Esteemed Company

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Well how's that for esteemed company? Two famous sportsmen announced their own retirements today, meaning that in years to come I shall be able to say that I retired the same summer as Jonny Wilkinson and Ryan Giggs.



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The 3 x 60 Challenge

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So much is written about the post-work bucket list that as you approach retirement, you inevitably feel that you should have one. A tick list of 100 things to see and do before you die. You don't even have to think up your own any more, the Internet is full of them. Glance through them if you will and you quickly get the impression that retirement must be full of adrenalin rushed grandparents throwing themselves out of aeroplanes or climbing Kilimanjaro. Indeed the eldest recently sent a book to Mister E and me entitled "101 Coolest Things to Do in Great Britain." Now it is a good read and has some, shall we say, "interesting ideas" but for those that hold the most appeal I can honestly say that I've already been there, done them, got the photographs. There are others that wild horses wouldn't drag me to. It may be cool, but somehow Mister E and I attending Bestival is beyond even the most vivid of imaginations. The problem with trying to...
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All Aboard for Pampering

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Mister E and I may be retired but we still enjoy being pampered now and again; who says you have to be working hard to deserve a treat? Yesterday offered one of those occasions when we were spoiled with a train trip on board the Northern Belle, previously operated and restored by the Venice Simplon Orient Express. It was a day for lounging back in a plush seat, eating and drinking everything put in front of us (and there was quite a quantity) whilst watching the scenery glide serenely past. The luxury of our surroundings and the attentive service from uniformed staff all added to the sense of occasion and enjoyment. We were entertained by wandering musicians and a magician on our figure of eight route around County Durham and North Yorkshire, ending up eventually back where we started at Darlington Station. Just like my retirement so far really; there is no obvious destination but the journey getting there is immensely pleasurable.
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A Full Service

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  It's not just the Spring Cleaning that I embrace in February and March because, much as I dislike routine, the end of winter and beginning of spring have become a time to put other aspects of our house in order. So, it's a period for sorting ourselves administratively with meetings with our financial adviser and personal banker; reviewing and renewing insurance policies, changing insurer as necessary; checking tariffs and switching energy suppliers. In fact this year we have surpassed ourselves by finally updating our wills too!  Energised by the thought of springtime and rebirth, it's also become a time for medical checks, new spectacles, and a dental check-up. When making my appointment with the optician, I was given the option of a hearing test; I declined but no doubt, in years to come, that too will find its way into my retirement body scan. It's not simply a phase for a human body overhaul either, as we've subjected our cars to annual serv...
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The Danger Zone

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I have generally considered myself  to be healthy and my retirement lifestyle equally so. I exercise daily; eat a good diet; don't add salt to my food; don't drink much; have never smoked; have no obvious stress triggers; have even lost half a stone in weight since finishing work although, like many people, several more pounds won't be missed. Grief, I sound so boring! Anyway, I was a little concerned by my hospital visit at the end of July when the nurse checked my blood pressure. I could see the reading on the screen and, as it seemed high to me, I did ask her if it was okay.  "Absolutely fine," she said but that didn't exactly allay my fears. After all I had been sitting in a waiting room that could easily have passed for Obesity International and what if mine had simply been the lowest she had seen all morning? The result has been nagging on my mind, so on Monday I called into our surgery and had the Practice Nurse take another readin...
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Late, Even in Retirement

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  (Image by Merry Christmas  from Pixabay) Whilst retirement continues to throw up its new experiences, I'm conscious that some of them only arise because I'm a little late for the party. We have the misfortune to suffer from the problems that rural connectivity throws up. In particular, we  frequently struggle with mobile reception at one side of the house, whilst at the other it has proved impossible to obtain a wifi signal meaning that the benefits of a smart televison are non-existent.  However, during last year's initial lockdown, for the first time I appreciated the potential of casting especially from the iPad to the living room. It's been an indispensable way to participate in online exercise classes.  On Sunday, I was idly exploring other options to cast when I discovered that every series of Downton Abbey is available on Amazon Prime. I'm one of those few people who until now has never watched a single episode. I was, of course, working when it aired ...
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Exhaustion

