 67 to 92, claim to have helped catch more than 100 criminals on the Highfields estate in Leicester using CCTV and long-range cameras.
The team draw up hit-lists of drug dealers during clandestine tea meetings and name and shame criminals on social networking websites.
Spokesman Albert Berer said the pensioners, known as the St Peter’s Neighbourhood Monitoring Group, were determined not to let yobs and criminals take over their estate.
‘We are not your typical “twitching net curtain” neighbourhood watch – we mean business,’ he said.
‘All the group, apart from myself, is made up of retired elderly people who are scared out of their wits about what is happening.
‘We literally cannot go out at night because of hooded louts causing mayhem outside our front doors, along our walkways and on our streets.’
He said the group planned highly detailed missions to pinpoint and catch the criminals.
Four of the team do most of the filming. Mr Berer added: ‘We are skilled in social media and technology and we have specialists in surveillance and state-of-the-art equipment which even the police are amazed by.’
The group came together after becoming frustrated by the failure of police to tackle the yobs.
‘They have a tough job to do, but when these drug dealers are caught another one replaces them.
'It has been happening for years.’
The group has set up a website and YouTube channel which show alleged crooks drug dealing, wielding weapons and carrying out assaults.
Leicestershire Police confirmed they had liaised with the group but were careful not to promote ‘vigilante’ actions. A spokesman said those with concerns should contact police directly.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z0szOLxuxH
Thin grey line: Pensioners armed with spy cameras take on gang of drug dealers... and win
By Claire Ellicott
Last updated at 10:22 AM on 7th July 2010
When gangs of drug dealers and yobs descended on the streets of a small community, most residents decided it was best to keep out of their way.
But a group of fearless pensioners refused to bow to intimidation and have started a fightback against the crime ruining their area.
Armed with £15,000 of the latest surveillance and night vision equipment, they covertly film criminals going about their business and then pass the images to police – in an echo of the popular TV crime series The Wire.
The group of 11, aged 67 to 92, claim to have helped catch more than 100 criminals on the Highfields estate in Leicester using CCTV and long-range cameras.
The team draw up hit-lists of drug dealers during clandestine tea meetings and name and shame criminals on social networking websites.
Spokesman Albert Berer said the pensioners, known as the St Peter’s Neighbourhood Monitoring Group, were determined not to let yobs and criminals take over their estate.
‘We are not your typical “twitching net curtain” neighbourhood watch – we mean business,’ he said.
‘All the group, apart from myself, is made up of retired elderly people who are scared out of their wits about what is happening.
‘We literally cannot go out at night because of hooded louts causing mayhem outside our front doors, along our walkways and on our streets.’
He said the group planned highly detailed missions to pinpoint and catch the criminals.
Four of the team do most of the filming. Mr Berer added: ‘We are skilled in social media and technology and we have specialists in surveillance and state-of-the-art equipment which even the police are amazed by.’
The group came together after becoming frustrated by the failure of police to tackle the yobs.
‘They have a tough job to do, but when these drug dealers are caught another one replaces them.
'It has been happening for years.’
The group has set up a website and YouTube channel which show alleged crooks drug dealing, wielding weapons and carrying out assaults.
Leicestershire Police confirmed they had liaised with the group but were careful not to promote ‘vigilante’ actions. A spokesman said those with concerns should contact police directly.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z0szOLxuxH
OneWingedBird
Beloved of Ra
- Joined
- Aug 3, 2003
- Messages
- 15,431
I suppose they're probably up half of the night so i guess they see a whole bunch of stuff.
If you gave a camera to my next door neighbour he'd be convinced there was some sort of muslim plot going on with the annoying leaflet men
If you gave a camera to my next door neighbour he'd be convinced there was some sort of muslim plot going on with the annoying leaflet men
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Antisa 'the oldest person on Earth' turns 130 (and she doesn't look a day over 110)
By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 9:22 AM on 9th July 2010
Authorities in the former Soviet republic of Georgia claim a woman from a remote mountain village turned 130, making her the oldest person on Earth.
Antisa Khvichava from western Georgia was born on July 8, 1880, said Georgiy Meurnishvili, spokesman for the civil registry at the Justice Ministry.
The woman, who lives with her 40-year-old grandson in an idyllic vine-covered country house in the mountains, retired from her job as a tea and corn picker in 1965, when she was 85, records say.
'I've always been healthy, and I've worked all my life - at home and at the farm,' Antisa said, in a bright dress and headscarf - and red lipstick.
Sitting in the chair and holding her cane, Antisa spoke quietly through an interpreter - since she never went to school to learn Georgian and speaks only the local language, Mingrelian.
Her age couldn't immediately be independently verified. Her birth certificate was lost - one of the great number to have disappeared in the past century amid revolutions and a civil war which followed the collapse of the USSR.
Make a wish: Antisa blows out candles on a special birthday cake and, despite her advanced age, can still get about with the aid of a walking stick
But Meurnishvili showed two Soviet-era documents that he says attest to her age.
Scores of officials, neighbors, friends, and descendants backed up her claim as the world's top senior.
The Gerontology Research Group currently recognizes 114-year-old Eugenie Blanchard of Saint Barthelemy, France, as the world's oldest person. Antisa would make Eugenie look like a spring chicken - but the research group is yet to examine Antisa's claim.
She has a son, 10 grandchildren, 12 great grandchildren and six great, great grandchidren.
Her 70-year-old son Mikhail, who was also at the party, apparently was born when his mother was 60.
She said she also had two children from a previous marriage, but says they died of hunger during World War II.
Mikhail said that, although his mother had difficulty walking and had stayed largely in bed during the past seven years, she made a point of hobbling unaided to the outhouse on the other side of the yard, because she hates to be a nuisance.
Though her body has all but quit on her - her fingers cramped by age mean she can no longer maintain her love of knitting - relatives say her mind remains sharp.
'Grandma has a very clear mind and she hasn't lost an ability to think rationally,' said Khvichava's granddaughter Shorena, who lives in a nearby village.
To mark Antisa's birthday, a string ensemble played folk music out on the lawn, while grandchildren offered traditional Mingrelian dishes like corn porridge and spiced chicken with herbs to all guests as the party.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldne ... z0tB8VMyIH
By Mail Foreign Service
Last updated at 9:22 AM on 9th July 2010
Authorities in the former Soviet republic of Georgia claim a woman from a remote mountain village turned 130, making her the oldest person on Earth.
Antisa Khvichava from western Georgia was born on July 8, 1880, said Georgiy Meurnishvili, spokesman for the civil registry at the Justice Ministry.
The woman, who lives with her 40-year-old grandson in an idyllic vine-covered country house in the mountains, retired from her job as a tea and corn picker in 1965, when she was 85, records say.
'I've always been healthy, and I've worked all my life - at home and at the farm,' Antisa said, in a bright dress and headscarf - and red lipstick.
Sitting in the chair and holding her cane, Antisa spoke quietly through an interpreter - since she never went to school to learn Georgian and speaks only the local language, Mingrelian.
Her age couldn't immediately be independently verified. Her birth certificate was lost - one of the great number to have disappeared in the past century amid revolutions and a civil war which followed the collapse of the USSR.
Make a wish: Antisa blows out candles on a special birthday cake and, despite her advanced age, can still get about with the aid of a walking stick
But Meurnishvili showed two Soviet-era documents that he says attest to her age.
