Years ago, I coined the term ‘cheap luxury’ in my household, but I think it is a good time to spread it around. See if you think it has meaning for you.

The term first arose, if I am not mistaken, over a jar of mustard. We were in a supermarket deciding what to buy and confronted a shelf full of mustards. Some were much more expensive than others and we were not very well off, but we had some small room for manoeuvre.

How to choose? Leaving aside the type of mustard (French, German, English, with seeds etc), there was also the question of cost. If my budget had been extremely tight, I would have gone for the cheapest, no doubt about it. In contrast, those who have no budget constraints and always want the best would choose the most expensive.

We discussed it and thought the most expensive was also notably better, I forget the reasons, and decided to buy it.  Why? Because it was basically a cheap luxury. And then I began to think about it.

What makes for a cheap luxury?

Most of us like to feel cossetted now and again. We can’t afford it most of the time. But my great ‘discovery’ was that we could afford it when the overall cost was low.

The difference between the cheapest brand of mustard and the most expensive was large in relative terms, but altogether small in the scale of things.

Perhaps this is obvious. But how many people really go for it?

A little luxury now and again does us good. We feel pampered and, for no good reason, more loved. We luxuriate in it. So, my argument was, why not indulge in a cheap luxury when it is something you really appreciate? It won’t break the bank.

Examples of cheap luxuries

There are numerous examples of cheap luxuries, some of which most of us do without even thinking about it.

I love lying in a hot bubble bath, for instance, soaking up the heat. It eases the muscles and relaxes the whole body. As the water cools, I will often let a little out and add more hot water. I know this is not costless, but I do it nonetheless. It is a cheap luxury.

Thinking of baths, have you ever considered your bath soap? Most people, as far as I know, buy ordinary bath soap for themselves but choose expensive brands as gifts for friends and family for Christmas or birthdays.

But we decided long ago to buy the good soap for ourselves for regular use – not even keeping it for special occasions. The cost is low, and it just feels nice.

I could go on and on. So many foods and ordinary household products fall into the category of cheap luxuries, depending on your interests and tastes. So, too, do small items of clothing, such as the not-most-expensive silk underwear.

Expensive luxuries

Lest anyone think I am advocating always buying at the high end, let me stress this is not remotely the case.

A new sports car – or even many ‘another’ car – is not a cheap luxury. It is an expensive one, as it will cost a lot of money. Hugely more than a simple car to get you around. Your bank balance will really notice.

I haven’t owned any car for years and when we did, it was a VW beetle. But I would never buy an expensive car now.

First class train or air tickets fall in the same category. You can’t even argue that they will get you to your destination any faster. Good luck to those who can afford to pay for them without holding back on other expenditure. But you know you are forking out sizeable amounts.

The same is true for hotels. You recognise the luxury and perhaps even decide to go for it, but you need to know what you are doing. In these days of inexpensive B&Bs, or even air B&Bs providing more space, luxury hotels are there for people who are not worried about cost.

None of us are going anywhere at the moment, but we will soon. I never travel first class, as it is a high price to pay for peace and quiet. And I have never liked the expensive hotels I have stayed in, as they tend to lack a human touch.

So I am not into expensive stuff – just cheap luxury.

Indulge yourself

I am not generally one to tell other people how to spend their money. We all have different interests and financial situations, and it is up to each of us. But if you do not do so already, think about splashing out on a nice bar of soap for yourself (or the equivalent).

You will get more than your money’s worth in the sense of luxury it brings.

This was first published on Sixtyandme.com

I cannot keep my secret quiet any longer. I have suffered in silence for years. Only my closest friends know the situation and they tend to sympathise. It’s not really my fault, BUT I really hate shopping. I always have.

The problem

Let’s try to ‘unpack’ this little problem. Perhaps I had a bad experience in the past. Perhaps if I were to be given the right sort of aversion therapy (or is it the opposite?), I might learn to love shopping.

I doubt it. There is very little I could learn to like.

First and foremost, I am not very acquisitive. I don’t much like ‘things’. A new dress rarely cheers me up. Nor does finding just the right vase or tablecloth.

I might make an exception for a new book I look forward to reading, but there aren’t many such exceptions.

Secondly, I am really uncomfortable in crowds. I try to find times to shop when the crowds will be small, but it is difficult. Many shops are quiet first thing in the morning, but if it requires public transport to get there, you are stuck in any case.

As you can imagine, I would never shop in a sale – people struggling to get into the front in order to acquire that one thing specially on sale is my idea of sheer hell.

