Ok, so they are a bit late, but I’m a firm believer that if New Year’s resolutions are to stand any chance of attainment then they are not to be rushed into. What’s that expression about acting in haste and repenting at leisure?

1.Firm up sagging muscles on tummy, thighs and arms by doing regular weight and resistance exercises. Step one (the easy bit) is complete as I have now bought a pair of dumbells.

2. Do more walking. Drag husband out at weekends, preferably ensuring there is a good pub en route for some (low calorie of course) sustenance. Book at least one big walk a week with girl friends. I really do think that at this time of year, with such low light levels, getting out into the fresh air is so beneficial. 

3. Wear sunscreen at all times. A beautician recently took a photo of my face with one of those cameras that picks up all the sun damage, and I was horrified at all the mottled brown patches.

4. Cook at least one new “never cooked by me before” dish each week, which will get me back looking at my stash of recipe books for inspiration. Here is the first one, chicken with cannelini beans and chorizo:

5. Bake some interesting bread – I have a ‘dough raising’ temperature setting on the oven so there really is no excuse.

Sloe spotting

6. Pick next autumn’s sloes earlier for sloe gin. Have you ever tried to pick prickly tiny sloes when someone else has got there before you and taken all the big low down ones? Leave it late and then also your sloe gin isn’t ready for Christmas.

7. Go on a cookery course to learn a new style of cooking.

8. Power clean the paving round the house so that we don’t dice with a slippery path when going to the bin.

9. Sort out the shed. All those never to be used plastic pots, tools put away unclean and unoiled, mower all clagged up with grass cuttings sort of thing. Then get husband off into the garage to do the same thing.

10. Improve my Italian which I am plodding on with. The trouble is remembering it all.

So there you go. I feel there should be more, but 10 is enough to be getting on with for the moment. wish me luck, and good luck with yours too.

Not a very Christmassy topic I know, but it is as good a time as any to contemplate it when one hears of friends’ parents suffering a slow lingering death. Why is it that we can put our pets to sleep to save them from suffering, yet we still condemn elderly and terminally ill people who are wracked with pain to a terrible lingering existence?

Faced with an ever aging population and ever more sophisticated ways of keeping a body functioning when the mind has long gone, this matter must now be properly addressed by parliament.  Surely it is far better to have a calm and painless death, a ‘good’ death if you wish, in the comfort and peace of your own home.

Current guidelines say that prosecution is unlikely when there is compassionate assistance to help a loved one die, but it still leaves a lot of doubt as to whether or not a loving helper would be prosecuted. Why is parliament so slow to move on this, when over 80% of the population would welcome a more definitive ruling?

Personally I think that a person should be allowed access to a painless assisted death if the only other option is unending intolerable pain. Who are we, who are sound in mind and body, to condemn a person to a living death that they would far rather end? Or indeed to force them into the only other expensive alternative at the moment, which is travelling to Switzerland to die in a soulless place far from home, at a date earlier than they would wish whilst they can still make the journey. Furthermore this is a very elitist option, as many cannot afford the associated costs. That of course assumes that the person can communicate their wishes. For those imprisoned in their bodies, denied the right of self-termination, there is at the moment no escape from their tortured lives.

I believe that currently legislation is only being contemplated to cover those who are terminally ill, rather than chronic pain sufferers that find it all too much to bear.

As the baby boomer generation lives longer, and indeed is now becoming the older generation, we need to think how do we want to end our days? In control, protecting our family and friends from prosecution, or kept going on drugs and machines in a twilight of non-existence? Will you have the choice?

I am a regular reader and huge admirer of Melanie Read, the Times columnist who suffered an appalling and paralysing accident when she fell off her horse over a year ago. She said that she ‘sometimes gets angry enough to wish that a few bishops, palliative care people and campaigners from Care not Killing were in my skin….facing my future’. Condemning people to a terrible lingering rather than a good death in the circumstances of their choosing is, she says, a scandal. I must say I agree.

Dear Drivers, I thought you should be aware of this email I received.

Please read this important message from Crime Stoppers…

While driving on a rural end of the roadway on Thursday morning, I saw an infant car seat on the side of the road with a blanket draped over it. For whatever reason, I did not stop, even though I had all kinds of thoughts running through my head. But when I got to my destination, I called the Police and they were going to check it out. But, this is what the Police advised even before they went out there to check…..

“There are several things to be aware of … gangs and thieves are now plotting different ways to get a person (mostly women)to stop their vehicle and get out of the car.

“There is a gang initiation reported by the local Police where gangs are placing a car seat by the road…with a fake baby in it…waiting for a woman, of course, to stop and check on the abandoned baby. “Note that the location of this car seat is usually beside a wooded or grassy (field) area and the person — woman — will be dragged into the woods, beaten and raped, and usually left for dead. If it’s a man, they’re usually beaten and robbed and maybe left for dead, too.

DO NOT STOP FOR ANY REASON!!! DIAL 9-9-9 AND REPORT WHAT YOU SAW, BUT DON’T EVEN SLOW DOWN.

“IF YOU ARE DRIVING AT NIGHT AND EGGS ARE THROWN AT YOUR WINDSCREEN, DO NOT STOP TO CHECK THE CAR, DO NOT OPERATE THE WIPER AND DO NOT SPRAY ANY WATER BECAUSE EGGS MIXED WITH WATER BECOME MILKY AND BLOCK YOUR VISION UP TO 92.5%, AND YOU ARE THEN FORCED TO STOP BESIDE THE ROAD AND BECOME A VICTIM OF THESE CRIMINALS.

