mercury

You want to be a cat person? Here are a few pointers: Get used to being scratched when you want to stroke them Install a revolving door to outside, otherwise move your sofa closer to the door Be prepared to spend a small fortune on top of the range food which will be ignored the following week. Give your bed over to the cat. It's going to happen. Don't buy the cat its own. Learn to love dead or dying mice and birds. Beds are the cat's preferred burial site. Finally - never, ever, try dressing them up in stupid outfits. Same goes for dogs incidentally, but a cat will quite fairly take your hand off with its teeth if there's any justice. Cats are beautiful and if you're lucky, loving creatures. Try a slow blink with them and when they do it back it's wonderful.

Oh God Lily, you could be relating my story. We moved to Swindon from Birmingham over 30 years ago and have tried three or four U3A groups. In the end we were so depressed and disheartened we packed them all in. Nobody made us feel at home or suggested we sit with them or even wanted to chat. Our history group just sat round in a circle while the group leader asked various people to read from dusty travel books, there were no lively discussions about places we'd visited, no humour to speak of, and the few tentative suggestions we made were ignored. One elderly chap next to us did a crossword, another fellow slept through all the meetings - you'd think that would tell the leader something wouldn't you? When we go back to Brum for a visit, no matter what pub we pop into there's someone to have a laugh and a chat with. God, I miss my home town.

It's boorish behaviour, no excuse unless the house is on fire or the dog's been run over. What the hell's so special and urgent that people are unable to unglue themselves from their phones?

Why are you still spending money on people who are now adults? They obviously don't care about you even to ring to say thank you. Sorry to be so blunt but their behaviour says it all IMO. Save your card and present money and treat yourself perhaps to a meal and drinks with friends instead, Seriously. Grandparents don't have to be guilt tripped into this.

Oh definitely. Anything rather than cause a nationwide uproar about, children in Africa being forced to mine for mobile phone metals, or FGM or fox hunting or, I don't know - Asian grooming gangs.

Isn't romantic love the whole point of the day? It's not about loving your cat or your stamp collection.

Absolutely not. I'm healthy, fit and wouldn't dream of having a vaccine that's been rushed through and untested. I know nobody in my area who has died so far of Covid and suspect that many reported deaths are of other diseases which leave people vulnerable to the virus which certainly isn't the same as "dying from Covid".

Absolutely agree Shelfie. Well done for expressing what many agree with, but are too lilly livered to vocalise. The programming has been going on for a while now. drip by insiduous drip. It is indeed fascism of the left and I'm just glad I'll be dead and gone by the time things turn really ugly and today's kids become tomorrow's Nazis.

Yes. By all means let's muzzle any signs of patriotism and bend the knee to liberal UK-haters - makes perfect sense to me. On the other hand, Proms attendees could just sing along whether or not the orchestra is "instructed" to stop playing, if indeed they have the guts..

No, not if you don't care if they are at risk out in the open among crowds, by all means wander about regardless. Otherwise, do as you are instructed and be protected. It's not a difficult decision if you want to live.

Only if Ian Fleming wrote the character as female - oh, wait - he didn't.

and this would be enforced how exactly?

Certainly. Wolf whistling, avoiding the word black, accidentally touching anyone, banning personal pronouns - I'm all for it. Anything to ignore tackling trivial things like FGM, slave trafficking, Asian grooming gangs and black youths stabbing people.

I can't think of anything more stressful than having to watch every mouthful I eat, worry about which cutlery goes with which course, terrified in case I knock over a wine glass and attempting to make polite chit chat with my neighbour who, let's face it, would have nothing in common with me.

Does anyone know how many weeks this is? I'm assuming two weeks but it doesn't give details.

Only if I could keep my liberty bodice on.

Heaven forbid we should use negative words to precious children. They're all special, beautiful, lovely, well behaved and oh yes - any sporting events must allow all participants to be winners, even if they're patently 100 metres behind everyone else. No wonder today's young people think themselves above the law and entitled to the world.

It's so easy to look back with nostalgia isn't it? Every generation has probably said exactly the same - that life in their youth was better. The fact is, many things were far worse than today. Men slaving in mines and filthy factories and going home to just a tin bath by the fire, women with no rights who were used as skivvies, overcrowded slums, poor hygiene etc. The cosy footage of smart parents and upright neatly dressed children sitting round a fire listening to the wireless may have been the norm for some middle class families but certainly not for many others. We tend to cherry pick the pleasant memories, long hot summers (was that ever so?) and cheery bobbies, no "evil" predators preying on children, contented adults happy with their modest "lot". I can almost hear the Hovis music .......

