BLUEMOMENT

I'm in a bit of a bad corner.
Since November 6 good friends have 'crossed the bar'
The latest funeral was yesterday and my liver is struggling to face the day
Cheer me up lads.

I wish I could. Mortality is a reality and the best I can do is to encourage you to do everything you want to do as soon as possible. Visit all the anchorages you have wondered about, visit the countries that you want, sky-dive, go for a few laps of Knock Hill, go to concerts, basically do everything that floats your boat. The difficulty for me is lack of motivation and a predilection for procrastination.

The old motivation is a bit of an issue for me too. The present mood will pass, of course, but it seems to have its own idea of how long it will be around. I know I have lockers to paint and some re-wiring to do as well as sorting our a couple of drains in the garden but I really cannot be arsed just now!
Light nights not that much in evidence yet but its a damned sight better that Danelandia was last week.

It is precisely this sort of scottish excrement that prompted me to take a flat in San Sebastian de La Gomera for a month.

I am sitting here full of garlic chicken and red wine, wearing shorts and sandals.

The FUK at this time of year is a nightmare, this particular year even more so than usual. Danelandia is not a cure. Plenty flights to the sun and cheap Airbnb rentals to be had.

Stop moping, it is pointless. If you really won't or can't go South then join an art class or take up bridge.

OK, apologies for telling you to pull yourself together... I know from personal experience this is rarely helpful.

Next I will tell you to count your blessings.

The liver is the only organ that can repair itself, even in old bastards, so look on the bright side.

And consider an emergency holiday... A week in the sun always helps. Turmeric for the inflammation.

Dear Doctor Bowels,
Again I find myself indebted to you for your sage and appropriate remarks and advice. Thank You.
As we move into another decade, might I take it that your fees have increased or are you still continuing to operate along the charitable lines that have served you so well, thus far?
I have another dilemma which I am sure you will be able to help me with - namely:
I was born in the 1940's
So far I have crawled through the 1950's
Blasted through the 1960's
Consolidated in the 1970s
Developed in the 1980s
Continued my Ascension through the 1990s
Hailed and embraced the new millennium through the 2000s
Beaten Medical challenges through the 2010s
and now find myself in the 2020s

By my reckoning, this is my 9th decade - am I really in my 90's or is this some mathematical trick aimed at destabilisation?
thanks in advance.

Had you been born early in 1940 you would indeed be entering your 9th decade. Were you 90 year's old then you would be in your 10th decade. As a post war youngster I am only in my 8th decade. None of it matters, though.

I contracted what was probably norovirus last week.
I'm another product of the 1950s, and rarely get sick. Times I had, it was day, maybe 2. This time, I'm weak for a week!
I rarely bother the NHS, but after a so called tennis elbow would not go away, I had to go and learn who my doctor is. An injection made it go away.

But on the bright side... summer's nearly here (1040mB thios week), and all that sailing time looming. Better get the boat ready!

You lot have cheered me up no end.
At some point in the early hours of new year's day it dawned on me that I turn 40 next year. I was so upset that I was forced to open another bottle of gin (we seemed to have finished the whisky).

Mavanier
my youthful fruitbat, you may like to remember it was me in need of the cheering up....

I've just been snorkeling along the outside of the marina breakwater in San Sebastian de La Gomera. Saw some parrot fish. Having some tapas. Hope this cheers you up.

Don't get too good a tan - "they" may not let you back in. And then there will be the cavity search probably based on "intelligence" from a phone call suggesting you may be a "person of interest". Not that I'm in any way jealous!

marisca wrote:Don't get too good a tan - "they" may not let you back in. And then there will be the cavity search probably based on "intelligence" from a phone call suggesting you may be a "person of interest". Not that I'm in any way jealous!

Of the cavity search? Each to their own I suppose!

Bitdefender has issued strong warnings that I should keep out of this discussion but what the heck.
I am a child of 1940 entering my 9th. decade next week, so qualified to deal with Claymores depression. Back in my late forties when my prostate started playing up, after sticking his finger up my bum, my GP said ' it is big, but no worries you could easily see 70', so that was my target, and I am stiil here and getting up at least twice every night. In the last decade I have permanently given up sailing twice, and am putting new windows in our Moody so that I can be ready to give it up again. At the same time I have worked several thousand boats through the Crinan Canal and shared the income with Mary's Meals feeding several hundred hungry kids. We started the 'death clean' last year but it is not going well, (you never know when you might need a spare bike or a 10 year old printer). This morning I did my usual 10 miles up the canal to Dunardry and back on the bike in order to be fit and ready for the coming season.
I expect to disappear one of these days, probably still owning a boat and with minimal progress on the death clear out but as long as it is quick and relatively painless the massive good fortune which allowed me to have a career that I wanted, to sail and race sucessfully when I was fit enough to do it and spend 16 retirement years mucking about in Argyll will have seen me through. Not to mention the girl that played hard to get for 5 years then succumbed and took care of me now for more than 50, sailing in weather she did not like and anchoring at the top of lochs when she really wanted to be in Tobermory'.
So having got this far my good fortune has been such that there is no way the balance sheet can show a deficit, regardless of Trump or Bojo, if you are all on your way to hell in a handcart it is our own fault, our generation had the best there ever was on offer.
Cheer up for fecks sake, it is January in Scotland, in a couple of weeks the sun will be out.

Good post from a genuine oldie. Corona. Makes you wonder what striplings like Claymore are whinging about.

I am a mere child, not three-quarters through my 7th decade yet. Mad enough to think a second boat in the Canaries for the Winter was a good idea. Bloody thing has already cost me a sum approaching or even exceeding five figures, and it is not even here yet, though I currently am.

Not a great sailing season this year due to working on boat 2, but got to Islay and round Mull - and Norway, the Canaries and the Azores are still on the cards for later this year. .Maybe the 1st Mate's arms will never recover enough for serious deck work, and it's a shame I can't afford new rigging or a decent engine for Avy-J, and feckit I got hearing aids last week, but IT'S NOT OVER UNTIL THE FAT LADY SINGS