Scores of officials, neighbors, friends, and descendants backed up her claim as the world's top senior.
The Gerontology Research Group currently recognizes 114-year-old Eugenie Blanchard of Saint Barthelemy, France, as the world's oldest person. Antisa would make Eugenie look like a spring chicken - but the research group is yet to examine Antisa's claim.
She has a son, 10 grandchildren, 12 great grandchildren and six great, great grandchidren.
Her 70-year-old son Mikhail, who was also at the party, apparently was born when his mother was 60.
She said she also had two children from a previous marriage, but says they died of hunger during World War II.
Mikhail said that, although his mother had difficulty walking and had stayed largely in bed during the past seven years, she made a point of hobbling unaided to the outhouse on the other side of the yard, because she hates to be a nuisance.
Though her body has all but quit on her - her fingers cramped by age mean she can no longer maintain her love of knitting - relatives say her mind remains sharp.
'Grandma has a very clear mind and she hasn't lost an ability to think rationally,' said Khvichava's granddaughter Shorena, who lives in a nearby village.
To mark Antisa's birthday, a string ensemble played folk music out on the lawn, while grandchildren offered traditional Mingrelian dishes like corn porridge and spiced chicken with herbs to all guests as the party.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldne ... z0tB8VMyIH
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"I think of death a lot, indeed always have, although when young I had a belief that it was a long way off. Now, it isn’t, and I continually think of how I would prefer to pass from light to darkness."
A couple of sentences from an essay by Beryl Bainbridge (1934-2010). This essay was originally written for BBC Radio 3, and first broadcast in March 2009. Her funeral is today, at St Silas the Martyr, London NW5
Essay here:
Beryl Bainbridge on the art of facing death
Mortality was a constant theme and inspiration in the work of the author Beryl Bainbridge. In one of her final pieces of writing, she reflects on the journey from light to darkness
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 24233.html
A couple of sentences from an essay by Beryl Bainbridge (1934-2010). This essay was originally written for BBC Radio 3, and first broadcast in March 2009. Her funeral is today, at St Silas the Martyr, London NW5
Essay here:
Beryl Bainbridge on the art of facing death
Mortality was a constant theme and inspiration in the work of the author Beryl Bainbridge. In one of her final pieces of writing, she reflects on the journey from light to darkness
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-enter ... 24233.html
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
We oldies leave dignity to the middle-aged
A belly-flopping 75-year-old has produced the perfect riposte to our timid times, says Oliver Pritchett.
Published: 6:37AM BST 14 Jul 2010
What are we to make of the Tombstoning Major, who, at the age of 75, dived off Durdle Door in Dorset and hurtled 40ft down to the sea? Christopher Irven, retired Army major, father of seven and grandfather of 19, did a stupendous belly flop and, as a result, had to be airlifted to hospital.
I believe Mr Irven was suffering from what we amateur psychologists call "Father William Syndrome". In Lewis Carroll's poem, the solicitous and rather tactless young man observes: "You are old, Father William." He then goes on to ask the elderly gent why he insists on still performing such feats as standing on his head, doing backward somersaults and eating a whole goose, including the bones and the beak.
Because we have an ageing population, there are now many more people who are old enough to know better. The sky is full of grannies free-fall parachuting on their birthdays; bungee-jumping octogenarians twang up and down and, wherever you look, there are half a dozen pensioners stumbling over some marathon finishing line. They are galloping across prairies on horseback, plunging into the sea on Christmas Day and ski-jumping. Get the children off the trampoline: here comes grandpa. Last year, George Bush Sr celebrated his 85th birthday by going sky-diving, and nobody seemed a bit surprised.
I am a devout coward in my seventies. The bravest thing I do is carry a hot dish to the dining table without an oven glove – but all the same, I have great sympathy with the doddery daredevils and elderly thrill-seekers. I have no desire to hurl myself off rocks or to celebrate my birthday by being fired from a cannon, but I'm aware that – at a much less exciting level – I sometimes take on unwise physical challenges. I try to lift heavy objects while my wife shakes her head and tells me to get help, I run for hopeless buses and cross the road unwisely. On the London Underground, I offer to help young mothers carry their buggies and babies up the stairs, and recognise the moment when the terrible doubt appears in their eyes as we are halfway up. It spurs me on. I can't resist a heavy suitcase.
All this can be partly explained by exasperation at being told to "take care" half a dozen times a day and at being informed by prissy television newsreaders that I am "at risk" in hot weather. I'm not inclined to try one of Father William's backwards somersaults, but I am tempted by one of his other accomplishments, so I might one day, without warning, try to balance an eel on the end of my nose.
The Tombstoning Major's seaside exploits ended with a loss of dignity, and he had to be pulled from the water by his sons. But I find, as I get older, dignity does not matter so much. Dignity is for the middle-aged.
The Lulworth coastguard, quite naturally, condemned Mr Irven's actions. "His family tried to stop him, but he wouldn't listen and went ahead with it," said a spokesman. "You would have thought he would know better."
That probably had a lot to do with Mr Irven's motivation, because I believe that behind every reckless old man, there is a tutting family. And nothing would make a person more want to take a leap off some rocks than being told that he ought to know better.
It's the disapproval which keeps us going. As senior citizens, we don't mind a bit of disapproval; in fact, we may actually seek it. Father William, in Lewis Carroll's poem, didn't bother about the opinion of the impertinent young man – who was obviously one of nature's health and safety officers. He simply said: "Be off, or I'll kick you down-stairs."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/colu ... -aged.html
A belly-flopping 75-year-old has produced the perfect riposte to our timid times, says Oliver Pritchett.
Published: 6:37AM BST 14 Jul 2010
What are we to make of the Tombstoning Major, who, at the age of 75, dived off Durdle Door in Dorset and hurtled 40ft down to the sea? Christopher Irven, retired Army major, father of seven and grandfather of 19, did a stupendous belly flop and, as a result, had to be airlifted to hospital.
I believe Mr Irven was suffering from what we amateur psychologists call "Father William Syndrome". In Lewis Carroll's poem, the solicitous and rather tactless young man observes: "You are old, Father William." He then goes on to ask the elderly gent why he insists on still performing such feats as standing on his head, doing backward somersaults and eating a whole goose, including the bones and the beak.
Because we have an ageing population, there are now many more people who are old enough to know better. The sky is full of grannies free-fall parachuting on their birthdays; bungee-jumping octogenarians twang up and down and, wherever you look, there are half a dozen pensioners stumbling over some marathon finishing line. They are galloping across prairies on horseback, plunging into the sea on Christmas Day and ski-jumping. Get the children off the trampoline: here comes grandpa. Last year, George Bush Sr celebrated his 85th birthday by going sky-diving, and nobody seemed a bit surprised.
I am a devout coward in my seventies. The bravest thing I do is carry a hot dish to the dining table without an oven glove – but all the same, I have great sympathy with the doddery daredevils and elderly thrill-seekers. I have no desire to hurl myself off rocks or to celebrate my birthday by being fired from a cannon, but I'm aware that – at a much less exciting level – I sometimes take on unwise physical challenges. I try to lift heavy objects while my wife shakes her head and tells me to get help, I run for hopeless buses and cross the road unwisely. On the London Underground, I offer to help young mothers carry their buggies and babies up the stairs, and recognise the moment when the terrible doubt appears in their eyes as we are halfway up. It spurs me on. I can't resist a heavy suitcase.
