Today is my grandson Joe’s birthday. Twelve years old, it’s hard to believe he will be a teenager next year. When you get to be a pensioner like me you say things like “where has all the time gone” and “it only seems like yesterday” and other such obvious comments but it is true the years have skipped by and the problem is with each one I get a little older.


And it’s a strange thing this getting older. Have you noticed that everyone over eighty years old starts each conversation by telling you their age, and it’s always their age next year as in “I’m 84 next, you know” always said with a dithering voice. Is anyone bothered? Just as an aside, if you let them they will also tell you about their latest operation. Do I need to know?


But what I really want to know is when you arrive at this change over point, the point when you start adding years on instead of taking them off. For example let’s take Christine, I can hear her saying “why me again” but she is a good example. She has only just accepted that she is over 45 and that was only because we recently celebrated our Ruby Wedding anniversary so she now admits to being somewhere between fifty and fifty five and the fact that her state pension arrives every four weeks is only because someone down at the pension office has made a mistake on her date of birth....she says.


But you see the point, she is still knocking years off. I find it hard to imagine a time when I hear Christine tell anyone her actual age never mind adding any on. Maybe when she’s ninety nine she may claim to be a hundred years old next but somehow I doubt it.


And another thing about age is that it only affects other people. All our friends get older, some more quickly than others but we, Christine and I stay the same. We are exactly the same now as we were twenty years ago, or so it seems to us. But there again I suppose to our friends they stay the same and we get older although I find that hard to believe.


But enough of the age thing, back to Joe’s Birthday. Tonight we are going out for a meal and it’s up to Joe to pick the place and he is undecided. He has it down to two places either Zio Gigi's Ristorante & Pizzeria at Hurricane Hole on Paradise Island or across the road from there at Anthony's Caribbean Grill. We all want Zio Giggis which must be the best Italian Restaurant in the Bahamas while Anthony’s is more of a ribs and burger type place but it has to be Joe’s choice as it is his birthday


Not being able to make up his mind Joe has been spinning a coin for the past ten days, heads Anthony’s, tails Zio Gigi’s. It’s now 6:3 to Anthony’s as Joe comes down to breakfast so whatever today’s result it’s Anthony’s except that Joe declares we are going to Zio Gigis as he wants a pizza. I remind him of the coin spinning and he replies “very childish granddad, I am twelve you know”. See we all grow up very quickly.


As Joe works out how to use his new Cam Corder and IDOG amongst other things, Christine is thinking about how many changes of clothes she needs before deciding what to wear to Zio Gigis tonight and Alex is wondering at what time on a Friday the week end officially starts so she can open a bottle of wine.


Me, I’m just concerned because it another weekend. Chances are Dave, Jamie and myself will be out with the boys after tonight’s birthday meal with Joe but my main concern is tomorrow. It’s festival time again over here, this time it’s the Art & Wine Festival. That will be somewhere about sixty different wines to taste finishing off with champagne and I can assure you there will be no spitting out while tasting the wine.


Christine will of course taste a few wines and take note of the ones she likes but will spend most of her time looking at the local art stands. Last year she bought a very large metal tortoise that I had to carry home on the plane, it now lives in our new garden room back in the cottage and naturally looks exceptionally good as part of the room ‘dressing’.


There will be a few other people there to look at the art so Christine will not be all by herself but the vast majority will be tasting the wines. I will probably spend more time with them than with Christine