Thirdly, I can’t bear the whole process of trudging from shop to shop to find the right thing. I find it incredibly dispiriting. Leaving aside food shopping, I have never found one store – yes, even a large department store – which sold exactly what I wanted in every department.

Too much choice

And finally, I hate being given too much choice. I can stand for what feels like hours in front of a shelf full of breakfast cereals, feeling like a deer caught in the headlights.

Yes, I will often fall down this line of thought… Maybe I should try that one with the little bits of fruit, but no, would I be better off with something with bran? Does it have too much hidden sugar? Or salt? Is this one over-priced because it has a child’s gift inside?

Point a gun and tell me what to choose and I would be much happier.

I am certainly no better with house furnishings. However much I try to prepare for such decisions, I am constantly worrying that something is the wrong size or the wrong colour for everything else in that room. I have no ability to visualise it.  It makes me feel incompetent. Not recommended.

And it is much worse with clothes. I am an awkward size (too short, hips too big), but then everyone I know says they think they are an awkward size. No problem if you enjoy the process anyway, but in my case it is a nightmare.

I dislike the whole rigamarole of trying things on – not because of the slim young things in the dressing room – but simply because I have never been very good at getting dressed and undressed.

And then you are back to the problem of choice. Well, it doesn’t fit perfectly, but then nothing ever does, so do I choose the slightly tight waist or the awkward fit over the shoulders?

Do I really need this garment anyway?

Mail order

So, you might argue – if you hate shopping, why not go the mail order route? It is so easy in this day and age.

Yes, I do a lot of shopping via mail order. I have learned, over time, which companies sell trousers that actually fit and which catalogues’ pictures are reasonably accurate. Some companies have very helpful staff who will discuss details like the ‘feel’ of a garment. Much welcomed by me.

It is a bit of a nuisance when you need to send things back, but they are making the packaging much more suitable for this purpose. And at least the line in the post office is not much longer than the line in the store you would have experienced if you had bought the item in a store in the first place.

The test I can’t pass

Shopping feels like a kind of test that I am always failing. Either I come back with nothing – and everyone says “What? You couldn’t find anything you liked?” Or I come home with something and they say “What? You chose that?”

I hate shopping. I’m afraid the feeling will stay with me until the en

A version of this article has been published in my book, The Granny Who Stands on her Head: Reflections on Growing Older

This was initially published by Sixtyandme.com. 

Do you feel that you spend too much time on life’s trivia? You know the sort of thing – dealing with gas or electricity bills, coping with computer or broadband problems or just keeping the household running okay.

A certain amount of time is acceptable, but sometimes there is a problem that refuses to be fixed easily. You try one thing, then another and nothing works – and you end up having a very bad day.

This happened to me recently when I needed to buy – of all prosaic things – a mop.

Broken mop

 It was about two weeks ago. My mop handle broke – in just the same way its predecessor had done before. I decided I not only needed a new mop, but perhaps a new kind of mop.

I asked my very savvy neighbour what type of mop she would recommend. I won’t bore you with the details, but she suggested a particular type and brand (it was a mop and bucket set) and I thought the problem was solved. All I needed to do was to buy it.

Online shops

I am a great believer that you can buy anything online and very quickly.

I went to the online supermarket that I use regularly and could see no sign of this mop. Yes, they had the bucket, they even had refill mops for this brand, but the mop itself was nowhere to be seen.

So off I went to Amazon, the supplier that everyone loves and hates at the same time (but that’s another story). Yes, they had the mop, but not the bucket. I was informed that they would have the perfect ‘mop and bucket set’ in three weeks, even at a good price. But I wanted the mop now.

This was getting annoying.

Actual shops

I then remembered that there is a not too distant hardware store, which sometimes has such things as mops, although it tends to be overpriced. I wanted to phone to check, but didn’t have their name. And then I had a senior moment and couldn’t think of the right word for a hardware shop. Nor could my husband.

But somehow, it came to me and I phoned the shop. They had the mop, they said, but the price given was so low that I doubted if it was the right one. And the bucket would be just under £50 ($65). I even phoned back to see if I got that right.

Was it a silver-plated bucket? I have no idea, but I do not need a bucket for that price!

This was getting seriously annoying. I was definitely losing my cool.

Wider impact

Indeed, I was in such a state that I realised I needed to stop. I went off to make lunch.

This may have been a mistake. I was so riled up that I began to do stupid things with the stove and nearly burned the lunch.

I certainly managed to annoy my long-suffering and very relaxed husband. He told me he thought I was about to burn myself or even damage the house, never mind the lunch. I didn’t.

But it was not a relaxed time. I kept trying to explain what a problem I had had, but he said he wasn’t really interested in a mop. Conversation came to a stop.