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  Who would have thought it?  Yesterday, according to my Fitbit app, I walked more than 5 miles without leaving the house; most of it was between wardrobes and the bed where robe contents were displaced and sorted. Now in the course of  the motivational training sessions, I was warned that one wardrobe and a time limit of 4 hours were desirable. However, when Mister E expressed interest in getting his hanging rails decluttered too, it seemed opportune to keep going. After all when the man who cannot even bear to throw away a cardboard box, admits his closets need a good tidy up and needs help to do this, who could possibly refuse? To be fair, he took to the process with a great deal more realism and less sentimentality than I did. In the end the hangers on his rails move freely whereas mine are still a trifle squeezed. Looking at the number of empty coat hangers we produced, I'm ashamed to say we must have jettisoned at least a hundred items between us, most of which wer...
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Seven Years and Itching

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  It is seven years today since I closed the door on my legal career and I still have no itch or desire to return to the world of court rooms and orders. If I have a yearning at all, it is for a resurrection of the retirement life I had become accustomed to before this darned pandemic descended upon us. It is a craving that is now, however, tempered by the sense that the simple life I have long hankered for is within my fingers' grasp, if only... I noticed a meme the other day that just about summed up my situation. In essence it was indicating that lockdown has demonstrated that we need more than time trapped at home to organise and sort; the problem was never a lack of hours to devote to the task as we had always assumed, but rather something within that needs to be tamed and brought to heel.  Who would have imagined that seven years down the track with supposedly oodles of time, I'd still be contemplating how to declutter myself of  physical stuff?  Strangely the ...
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A Reprieve

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  Tonight I am writing this post rather than continuing my game of catch up with Downton Abbey. After a week of  constant viewing, I am even beginning to sound like Lady Mary; should I deign to clamber on top of a horse and ride it side-saddle, you will know that my conversion is complete. Yesterday, I remained on target to reach the finale today when I noticed that the warning to the effect that all episodes would be removed on 31st January appeared to have disappeared. I wondered if an extension had been granted or if instead I was already viewing on borrowed time. I checked again this morning, and, can you believe it, after all those mammoth sessions in front of the television there is indeed now a new expiry date in two weeks' time! I am unable to explain my relief.  Retirement and deadlines simply don't go together. After a career of working to time limits,  I honestly have no idea why I succumbed to the challenge. All I can think is that, still slightly intoxi...
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Happy New Me

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  There's something very special about New Year. There I am at 11.59 pm on 31st December waiting for the clock to strike; I whisper a few resolutions; the New Year rushes in and I am a transformed being. Except it doesn't work like that. Least of all last night, when I couldn't keep my eyes open late enough to witness the ushering in of 2022. It continues to be a hard life in retirement (she says smiling).  I was up this morning, however, with a good thirty minutes to spare before welcoming the first dawn of the new me, assuming of course that I had remembered to make some resolutions.  I hadn't.  It wasn't so much that I'd forgotten to make any as, to be honest, I genuinely couldn't think of any. Of course, nobody's perfect but in retirement where everyone strives to live in the present, resolving to socialise frequently, regularly ring Great Aunt Betsy (another figment of my imagination), shed pounds or come up with anything to alter your life for the ...
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Living the Dream

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  It is 8 years ago today that I left my office desk and took my first steps into retirement.  Fittingly, this afternoon I was reminded of some of the associated emotions whilst chatting to our next door neighbour who retired too a few weeks ago. Whilst he's clearly throwing himself into all those tasks that you let slip whilst you are busy working down to your final day, he also divulged that he is experiencing those horrendous nightmares where you wake up, palms sweating, realising that you were imagining yourself back in the workplace. At least I was able to reassure him that, 8 years on, not only would I be incapable of doing the job that kept me occupied and fulfilled for so long, but also I honestly would be unable to recall what used to be required of me, at least not sufficient to dream about it. Who would have thought it would be possible to get to that stage, but when life is filled in other ways, memories of the task of earning a living by pursuing a career do actu...
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Dementia Torment

