tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-179861312010-02-03T13:35:28.393+01:00Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.comBlogger154125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-19867865815875797622010-01-26T13:50:00.005+01:002010-01-26T14:04:20.091+01:00

The novelist Martin Amis’ newspaper interview at the weekend has caused widespread condemnation after he called for euthanasia booths on street corners, where elderly people can end their lives with “a martini and a medal”. The author even predicts a Britain torn by internal strife in the 2020s “‘if the demographic time bomb of the ageing population is not tackled head-on. There’ll be a

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-24239761047812216272010-01-23T15:52:00.004+01:002010-01-25T09:44:56.543+01:00

It was the lament of an elderly friend. She is 81, lives alone in a second floor flat with a long walk into town to do her shopping. She had a hip replacement a year ago and is now warned that it was not very successful and she may have to endure a second operation. She is a spirited person and doesn’t give up on her life easily, but this hard and tedious British winter, with frost and snow

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-88233727459277914202010-01-08T17:24:00.003+01:002010-01-09T10:35:59.975+01:00

Britain’s spell of cold weather is headline news. Supplies of gas and electricity are under threat, near to capacity at 96%. Residential customers are being given priority over industries. It’s true that the U.K. is always unprepared for extremes of weather, but the present one is creating new records of severity. Temperatures in some parts of the north and in Scotland have fallen to minus 21C.

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-87702689378704640562010-01-02T12:06:00.002+01:002010-01-02T12:12:33.998+01:00

The local Churches Together in our city ran a Christmas Day lunch for 150 people who otherwise would be alone on that day. It’s held in the dining hall of a public school, which John Wesley founded for the sons of his travelling preachers. (Surprised by this initiative no doubt he would have probably appreciated it, though he might have qualms about the lavishness of the meal and the

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-17420761378285262072009-12-18T10:59:00.004+01:002010-01-03T20:42:52.111+01:00

Another minor avalanche of cards, letters and e mails this Christmas from friends and onetime colleagues. Everybody seems surprised that there is such a thing as ‘TIME ‘, which seems to flow by more speedily than perhaps when we were younger. ‘I cannot believe that the year has come round so quickly…’ is how many letters begin; our’s did! But we find ourselves saying the same as the weeks go by –

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-36098641811417561892009-12-14T16:30:00.003+01:002009-12-14T16:36:45.739+01:00

The Guardian arranged a morning Conference on Ageing last week, chaired by their excellent columnist, Jackie Ashley. She writes about it in today’s edition. She cites familiar projections, such as that there are likely to be 2.9million people over the age of 85 in the U.K. in twenty years time. Today there are four working people for every retired person, but in forty five years time it may be as

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-4078709926861396742009-12-12T16:23:00.001+01:002009-12-12T16:25:42.615+01:00

Initiated by the Alzheimer’s Society, Singing for the Brain is something that people with dementia and similar conditions and their carers enjoy and which has proved to be amazingly therapeutic. There are some 25 groups around the country, of which Bristol is one and presently has 80 members. Devised by music specialists at Reading University, the groups are regarded as stimulating and

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-49416181430366665922009-11-24T19:30:00.004+01:002009-12-11T17:31:09.642+01:00

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-8921648341138396552009-11-24T19:30:00.003+01:002009-11-26T14:10:03.536+01:00

I was staying with dear friends we have known since student days and inevitably the conversation developed around the subject of these postings, and we talked about what its like to be at this time of our lives. Able to fulminate about the sort of things that make me despair at the culture of manipulation and greed that surrounds us, Brian however was essentially positive about his life. At one

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-3914470255190034282009-11-14T16:51:00.004+01:002009-12-11T17:33:22.965+01:00

I have never been reluctant to share my opinions with people – often positive but sometimes negative ones, ranging from politics, the shape of society, the state of the church, music and the arts. Kind friends and tolerant family have mostly listened to them sympathetically whilst reserving the right to disagree. But I find as I grow older, I am more easily irritated and get even angry about all

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-23171819544360374062009-11-13T11:57:00.001+01:002009-11-13T11:59:58.882+01:00

The fear that older people have of ending their lives in a Care Home was brought into vivid relief yesterday when a government report on the use of ant-psychotic drugs for the elderly was published. Apparently as many as 144,000 people suffering from dementia are routinely being given such drugs unnecessarily. The Report claims that such excessive use causes an estimated 1,800 deaths each year,

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-1511298807403725982009-11-11T17:26:00.003+01:002009-11-11T17:47:32.266+01:00

Today is Armistice Day, so named to commemorate the ending of hostilities prior to a peace settlement, as the 19145-18 War between Germany and Great Britain drew to its end. I grew up during a time when the memory of that appalling conflict and the slaughtering of young lives was still fresh in people’s minds. My father served in the Royal Navy and his ship was torpedoed in the N. Atlantic. Only

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-50101187341649894252009-11-01T13:09:00.003+01:002009-11-01T13:15:58.549+01:00

We saw the Pixar animation/Disney film, ‘UP’ last week. It tells the story of a love affair between the cautious Carl and his adventurous tomboy wife Ellie, whose great but unfulfilled ambition was to go to Paradise Falls in South America. Carl makes a living selling toy balloons and Ellie works in the local zoo. They grow old together in the ramshackle house where they first met. They save money

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-10984666154146057512009-10-23T13:54:00.013+02:002009-11-15T12:48:46.623+01:00

My eleven year old grandson and I were having a quiet moment together. We’d talked about school, the family, football. He moticed the ‘liver spots’ on the back of my hands and realised that all he knew of me was as an old man, and that that couldn’t be the whole of my story. He had never seen me young! So he asked his question. Imagination was a help –‘so you used to have hair and it was black?’

