We are all ageless on this forum!

Well I stopped at 35 (until I look in the mirror and wonder who that old woman is) so I imagine that all the GNs are that age too,

I don't know about ageless - most days I feel every single one of my 62 years - but I've never been one to fit into stereotypes (of any age) and most days I'm glad in leggings and a t-shirt or hoodie, most of them featuring rock/metal/punk bands.

Can I just say I don’t look like Hyacynth Bouquet * kadinsky*
🤣🤣🤣

I don’t have a mental image of what Gransnetters look like. We are a mixed bunch, I’m guessing many are over 70, rather than 50-60.
At my U3a I would say most people look their age. Nobody stands out as mutton dress as lamb. On the other hand some of the most intelligent people are some who care least about their appearance.

I image everyone on here looking like Hyacinth Bucket.

I have all my own teeth and a good head of hair , admittedly very short, not long and flowing, however the rest of me…..

That's the trouble with stereotyping, no one fits the stereotype! I most certainly don't!

I wonder if the surgically enhanced younger people having implants on face and teeth etc. ever arrive at a point nothing can be done. Looking in the mirror yesterday at the hairdressers I couldn't believe how old I looked, I should have done more often perhaps.
I always looked younger than my age, until a few years ago and it happened without me noticing. I don't sleep and I still
worry so I think that may be the reason. Worrying has never solved anything, not for me anyway.

I’ve sometimes been surprised on here when a poster gives their age and are either much older or younger than my mental image of them😁 but as mum2three says older people as just as variable as younger ones.

windmill 😄 but ……can I throw out the supremely annoying Grayson Perry please?

People's personalities don't change much so older people are just as variable as younger ones. This is why I get so annoyed at the assumption by advertisers that we are all insipid, decrepit old whingers living on our memories.

windmill 😅😂

Our U3A monthly meeting hall yesterday was packed with over 100 of the older generation. We listened to a very interesting talk by a professor of environmental law followed by Q &A session.

The person who set up the sound system was wearing a very short pink lacy mini dress with black leggings and boots.

Admittedly the rest of us were the usual motley crew, who could be on GN.

I have been lucky and have met quite a few of us at Meetups and can confirm that we don't match the glossy images from the brochures.

There used to be a TV ad accompanied by the tune greensleeves with a grey haired couple driving through quiet country lanes. DH and I would chuckle at ourselves if we were ever on a greensleeves outing.

I've never really explored this particular topic, in depth, but I like to think GN posters are nothing like the images that go with advertisements for Saga Cruises, mobility scooters and pension plans! These are likely cobbled together by PR types, no older than, say, 29.

They give us glossy care home brochures with smiling, attentive care staff happily engaging with an equally smiling, well-dressed, well permed, well made-up (in a care home?) old dearie who clearly still has all her marbles and is attended to by benevolent staff who have all the time in the world.

Or the images of retired couples jogging together along leafy lanes, laughing their heads off because they still have their own hair and teeth and they're dressed from head to toe in Boden and have healthy outdoor tans.

No, no. These are synthetic media images which do not acknowledge getting older and therefore getting wiser - and more human, tolerant and realistic.

I prefer to think of GNetter's as being like the late Beryl Bainbridge, the quirky Edna O'Brien and the much-missed actor Richard Griffiths. None of them remotely like the primped, crimped and airbrushed images of what we're supposed to look like!

Good on them - and us!

To conclude........can I throw in glorious Grayson Perry, please?