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Hats off to Andy Burnham for his speech on social care today. Since returning from an 18 day trip (more in another post) I have been very much banging my head against the wall with the authorities within a system that isn't so much broken or unfit for purpose as barely functioning or perhaps even extinct. When you have dementia and are blind, you can genuinely believe that not only are you completely rational and can cope, but that you can also see. It's a time bomb ticking towards an explosion and when it does there's an inevitable crisis. At least I've learned a new word: anosognosia. Moreover, I've had plenty of time to practise saying it whilst I've been holding on the phone line for hours in total trying to speak to someone who can assist. In the midst of a safeguarding dilemma, you do not expect everyone to keep referring you to the Duty Officer in the Department of Social Care, the emergency telephone number for which only ever results in an answerphone t...
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Celestial High

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  I've been clearing out our garage again this week. It's one of those once a year tasks that involves countless discussions with Mister E as to what is useful and what really should just be binned. In my book anything that moved to the house with us more than 25 years ago and has sat unused ever since has to be ripe for jettisoning, but Mister E applies other benchmarks, especially when it comes to "boat stuff." Bit by bit, year on year a little more edges its way towards the dustcart. Give me another two decades and the garage shelves might finally be properly decluttered. There are, of course, always items that do prove their worth even if the gap in using them exceeds a quarter of a century. That was the case with Mister E's precious sextant. He used it on some seriously long Atlantic voyages in the early 1980's before modern navigational aides became widely accessible to the leisure yachtsman.  After that, it lay unused until 1999 when  he and the eldest ...
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The Danger Zone

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I have generally considered myself  to be healthy and my retirement lifestyle equally so. I exercise daily; eat a good diet; don't add salt to my food; don't drink much; have never smoked; have no obvious stress triggers; have even lost half a stone in weight since finishing work although, like many people, several more pounds won't be missed. Grief, I sound so boring! Anyway, I was a little concerned by my hospital visit at the end of July when the nurse checked my blood pressure. I could see the reading on the screen and, as it seemed high to me, I did ask her if it was okay.  "Absolutely fine," she said but that didn't exactly allay my fears. After all I had been sitting in a waiting room that could easily have passed for Obesity International and what if mine had simply been the lowest she had seen all morning? The result has been nagging on my mind, so on Monday I called into our surgery and had the Practice Nurse take another readin...
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I Marched Because...

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On Saturday I joined the march through London demanding a people's vote on the terms of exiting the E.U. It was the biggest protest since the march against the Iraq War back in 2003 and which, of course, failed to alter Government policy. I therefore walked on Saturday knowing that shuffling en masse through the streets of the capital is unlikely of itself to change political direction and that even if it were to, a second referendum is no guarantee for resolving the current chaos. So why you may well ask, with a blister on my toe and exhausted from a week of walking around walled towns in the Adriatic (of which more, in my next blog entry), did I make the effort to attend? The answer is simple: anger! Yes I am irate in circumstances where I can never previously recall such an ineffective collection of Parliamentarians in key posts across all parties. The country has been dragged into a long running internal debate within the Conservative Party where...
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A Lifesaver

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  I clearly enjoyed last week's overnight stay in hospital so much, that I went back for another one on Sunday. On this occasion, however, it was far from pre-planned. I've been doing really well with my post-operative recovery and have ditched the pain killers. I've taken a peep at the surgical wounds and they are healing splendidly on the outside at least. After a wave of nausea and diarrhoea kept me awake overnight on Saturday, I was feeling generally fine if a little fatigued by Sunday morning and went back to bed to catch up on missed sleep. When I awoke my heart was pounding; so much so that I mentioned it to the youngest when we chatted, with me dismissing it as simply a sign of its strength. An hour later, sitting reading, I was aware of that heart beat again and for a moment felt whoozy. I got up and went slowly downstairs, pausing just inside the kitchen door where the same thing happened and I moved to sit down. I could feel my heart racing and out of interest de...
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Christmas Comes But Once a Year

