I’ve always wanted to be that person who says: ‘when you get to my age…’ because I’ve always found that really annoying, stupid and pathetic, all characteristics I strive for in my life. So now I’ve reached sufficient yearage that I could invoke such a phrase in earnest, I can’t do it. Its like admitting you’re the wrong side of ‘young’, that you’er much nearer to death than birth, it implies you might have learned something, which means they’ll prove you wrong.

Because that’s what happens. You get old thinking you’re absorbing all this wonderful knowledge and learning the secrets of longevity, and then you read the paper and the goalposts have shifted again, so if you don’t wise up, you’ll be dead within a week!

I’d always thought that 10,000 steps a day was a good goal. A realistic aim. A worthy and accessible target. For health, fitness, longevity, blah, blah, blah. So at the end of every walk, I look at my watch, like all us fitness mavens do, and see that in fact its ten past three. Or quarter to nine. Because my watch doesn’t count steps. So I look at my phone and see that I have 14 messages from Amazon about a parcel I never ordered. Again, I’ve never installed a step-counter on my phone either. Because I just don’t fucking care. I walk, generally, until I stop. Worried that if I reach my ten thousandth step whilst crossing a road, I’d have to stop there for the rest of the day, and it could be dangerous.

But now I’m fine. It has been decided, I’m sure really, really scientifically, that you only need ‘2337 steps a day’ to live forever. Any more is just wasted. Or sets you back. Affects you badly.

And the good thing about this latest info-flash is that it completely highlights the fact that ALL this information is total bollocks and should be completely ignored. Here’s another newsflash: walking is nice, its fairly healthy in that (unless you take a few mars bars with you) its generally time spent not eating. Or drinking (never leave home without a fully charged hip flask). But its not ‘exercise’ in any meaningful way. Its just much better than sitting down. If you want exercise, play tennis. Apparently there are other things you can do but quite frankly they just don’t count. Like steps. I tried counting them ‘analogue’. But by the end of the road I’d forgotten if I was up to 174 or 274, so I had to go back home and start again.

Happy walking

A xxxx