And, indeed, who could blame him? How interesting can a mop be?

Buying a mop

After this break, I worked it out. I bought the mop from Amazon (it arrived the next day) and ordered the bucket from my online shop, with some other groceries, all of which were duly delivered a few days later.

That was that – a shiny new mop and bucket set.

After thoughts

Why do we get so annoyed at such trivia?  Is it just me on a bad day? No, I think little things can set anyone off from time to time. And the fact that it is a small thing just makes it worse. You know you should ‘do better’ when the issue isn’t all that serious.

I wondered whether it is the internet. Not really, I think, but it does raise our expectations that everything is available quickly. And things often are. But not always. We need to learn that and build it into our planning.

Think of our mothers – or, even more, our grandmothers – who would never had the luxury of dealing with such trivia so quickly. They would have needed to trudge down to actual shops, often some distance away, to find what they wanted. If they found it at all.

They would be amazed to see how easy it is for us today.

A version of this article has been published in my book, The Granny Who Stands on her Head: Reflections on Growing Older

(A version of this article was first published on SixtyandMe (see https://sixtyandme.com/trivial-daily-nuisances-how-difficult-can-it-be-to-buy-a-new-mop/)

People who go everywhere by car may have many complaints – traffic, the price of petrol (gas), or finding a parking space. But at least they can expect to travel in comfort.

Many of us, however, are dependent on buses, trains, and subways (known as the ‘underground’ or ‘tube’ in London and the ‘metro’ in some other places) to get around. We do not always travel in comfort, despite such trips being part of our daily routine.

Getting a Seat

I well remember the first time it happened. I was in my early 60s and standing in the underground train, thinking about nothing in particular.

A young man in a seat was waving, trying to get someone’s attention, I assumed behind me. But I looked behind and no one was there. My brain re-jigged the situation, and I realised he was trying to get my attention. Why?

Of course, he was trying to offer me a seat. Me! Of all odd things to do. I was young and able and waved him away to indicate I was fine.

This was the very first time I was ever aware of being labelled as ‘old’ and it came as a shock.

Seats galore

And then it started to happen more often. Someone would prod me and point to a person getting up, indicating that the vacated seat was available.

Or they would stand up very visibly and offer the seat there and then. On tube trains, on buses. More and more frequently.

There was one period when I had a bad back and sitting down was very painful. I turned down the frequent offers. But once someone decides you need their seat, it is very hard to dissuade them.

Once or twice, I even took a seat, which I didn’t want, because it was too complicated to explain to the eager helper.

Who offers seats?

In my experience, women are more likely to offer a seat than men and older people more than younger ones. They seem, more often than not, to be foreigners, brought up in an etiquette that no longer applies here.

But I think it is happening more often. Perhaps there are more foreigners using public transport in London. Or perhaps Londoners generally are becoming more aware of the issue. Even young men, lost in their own worlds, do occasionally offer.

Who gets seats?

Most often, it seems to be older women who are offered seats. And anyone with a cane or otherwise visibly disabled. I know that when I have a cold or am generally under the weather, I get offered one more readily. I assume it is because I am looking older.

Older men sometimes get one. My husband actually needs one more than I do, because of a bad knee. If we are together, I will try to ensure he gets one, although it is difficult to persuade him.

And sometimes women with children or pregnant women get offered a seat, but the latter are complicated as they might just be overweight.

I know that nearly 40 years ago, I wasn’t offered a seat when I was nine months pregnant and there was no mistaking it.

Last week, I watched a woman with a guide dog get on a bus and two people vacated a double seat to allow her to sit with the dog next to her. I wondered how the dog knew what was going on. But even more, I wondered how the dog knew which bus to get on.

In any case, the older I get, the more I welcome an offered seat. It is no longer a surprise, but a wonderful relief to get off my feet.

This was first published by SixtyandMe.com

Almost everybody has friends. It is part of life to have them. Some of us have loads and some have very few, but we all feel that they are important in our lives.

And we all know who our friends are. They are people who are not our family, not our neighbours, and much more important than acquaintances.

(Of course, some people count some family members as friends and married people often say that their spouse is their ‘best friend’. This is a wrinkle that needn’t worry us here.)

We get together with friends when we can, we talk to them in person or on the phone, and generally view them as a significant addition to our well-being.

But although there is a single word – friends – for all the people in this category, in actual fact they do not all mean the same to us at all. They play very different roles in our lives.

Friends who provide us company

You probably have some friends who you enjoy doing things with – they provide company, diversion, and a chance to explore new things. They are often people you see in a group.

