Useless, depressed and ugly? Let’s hear it for Kurt Cobain!

 I came across a somewhat depressing little piece on Google’s highly commendable Ageism Alert. According to a blogger called Julian of ‘The Tattler’ (sic), ‘there are nine known major stereotypes that reflect prejudice towards senior citizens: Illness, impotency, ugliness, mental decline, mental illness, uselessness, isolation, poverty, depression’. I don’t want to be accused of ageism in reverse but I know a good many young people to whom those labels would fit very well.

Like so many other prejudices in life, the antipathy towards older folk is mostly born out of fear. Young people know they will inevitably have to face the negative features of growing old at some stage (completely overlooking the positives) but by ridiculing those who have already arrived at that time of life they can pretend it will never happen to them.

There is also the element of difference which is at the root of so many human prejudices I liked a story from another blogger who said that when he turned 60 he had more time to focus on his passion for rock music. He wanted to go to a live gig but fearing the trendy young things would poke fun at him, he had a T-shirt made bearing one of Kurt Cobain’s more memorable sayings: ‘You laugh because I’m different. I laugh because you’re all the same’. Says it all, really.

Bums up for sexy Sian Lloyd

A big thumbs up for Sian Lloyd, the BBC weather girl, who frequently provides Britain’s mature males (and probably the less mature ones as well) with a ridge of high pressure, not to mention the occasional warm front. Ms Lloyd gets my personal accolade not just for being voted Rear of the Year at the age of 49 but also for her confident assertion that ‘Fifty is the new 30′.

In winning the top bottom award, Sian joins such posterial luminaries as Felicity Kendall, Lulu and Anneka Rice. After revealing she is a keen skier, swimmer and walker, she gave a dash of hope to the rest of us mere mortals by adding: ‘I eat like a pig and can’t stand the gym but I do look after myself – I’d be groomed even if I worked in a supermarket’. Which goes to prove yet again that this ageing lark really is just a case of mind over matter. So don’t let the bottom drop out of your world; give the bums down to ageist doom-mongers wherever they rear their miserable heads.

Sex over 60 – stating the bleedin’ obvious

One of John Cleese’s many memorable lines in Fawlty Towers was a typically waspish dig at his wife, Sybil, for ’stating the bleedin’ obvious’. That phrase sprang immediately to mind when I came across a full page article in The Times this week headlined ‘Sex, sexuality and the over 60s’. Under a sub-heading, ‘Ground-breaking study of 3,000 people’, the article drew on a survey of 3000 Americans aged from 57 to 85 in the ‘ultra respectable New England Journal of Medicine’, and came up with such earth-shattering conclusions as ’sex looms large in the lives of the over-60s’ and ‘age plays a smaller part in sexual activity than attitude. You are as young, and sexy, as you feel’.

 Amazing, stunning, utterly incredible. What will these gods of medical knowledge reveal to us next? I can hardly wait for them to pour out more of their transcendental wisdom. In the meantime I’ll carry on with my life, eternally grateful to them for confirming what I and millions like me knew all along – that feeling horny doesn’t disappear as soon as the grey hairs appear – despite the ‘Old people having sex jokes’ that were printed alongside The Times article. My two favourites were Joan Rivers ‘It’s so long since I’ve had sex that I’ver forgotten who ties up whom’ and George Burns ‘Sex at 90 is like trying to shoot pool with a rope.’ Boom, boom. 

My night of Fame with Hendrix, Bowie – and Gunnell.

A friend of mine took me to a Georgie Fame gig the other night. For those of you who weren’t around in the 60s, Georgie was – and still is – one of the coolest guys around. Now 64 and slightly greyer round the edges, Georgie has lost nothing – and I mean nothing – in terms of his ability to please, tease and occasionally mesmerise an audience.  Only a couple of hundred or so gathered together at the somewhat bizarre venue, Hampton open air pool, and for virtually the whole of the evening, rain poured down on the picnicking fans, turning meals mushy, sandwiches soggy, and white wine into spritzer, but there was a whiff of magic in the air as Georgie hunched over his keyboard and belted out his unique blend of jazz, blues and ballads.

As he delighted the faithful with classic hits like, Yeh, Yeh, the Ballad of Bonnie and Clyde and Get Away, what stood out for me was the fact that his voice is as powerful as ever and his enthusiasm and ability to hold an audience – even when they are soaked to their smalls – has not dimmed one iota. And his performance was greatly enhanced by some fascinating story telling between the songs.

There was a never-ending stream of tales based around hanging out with Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie and other giants of the 60s music scene but it was revelations about his late manager, Rik Gunnell, that really made compulsive listening. To say Gunnell was something of a character would be like saying the Pope gets religious now and then. Gunnell was a self-made entrepreneur who gave early breaks to the Rolling Stones, the Who and the Animals, ran trendy clubs, promoted rock festivals, made money his god and mixed with the kind of people who would bury you under the M1 if you looked at them the wrong way.

Georgie makes no secret of the fact that he lived the whole sex ‘n drugs ‘n rock ’n roll thing to the max. In fact when I was at university in Leeds in the 60s I knew a young lady whose claim to Fame was that she and Georgie had crossed more frontiers than Dr Who when they ended up in a phone box together one night. Come to think of it, I’m surprised Georgie never wrote a song about it. But then again maybe he did. Bearing in mind the lady in question bore a close resemblance to one of Gunnell’s gangster buddies, perhaps he based the lyrics of (Gotta) Getaway on that particular close encounter.