All this can be partly explained by exasperation at being told to "take care" half a dozen times a day and at being informed by prissy television newsreaders that I am "at risk" in hot weather. I'm not inclined to try one of Father William's backwards somersaults, but I am tempted by one of his other accomplishments, so I might one day, without warning, try to balance an eel on the end of my nose.
The Tombstoning Major's seaside exploits ended with a loss of dignity, and he had to be pulled from the water by his sons. But I find, as I get older, dignity does not matter so much. Dignity is for the middle-aged.
The Lulworth coastguard, quite naturally, condemned Mr Irven's actions. "His family tried to stop him, but he wouldn't listen and went ahead with it," said a spokesman. "You would have thought he would know better."
That probably had a lot to do with Mr Irven's motivation, because I believe that behind every reckless old man, there is a tutting family. And nothing would make a person more want to take a leap off some rocks than being told that he ought to know better.
It's the disapproval which keeps us going. As senior citizens, we don't mind a bit of disapproval; in fact, we may actually seek it. Father William, in Lewis Carroll's poem, didn't bother about the opinion of the impertinent young man – who was obviously one of nature's health and safety officers. He simply said: "Be off, or I'll kick you down-stairs."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/colu ... -aged.html
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
"Who Do You Think You Are?" is one of my favourite TV series. Tonight's show focussed mostly on Bruce Forsyth's great-grandfather, who became rich and famous as a landscape gardener, in both the UK and America, but who married twice (bigamously), and eventually abandoned both wives. He finally died alone and almost broke.
He died without leaving a will - an acquaintance asked me only last night if I'd made a will; I haven't....
What drama! Although I've never been rich or famous, I can see some parallels with my own life, which is very thought-provoking. It's a reminder of what complex family histories we all have, whether we know it or not.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... e_Forsyth/
He died without leaving a will - an acquaintance asked me only last night if I'd made a will; I haven't....
What drama! Although I've never been rich or famous, I can see some parallels with my own life, which is very thought-provoking. It's a reminder of what complex family histories we all have, whether we know it or not.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... e_Forsyth/
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Two nuns go on run over threat to send them to retirement home
Two fugitive nuns in their 80s have gone on the run in France to escape being sent to a retirement home by their Mother Superior.
Published: 5:02PM BST 23 Jul 2010
Sister Marie-Daniel, 86, and Sister Saint-Denis, 82, fled their nunnery two weeks ago after convent officials said they were being sent to a remote mountain retreat 250 miles away.
The pair vanished from the Sisters of Saint-Joseph convent in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, on the French Riviera convent, on July 12 and have not been seen since.
A third 89-year-old nun, Sister Maurice-Marie, has revealed she also wanted to flee but broke her leg four days before the two elderly sisters disappeared.
A convent insider had told France-Soir newspaper that the nuns were furious at being "put out to grass" in a retirement home after 50 years at the nunnery.
They said: "They decided they wanted to jump before they were pushed.
"They would rather take their chances out in the world than have to live out their days in some far away rest home."
Sister Colette Philibert, the region's chief nun, said: "All we want is for our two dear sisters to make contact with us and return to the convent."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... -home.html
Two fugitive nuns in their 80s have gone on the run in France to escape being sent to a retirement home by their Mother Superior.
Published: 5:02PM BST 23 Jul 2010
Sister Marie-Daniel, 86, and Sister Saint-Denis, 82, fled their nunnery two weeks ago after convent officials said they were being sent to a remote mountain retreat 250 miles away.
The pair vanished from the Sisters of Saint-Joseph convent in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, on the French Riviera convent, on July 12 and have not been seen since.
A third 89-year-old nun, Sister Maurice-Marie, has revealed she also wanted to flee but broke her leg four days before the two elderly sisters disappeared.
A convent insider had told France-Soir newspaper that the nuns were furious at being "put out to grass" in a retirement home after 50 years at the nunnery.
They said: "They decided they wanted to jump before they were pushed.
"They would rather take their chances out in the world than have to live out their days in some far away rest home."
Sister Colette Philibert, the region's chief nun, said: "All we want is for our two dear sisters to make contact with us and return to the convent."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... -home.html
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
The midlife brain surge that means we DO grow wiser as we get older
By Marianne Power
Last updated at 2:18 AM on 27th July 2010
Ever traipsed to the shops only to find once there you've completely forgotten what you went for? Or struggled to remember the name of an old acquaintance?
For years we've accepted that a scatty brain is as much a part of ageing as wrinkles and grey hair. But now a new book suggests we've got it all wrong.
According to the Secret Life Of The Grown-up Brain, by science writer Barbara Strauch, when it comes to the important stuff, our brains actually get better with age.
In fact, she argues that a raft of new studies have found that our brain hits its peak between our 40s and 60s - much later than previously thought.
Furthermore, rather than losing many brain cells as we age, we retain them, and even generate new ones well into middle age. For years it's been assumed that the brain, much like the body, declines with age.
The accepted view is that we gradually lose brain cells - up to 30 per cent of our neurons - as we get older, hence the forgetfulness, lack of focus and mental slowness we associate with senescence.
But the longest, largest study into what happens to people as they age, the Seattle Longitudinal Study, suggests otherwise.
This continuing research has followed 6,000 people since 1956, testing them every seven years. It has found that, on average, participants performed better on cognitive tests in their late 40s and 50s than they had in their 20s.
Specifically, older people did better on tests of vocabulary, spatial orientation skills (imagining what an object would look like if it were rotated 180 degrees), verbal memory (how many words you can remember) and problem solving.
Where they fared less well was number ability (how quickly you can multiply, add, subtract and divide) and perceptual speed - how fast you can push a button when prompted.
However, with more complex tasks such as problem-solving and language, we are at our best at middle age and beyond. In short, researchers are now coming up with scientific proof of what we've all known for years - we do get wiser with age.
Meanwhile, job-related studies have found that middle-aged people out-perform younger ones.
In two trials, air traffic controllers and pilots were put [on] simulators to see how they responded to demanding tasks and emergencies.
While the younger colleagues were a little bit faster in their reaction times, the experienced professionals did as well or better in actually doing the job at hand — keeping the planes apart.
So what is it about our older brain that is so good? Traditionally, neuroscientists thought that millions of our brain cells died as we aged.
Now, new studies show that while we can lose brain connections if they are unused, we keep most of our brain cells for as long as we live.
Furthermore, researchers have found that the amount of myelin increases well into middle age, boosting our brainpower.
Myelin is the fatty substance which insulates the brain’s cells (the neurons) and makes the signals between them move faster.
It used to be thought that all our myelin was laid down in our childhood and adolescence, but now we know it goes on much longer. American scientists scanned the brains of 70 men aged 19 to 76, and found that in two crucial areas, the amount of myelin peaked at the age of 50, and in some cases in people’s 60s.
The study found that the amount of myelin increased in the parts of the brain we use the most — the frontal lobes (which control emotion, risk-taking and decision-making) and the temporal lobes (responsible for language, music and mood).
The neuroscientist who led the trial said this increase in myelin can boost our brain’s ability by up to 3,000 per cent, and is ‘the brain biology behind becoming a wise middle-aged adult’.
