Believe it or not - blogging at 107

In my post Senior Citizens, blogging is a passport to good health I mentioned about the 95 year old Spanish great-grandmother Maria Amelia Lopez who is a big hit in the blogosphere. Well, yesterday GV Krishnan has come out with an interesting article World’s eldest YouTuber? According to it an Australian great-great grandmother, Olive Riley at 107, is likely to be the world’s oldest blogger and You Tuber.

I visited Olive’s site. It’s delightful. How would you like to read about a horse who was a regular visitor to the local pub? Or the poignant piece about a girl running into a boy from her school days decades later in a ‘what could have been but was not to be’ story?

I’m giving below the Links relating to Olive, which Eric Shackle, 88, who is on a mission to convert elders to the computer, has been kind enough to provide:
Olive’s blog http://www.allaboutolive.com.au/
Olive’sYouTube http://www.allaboutolive.com.au/
Mike Rubbo, film maker (Olive’s helper) http://www.mikerubbo.com/
World’s favourite grandma ftp://ftp.bdb.co.za/olive_riley.pdf

And read Eric’s ‘Life Begins at 80’ at http://bdb.co.za/shackle

Coming to India, MYSORE BLOG PARK carries a post by a Mumbai based 75 year old lady, Anandi, who took up blogging just a month back. I’ve marked it to read later.

But one of the few blogs that I have bookmarked is Memories and Musings
http://memories-and-musings.blogspot.com/ by Maiji, a Chennai based great-grandmother, 79, (may be 80 now) who has been blogging since May, 2006. It is a site where the scenes shift from Trivandrum to Delhi to Chennai - people, places, events, so much of history.

Please read the comments on Senior Citizens, blogging is a passport to good health carefully. They are interesting and illuminating. The case of my good friend Jacob Matthan is inspiring. He is only about 65. The recovery of parts of his brain, which had been affected by excessive alcohol consumption, was helped considerably by his blogging through which he was able to establish contact with his old friends and slowly rebuild his links with the past. He has been a teetotaler for 25 years now.

I am quoting here a part of the comment by Ronni Bennetty, ‘As we get older, our social circles shrink. After retirement, we don't have the daily camaraderie of work colleagues. Families may live far away. Old friends die. And perhaps in time, it is not so easy to get out and about as we once did.

’Real friendships form among bloggers, as strong over time as in-person friendships. And with blogging, one's new friends might be anywhere in the world.’ There is more.

Start blogging, it’s good for you.

Ends.

Also see: Senior Citizens, blogging is a passport to good health