As a seventy-three-year old it really cheers me up whenever I hear about yet another way we old people are being looked out for by wiser heads; when these experts come up with yet another wheeze that will help me squeeze out a few more years of life.

The latest of these wiser heads to advise we coffin-dodgers on the best way to keep both our feet on the ground, and not six feet under it in the aforementioned coffin, can be found at the Royal College of Psychiatrists. This learned body recommends that the safe limits for alcohol consumption by older people should be drastically cut, and that anyone over the age of sixty-five should confine their intake to 1.5 units a day. Why this should be has left me a little confused as I have been consuming a bottle of wine a day, which is about 10 units, since I was sixty-five, and I’m still above ground and in fairly reasonable nick.

Personally I would have thought that psychiatrists would have been better confining themselves to what is going on in people’s heads and leaving what is going on in their bodies to those better qualified, but then my brain is very old now and probably no longer capable of rational thought. The psychiatrists’ advice also begs the question: ‘Why would anyone want to go on living beyond age sixty-five if they are confined to only 1.5 units of alcohol a day?’ I certainly wouldn’t. However these are not things I need concern myself with: the brainwork has already been done, the calculations made, the decision arrived it, the sound advice given.

More sound advice was given to me only a couple of weeks previously when I was told that all my years of eating five pieces of fruit and veg a day was fruitless (apart from all the fruit I’d been consuming of course) and that the correct amount is seven. Again the report said that older people would benefit most by this increase. People who would definitely not benefit are those who happen to be standing anywhere near an old person who has consumed an apple, a banana, an orange, and portions of carrots, peas, turnips and sprouts, as such an old person will be farting for England, if they’re anything like me and have only occasional control of their gaseous emissions.

The following day I was warned in the Saga Magazine, which I’d picked up at the dentist’s, where I’d gone to have my teeth checked in readiness for the extra acid they would have to cope with from the seven pieces of fruit and veg a day, to ‘Watch out for dehydration!’ Apparently, because of physical changes, older adults are more prone to dehydration. To deal with this the  advice was to drink plenty of fluid, even if you don’t feel thirsty, because if you’re not getting enough water you’re not going to be as sharp and your energy will suffer.

I’m afraid I had to take a piss on – sorry, a Freudian slip there – a pass on that one; with the state of my waterworks dehydration is what I’m looking for, not trying to get rid of. A ten mile walk in the Sahara? Bring it on. At least I won’t have to stop for a wee every ten minutes. Of course my prostate condition applies to many, many other old people too. I would have thought an organisation like Saga would know that. Still I’m sure they meant well.

As did the perpetrators of a recent article in the newspaper that advised ‘Laughter is strong medicine for both the body and the mind. It helps you stay balanced, energetic, joyful, and healthy at any age, but especially in old age when you are more prone to depression’.

I was feeling a bit down at the time and decided to avail myself of some of this strong medicine. But where to obtain it? I noted that  Live at the Apollo, a stand-up comedy show I sometimes watch, was on TV. I switched on. Michael McIntyre was in full flow. I watched for a couple of minutes. It made me so depressed that I opened another bottle of ten units of wine.

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