Scientists have also found that as we age, we start to use both sides of our brains instead of just one — a skill called bilateralisation.
For example, studies in which volunteers learned pairs of words revealed that younger adults used only their right frontal lobes when recalling the two words, while older adults used both the left and right side.
Scientists compare this to lifting a chair with two hands rather than one.
Drawing on these extra brain reserves is why older people can get to the point of an argument faster than a 20-year-old, and why they can analyse situations more accurately and solve problems.
etc...
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/artic ... z0us3aIEnV
By Marianne Power
Last updated at 2:18 AM on 27th July 2010
Ever traipsed to the shops only to find once there you've completely forgotten what you went for? Or struggled to remember the name of an old acquaintance?
For years we've accepted that a scatty brain is as much a part of ageing as wrinkles and grey hair. But now a new book suggests we've got it all wrong.
According to the Secret Life Of The Grown-up Brain, by science writer Barbara Strauch, when it comes to the important stuff, our brains actually get better with age.
In fact, she argues that a raft of new studies have found that our brain hits its peak between our 40s and 60s - much later than previously thought.
Furthermore, rather than losing many brain cells as we age, we retain them, and even generate new ones well into middle age. For years it's been assumed that the brain, much like the body, declines with age.
The accepted view is that we gradually lose brain cells - up to 30 per cent of our neurons - as we get older, hence the forgetfulness, lack of focus and mental slowness we associate with senescence.
But the longest, largest study into what happens to people as they age, the Seattle Longitudinal Study, suggests otherwise.
This continuing research has followed 6,000 people since 1956, testing them every seven years. It has found that, on average, participants performed better on cognitive tests in their late 40s and 50s than they had in their 20s.
Specifically, older people did better on tests of vocabulary, spatial orientation skills (imagining what an object would look like if it were rotated 180 degrees), verbal memory (how many words you can remember) and problem solving.
Where they fared less well was number ability (how quickly you can multiply, add, subtract and divide) and perceptual speed - how fast you can push a button when prompted.
However, with more complex tasks such as problem-solving and language, we are at our best at middle age and beyond. In short, researchers are now coming up with scientific proof of what we've all known for years - we do get wiser with age.
Meanwhile, job-related studies have found that middle-aged people out-perform younger ones.
In two trials, air traffic controllers and pilots were put [on] simulators to see how they responded to demanding tasks and emergencies.
While the younger colleagues were a little bit faster in their reaction times, the experienced professionals did as well or better in actually doing the job at hand — keeping the planes apart.
So what is it about our older brain that is so good? Traditionally, neuroscientists thought that millions of our brain cells died as we aged.
Now, new studies show that while we can lose brain connections if they are unused, we keep most of our brain cells for as long as we live.
Furthermore, researchers have found that the amount of myelin increases well into middle age, boosting our brainpower.
Myelin is the fatty substance which insulates the brain’s cells (the neurons) and makes the signals between them move faster.
It used to be thought that all our myelin was laid down in our childhood and adolescence, but now we know it goes on much longer. American scientists scanned the brains of 70 men aged 19 to 76, and found that in two crucial areas, the amount of myelin peaked at the age of 50, and in some cases in people’s 60s.
The study found that the amount of myelin increased in the parts of the brain we use the most — the frontal lobes (which control emotion, risk-taking and decision-making) and the temporal lobes (responsible for language, music and mood).
The neuroscientist who led the trial said this increase in myelin can boost our brain’s ability by up to 3,000 per cent, and is ‘the brain biology behind becoming a wise middle-aged adult’.
Scientists have also found that as we age, we start to use both sides of our brains instead of just one — a skill called bilateralisation.
For example, studies in which volunteers learned pairs of words revealed that younger adults used only their right frontal lobes when recalling the two words, while older adults used both the left and right side.
Scientists compare this to lifting a chair with two hands rather than one.
Drawing on these extra brain reserves is why older people can get to the point of an argument faster than a 20-year-old, and why they can analyse situations more accurately and solve problems.
etc...
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/artic ... z0us3aIEnV
ramonmercado
CyberPunk
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- Aug 19, 2003
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- 58,323
- Location
- Eblana
The Last Tweet.
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Tom Jones: the oldest swinger in the charts
By Neil McCormick Music Last updated: July 29th, 2010
If midweek sales hold up, 70-year-old Tom Jones is on course to becoming the oldest man to top the British album charts. Jones previously held the record as a mere stripling of 59, when his contemporary pop duets set Reloaded went to number one in 1999. But he was superseded by then 68-year-old Bob Dylan last year with Together Through Life. Now Jones is poised to take the crown back, with an album or raw rocking gospel music, Praise And Blame.
The old guys are but spring chickens (well, autumn chickens, maybe) compared to Dame Vera Lynn, who got to number one last year aged 92, although that was with a compilation album recorded in her prime.
Age used to be one of the battlegrounds of pop culture. Now, one has to almost wax nostalgic to think back to a time when fans debated whether this or that artist was too old to rock and roll. Do you remember when critics liked to poke fun at veteran rockers, referring to the Glimmer twins Mick Jagger and Keith Richards as the Zimmerframe Twins? It turned out that rock was not really a flashpoint for youthful rebellion but just another form of music. And music is for life. And life is long.
I have to admit, when I was an 18-year-old punk, I never imagined I would be a middle-aged rock critic. But the charts are still full of people who are older than me, and it is we middle-aged consumers who are keeping the music industry afloat. More than half of all CDs are bought by people over thirty, less than a fifth by people under twenty. Mind you, the young are still consuming just as much music, its just that they are not paying for it. Legal downloads are still dwarfed by the illegal. The international trade body IFPI has estimated that 95 per cent of music downloads worldwide are illegal. And there are figures bandied about the American music business (of which, I must admit, I am a little sceptical) claiming over 70 per cent of Americans under 20 years old have never paid for a piece of music. The generation gap is no longer about the music, it’s about the technology used to consume it.
Well, we all know the music industry is in trouble. But in the meantime, it may be up to the oldies to keep us rocking.
etc...
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/ne ... he-charts/
By Neil McCormick Music Last updated: July 29th, 2010
If midweek sales hold up, 70-year-old Tom Jones is on course to becoming the oldest man to top the British album charts. Jones previously held the record as a mere stripling of 59, when his contemporary pop duets set Reloaded went to number one in 1999. But he was superseded by then 68-year-old Bob Dylan last year with Together Through Life. Now Jones is poised to take the crown back, with an album or raw rocking gospel music, Praise And Blame.
The old guys are but spring chickens (well, autumn chickens, maybe) compared to Dame Vera Lynn, who got to number one last year aged 92, although that was with a compilation album recorded in her prime.
Age used to be one of the battlegrounds of pop culture. Now, one has to almost wax nostalgic to think back to a time when fans debated whether this or that artist was too old to rock and roll. Do you remember when critics liked to poke fun at veteran rockers, referring to the Glimmer twins Mick Jagger and Keith Richards as the Zimmerframe Twins? It turned out that rock was not really a flashpoint for youthful rebellion but just another form of music. And music is for life. And life is long.