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  Christmas comes just once a year but when it does it lasts a long time! At least that's how it feels after hosting the family for 8 days. Of course it was great to be back together once more but having 5 adults in the house for that long, increased by day visitors and on one night an additional overnight guest, is something neither Mister E nor I are used to anymore. Retirement has given us the house to ourselves, day and night, week after week. Sharing our space with others is somewhat strange, as well as tiring (or maybe that's just the thought of all the bed linen and towels that now need washing!). Lolling with a post-Christmas fatigue, normality is slowly being restored, or it  would be if I wasn't suffering from a running nose and sneezing. Typical Christmas guests, they may have gone but they always leave something behind and this year it was their colds. Proud of our potential Covid immunity after succumbing in October, we thought we'd  breeze through the ind...
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Menopause After the Workplace

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Perhaps I'm being a little sensitive but it seems there's so much magazine and newspaper print lately that's been devoted to menopause in the workplace.  The final bastion in the battle for gender equality or so some articles would have us believe. With women apparently averaging 51 years when they complete their menopause transition, it is perhaps surprising that there isn't more coverage of the impact on retirement. Early menopause gets an avid press, late menopause less so. In my own case, it must be 20 years since I was told that I was perimenopausal. When, suffering dreadfully with menorrhagia (an abundance) and dysmenorrhea (it hurt), I finally sought medical assistance and various prescriptions followed. "Progesterone is good for this," followed several months later by "But maybe not in this form," and then "Maybe not for you, at all." Prodded, poked and scanned. "You have fibroids, let's monitor them." "They are n...
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No Fog at Sea

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  On Monday the youngest, who was paying us another flying visit, and I went for a coastal walk, blowing the proverbial cobwebs away. It was a complete change of scenery and colour. Day after day, I am surrounded by the beauty of the countryside but it is definitely green and not blue. Grass and trees sway silently in the gentle summer breezes. Looking out at the North Sea, the waves came crashing in and the expanse of sky above an empty beach created a sweeping azure-soaked panorama. After weeks in the city on the youngest's part and in the countryside on mine, we both felt refreshed and re-energised. I was reminded of that feeling reading about research in Italy and Scotland where studies have shown that last year's hard lockdowns affected many people's cognitive abilitites causing them to suffer "brain fog." It's obviously important to exercise and socialise and whilst a routine can be important if you are working or studying, for the rest of us impetuous...
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Happy Feet Again

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The first couple of weeks of January have been as busy as ever. There have been: a new laptop for the Parish Council to set up (why do these things take so long?); exercise classes to endure or enjoy depending on my daily fitness aptitude and the level of the group; more DIY at the rental property; a new Future Learn course; lunches out and time spent chatting (rather a lot) with family and friends. Yesterday I was back in volunteering mode, covering not one but two shifts at Save the Children's local high street shop. Well it was short of staff, I had a diary that could be easily altered, so why not? After all seven hours is nothing compared to the daily grind, week after week, month after month, decade after decade that goes with full-time work; at least that is what I thought.  So, I dressed appropriately in several layers and my comfortable ankle boots to ward off the chills from the open shop door and set off with enthusiasm, ready to meet and greet; sort and stac...
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Technophobia

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  It's happened; I have finally reached that stage of retirement where I believe it appropriate to declare myself a technophobe. It all came to a head yesterday after permitting my iPad to  update to iOS 14.6. I'd been avoiding the upgrade on the basis that whilst it might resolve some issues it would inevitably create others. However, conscious that certain apps appeared to be struggling, I ultimately and unwisely decided to try it as a potential solution. I wish I hadn't bothered, or at least not without doing a little more investigating as to the consequences. How do you keep your passwords safe? I moved on from the favoured one or two repetitive sequences several years ago and purchased a purpose designed app that stores passwords in an encrypted format. It automatically backs up to iCloud,  and I recently even started to rely on it to generate frustratingly unmemorable chains of random digits. Now, I did consider, rather than chancing my luck and banking on the iPad ...
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