Bit of this I wonder if there...

[nedd]

Bit of this

I wonder if there is a correlation between the way people read books and longevity? Mrs T can't get into her new book but rather abandon it for another she prefers to "plod on". She is 94. No meals on wheels for her she cooks meat and 2 veg daily and irons towels and knickers. Puts the enormous beast of an ironing board away that I struggle to put up. She has a set routine and sticks to it with ruthless determination despite having painful joints. She won't let me unload the washing machine and kicks the wash basket from room to room when putting the washing on her radiators to dry. She only allows me to clean for her to keep her family happy. If a book fails to engage me with in the first 30 pages I nip to the end to suss out wether it's worth investing time in and have never ever ironed anything that was not worn for state occasions. (when I buy I do the scrunch up test, to see if the creases fall out quickly). She let slip today that he had been up a step ladder!

So does the plodder plod for longer?

Bit of that

Now gang

Don't put off tomorrow what can be enjoyed today.

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I think you are right. The generation that survived the wars are the healthiest we have ever seen and they live the longest. Surviving on a frugal diet (carefully balanced but severely rationed) wouldn't keep people fed for a couple of days today. Then add all the hard labour that most people had to do whether it was at war or keeping the country running.

Medicine may play a part but most people of that generation went yo the DR as a last resort. It really rei

I

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Oops - hit send by mistake

Was going to say, that their lifestyle should be adapted for modern day living - less damaging food and more hard physical work. Its obviously a good recipe for the human body.

In my case though, the hard physical exercise evades me. It took me 3 hours to clean the kitchen floor, and lower cupboards yesterday, its only 4x5 cuboards in size. This type of work doesn't leave me with a glow of a job well done, just aches and pains all over. Why do it then? It's on my functional exercise rota. It's a safe way for me to exercise my body in my own time, with as many stops as I need. I try not to renember the days when it took me 20 mins to do.

Which is exactly what Mrs T is doing, by continuing with her usual activity all these years she's maintaining her body at a physical level that she knows it can cope with. What's the alternative? Sitting in front of the telly knitting all day? She'll still have the aches and pains.

Aches and pains don't mean you stop doing things, it just means you have to be a bit crafty and inventive to find a way to carry on doing things.