I have to admit, when I was an 18-year-old punk, I never imagined I would be a middle-aged rock critic. But the charts are still full of people who are older than me, and it is we middle-aged consumers who are keeping the music industry afloat. More than half of all CDs are bought by people over thirty, less than a fifth by people under twenty. Mind you, the young are still consuming just as much music, its just that they are not paying for it. Legal downloads are still dwarfed by the illegal. The international trade body IFPI has estimated that 95 per cent of music downloads worldwide are illegal. And there are figures bandied about the American music business (of which, I must admit, I am a little sceptical) claiming over 70 per cent of Americans under 20 years old have never paid for a piece of music. The generation gap is no longer about the music, it’s about the technology used to consume it.
Well, we all know the music industry is in trouble. But in the meantime, it may be up to the oldies to keep us rocking.
etc...
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/ne ... he-charts/
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Growing old doesn't bring peace of mind...
War veteran, 83, facing eviction from the council house he's lived in for 74 years to make way for a 'family in need'
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 9:54 AM on 18th August 2010
An 83-year-old war veteran who has lived in the same council house for 74 years is being evicted after the death of his sister left him living alone.
Edward Meakins fears moving out of his life-long home will kill him but Barnet Council wants to use the three-bedroom property for one of the rising number of families needing large council homes.
He moved into the house in Cricklewood, north-west London, with his parents and four siblings in 1936 but is now the only resident after his sister Margaret died in May.
He was born just a few houses down the road and has only ever lived on the one street.
Following his sister's death, Mr Meakins signed a temporary contract taking on the rights and responsibilities of the former tenant, but has since been told this will run out in six months.
'I moved here when I was nine, which was 74 years ago, and I don't think it is fair that after I have lived here for that long I should go and live in a flat,' he said.
'This has been my life in this house since I was nine. Why do they want to turn me out? I don't suppose I have got many more years to go, so why can't they just leave me here until I die?'
Mr Meakins, who actually worked as a gardener for 16 years for the council now trying to evict him, remained in the house with his sister after both parents died in the 1950s.
His only absence from his home was during his two year WWII service as a private in Germany, where he served for the Somerset Light Infantry.
Mr Meakins, who also worked as a window cleaner for 25 years, said: 'I don't want a flat. I don't like the idea of it at all. It's very important for me that I stay here.
'I have been very worried about it. I wouldn't last long in a flat, it would kill me.
'I have got my garden and all my life here, so why do they want to take it all away from me?'
etc...
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z0wx1PT6BQ
War veteran, 83, facing eviction from the council house he's lived in for 74 years to make way for a 'family in need'
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 9:54 AM on 18th August 2010
An 83-year-old war veteran who has lived in the same council house for 74 years is being evicted after the death of his sister left him living alone.
Edward Meakins fears moving out of his life-long home will kill him but Barnet Council wants to use the three-bedroom property for one of the rising number of families needing large council homes.
He moved into the house in Cricklewood, north-west London, with his parents and four siblings in 1936 but is now the only resident after his sister Margaret died in May.
He was born just a few houses down the road and has only ever lived on the one street.
Following his sister's death, Mr Meakins signed a temporary contract taking on the rights and responsibilities of the former tenant, but has since been told this will run out in six months.
'I moved here when I was nine, which was 74 years ago, and I don't think it is fair that after I have lived here for that long I should go and live in a flat,' he said.
'This has been my life in this house since I was nine. Why do they want to turn me out? I don't suppose I have got many more years to go, so why can't they just leave me here until I die?'
Mr Meakins, who actually worked as a gardener for 16 years for the council now trying to evict him, remained in the house with his sister after both parents died in the 1950s.
His only absence from his home was during his two year WWII service as a private in Germany, where he served for the Somerset Light Infantry.
Mr Meakins, who also worked as a window cleaner for 25 years, said: 'I don't want a flat. I don't like the idea of it at all. It's very important for me that I stay here.
'I have been very worried about it. I wouldn't last long in a flat, it would kill me.
'I have got my garden and all my life here, so why do they want to take it all away from me?'
etc...
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z0wx1PT6BQ
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Adventurer, 84, to cross Atlantic on raft
Anthony Smith, an 84-year-old adventurer who walks with a stick, is preparing to cross the Atlantic with his three crew on a raft made of plastic gas pipes.
By Michael Howie
Published: 8:30AM BST 22 Aug 2010
When he placed his advertisement in the Telegraph, he ran the risk of being dismissed as a fantasist.
The appeal was brief and to the point: "Fancy rafting across the Atlantic? Famous traveller requires 3 crew. Must be OAP. Serious adventurers only."
But it caught the eye of several experienced seafarers - and now 84-year-old Anthony Smith is preparing to lead his veteran team across the ocean in a vessel made from plastic gas pipes.
In a few months the team will push off their craft from the Canary Islands bound for a beach in the Bahamas, 2,800 miles away, on a voyage that would make most people, never mind octogenarians, quiver with fear.
Mr Smith, an adventurer, writer and grandfather, will be attempting to satisfy a lifelong itch to cross the ocean on one of the most primitive forms of transport.
What makes the expedition even more extraordinary is that he will be setting off two years after he was run over by a van, an accident that left him with metal pins in his leg and walking with the help of a stick.
The former RAF pilot rejects the idea he is too old to embark on the 60-day crossing, and insists that rafting is relatively safe.
"Most people my age are happy with a trip to Sainsbury's every Tuesday, or maybe helping out fixing the church hall roof," he said. "What I want to show is that you don't have to be satisfied with a trip to the supermarket. You can do other things."
Mr Smith, a former science correspondent of The Daily Telegraph, has written over 30 books, worked on several film and documentary projects, and even presented Tomorrow's World when the BBC television show was in its infancy.
....
The team aims to launch in January, when the trade winds are at their strongest and before the Atlantic storms are most likely to hit.
The raft is being built from 13-yard (12-metre) sections of pipe donated by a manufacturer. Those at either end will be sealed full of air, providing buoyancy.
Those in the middle will contain drinking water and ballast. Crew members will live in two small shelters adapted from pig huts.
A fence will prevent the crew falling overboard, while Mr Smith will be constantly attached to a harness.
The men will manoeuvre the craft using small Peruvian-style rudders, known as guaras, which Mr Smith insists will provide greater flexibility than a conventional rudder.
A support vessel will accompany the raft for the first few days at sea, "in case we forget the can opener". A film of the voyage is planned, and Mr Smith hopes that schools will follow his progress.
The raft, called the An-tiki - adapted from the Kon-Tiki, the raft used by Norwegian explorer and writer Thor Heyerdahl in his 1947 expedition from South America to the Polynesian islands - will be easy to spot as it approaches land.
"We're going to put a giant 'elderly crossing' sign on the sail," said Mr Smith.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... -raft.html
Anthony Smith, an 84-year-old adventurer who walks with a stick, is preparing to cross the Atlantic with his three crew on a raft made of plastic gas pipes.
By Michael Howie
Published: 8:30AM BST 22 Aug 2010
When he placed his advertisement in the Telegraph, he ran the risk of being dismissed as a fantasist.
The appeal was brief and to the point: "Fancy rafting across the Atlantic? Famous traveller requires 3 crew. Must be OAP. Serious adventurers only."
But it caught the eye of several experienced seafarers - and now 84-year-old Anthony Smith is preparing to lead his veteran team across the ocean in a vessel made from plastic gas pipes.
