The Age-Well Project

EAT CHEESE, READ BOOKS, LEARN A LANGUAGE, DRINK TEA

Did you eat a lot of cheese over Christmas and New Year? Well, panic not. Turns out cheese is an age-well food. In fairness we were bigging up cheese as a delicious longevity food, years back, as you can read here. The latest study suggests that cheese can lower our dementia risk – although no...

Art, peanuts and Dick Van Dyke: ageing well at Christmas

And all of a sudden – it’s almost Christmas! Another year of ageing well, for us all, we hope. The festive photo of Annabel and I above shows us flanking a Christmas tree decorated by our friend, artist Amy Robson. She handmade the dolls that decorate the tree. Making by hand, crafting in any form,...

THE CURIOUS POWER OF JOURNALLING

Do you keep a journal? Many of us do. Indeed, I do. Over the last couple of months I’ve become obsessed with reading the published diaries of writers and artists. These have included the diaries of English writer Sylvia Townsend Warner, the collected diaries of Australian writer Helen Garner, the war diaries of Simone de...

Should we worry about ‘digital dementia’?

The first time I came across the term ‘digital dementia’, it gave me pause. I spend a lot of time coaching people to reduce their risk of dementia, working to reduce my own risk, talking and writing about the topic. It takes up a lot of space in my brain! But am I causing long-term...

WHY WALK IN WINTER?

I’ve just spent a month working in the Swiss Alps (yes, I know, lucky me!). As my accommodation was at the bottom of a valley surrounded by mountains, and as I had no car and there was no bus service on the valley floor, I spent a lot of time climbing a lot of mountains....