People (young people) wonder why older adults become *grumpy old men/women well I can tell you It's things like this.

People will often say oh such and such is no age, well clearly it is to *Officials* Presumably as many over 50's now care for their grandchildren so that parents can work, they can all look forward to *officials* with clipboards risk assessing their homes.

Last year I had a radiator replaced in my sitting room, the young man who came to do it declared he had brought the wrong one, couldn't put it in, and would have to return the following week with a new one. I asked why. informed him that it didn't matter if it was a little smaller, however, he then informed me that he would ask * the office* if it was ok to install it. It turned out that the valve was at the bottom and he had been instructed not to put radiators like that in the homes of the elderly.

I was 57

cool eh?

It would seem that climate change has wrought serious changes to the fauna in my street, and the birds have become sick as parrots.

Seriously though, Isn't it lovely to see something so lovely and so humerous. It made my day!

Richard Ottoway is not my MP, he is the MP for the bottom of the hill. My MP is Tom Brake. Now I am sure that Tom Brake is not to everyone's taste However , as MP for Carshalton and Wallington, in addition to pursuing the Lib Dem agenda, and supporting his constituents, Tom lives in Carshalton and travels from local stations each day to Westminster. As a commuter he has worked very hard to improve the lot of his fellow commuters. Andrew Pelling however, MP for Croydon South, does not travel in the manner of many o constituents. That would be because his home is not in Croydon South, it is in Westminster, so presumably he uses his shoes ( no doubt Church's, Loake, Barker, Barbour, Cheaney or Gant.) to walk to the Houses of Parliament. But I hear you say, he will have a home in leafy Croydon South, from where he, at the weekend will visit pensioners, open fetes, and do whatever he feels he ought to do to be seen, and re-elected. Sadly no.

Richard Ottaway is under the impression that he is too good for this place, and has his second home in some 7.8 miles away by google maps. Being some 7.8 miles away from his constituency and some 22.1 miles from his place of work, he has incurred some expenses.

Not a duck island, not a moat, but ludicrous nevertheless.

My main question is, why, when we all eat every day, are MPs allowed to claim £400 a month for food, , and why, in the age of the food police, do they not have to provide receipts for that money. Surely if this is in addition to what normal people eat every day and pay for themselves, someone should be checking out that this food paid for by the government is healthy, after all we wouldn't want them using our money for anything high fat, or high sugar, or in any way unsuitable.

Anyway, Richard Ottoway, I hope you enjoy your garden this weekend, I, and everyone else in the country paid enough for it.

I am in tears this morning, listening to the coverage of the D-Day anniversary on radio 4.

One of the comments that has been made is that as time goes by these commemorations are more not less important. When I was a child many of my friends had fathers who had been in the forces during the 2nd World War. Mine had been in a reserved occupation and had been in the Home Guard. One of my friends used to laugh at her father who wore his North African shorts during the hot weather.We were their children, their stories were something that came out every time they met.

They were dads, in the 1950's we loved our dads, but by the 1960's they were old (younger than I am now) , and it was a new world.

Thankfully (and maybe fuelled by the History channel and saturday afternoon films) many of this generation have more respect, or maybe we have as we have got older learned more respect.
e)
Moreover

As I watch those old grey haired men hug one another my 21 year old son comes into the room , and I realise (not for the first time) that 65 years ago those old men were like he is now.

and a quiet tear trickles down the side of my nose.

thank you Tweetminsterfor this

sometimes when the authorities get it wrong it is hard to believe. In fact what is hard to understand here is that no one checked these letters before they were sent out.

However

As we all have surnames originating from something that was noticeable about us ( my own name means *over the hill_* - how apt) perhaps Hull are staring a new allocation of surnames bases o our present idiosyncracies, In that case I guess I can expect to get a letter addressed Mrs Fatbellybigboobs,

Don't we have enough home grown bigots and idiots, have we really reached the stage where we have to import them from somewhere else.

do you tweet,

a dawn chorus of Croydon Twitterers

Lloyds TSB and governemnt money

In January there was a campaign to get people to take up a child tax credit that many were owed . I applied and amazingly i qualified. Much to my excitement I qualified, and on Saturday I got a cheque , not for a vast amount but for enough to do a few nice things.

Yesterday I hoy footed it over to the bank - Lloyds TSB I paid in the cheque , had a little banter with the counter assistant, and left. Lloyds have, in the past been very good with cheques, if there has been no doubt that it was good then you had no problem acessing it. Imagine therefore my surprise , when i noted last evening that, although the amount had been credited to my account I could not access it because the cheque had not cleared.

So is it the case that

Lloyds bank does not believe that HMRC are good for an amount of less than £1000

or

Lloyds needs the benefit of my money



Do I need a more secure bank , If so where the hell do I find one !!!!

The other day I needed to order a couple of things from e buyer and i noticed that they were selling grab bags for a fiver.So I added one to the order, and today it came .

For my fiver I got 5 items,

some earphones (bass boosted - not really my thing)
A usb powered fan
a mouse mat
a universal remote control
and a special zipped case for my sat Nav

Well I said that it would be worth a punt

This is one for the drivers of Croydon.n
South of Croydon town centre yesterday morning there was gridlock, caused not by the snow and ice , but bydriver's seeming inability to use one of these.

It's a box junction people, the reason that you are not supposed to enter it until your exit is clear is to keep traffic moving. If you sit in it nothing can move.