What the f… does age have to do with it?

I came across a great acronym the other day. After I had frantically searched for my car keys for ages and then discovered they were in my pocket all the time, I joked to a friend of mine that I had just had a senior moment. ‘More like a “craft” moment’, she replied. When I asked what that signified, she looked surprised. ‘It’s a ruder variation of senior,’ she said. It stands for “Can’t Remember A Fucking Thing!” ‘

Does anyone know any other witty acronyms, not necessarily connected to age? We’re offering a prize of a trip to a Zimmers concert for the best response. Second prize is two trips! (only joking; we love you really, Zimmers)

Is Viagra hardening hearts and minds?

I was fascinated by the fact that The Sunday Times magazine recently devoted its front cover and six inside pages to what it called ‘Viagony and the ecstasy’, an evaluation of the social changes that Viagra has made since it first thrust itself to the forefront of our collective consciousness nine years ago. One of the main themes of the article was the suggestion that modern man’s ability to achieve chemically-induced erections at will is having an adverse effect on heterosexual relationships because of the emphasis on penetration, performance and prolonging the sexual act and the concomitant decrease in communication and the celebration of the human mind as the most erotic part of the body.

To me the debate should be seen in a far wider context which The Sunday Times chose to ignore, namely the medical profession’s drive to offer us a pill for every human ‘defect’, both physical and mental. If you believe what you read in the papers, you will soon be able to pop a pill to cure shyness, baldness, addictions, obsessions, negative thinking, many major illnesses and other faults and imperfections which the test tube brigade are no doubt working on at this very moment. There are those who react instinctively by bracketing such instant cure-alls with genetic engineering and body part replacement, dismissing any positive aspects by suggesting the whole pill therapy business smacks of Frankenstein syndrome.

 There is certainly a danger that the quest for physical and mental perfection is making neurotics of us all, leading us to become compulsive seekers of an impossibly flawless self-image that can never be fulfilled. As against that, anything that can lessen misery and suffering, however trite the problem might seem, can surely not be a bad thing. In the end it is all a question of balance. Being human means living with something less than perfection but more than mediocre acceptance.

BBC’s treatment of Nick Ross is an ageist crime

The BBC have put themselves well and truly in the firing line by removing Nick Ross from his 23-year tenure as frontman for Crimewatch. Although it has not been officially stated, there is apparently little doubt that the Beeb consider Ross to be past his sell-by date at the age of 59. The fact that Ross has become something of a national institution has not been taken into account; neither have Ross’s charisma, charm and amazing ability to cheat the years, all of which are surely major factors in attracting and retaining viewers. It is the powers at the BBC who should be appearing on Crimewatch, charged with carrying out a monstrous exercise in ageism.

Ageism makes London’s Olympic logo a no-go

Former Olympic champion Seb Coe, or Lord Coe as he is now known, put his athlete’s foot in it when he said that the controversial logo for the London Olympics in 2012 was designed for its street cred and was aimed at younger people. I am surprised that chairman of the Olympics organising committee strayed into the murky waters of ageism because that is exactly what his sentiments represent.

 Ironically, a recent poll of younger people showed that 68 per cent think the logo is awful. I wonder what those in the more mature age groups think? If Coe wanted to alienate the older members of our society he has certainly made giant strides in that direction. The man who was arguably our greatest middle distance runner spoke about the logo’s ability to unite the nation but he is on the wrong track this time.

More sex please, I’m sixty!

I came across this extraordinary column in The London Paper, one of the capital’s freesheets, the other day. The column is entitled ‘Gay girl about town’ and the heading for that particular day was ‘ Strip off, strap on’. I’m no prude but I have to say I was suprised by the explicit content, especially as TLP would presumably describe itself as a mianstream family newspaper. The writer chronicled her lesbian exploits, using a certain type of sex aid, in fairly graphic detail. To be honest, I am amazed such a column has been given house room; it’s not even good journalism.

Reading this tawdry little attempt at grabbing readers by shocking them set me thinking about what the response would be to a column featuring sex among the over sixties. I’m willing to bet the reaction would be far stronger than anything the lesbian meanderings could drum up. The truth is that sex at a certain age is still considered something to brush under the carpet. It’s also true that when you reach that time of life your sex drive doesn’t just go AWOL; in fact, given that you have more free time on your hands and less life pressures, the dormant libido often returns more potently than ever. I know that’s true in my case; in fact I think I’ll ring the editor of The London Paper and suggest he ditches the lesbian and lets me have a shot.  I could give Bryan Adams anthem ’Summer of 69′ a whole new meaning…

The Zimmers – you’ve been framed?

I am gratified to see that there has been a world-wide response to The Zimmers releasing a single which is a re-worked version  of The Who’s My Generation. The Zimmers were featured in the final programme of the recent BBC three-part series Power to the People highlighting the isolation of old people who feel marginalised by society. Any publicity drawing attention to this blot on our national landscape can only be a good thing but I seriously question whether The Zimmers will achieve what they set out to do – or exactly the opposite.

 The combined age of the 40 members of the band is 3000, with the lead singer, Alf, a wel-preserved 90. However, if I am brutally honest, watching them perform made me cringe. Old people singing Who songs are simply not cool; if anything their rather contrived rendition of this classic rock song reinforces stereotypes. I’m all for breaking down age barriers and taboos but, realistically, there are limits. Growing old disgracefully is something to be encouraged but am I the only one feeling more than a little uneasy about The Zimmers?