The Quest

Life is driven by the need to answer questions. The trick is understanding the nature of the question and then determining how much you really do want to know the answer. I am a curious, maybe trending to a nosy type, with an insatiable appetite for information. I panic sometimes when I feel my ability to store and retrieve information is dimming from what I remember, on good days, as a once brilliant radiance. I have days now when I can’t remember the simplest word or person’s name. Having a grandmother and aunt who had severe Alzheimer’s, albeit in their 80s, is probably what makes me feel this more acutely than most. Forgetfulness increasing with old age seems to be the human norm. It might be hubris, but I intend to fight this all the way.

My success with losing weight (basically just getting my tiring body off the seat and moving forward at a pretty good lick) has inspired me to greater achievements in other parts of my life. I want to achieve very desperately. Perhaps it will be a sign of my independence but it is also one of the few things I feel able to work on and succeed. I want to be fit when the average woman of my age is complaining of their ailments; and I want to be productive when they are retired and idling. It is how I want to be remembered.

The quest for the questions is my theme. I enjoy the answers but the quest is the thing that drives me on. Competing. I had no idea that I was so competitive.

Oi!

I was ‘Oi-d’ today.

I don’t like being hailed with an ‘Oi’; so I ignored it, and continued my walk, listening to the music on my iPod. As I had my sunglasses on, I considered myself almost invisible. After three more ‘Ois’ I was ready for a set-to. I turned into the sun to face my assailant… and almost burst out laughing…
The section of path was on a bit of an incline and I was still striding along at a fair lick (for me anyway). Nothing was going to interfere with that. This is 2015 – And I mean business! The sight of the scruffy looking guy on a bike coming up behind me made me laugh because he was struggling to manage the small bike that he might have nicked from a neighbour’s kids, and I was going faster than he was! Hehe.  Back to the music.

The correct expression – you almost growing-a-moustache, scruffy Herbert, is “Passing on your left.” It is definitely not ‘Oi’.