In a few months the team will push off their craft from the Canary Islands bound for a beach in the Bahamas, 2,800 miles away, on a voyage that would make most people, never mind octogenarians, quiver with fear.
Mr Smith, an adventurer, writer and grandfather, will be attempting to satisfy a lifelong itch to cross the ocean on one of the most primitive forms of transport.
What makes the expedition even more extraordinary is that he will be setting off two years after he was run over by a van, an accident that left him with metal pins in his leg and walking with the help of a stick.
The former RAF pilot rejects the idea he is too old to embark on the 60-day crossing, and insists that rafting is relatively safe.
"Most people my age are happy with a trip to Sainsbury's every Tuesday, or maybe helping out fixing the church hall roof," he said. "What I want to show is that you don't have to be satisfied with a trip to the supermarket. You can do other things."
Mr Smith, a former science correspondent of The Daily Telegraph, has written over 30 books, worked on several film and documentary projects, and even presented Tomorrow's World when the BBC television show was in its infancy.
....
The team aims to launch in January, when the trade winds are at their strongest and before the Atlantic storms are most likely to hit.
The raft is being built from 13-yard (12-metre) sections of pipe donated by a manufacturer. Those at either end will be sealed full of air, providing buoyancy.
Those in the middle will contain drinking water and ballast. Crew members will live in two small shelters adapted from pig huts.
A fence will prevent the crew falling overboard, while Mr Smith will be constantly attached to a harness.
The men will manoeuvre the craft using small Peruvian-style rudders, known as guaras, which Mr Smith insists will provide greater flexibility than a conventional rudder.
A support vessel will accompany the raft for the first few days at sea, "in case we forget the can opener". A film of the voyage is planned, and Mr Smith hopes that schools will follow his progress.
The raft, called the An-tiki - adapted from the Kon-Tiki, the raft used by Norwegian explorer and writer Thor Heyerdahl in his 1947 expedition from South America to the Polynesian islands - will be easy to spot as it approaches land.
"We're going to put a giant 'elderly crossing' sign on the sail," said Mr Smith.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... -raft.html
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
The baby boomers and the price of personal freedom
As the postwar baby boomer generation begins to enter comfortable retirement, their children face a future of massive debt and uncertainty
Will Hutton The Observer, Sunday 22 August 2010
The baby boomers. Born between 1945 and 1955, they are busy ignoring the biblical calculus that a man's span is three score years and 10. Having enjoyed a life of free love, free school meals, free universities, defined benefit pensions, mainly full employment and a 40-year-long housing boom, they are bequeathing their children sky-high house prices, debts and shrivelled pensions. A 60-year-old in 2010 is a very privileged and lucky human being – an object of resentment as much as admiration.
I'm at the heart of all of it – guilty as charged. Born 21 May 1950, I'm the quintessential baby boomer. And for the last three months, while most of the rest of the world has been getting on with their lives, I've been wrestling with the implications of my new seniority. Sixty may or may not be the new 50, but it is a significant milestone; I've been on the planet for an awfully long time. What sense can I make of the decades I have lived through? To what extent am I and my generation unfairly lucky? What is the best way to live my life from now on?
To a degree I have some sympathy with the resentment, marshalled in a cluster of recent anti-boomer books. Individually, we may not have been the authors of today's flux, uncertainty and lack of social and cultural anchors, but we were at the scene of the crime. The cultural, economic and institutional cornerstones of British life have been shattered – and the way our love of fun was channelled is undoubtedly part of the story. The upside is that some of the old stifling prohibitions and prejudices have gone, hopefully for ever. But the downside is that we have become authors of our own lives without society offering us a compass to follow.
What, for example, should men and women expect of each other as they make the lifelong commitment to marriage? Have families become too child-centred to the detriment of our kids – mollycoddling and overprotecting them? Social landmarks such as our health service, education and police systems are the objects of near-permanent revolution, fired once again by the coalition government in the name of "radical reform" – as if radical reform is so important that it is worth the accompanying cost and disorientation.
Thus the paradox: more freedom but more angst and uncertainty.
There is no longer any discrimination in our embrace of cultural liberalism; it stretches into every nook and cranny of our lives – from the financial markets to sex – and sometimes with consequences none of us like. It was Howard Davies, when he ran the Financial Services Authority, who compared financiers to consenting adults; the inference was that he had no more business inquiring into their private business affairs than he would into what went on in their bedrooms. His liberalism has been proved wrong. The story of the past six decades is in many ways the story of how we threw off our shackles only to discover that we do need some constraints, even in the City. And in the bedroom? Our extreme liberal stance has seen us deluged under a tidal wave of pornography. The debate in the years ahead will not be about how to continue with our baby boomer liberalism, but over how and where we need restraint around some shared principles and rules.
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/ ... -60-hutton
As the postwar baby boomer generation begins to enter comfortable retirement, their children face a future of massive debt and uncertainty
Will Hutton The Observer, Sunday 22 August 2010
The baby boomers. Born between 1945 and 1955, they are busy ignoring the biblical calculus that a man's span is three score years and 10. Having enjoyed a life of free love, free school meals, free universities, defined benefit pensions, mainly full employment and a 40-year-long housing boom, they are bequeathing their children sky-high house prices, debts and shrivelled pensions. A 60-year-old in 2010 is a very privileged and lucky human being – an object of resentment as much as admiration.
I'm at the heart of all of it – guilty as charged. Born 21 May 1950, I'm the quintessential baby boomer. And for the last three months, while most of the rest of the world has been getting on with their lives, I've been wrestling with the implications of my new seniority. Sixty may or may not be the new 50, but it is a significant milestone; I've been on the planet for an awfully long time. What sense can I make of the decades I have lived through? To what extent am I and my generation unfairly lucky? What is the best way to live my life from now on?
To a degree I have some sympathy with the resentment, marshalled in a cluster of recent anti-boomer books. Individually, we may not have been the authors of today's flux, uncertainty and lack of social and cultural anchors, but we were at the scene of the crime. The cultural, economic and institutional cornerstones of British life have been shattered – and the way our love of fun was channelled is undoubtedly part of the story. The upside is that some of the old stifling prohibitions and prejudices have gone, hopefully for ever. But the downside is that we have become authors of our own lives without society offering us a compass to follow.
What, for example, should men and women expect of each other as they make the lifelong commitment to marriage? Have families become too child-centred to the detriment of our kids – mollycoddling and overprotecting them? Social landmarks such as our health service, education and police systems are the objects of near-permanent revolution, fired once again by the coalition government in the name of "radical reform" – as if radical reform is so important that it is worth the accompanying cost and disorientation.
Thus the paradox: more freedom but more angst and uncertainty.
There is no longer any discrimination in our embrace of cultural liberalism; it stretches into every nook and cranny of our lives – from the financial markets to sex – and sometimes with consequences none of us like. It was Howard Davies, when he ran the Financial Services Authority, who compared financiers to consenting adults; the inference was that he had no more business inquiring into their private business affairs than he would into what went on in their bedrooms. His liberalism has been proved wrong. The story of the past six decades is in many ways the story of how we threw off our shackles only to discover that we do need some constraints, even in the City. And in the bedroom? Our extreme liberal stance has seen us deluged under a tidal wave of pornography. The debate in the years ahead will not be about how to continue with our baby boomer liberalism, but over how and where we need restraint around some shared principles and rules.
