2young2retireUK

Do you know your friends on Facebook and Twitter better than you know your neighbours?

I was leaving my house the other day when I saw Lynsey, my next door neigbour, hobbling down her path on crutches, with her leg in plaster.  I, naturally, asked her what had happened to her and it turned out that she'd fallen downstairs and broken her leg quite badly - it had been pinned and plated and all kinds of things.  And she'd had the accident 8 weeks ago!  She'd been hobbling around on crutches for 8 weeks and I had absolutely no idea!

So this article by Hazel Davis - I've got 668 'friends' on Facebook... but I don't know any of my neighbours - struck a chord with me when I read it this morning (ironically, after following a link to it from someone I know on Twitter).

How about you?  Do you know your neighbours and what's going on in their lives?  Or do you know more about your friends on Facebook and Twitter?

A supportive website for widows

I found a useful-looking website for widows this morning - www.widowspath.com.  It has helpful weblinks, a blog, articles and, if you join (it's free), you get a free ebook entitled: Grief Loss Guide for Widows.  An audio version of the book is also available.

Don't forget to take time off from your relationship if you want it to thrive in retirement

Do you worry about you and your partner getting under each others' feet once you both retire?

Gay Hendricks is a psychologist, writer and practitioner in the field of personal growth and relationships and is best known for his work in relationship enhancement. In his latest book, The Big Leap, he advises:

'Make sure you take plenty of time for yourself, in a space apart from your partner.  It could even be in the next room, so long as the intention is to nurture the independent part of you.  Human beings have twin drives of equal power: the urge to merge and the urge to be an autonomous person.  For a relationship to thrive, both drives need to be celebrated.

If you can learn to take time off from the relationship consciously, you won't need to do it unconsciously by starting arguments and engaging in other intimacy-destroying moves.'

Top traits that really turn us off

I've just been over to visit with my Blogging Boomer friends at LifeTwo and couldn't help laughing when I spotted these two little gems:

Top men’s traits and behaviors that turn off women

Top women’s traits that turn off men

I'm not a man, so obviously I can only comment on the traits and behaviours that turn off women, but I'd say they've got it pretty spot on!

Adult children moving back home?

Are you feeling like a fully-paid-up member of the sandwich generation?  Taking care of parents/other older relatives and still providing financial and emotional first aid to your offspring? 

If the economic downturn has sent your chicks heading back to the nest, here's a website that could help you ensure that your boomerang offspring don't derail your plans for the future or jeopardize your retirement fund...  www.BoomerangKidsHelp.com

Money CAN buy you happiness (if you know the right way to spend it)

Although we've always been told that money can't buy you happiness, an increasing number of studies show that, if you know the right way to spend it, money may be able to buy you happiness after all... 

However, as you'll see in this article from Superliving.com, this doesn't involve using money to buy more 'stuff' but, instead, using it to 'facilitate those parts of life most likely to promote happiness' (such as paying someone else to do the jobs that cause conflict between you and your partner, or paying off or reducing debts to help you sleep easier at night).

Dating and an age difference - How much does it matter?

Although single baby boomers in their 50's and 60's are free to date people from a wide range of age groups, is it actually such a good idea? 

Does dating someone 20 years younger than you make you feel like a kid again or does it just make you feel old? And what about dating someone 20 years older?  Will you end up feeling like a nursemaid or caretaker?

MSN Dating and Personals spoke to a group of single boomers and a panel of relationship experts in an attempt to determine just how important age really is.

Do your aging parents lie to you?

Do your aging parents lie to you?  After a recent visit to her elderly parents' home, life coach Cheryl Miller started a series of regular blog postings about caring for aging parents, in order to give her readers an opportunity to share their frustrations and their wisdom. 

In a posting entitled Aging Parents Lie, she ponders the reasons why our parents tell us that everything is fine with them, when all the evidence points to the contrary. 

50 tools for researching your family's history

Nowadays, thanks to the Internet, researching your family history needn't mean spending hours searching through library archives and public records.  There are loads of sites to help you find the information you need and now Christina Laun has made it even easier, by compiling a list of 50 Awesome Tools for Researching Your Family's History.  Check it out here.

An affair to remember

Here's a sad and cautionary tale from the US.  Dorothy was 82.  Bob was 95.  Both had dementia.  Both lived in a nursing home.  When they fell in love and, horror of horrors, started having sex, all hell broke loose...  Read the full story at Slate.com and, please, feel free to comment.