There are loads of activities which you might undertake with such friends on a regular basis. You could meet to play tennis, to go for walks, to explore the meaning of books, or to sing together in a choir.

There are also all sorts of other meeting places, where you might get together on a regular basis for a drink or a meal ­– depending on the country, a local wine bar or cafe or pub.

These people tend to share your tastes, whether in movies or sports. They are fun to be with.

We see these friends a lot, but we often don’t really know them very well. We chat about day-to-day events, but don’t go any deeper. They might even be in the middle of a divorce and not tell us about it.

Many of the activities we undertake with such friends are not possible – or are severely hampered – during these difficult times of Covid. You might keep in touch with some of them by phone or email, but that would be it.

Friends who provide us intimacy

In contrast, you probably have other friends who you tell your problems to and listen to theirs. They understand your character and the deeper recesses of your mind – and vice versa.

You tend to see them on a one-to-one basis, at least some of the time, so you can have more intimate discussions.

These friends, whether you do or don’t do things with them, have an importance well beyond the amount of time you spend with them. You may not even see them for years, but the telephone, email and, nowadays, Zoom enable you to keep up to date.

And when you do meet up with them, even after a long break, the connection is so deep that you talk with them as if you had done so yesterday. Uncannily, you pick up where you last left off.

Indeed, you may not bother with the usual niceties (the weather, a minor cold, small irritations), but go straight to the important stuff about what is going on emotionally for you.

It is to these friends that we go when we are worried about something or need to make an important decision. They know us, care about us deeply and always have our best interests in mind.

These friends are often people we knew in school or college and have kept in touch with over the years. They were there for all the ups and downs of early relationships, they knew when you were trying to have a baby, and followed your career choices and dilemmas over time.

But they might equally be people you met through any number of circumstances – perhaps at a dinner or through work or any activity which enabled you to talk comfortably. Somehow, you made a very deep connection and felt there was no need for lots of explanations.

You probably have fewer such friends. Perhaps just one. There is no question of losing touch with them because of the pandemic.

Helping people to make friends

These distinctions became very clear to me over 30 years ago. At that time I doing research on friendships among people with learning difficulties. Many were being released from the hospitals where they had lived most of their lives and much attention was given to fostering their well-being.

There was great enthusiasm for moving them into what was always called ‘the community’. The term is falsely reassuring and makes the new environment sound warm and full of friends.

It was thought that they would then be free to do what they liked, when they liked, just like other people.

But social workers began to notice that, in the course of a day, these people only spoke with shopkeepers and the like. And so, they wanted to help them to find friends of their own.

A popular solution was to arrange discos where they could meet. Their intentions were good, but the effect was limited. How many friends – of either kind – would you make in the loud surroundings of a disco?

A colleague and I wrote a report on the issue, but I am not sure what happened as a result. I would hope that more imaginative ways were found to help this group of people to develop and sustain relationships. It is certainly what I would have wanted if I had a son or daughter in that situation.

The importance of friendships

Friendships are important, of whatever kind. Human beings are social animals, a fact that has become particularly visible as social activities have come under strain during the pandemic.

Our individual needs differ, with some people wanting loads of casual friends to make themselves feel comfortable. Others have less need for activities with other people but feel a real need for one or two close friends.

I hope that you have managed to sustain your friendships during this difficult – and sometimes lonely – period.

A well-known saying floated into my head recently: “The past is another country.” Interesting, I thought, and wondered who said it first.

It turned out to be J. P. Hartley, the novelist, and it is the first line, slightly wrongly remembered, of his novel (later a movie), The Go Between:

“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.”

I began to think about whether this is right or not, in terms of my own past, but then my thoughts took a different turn. The question that was buzzing in my head was whether the same was true of the future, when viewed from the perspective of younger people.

Is Being Old a Foreign Country?

When I was young – pick any age up to 55 or so – I definitely thought that the future was a foreign country. It would be strange to me, and it would be difficult to cope with.

And they would definitely “do things differently” there. I looked around at the old people I knew, and they clearly had different interests and temperaments and felt altogether different to me. It was not something I looked forward to.

Yes, I knew that at some point I would become an old lady, but that in itself seemed an odd concept. Me – old? Surely not. It was, literally, unimaginable.

At the same time, I thought that if it ever happened, I would be a different person when I got there. I would have the same name and the same history, of course, but there the resemblance would end.

Somehow, I thought that when I was magically transformed into this strange state of old womanhood, I would be unrecognisable. I would not be the me I had always known.

It was going to be hard – I would not know how to navigate all the twists and turns foisted on me by the passage of time.

It would be a double learning problem – a new me in a new landscape.