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-69515076522626115252009-09-28T16:44:00.003+02:002009-10-19T12:06:26.665+02:00

Another sign of ageing this morning, when at the local hospital I got fitted with my new hearing aids.The family had been pointing out in mostly kind ways that I wasn’t able always to follow conversations as I used to. Asking people to repeat what they have said can be very annoying and having the TV on too loudly is, understandably, very unwelcome. I had got used to looking attentive and

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-86722714750559888722009-09-10T17:19:00.003+02:002009-09-12T09:49:32.679+02:00

I mentioned (last November) that most weeks I go to cardiac rehabilitation sessions. At each of the four weekly sessions, there are about twenty or so older men and two or three women who have been through some sort of critical heart trouble. It is a mildly athletic occasion, but also a social one. We talk. Often we talk about our ailments in response to the repeated question, ’how are you?’

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-28191119479322599052009-09-08T18:35:00.003+02:002009-09-08T20:53:59.497+02:00

I have been visiting old friends recently – in Northampton, Birkenhead, Sheffield and Exeter; catching up on their news and sharing some of my own. J.P. e- mailed afterwards : ‘ though it may be a couple of years since we last talked, the conversation seemed to pick up where we left off’. It was like that for me all the time. There were new things to learn, family and work developments to hear

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-32294783251014451992009-08-04T10:40:00.001+02:002009-08-04T10:42:51.531+02:00

We are just back from spending a few days at our second family base in St. Juan, Alicante. The weather has been as hot and clear as apparently it has been cold and wet in the U.K. Spain’s holiday month coincided with our flight home, but even so the expansive and daily cleaned beaches were already full of holiday makers, each group or couple plotting out their territory with towels spread out

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-81112405297709774812009-07-26T22:04:00.004+02:002009-07-26T22:09:35.973+02:00

.... who is aged 76 is a prolific, popular and critically acclaimed author of fiction for both children and adults. Quoted in today’s ‘Observer, she says that chronologies irritate her. ‘There is no chronology inside my head… The pack of cards I carry around is forever shuffled and re-shuffled; there is no sequence, everything happens at once’.The thoughts she has given to one of her characters

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-20967425178144453892009-07-24T11:24:00.003+02:002009-10-19T12:10:07.744+02:00

The U.S. Census Bureau has published a comprehensive report, ‘’Ageing World : 2008’ *which suggests that within 10 years older people will outnumber children for the first time. It forecasts that over the next 30 years the number of over-65’s is expected to almost double from 506M in 2001 to 1.3B.They have come up with some astonishing statistics, such as the number of people over 65 throughout

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-15857405261387831962009-07-21T11:55:00.001+02:002009-07-21T11:56:53.709+02:00

Younger people must be fed up with us older ones – certainly if they listen to the U.K. radio and buy newspapers. There was an excellent article in The Guardian a few days ago about Care homes. The author made the mistake of stating that old people go to such homes ‘to die’. There is a chorus of protests about that slick simplicity in the paper today. One writer says people go to care homes to be

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-64248920104619432162009-07-13T18:48:00.003+02:002009-07-15T10:34:27.741+02:00

Getting older brings a variety of frustrations. In the mornings it takes longer to get yourself ready for the day. Clothes once slipped on in a moment have to be engineered onto your body, laces on your shoes take longer to get tied, its not so easy to find the gap in your jacket to put your arm through. It can involve a lot of hopping about before the process is completed. And then you go from

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-9776834338920456332009-07-09T17:28:00.002+02:002009-07-09T17:36:05.343+02:00

It’s something few of us want and many of us dread : to leave your own home and in the company of other older people to be cared for by people paid to do the job But sometimes it has to happen. It is estimated that in the next twenty years there will be twice the number of people living who are over eighty five years old, many of whom may not be able to look after themselves. It was announced

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-69100822511612459022009-06-21T13:22:00.003+02:002009-06-21T13:31:46.097+02:00

I find as I get older that I get tetchy very easily. Often a fairly trivial thing may happen, which gets me overly irritated, cross, complaining. It often happens when I watch TV, especially those documentaries where the presenter seems more interested in projecting themselves than in the subject of the programme. It doesn’t make it any easier for me when, looking over their shoulder at the

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17986131.post-7482034974862375222009-06-01T11:03:00.006+02:002009-06-21T13:28:49.459+02:00

…so says the actress Isabella Rossellini in response to a new book. ’50 is the New Fifty’ by the journalist Suzanne Braun Levine. ‘To listen to the society we live in’, says Levine, ‘you would think that you have to stay young – and look young – to be happy. And we literally buy into that message, spending millions on age-defying cosmetics, surgery, drugs…We live in a society that is very ageist.

Euroresidenteshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09720730325379243865noreply@blogger.com0