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/ ... -60-hutton
- Joined
- Aug 7, 2001
- Messages
- 54,631
Jane Miller: 'I'm not sure I really will die'
In an extract from her new book Crazy Age, the 77-year-old author takes a stark – and very personal – look at the realities of growing old in the 21st century
The Guardian, Thursday 26 August 2010 Article history
A statistic from nowhere, or nowhere I remember, but it has the ring of truth: if most of us can look forward to living for about 10 years longer than our parents, we can also expect to spend the equivalent of eight of those years in hospital or doctors' waiting-rooms. When, at nearly 80, Gore Vidal was asked to explain why he had left Italy for California, he spoke of his future as "the hospital years".
My local hospital is ugly on the outside and beautiful within, though both the outside and the inside seem differently determined to masquerade as something that is not a hospital.
...
The building itself is curiously ship-like, constructed to seem open to the sky. There are wards from which you might gaze out across the roofs of London with a telescope to one eye, and walkways like gangplanks, and a chapel suspended in space, a kind of crow's nest from which to survey the turbulence below.
In this surprising building, I have now been in receipt of two new knees and weeks of physiotherapy in a hot pool and a gym. Twice a year I have my eyes tested for glaucoma and for mysterious "drusen" growths at the sides of my eyes, which must be stopped from putting pressure on the optic nerve. Also twice a year I go less happily through the endoscopy department to emerge bloated and suffering after a "procedure" I shall decently leave to the imagination. I have had x-rays of most bits of me and MRI scans, and tests for heart and lungs on a machine that simulates running uphill. I have been asked to count backwards in sevens and remember the name of the prime minister (part of a somewhat cursory test for Alzheimer's).
Only my teeth fail to interest anyone in this glorious NHS galleon, and for their sorry state I travel by three forms of public transport to north London, sometimes once a week. All that doesn't quite add up to four-fifths of my life, but it is mounting up.
I'm not sure this new familiarity with the inside of a large teaching hospital is especially cheering or enlightening, but it is intrinsic to contemporary experience.
...
I should add that in general I am in remarkably good health. I hardly ever get colds or flu. I can now walk for miles with my new knees and stand for quite long stretches at bus stops or in exhibitions. I hardly ever sleep in the day (but don't sleep nearly enough in the night) and I eat and drink as much and as indiscriminately as I ever did.
My natural competitiveness let me down badly when I was assessed at the town hall for a temporary disability parking badge for my car. It was before I'd had my knees replaced, and I was having difficulty walking. There, in a tiny office, with an old-fashioned games teacher checking me for any tricks I might get up to, I found myself unable to resist showing her that I could still touch my toes, with my hands flat on the ground. Proving, I suppose, that I have long arms, short legs and little in the way of persuasive gifts. I was denied the badge.
Old people are often told they're "marvellous" for simply being there and not complaining much. As though our longevity or our susceptibility to disease were entirely up to us, were choices we make: pain and illness the outward signs of weakness, vacillation, lack of character; health the well-earned consequence of courage and the right amount of moral fibre. The man or woman who meekly submits to illness and death rather than "fighting" it, "putting up a struggle", is unlikely to figure gloriously in obituary columns.
What are we allowed to say about pain? The hardest aspect of it is the difficulty of describing it, measuring it, knowing if it is better or worse, more or less, than anyone else's or, indeed, our own on another day. When a doctor's report from the endoscopy department included the words "low pain threshold" I felt accused and slandered. How could he know that? How can any of us know? Perhaps the pain was beyond anyone's threshold. We'll never know.
This is all the more important now that the sinister word "triage" has been reintroduced into medical practice, reminiscent of Florence Nightingale and her nurses patrolling the tents in the Crimea in order to decide which of the wounded were worth treating, which should be attended to first and which were not worth bothering about because they were bound to die anyway. It may no longer be wise to show fortitude under stress if we want our ailments to be taken seriously.
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/ ... old-ageing
In an extract from her new book Crazy Age, the 77-year-old author takes a stark – and very personal – look at the realities of growing old in the 21st century
The Guardian, Thursday 26 August 2010 Article history
A statistic from nowhere, or nowhere I remember, but it has the ring of truth: if most of us can look forward to living for about 10 years longer than our parents, we can also expect to spend the equivalent of eight of those years in hospital or doctors' waiting-rooms. When, at nearly 80, Gore Vidal was asked to explain why he had left Italy for California, he spoke of his future as "the hospital years".
My local hospital is ugly on the outside and beautiful within, though both the outside and the inside seem differently determined to masquerade as something that is not a hospital.
...
The building itself is curiously ship-like, constructed to seem open to the sky. There are wards from which you might gaze out across the roofs of London with a telescope to one eye, and walkways like gangplanks, and a chapel suspended in space, a kind of crow's nest from which to survey the turbulence below.
In this surprising building, I have now been in receipt of two new knees and weeks of physiotherapy in a hot pool and a gym. Twice a year I have my eyes tested for glaucoma and for mysterious "drusen" growths at the sides of my eyes, which must be stopped from putting pressure on the optic nerve. Also twice a year I go less happily through the endoscopy department to emerge bloated and suffering after a "procedure" I shall decently leave to the imagination. I have had x-rays of most bits of me and MRI scans, and tests for heart and lungs on a machine that simulates running uphill. I have been asked to count backwards in sevens and remember the name of the prime minister (part of a somewhat cursory test for Alzheimer's).
Only my teeth fail to interest anyone in this glorious NHS galleon, and for their sorry state I travel by three forms of public transport to north London, sometimes once a week. All that doesn't quite add up to four-fifths of my life, but it is mounting up.
I'm not sure this new familiarity with the inside of a large teaching hospital is especially cheering or enlightening, but it is intrinsic to contemporary experience.
...
I should add that in general I am in remarkably good health. I hardly ever get colds or flu. I can now walk for miles with my new knees and stand for quite long stretches at bus stops or in exhibitions. I hardly ever sleep in the day (but don't sleep nearly enough in the night) and I eat and drink as much and as indiscriminately as I ever did.
My natural competitiveness let me down badly when I was assessed at the town hall for a temporary disability parking badge for my car. It was before I'd had my knees replaced, and I was having difficulty walking. There, in a tiny office, with an old-fashioned games teacher checking me for any tricks I might get up to, I found myself unable to resist showing her that I could still touch my toes, with my hands flat on the ground. Proving, I suppose, that I have long arms, short legs and little in the way of persuasive gifts. I was denied the badge.
Old people are often told they're "marvellous" for simply being there and not complaining much. As though our longevity or our susceptibility to disease were entirely up to us, were choices we make: pain and illness the outward signs of weakness, vacillation, lack of character; health the well-earned consequence of courage and the right amount of moral fibre. The man or woman who meekly submits to illness and death rather than "fighting" it, "putting up a struggle", is unlikely to figure gloriously in obituary columns.
What are we allowed to say about pain? The hardest aspect of it is the difficulty of describing it, measuring it, knowing if it is better or worse, more or less, than anyone else's or, indeed, our own on another day. When a doctor's report from the endoscopy department included the words "low pain threshold" I felt accused and slandered. How could he know that? How can any of us know? Perhaps the pain was beyond anyone's threshold. We'll never know.