The Future Is Here

How very, very wrong could I be! Now that I am an old lady, by whatever measure, having recently reached the age of 79, I realise that old age is not another country at all.

Yes, there are aspects of my life that are different, but I don’t feel that I am wandering in a strange land. And there is a great deal that is very much the same.

Old age creeps up on us rather stealthily, even if we don’t make a fuss of our birthdays. Only a few things happen fast, like retirement from your lifetime’s work, although in my case, I worked freelance and work just slowly stopped coming in.

But generally, it just means a few things changing each year – the hair getting whiter, the wrinkles getting deeper, and so forth. You walk a little slower, your hearing becomes slightly more difficult, sometimes you even become shorter. I could list much more.

You get used to one thing, absorb that, and start getting used to another. There are very few shocks involved, in the absence of a significant death or illness, which is another matter altogether.

At the same time, other things happen, too. Some are definitely negative – friends die or become much more ill. Your energy slowly diminishes, so you tend to be more homebound.

But on the positive side, you may acquire grandchildren, and they may become a very active and joyful part of your life. Your relationships with your adult children change and deepen. You may develop new interests and activities.

And You’re Here, Too

And, most important, as you get used to these changes, you realise it is the same old you dealing with them. For good or ill, there is no amazing transformation. Whatever your character and personality at age 30, you will be the same at 60 – or 70 – and beyond.

If you were an optimist when you were young, you will find yourself still an optimist later. Have you had a tendency to fuss over unexpected events? You are almost certainly still fussing later. If you laughed at life’s vicissitudes, you will be laughing still.

I was reminded that when my mother was about 50, she declared to my father that she had decided to become an “eccentric” old lady. That sounded a good ambition, but my father laughed. “You’ve never been eccentric in your life,” he replied accurately. “So you won’t be eccentric then. You will be you.”

And he was proved right. She never became the least bit eccentric.

Knowing Yourself

I think this is good news, although perhaps not everyone will agree. It means that by the time you reach old age – however defined – you have lived with yourself a long time and know how to cope with your own individual ways.

Some things in your life will have changed and others remain very much the same. If you liked swimming or playing bridge then, you probably do so now. Yes, there are some new challenges, but they are softened by new joys.

Growing older changes both our internal and external environment in subtle ways. But it can still be a lot of fun!

This post was initially published by Sixtyandme.com (see https://sixtyandme.com/old-age-not-another-country/)

They say that the older you get, the more difficulties you have sleeping. This may be true, but I have always had trouble sleeping, so for me it is nothing new.

I have read all the advice about how to avoid – or, at least, minimise – sleeping problems. No coffee after 2pm (in my case, no coffee at all), no daytime naps, no screens an hour before bedtime, and so forth.

None of them seem to help much. Or if they do help slightly, I still do not sleep well.

And then I discovered sleep apps, and they have made a huge difference.

The Device

Some people sleep with their smartphones, but I don’t like to do so. I am always afraid that it will go off. It is somehow not relaxing.

But long ago, I discovered – and fell in love with – the Apple iPod. This is a very simple and small device on which you can listen to music or podcasts, updated regularly via the computer.

This is otherwise known as an MP3 player.

It is wonderful for sleeping, and I never go to bed without it. You can put an earplug into one ear, with no problems of size or weight and hence not disturb a sleeping partner.

In the daytime, the iPod is useful for listening to the radio or podcasts while cooking or gardening.

Meditation Apps

I have been using meditation programmes for years and managed to find one or two that I work well. They encourage you to relax your muscles, to breathe in a deep and soothing way, and to focus on various matters that take your mind away from your day-to-day concerns.

Some work better than others. I find those that direct your mind to focus very specifically on some image or action work best. Very general suggestions don’t work so well for me, because my mind goes back to whatever is worrying it.

A number of meditation programmes emphasise that it is important not to try to achieve some particular end, but how do you try not to try? This is a conundrum. Sometimes contemplating what this means in practice puts me to sleep. Problem solved.

Sleep Stories

The most recent addition to this genre is the sleep story. This is a brilliant idea. Reading you a story that lulls you off to sleep, just like a small child.

There are a growing number of stories available on sleep apps. Some are old stories you may have read before, whether fiction or non-fiction. Some have been written expressly for the purpose.

A common theme is a travel story, taking you on a journey from one well known place to another or along a particular coastline or through especially lovely scenery.

Many are labelled by headings to suggest that they are not arousing or that it won’t matter that you never hear the end. All this is sensible.

What to Look for in a Sleep App

But the problem with sleep apps is that finding ones that suit is not as easy as one might think.