How will that work then? Is every home going to have CCTV installed in every corner? Tell me how you discipline a child who's too young to understand reasoning?

We've HAD the final say! It was called a referendum. Let it go for God's sake and let's get out before we all die of prevarication.

Don't know and don't care, but did you know they use apricots and not oranges as the filling?

Women should not be placed in top positions because they're women. They should be there on merit and achievement and ability to carry out the role. If they can't, they shouldn't be there - simple. Same goes for inept men.

Why the hell would anyone use margarine, it's vile and butter's not expensive any more.

That's a ridiculous idea IMO. Fat people are now re-named cuddly, curvy, plus-size, as if by giving them a cosy non-threatening label we ignore their weight problems. It's no longer shameful to be obese, huge wobbly young people have taken over our town centre, bulging out of tight ugly clothes and flaunting their rolls of lard like trophies to revel in. Toddlers should be educated to eat healthily by schools if their own parents are too ignorant to do it.

If women are paid the same as male soldiers, carry the same rank and have the same training then I see no reason why they shouldn't face similar dangers on the frontline. Otherwise, their pay should reflect their safer option, whatever that might be. Women are always moaning about equality, well they can't be expected to pick and choose their battles (no pun intended).

Dying comes pretty high on my list.

I'm not a fan of romantic films but if I had to choose I'd go for Ghost. It's got everything - love interest, the supernatural, comedy, baddies, a ridiculously enormous loft space, a pottery master class... what's not to like?

Totally agree with Celtwitch. Well said.

I think they're horrible sickly gooey things. Apart from the rare nut filled one, they all taste the same to me and I'd never buy them, even when the tins were larger. I love proper chocolate though.

No - the answer to obesity is to eat less fat and sugar and stick to sensible meal portions. Combine it with exercise and you lose weight. It's not complicated, just requires self discipline.

If they're paid the same as fighting men then they should be subjected to the same conditions and that includes fighting abroad.

How can it be wrong to spend your own hard earned cash rather than leave it for your children? They don't have a right to your money.

Of course grammar's important! How can you even ask? We're now in a position where some English teachers are unable to spell or punctuate properly, so what chance for their pupils? English is a tricky language to learn and I do sympathise with people who struggle with apostrophe usage and the various ways to spell words that sound the same but surely we should aim higher than to just say who cares, and "as long as people understand me."

There's always been an inclination for people to look back with fondness to earlier years and muse that it was a "better" or "friendlier" era. True enough perhaps for the rich, but the Victorian age was a nightmare for poorer folk, the 1940s must have been a terribly stressful and deprived time for many, the 1950s may seem to have been a simpler time but families still lived, many of them, in back to back houses and shared toilet facilities and communal back yards. Every era has had its positive and negative repercussions and looking back with rose tinted spectacles I think is to simplify living conditions. There has always been crime, child abuse, murders and thievery, there have always been wars and poverty and prostitution. Most people in the Western world now have warmth and food and a reasonable standard of living. Materially speaking most of us have holidays, electronic knick knacks, plenty of clothes, one or two cars per family and nice homes. There's no such thing as an ideal time to live IMO. Memory is selective and I think we tend to block out the undesirable or miserable reminiscences from our childhoods.

I think it's their unfounded belief that everyone within earshot is remotely interested in their drivel, which they deliver in an intrusively loud voice just to make sure none of it is private.

No - most pregnant women should be given contraceptive advice.

Dogs are slaves At your command. They squirm and roll, They lick your hand. Dogs die of love If you should leave – Refuse to eat And whine and grieve. Dogs only ask To be thrown sticks, Ingratiating With their tricks. Man’s fragile self Loves sycophants, And how well dogs This self enhance. But take a cat – A slave to none, A haughty Enigmatic one. You give, it takes, Secure in grace – And in my heart A special place.

Page 3 is no longer shocking or a cause for moral outrage, sadly. When so-called celebrities flaunt their half naked (and naked) plastic bodies all over the papers and attend award ceremonies with most of their flesh on display, we do no more than glance. At least the Sun is honest enough to display these women openly as simple titillation (no pun intended). As for people who seem to think the women are being exploited and objectified - if they can show me proof they have been tortured, drugged, forcibly coerced or blackmailed into posing I'll be the first to complain. In what way are their career choices, tacky as they might be, different from a woman shoving her silicone naked oily bum in our faces or a has-been soap star wearing a dress cut down to her navel?