This is all the more important now that the sinister word "triage" has been reintroduced into medical practice, reminiscent of Florence Nightingale and her nurses patrolling the tents in the Crimea in order to decide which of the wounded were worth treating, which should be attended to first and which were not worth bothering about because they were bound to die anyway. It may no longer be wise to show fortitude under stress if we want our ailments to be taken seriously.
etc...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/ ... old-ageing
GNC
King-Sized Canary
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Anyone else watch the last ever Last of the Summer Wine, then? I was surprised at how many I recognised were still in it from the last time I watched in the 80s, they all looked ancient, mind you. I wasn't surprised that it didn't make me laugh once, but it wasn't offensively unfunny. Nice that Peter Sallis got the last line.
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Wasn't goodnight Gromit was it?gncxx said:
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Yeah, I watched for the nostalgia factor. I was a fixed fave in our house when I was growing up, and I do remember laughing fairly hard at it. But you're right, I wasn't as funny as I'd remembered it.
One strange thing tho...when I lived in the USA, around the turn of the century (oooh I've been waiting to write that for ages lol) the folks I met were all HUGE LOTSW fans. I think because if fitted their idea of the English countryside.
One strange thing tho...when I lived in the USA, around the turn of the century (oooh I've been waiting to write that for ages lol) the folks I met were all HUGE LOTSW fans. I think because if fitted their idea of the English countryside.
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ramonmercado
CyberPunk
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- Location
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You're only as old as the era you love
A new BBC series examines whether it is possible to reverse the signs of ageing by transporting celebrities back to their heydays.
by Patrick Smith
Published: 7:00AM BST 14 Sep 2010
It is one of our timeless obsessions: how to look and feel younger. The idea of recapturing one’s youth has long fascinated writers, from Dickens’s Miss Havisham to Wilde’s Dorian Gray. And in the UK alone there are more than 32,000 cosmetic surgery operations carried out each year, while anti-ageing creams sell in their millions. Lotions, potions and plastic surgery can alter surface appearance but time makes you feel old on the inside, too. Surely no one can reverse that part of the ageing process, can they?
BBC’s The Young Ones thinks it might have found a way to make people feel young again. Not to be confused with the anarchic Eighties sitcom starring Ric Mayall, the three-part series follows a bizarre scientific experiment in which six celebrities all over the age of 75 are sequestered in a country house completely decorated and furnished as if it were 1975. Featuring garish shagpile carpets, horrendous brown patterned wallpaper, and 1970s food in its original packaging, the Young Ones house was meticulously prepared for the housemates’ arrival. It was hoped that by surrounding the celebrities with a world they were familiar with and which they associated with a happy, successful period in their lives, it would transport them psychologically to their halcyon days, thereby encouraging them to “think themselves young”.
It may sound like Big Brother crossed with The Time Machine, but for the ageing guinea pigs – tabloid journalist and broadcaster Derek Jameson, 80, newscaster Kenneth Kendall, 86, entertainer Lionel Blair, 78, former cricket umpire Dickie Bird, 77, actresses Liz Smith, 88, and Sylvia Syms, 76 – it was Botox on the inside, as well as the outside.
The series was inspired by an experimental study of the ageing process carried out 30 years ago by Dr Ellen Langer involving two groups of men in their late seventies and early eighties. One group stayed living in a 1979 environment but was encouraged to reminisce about life 20 years earlier. The second group was placed in a house surrounded by props from 1959, and were encouraged to watch 1950s films and debate 1950s news topics, such as the Nasa satellite launch. The study, Langer says, revealed that the elixir of youth may in fact lie in the workings of your own brain: when tested, the second group emerged from the study with improved physiological performances: their blood pressure dropped; their cognitive abilities and memory greatly improved; one man was even able to cast aside his walking stick.
Science presenter Michael Mosley – who, alongside Langer, oversaw the new Young Ones experiment – agrees that thinking differently can help wind back the clock. “If you can go back into an atmosphere where you could do things, one where you were king or queen of the heap, it will bring back all those memories,” he explains. “And if you truly and completely believe [that you’re in that environment] then your body will follow where the mind has gone.”
etc...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvan ... -love.html
I sailed Scorpion dinghies in my younger days, but I last sailed one in 1982.
However, I do have a Scorpion Class calendar hanging on the wall before me, so perhaps that helps me cope with the ageing process... 8)
(It's this year's Calendar, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the class.)
A new BBC series examines whether it is possible to reverse the signs of ageing by transporting celebrities back to their heydays.
by Patrick Smith
Published: 7:00AM BST 14 Sep 2010
It is one of our timeless obsessions: how to look and feel younger. The idea of recapturing one’s youth has long fascinated writers, from Dickens’s Miss Havisham to Wilde’s Dorian Gray. And in the UK alone there are more than 32,000 cosmetic surgery operations carried out each year, while anti-ageing creams sell in their millions. Lotions, potions and plastic surgery can alter surface appearance but time makes you feel old on the inside, too. Surely no one can reverse that part of the ageing process, can they?
BBC’s The Young Ones thinks it might have found a way to make people feel young again. Not to be confused with the anarchic Eighties sitcom starring Ric Mayall, the three-part series follows a bizarre scientific experiment in which six celebrities all over the age of 75 are sequestered in a country house completely decorated and furnished as if it were 1975. Featuring garish shagpile carpets, horrendous brown patterned wallpaper, and 1970s food in its original packaging, the Young Ones house was meticulously prepared for the housemates’ arrival. It was hoped that by surrounding the celebrities with a world they were familiar with and which they associated with a happy, successful period in their lives, it would transport them psychologically to their halcyon days, thereby encouraging them to “think themselves young”.
It may sound like Big Brother crossed with The Time Machine, but for the ageing guinea pigs – tabloid journalist and broadcaster Derek Jameson, 80, newscaster Kenneth Kendall, 86, entertainer Lionel Blair, 78, former cricket umpire Dickie Bird, 77, actresses Liz Smith, 88, and Sylvia Syms, 76 – it was Botox on the inside, as well as the outside.
The series was inspired by an experimental study of the ageing process carried out 30 years ago by Dr Ellen Langer involving two groups of men in their late seventies and early eighties. One group stayed living in a 1979 environment but was encouraged to reminisce about life 20 years earlier. The second group was placed in a house surrounded by props from 1959, and were encouraged to watch 1950s films and debate 1950s news topics, such as the Nasa satellite launch. The study, Langer says, revealed that the elixir of youth may in fact lie in the workings of your own brain: when tested, the second group emerged from the study with improved physiological performances: their blood pressure dropped; their cognitive abilities and memory greatly improved; one man was even able to cast aside his walking stick.
Science presenter Michael Mosley – who, alongside Langer, oversaw the new Young Ones experiment – agrees that thinking differently can help wind back the clock. “If you can go back into an atmosphere where you could do things, one where you were king or queen of the heap, it will bring back all those memories,” he explains. “And if you truly and completely believe [that you’re in that environment] then your body will follow where the mind has gone.”
etc...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvan ... -love.html
I sailed Scorpion dinghies in my younger days, but I last sailed one in 1982.
However, I do have a Scorpion Class calendar hanging on the wall before me, so perhaps that helps me cope with the ageing process... 8)
(It's this year's Calendar, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the class.)