First, you need the person doing the talking to have a pleasant voice. Not raspy or too nasal. No strong and distracting accent. They need to be very mellow and gentle. Surprisingly, many are not.

Then you don’t want self-advertising. I found one meditation programme that I liked a lot, but every episode started with a long invitation to donate if you found it helpful. Plus where to do so.

Another informed the listener, with some excitement, that they had just produced a book and added where it could be bought.

If you know your system well, all these intrusions can be eliminated by a quick forward wind, but that is still annoying when you are trying to sleep.

Whether fiction or non-fiction, the stories need to succeed in the delicate balance of being neither too interesting nor too boring.

You might think the latter would be perfect, but it’s not – if you are too bored, you cease to listen and then start thinking of your own worries. But if it is too interesting, of course, you try to stay awake to hear how it all turns out.

I have found this a major dilemma and difficult to get right.

Another difficulty for me is, I also get annoyed if I think the story is badly written. I am an inveterate editor when I read books, newspapers, or any other writing, which sometimes distracts me from the content.

The same is true for sleep stories. Too many adjectives? You need an editor! I am awake.

And there are still other difficulties. One reader did a wonderful job of lulling me to sleep, only to add at the end of the reading that he hoped this had put me to sleep. His voice was so loud that it woke me up.

Another was probably recorded in a not completely sound-proof room. I could easily hear the sound of a distant doorbell. Perhaps he thought no one would notice. But I was immediately awake – was it mine or on the recording? At this hour, who could it be? It certainly made me jump, and it took a while to settle down.

Keep Trying

There are new sleep stories being developed each day. I will keep trying to find the app that works well and has none of the above annoyances.

If you suffer sleep problems, do give it a try.

This post was originally published by SixtyandMe.com (see https://sixtyandme.com/sleep-apps/)

When those of us who are over-sixty were young, there were very few ways of communicating with people who didn’t live nearby. There were handwritten letters (remember them?), there was the house phone, and, in an emergency, there was a telegram. Getting one of those was an event – often the source of panic.

Now, we are overwhelmed with choice. In addition to the traditional landline, there is the mobile phone and its accompanying written forms, like text and WhatsApp. In addition, via computer (or mobile phone), there is email.

And we can even see the person we are communicating with, if we want, using Skype (or similar apps) for discussions between two people, and Zoom and a number of equivalent apps for on-line meetings between many people.

Not to forget the numerous forms of social media, like Facebook and Twitter, but so many, many more. It has become so very much easier.

Or has it?

When to Use What?

We are now clearly spoiled for choice when it comes to communication. But this has brought in its wake a serious dilemma. When should you use text and when email? Are there social rules, or even conventions, for which is the most appropriate method for particular circumstances?

Perhaps it is a social gaffe to invite friends to dinner by text, but not by email. Perhaps thank-you notes should be sent only in writing.

I’m darned if I know.

Who Uses What?

But it is not simply when to use what medium but remembering who uses which one. If you get this wrong, you may not communicate at all.

Mobile Phones

I have never been comfortable with my mobile phone. The landline is fine and I use it all the time. But I have never got into the habit of doing the right thing with my mobile, leading to any number of problems.

First, I rarely carry it around, partly because it really doesn’t fit in most of my pockets. The best is the back pocket of my blue jeans, but you know where that lands when there is a call of nature. Or would, if I am not very careful.

Then there is the problem of whether it is turned on or off. I try to remember to put it on when someone is due to phone me, but I often forget. Various members of my family have been hugely frustrated on numerous occasions.

And then it goes off when I least want it to – the most embarrassing being the Evensong service in Lincoln Cathedral, where we were visiting a couple of years ago. And that turned out (when I checked later) to be a wrong number. I hadn’t even remembered that I had my phone with me.

I haven’t even mentioned, ensuring the phone is charged. I had that problem this very morning.

I have a friend who uses her mobile phone very diligently, but she says she never listens to her voice mails. So, I need to remember not to leave a message if I phone her, although that would be the natural thing to do.

Texts and WhatsApp

Text seems the most popular with people, complete with all the little abbreviations that I, in my old-fashioned way, find abhorrent. ‘For’ becomes 4, ‘you’ becomes U, ‘see’ becomes C and so forth. You probably know already.

I write everything out, as if I were about to be graded on my English by a high school teacher. It probably makes me look very prim.

On the other hand, I avoid writing texts altogether. They take too much time, typing out each letter at a time unless the phone can guess what I want to say. Most people know not to text me, if only because I never get the message until it is too late.

Texts and WhatsApp seem like the same thing to me but are completely different. My older grandson uses WhatsApp all the time but has never texted me in his life. Many others are the opposite.

