Report in today’s paper claims that

• around 85% of women aged 50+ spend more than £1000 on their summer wardrobe
• 54% take up to 10 outfits for a weeks holiday
• 56% take five pairs of shoes
• 91% take an average of five handbags.

So as not to disappoint please note that I might bring one spare pair of shoes and I have to bring one of my only two handbags for my books and notebook for the plane.   And I’ve bought nothing new at all.

<--- Sandra

Giselle could feel aching in her soul, not like a heart attack or gastritis, nor was it physical like her monthlies. She wanted something more here and now. It seemed ironic to her, a great reader, that she had never experienced this intense discomfort before taking up the works of Doris Lessing’s later period, which led her to revisit Gurdjieff and see…

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<--- Bill <--- Sissy <--- Gita

The ghost of his grandfather looking remarkably young and fit, and wearing his holiday uniform spoke to him in a withering way, saying, “Why should you get to…

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<------ Daniel



The world around him whirled like a Category 5, steel beams turning to snow, Graham's face reforming and his body shrinking. Clara -- was that really Clara -- started to fade, her voice more distant than before.



"Graham, our last night together . . . well . . . I'm pregnant," were the last words he heard as the tunnel engulfed him.



The pull was strong, sucking… Continue

<--- Salvatore Buttaci



Graham wished for an easy solution like changing the channel halfway through a movie to which one had lost the thread, or perhaps never even picked it up from the beginning, but there was no answer coming from outside his mind. Here he stood amidst many ghosts calling him to responsibility, or perhaps merely trying to spook him out in the way an old rival might play devil’s… Continue

<--- Adam Fine



He knew well enough. He had drunk himself through this experience twice before, and had in fact been expecting Clara to return again this holiday. The question was only a formality, and he felt he would soon be easing into her visit in a much more subtle way than his fat cat was ever able to muster. Graham had spent the early days of December wishing for a return to his past,… Continue

<------------- Bill





Carol singers? Nasty enough for a man of Graham’s Scrooge-like temperament. But the scarlet stains in the snow seemed to deny that, and although the bloke at their head (NOT the one Graham had thrown) looked Biblical enough – long beard and ground-draping cloak – the half dozen followers looked anything but festive – and no, their hands weren’t clasped in prayer but were ...… Continue

Decorating the Christmas tree, passing on an ugly wooden squirrel statue by hiding it in the next family member’s house when you visit, or playing cards on the third Thursday of the month are all time-honored memories to somebody. Tradition is doing what you’ve always done because that’s what you’ve always done. Some people scoff at tradition and the ties that bind…

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On Saturday we head south to Kent for two weeks in a tent, in the grounds of a Carmelite priory.

The Priory prides itself as “a venue for a gathering” and ‘gather’ is what some two hundred and fifty BSAs will undoubtedly do.

However, the beer tent and nightly music (and no night is complete without at least one rendering of ‘Mustang Sally’) would seem to be incompatible with its claim to also be “a place of peace”.



In the second half… Continue

OR HOW TO STAY OUT OF THE DOGHOUSE

Hilarious.

My University gifted staff and faculty with furlough days - what's your boss getting for the holidays?

Peace, Linda