THIS IS A NEW TECHNIQUE USED BY GANGS, SO PLEASE INFORM YOUR FRIENDS AND RELATIVES. THESE ARE DESPERATE TIMES AND THESE ARE UNSAVOURY INDIVIDUALS WHO WILL TAKE DESPERATE MEASURES TO GET WHAT THEY WANT.”

Please talk to your loved ones about this. This is a new tactic used. Please be safe.

Get started NOW — SEND THIS MESSAGE TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS AND LOVED ONES TO BE CAREFUL AND AWARE OF EVERYTHING AROUND THEM SO AS NOT TO BECOME A VICTIM.

I’m fed up having to defend myself as a baby boomer!

Suddenly everyone is anti we ‘baby boomers’ and empty nesters. And that’s before the granny bashing that has gone on post budget. It seems to have pitched the generations against each other.

Ok,  so yes my generation have had free university fees, but actually I was the first in my family to go to university. I was on almost the maximum grant and my parents had to make a lot of financial sacrifices for me to go.  If I had had to pay fees on top, the BB bashers would say that they were very low anyway (as indeed in comparison to fees nowadays they would seem to be) and they would have been paid off by now ( it was over 30 years ago so that would be likely anyway), and I would still get it in the neck as being ‘privileged’.

Yes I have been fortunate to have worked through the decades that saw a boom in house prices, but I still started off my married life as a lodger, renting a one bedroom flat at the top of a house in Bromley, and our one holiday a year was camping in France.  We certainly had no spare cash for clubbing, and our wardrobes were not stuffed with shoes and handbags. The way everyone is talking nowadays makes me think younger generations assume we just pinged into comfortable middle class by magic -they should know it has taken us 40 years of hard work!

And to end my muttering, a woman I spoke to the other day sounded positively resentful of the fact that,as new empty nesters, we were out there enjoying ourselves. Well, after 21 years of child care and related expenses, why on earth shouldn’t we in the short gap before we start looking after elderly parents and begin getting old ourselves.

Thats it – moan over!

What a fabulous weekend of celebrations. We started it off with a party in the garden with a bunch of close friends, with bags of sunshine and an appearance by her majesty.

Jubilee chicken, red white and blue puddings and jubilee cupcakes.

Then next day off to the River Pageant. I have never seen such crowds, whole generations of families, picnics in the middle of the embankment, toasting the Queen and eating sausage rolls, seeing that fabulous procession of boats.

Then getting soaked through and battling our way back over London Bridge to the strains of the Royal Philharmonic to the challenge of getting onto a train.

Yesterday  was an early start as our big tent from saturdays lunch took off from its guy ropes and hurtled round the garden at 5.30 am with us in hot pursuit. Then down to decorating a huge Jubilee cake with a friend for 8o villagers and a morning of cake baking.

We had a joyful village street party with everyone enjoying cucumber sandwiches and jubilee cake. It was a huge turnout from the newest born to the oldest residents.

A short break and then a bring your own supper for 300 in a barn and under a full moon the village Jubilee Beacon was lit and the queen’s health was toasted.

Back to watch the Jubilee concert last night, I was left speechless by Grace Jones,  those incredible graphics on the palace and the fireworks. A quiet day today glued to the TV, although I then really wished I had gone up again to wave my flags.

A feast of super and joyful celebrations for a fabulous Queen

Loneliness is a big enemy of the elderly, so we all need to keep ourselves plugged into the internet, and keep up with all the advances in technology so that we don’t get left behind. That way we will be able to Skype our friends and family and maintain a social network even if we become less mobile. We will be able to get our groceries delivered and maintain an interest in anything from learning a language to enjoying a bit of virtual travel. Its never too late to start, and that includes getting our parents set up with the basics of internet and email – they will feel empowered by what they can do, and much more connected to the world  and their family and friends.

So now we are faced with not being able to retire until we are nearly 70, and then when we need care having to choose between being washed and dressed or being fed. Heaven help you if you need assistance to go to the loo. There never was any advantage to getting old (other than being like the lady who vowed to wear purple) but for our generation and those that follow the prospect  is suddenly becoming a whole lot worse. Why don’t our politicians realise they will be in the same boat too, and take long term effective measures?

I do believe that assisted dying should be allowed, but I fully appreciate that it is such a hard area to legislate on , and that must be done to protect the vulnerable and fragile. We need safe guards and compassionate parameters.

The hypocratic oath precludes a doctor from administering the fatal dose, yet I’m sure all sides are united on the desire to reduce unnecessary suffering in the final months of life. We must protect relatives from prosecution, to avoid pressurizing the ill to take their own lives in order to protect their loved ones from criminal charges.

At last something constructive is planned to help old people stay at home rather than having to go into care
Surely the longer we can help maintain a persons independence at home the better?

There are now proposals in a White Paper due out in April to encourage more social support in the home. The idea is to loan money to the elderly to adapt their homes to make continued living there more possible – like building a downstairs loo, installing a chair lift etc.The other initiative is to help the elderly feel ‘ less isolated and better connected to others’  – one method would to be to encourage people to do volunteer work with the elderly to earn credits that they could then bank and exchange for services later on – it’s a system that has worked in Japan for many tears. All good stuff, but lets not get too excited until this initative is converted into real action.