I have no idea why, but I need to remember which friend does which.

Emails

My favourite means of communication is email, as I am comfortable on my computer and can write an email quickly. It does not feel gimmicky – just very straight-forward. Fortunately, most of my friends are the same.

But not everyone looks at their email every day. I know my husband doesn’t, and we have occasionally had worried phone calls from friends, checking that he is OK.

Video Communication

We have all become accustomed to Zoom meetings during the period of lockdown. I find them ok for meetings but prefer not to see friends when I am talking to them.

It is much more relaxing to lie on a bed while chatting by phone than sitting up carefully to look into a screen.

Social Media

For many of us, social media are unknown territory, best left to a younger generation. There are now so many different platforms – hands up those of you familiar with TikTok – that sorting them out is a nightmare.

But if you are active on, say, Facebook, how many of your friends can you assume have seen your postings? Do you send them the same information by email, just in case? Or is this considered overkill?

Trying to Keep Up

I guess I am not made for the modern world, although I do try to keep up as best I can. But keeping up with the disparate mindsets of my friends and family is a serious job. I have thought of setting up an excel spreadsheet to mark the best way to communicate with each person.

Do you have a better solution?

This post was first published by SixtyandMe.com

Do you experience enormous aggravation when things don’t work properly – and, more disturbingly, break down?

I don’t mean important things like your medication or even local transport. No, I mean the computers and numerous appliances on which we all increasingly rely.

At one point or another, they tend to exhibit some kind of technical malfunction and worse, much worse, stop altogether. They have hidden ways of making us suffer.

My house is full of technology that has been going haywire over the last few days, as if some evil spirit had cast a spell to irritate me on numerous fronts. It has certainly succeeded.

Telephones

First, there is my telephone system. Simple wireless handsets, bought four years ago from a good shop and made by a well-known Japanese manufacturer, are suddenly emitting frequent bleeping sounds (not rings) for no particular reason. I duly changed the batteries and they behaved themselves for one day, but the problem returned.

The company provides no phone number for assistance, but I tried an email helpline. After some days, I received a proposed ‘solution’ written in such obscure English that it was impossible to comprehend.

I am biding my time until some ’techie’ visitor can tell me what to do. I can at least work around it.

Dishwasher

Second, there is my very reliable German dishwasher, which has washed dish after dish with no problems for over 11 years. Suddenly, the electronic numbers on the front of the machine, which tell you how much longer the programme is supposed to run, seem to bear no resemblance to likely reality.

We put the machine on, it goes for 40 minutes, then it takes a rest with no lights and no explanation. At the point when we feel that it has stopped completely, the lights go on, it begins to work for a while, but stops before finishing the cycle. This can go on all night.

This makes a guessing game of whether our dishes are washed sufficiently to put them away. But we can live with it.

The manufacturer tells me that it might be a simple issue and is worth investigating. I have therefore called in an engineer.

Computer

But by far the worst is my computer, which has definitely got the upper hand over me, and has recently been showing me who is boss.

I opened it the other day only to find that every Excel document on the computer was blank. All data gone, from some old statistics to my current financial tally for what I owe my neighbour who has been shopping for me. Total panic.

Yesterday, the device decided that I shouldn’t be able to print anything. The printer, which has never caused me any problems, ceased to exist as far as the computer was concerned. If a printer does not show up on a computer, you cannot print. Great frustration.

And with all these difficulties, I decided I really must back up the computer, a task I have ignored for much too long. But my external disk drive was nowhere to be seen on the computer itself. Nothing much I could do but worry. Which I did, for sure. There were important documents to back up.

Luckily, there is an excellent technical advice service by telephone for this brand of computer and I have become very familiar with it. One of these days, I will be able to recite the number off by heart.

Each problem seems to take at least an hour to solve, don’t ask me why, but I did manage to get each of these difficulties resolved, one by one. It is all working now, and the lost data was mysteriously restored.

Of course, these were only minor problems next to what a computer can present you with. It can do all sorts of things to stop you using it, even when turned on, or – much worse – break down completely. Nowhere to write, no access to Google to look up information (including a helpline number), no incoming or outgoing emails.

I don’t know about you, but I feel lost altogether when this happens. Angry, frustrated, and at a complete loss.

Naming the Frustration

For years, I have felt that there should be a word for the absolutely gripping frustration we sense when our computers are down. It is like a kind of illness or, perhaps mental illness.

You become irritable, you can’t settle, and you can think of little else. You are definitely no fun to be around. It is something to do with the loss of connection to the rest of the world or, even stronger, loss of agency.

