On exercising … or not. Time passing for us all.

 While we were in Portugal last week I got up almost every day and ran along the boardwalks on the very long Figueira beach. This week my exercise routine has been severely disrupted. On Sunday, last day of the chess tournament I got up early to make sure my chess-playing husband got himself to the playing venue on time. No running that day, although I did take myself off for a brisk walk later in the morning. On Monday we got up even earlier to have breakfast at 8.00 before being collected at 8.45 to drive to the airport at Porto. My only exercise was walking up and down the airport lounge. Mind you, as I have already commented the walk from Manchester terminal 3 arrivals to the tram stop was a sort of walking marathon on its own. Tuesday was just wet! And I did some fruitless trekking about on buses. Wednesday, Okay! I did get on my bike.  But yesterday I didn’t put more than the tip of my nose out of the door into the torrential rain! Not my most successful week exercise-wise. 

This morning, however, I got up and ran my usual round the village circuit in reasonably fine weather, noting as I ran that my favourite tree is now completely bare. 

 

Later, as the rain had set in, I abandoned my plan to accompany Phil to Uppermill where he had an appointment for a haircut. However, the day brightened up and he called me to suggest I walk up the hill to meet him, which I duly did. 

 

It was still very grey but nobody seems to have told the wild flowers that we’re already half-way through November.

Skimming the newspapers, avoiding the serious news, I spotted this headline: 

20 actresses we only remember being old, but they could’ve stolen your grandpa’s heart:

So I took a quick look and found myself thinking that surely some of those named are not old. Of course, Maggie Smith has been around forever, Judi Dench has played the Queen, and Jane Fonda was old enough (but never “old”) to be a role model in the days when I was buying her work-out book. But surely Diane Keaton (in those old Woody Allen films) and Susan Sarandon (forever the young woman in Thelma and Louise) aren’t old! But of course, they are of my generation and as such we have to accept that we are now the older ones. And actors are known to the younger generation for the roles they have played most recently, some of which I’ve not seen, not for the roles I remember them playing in their youth. And it’s not just the women; think of Alec Guinness, known to many simply as Obi-Wan Kenobi, in Star Wars, and even that is now an old film series. Or there is Ian McKellen, forever Gandalf. So it goes.

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone.