I'm not sure if you get old codgers in other English- or Quasi-English-speaking countries. You don't get young or middle aged codgers anywhere, or female codgers of any age. Old codgers can be found in the corner of a pub, nursing one pint all evening or playing dominoes. This probably means that they are exclusively British, as you don't get proper pubs or pints anywhere else. Codgers have been driven out of pubs by "family friendly" policies, for which read horrible screaming brats, "continental" beers and bizarre revolutionary makeovers.
Old codgers can be quite amiable. Generally potty, occasionally very intelligent in their own way, they may be lovable eccentrics, but sometimes they are simply curmudgeonly and plain barmy. Sometimes they're all of these. Which brings me to Patrick Moore:
Sir Patrick Moore has identified an alien species that threatens to destroy intelligent life – the women who have taken over the BBC.
The veteran astronomer celebrated the 50th anniversary of The Sky at Night with a withering attack on the female executives he believes have dumbed down the corporation.
Sir Patrick’s outburst echoes criticisms raised by Alasdair Milne, a former Director-General, who provoked a furious response when he accused a female-dominated BBC of producing “terrible” programmes.
Sir Patrick, 84, was asked by the Radio Times if television had got better or worse during a career spanning the medium’s life. The answer was worse – “much worse”. He said: “The trouble is that the BBC now is run by women and it shows: soap operas, cooking, quizzes, kitchen-sink plays. You wouldn’t have had that in the golden days.”
They have even destroyed sci-fi, Sir Patrick’s personal passion. He said: “I used to watch Doctor Who and Star Trek, but they went PC – making women commanders, that kind of thing. I stopped watching.”
And don’t sit Sir Patrick in front of a Sophie Raworth bulletin. He said: “These jokey women are not for me. Oh, for the good old days.”
He recalled: “There was one day (in 2005) when BBC News went on strike. Then we had the headlines read by a man, talking the Queen’s English, reading the news impeccably.”
Fortunately, Sir Patrick has a solution. Institute a gender divide and create BBC Bloke.
He said: “I would like to see two independent wavelengths – one controlled by women, and one for us, controlled by men. I think it may eventually happen.”
Things, you see, aren't what they used to be. And guess what - they never have been. Patrick Moore's great grandfather, looking down from the sky, said: "Old people today don't know they're born. In my day things really weren't like they used to be."
Patrick Moore is eighty-four. Were he under eighty, his demented ravings would be fair game for merciless ridicule. That I don't see him as fair game is not necessarily a sign of respect, much as I enjoy The Sky at Night.
One of Alan Bennett's best "Talking Heads" plays featured an old lady lying in hospital reminiscing about the old days, when her legs were much admired by the local lads. She was played by Thora Hird, no spring chicken herself at the time. "Were things better in the old days?" asked a teenage visitor. This was a nonne question, for the expected answer is "Yes." But the old lady's answer was not quite as expected: "My legs were better."
For Patrick Moore, things were better sixty years ago because he was twenty-four, not eighty-four. Perhaps the old coins were better because he was the full shilling.
Update: regular commenter and self-confessed old codger (around Patrick Moore's age), John Utting, A.K.A. Infidel Dog, has pointed out that there is a bit of stereotyping in this piece, and that he is "so cool he could be the answer to global warming". This is true, but I'd argue that John is not really a codger so much as a geezer.