This afternoon, I decided to do something about this.

I wrote to my son, now a university teacher. He was always clever with words and has a number of languages under his belt. I suggested he might combine the word that would have meant computer in ancient Greek if they had such things, with a suitable word for emotional pain or grief.

He replied that the word hypologistes in modern Greek means a reckoner and algia is the usual ending for pain, like myalgia. So, the word might be something like ‘hypologistalgia‘.

But he suggested it might be better to go with the German instead and he came up with the word rechnerschmerz. Rechner, he wrote, is one word for computer (although modern Germans tend to use the English word computer), and schmerz means pain, including emotional pain (as in weltschmerz).

Rechnerschmerz – this sounded just right. German sometimes has a way of sounding like its meaning.

I now know what I am suffering from. Do you recognise cases when you have suffered the same malady?

(This was initially published by SixtyandMe.com)

Until we all went into lockdown – the ‘before’ period that feels like another time altogether – I used to love to eat out. Although I am a moderately good cook (and my husband a willing sous-chef), there is so much to be said for it.

Making an Occasion

First, it is such a nice way to make an ‘occasion’. We put on somewhat nicer clothes (and, for some restaurants, much nicer clothes) and feel we are already in a different-from-normal situation.

We are waited on, of course, and have the pleasure of choosing what we will eat that day. It is fun to choose different things from the menu and taste each other’s choices.

We can sit and talk for as long as we want, with someone bringing food or drink as needed. If it is somewhere with a view, so much the better.

New Dishes

Eating out also gives the chance to eat food we don’t normally eat – and sometimes I discover something I feel I could make at home. If I am keen on a dish, I will ask the chef how he or she makes it.

I also love the way some restaurants make food look especially inviting. We do that a little at home, but with much less of the flair – no swirls in the soup or parsley artfully scattered.

New Ideas

Sometimes, it is simply a matter of a new idea about food.

We once had an anniversary dinner at the Connaught Hotel in London, with its very special surroundings (a handsome room with wood panelling), and it then had a well-known female chef.

At the end of the meal, after a very delicious dessert, the waiter brought a simple basket of large dark Italian cherries. I would never have known it, but cherries are just the thing to settle the digestion after a large meal.

Every time I eat cherries, I think of that occasion.

Special Meals

I have some clear memories of particular meals, often served outdoors somewhere in Europe (or ‘on the continent’, as we say in England).

A totally unexpected platter of prawns, herbed vegetables, and garlic bread, beautifully laid out, provided by a very unpretentious hotel in the Basque area of Spain. It had no restaurant, but we had asked if they could rustle up something simple because we didn’t want to drive further that evening.

The seafood platter served on the terrace of a beautifully situated hotel in the French Alps, not far from Chamonix. The food was not only delicious but happened to be accompanied by a distant small avalanche within our view.

The seven-course vegetarian meal, each course more inventive than the last, in a restaurant in the Auvergne area of France. I love good vegetables, but they are so rare in good restaurants, as chefs usually focus on the meat.

To add to the surprise (we had chosen the place because it had a Michelin star), but when we arrived, they told us with regret that they had lost the star, but we had an out-of-date guide and therefore did not know that.

I could go on.

The Downside

But there are some things I don’t like at all about eating out. I don’t like the bowing and scraping of elegant waiters, asking constantly “Did you enjoy the meal?” Indeed, I don’t like that question in any restaurant. I don’t want my napkin placed into my lap when I sit down.

I don’t want a waiter pouring my wine or water every time I take a few sips. Indeed, one of our tests of a good restaurant is whether the waiter will desist from this, once we make it clear we prefer to pour our drinks ourselves.

Mutual Pleasure

Eating out should feel like there is a mutual pleasure between the restaurant staff and you, the customer. You may or may not meet the chef, but the person bringing the food should feel enthusiastic about it and greet your interest and comments with warmth, not formality.

Preferably, they make you feel that they want nothing better than to please you. Such restaurants are hard to find, but they are the ones we keep going back to.

In recent years, our favourite restaurant met all these criteria. The premises were not remotely fancy, but the food was perfectly cooked tapas of all kinds, brought to the table hot from the kitchen in whatever order it was cooked.

Because we ate there frequently, we got to know the people who ran it and could joke with them about all sorts of things. And then, a year ago, they told us the sad news that they were closing, as they wanted to move on to other activities.

We never managed to replace it.

All Change

But since Covid-19 has been upon us, we have not eaten out once. I don’t like the idea of being served by people in masks. It changes the nature of the occasion. Perhaps I will learn, but we haven’t tried.

One of life’s losses for the moment.