Not actually advice as such but it's certainly stayed with me
My nanna was riddled with rheumatoid arthritis and lived with constant joint pain even though she'd had both knees and one hip replaced. She also had chronic kidney failure requiring dialysis four times a week, but always answered "How are you?" with a cheery "Fine", or if she was feeling particularly rough she'd possibly expand it to "Oh, not at my best today but never mind, how are you?"

It's always stuck with me how much nicer that is for other people than a sigh and a runthrough of all your ailments.

She died in November 1999; we all joke now that she wasn't Year 2000 compliant. I can't believe it'll be a decade next year, and I still miss her.
(Professor Kenny Martin Hmm? What?, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 16:32, 1 reply)

Top bit of advice
Quite a while back I listened to the advice given to me by an old bloke.

I turned off my targeting computer and used the force instead.
(mon bison powered by magnets, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 16:23, 1 reply)

At your age.
As a student on a ward I was talking to a patient when she asked how old I was to which I reply 19, she then comes out with, "At your age, you are what I consider to be a young buck and should be sleeping with as many women as you can, because you don't want to look back when you're married and regret that you didn't."
Edit: she was in her late 70's.
(ticklishrew, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 16:10, Reply)

The day before I left for University,
my grandmother told me to "Have sex with fat girls, they'll appreciate it more"

Bless her. This is the same Grandmother who also asked me if the Internet was open on Christmas Day.
(The Oscillating Gibbon is eating curried squid, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:58, 13 replies)

This one from my Pa
'Never bring anything to a fight you aren't prepared to have used against you.'

I'm thinking of taking a feather to my next street brawl.
(UncleChuckles "Cthulhu fhtagn", Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:53, 4 replies)

Sex.
My gran (my dad's mother) once randomly told me and my mum that even after she was married, she didn't know what sex was. She had it explained to her after the honeymoon. O_o

Her advice was to make sure 'we know what we're getting into'.

I have been practicing, and think I'm finally getting the hang of it...
(niceandwarmandhot vive la résistance, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:47, 4 replies)

Thanks Dad
It is better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool, than to open it and remove all doubt!!
(Dairy Air, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:44, 2 replies)

The greatest words ever spoken to me
were from my best friend ever, and my role model - my Grandad


Good manners don't cost you anything, but bad manners cost you a lot


I still miss you so much
(steve dubbleyoo, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:41, 1 reply)

Teaching your son how to fight.
My Dad was obviously a master of scrapping - after I got panelled at school his advice was:

1. A good pair of running shoes is better than a good left hook.

2. No one wins in a fight. If you hit him 20 times and he hits you once it still fucking hurts.

3. Our family are too handsome to fight. Leave that to the Uglies.

4. Never start a fight and do everything you can to prevent one happening. If it ends up being the only option and you know that you have done everything in your power to prevent it; pick up the sharpest or heaviest item you can and batter the fucker.

5 Always kick a man when he is down because you probably won't have the balls to hit him if he gets back up.

My Dad was ace.
(Tugnut Ex of this parish, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:09, 3 replies)

Cycling forever!
When I was about 14 years old I was cycling down Broadstairs front and stopped to admire the view. Some old bloke with a cane came up to me and told me he had stopped cycling a few months ago after being hit by a car and now his health was suffering due to the lack of pedaling. He must have been about 80 odd.

He told me to never stop cycling as it's the best form of exercise there is. And with that he walked off. What a nice old man, I thought.

Since then I've been on the fags, get pissed up regularly and general eat quite badly, but I've never stopped cycling so I'm still relatively fit.

I sometimes wonder if that guy was me coming back from the future to tell myself probably the most important thing that would allow me to get that old. Or maybe that's just the acid talking.
(KingOfMyCastle, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:07, 2 replies)

I used to be scared of graves/graveyards...
Until I mentioned it to my Grandad and he highlighted that "it's not the dead that you need to be afraid of, it's the ones that are alive that you need to worry about".
Good point.
( DUMBLONDE is a rubber lover girl, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:06, Reply)

One from my grandad
Take the money & run!!!
( Big Ian has stopped changing his sig, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:06, Reply)

A bit cracked?
My grandfather used to say: "always leave the house by the door ye came in or the hens will stop laying."

"Granda, we don't have hens," we'd say.

"Exactly..." he'd say knowingly.

He still follows that rule no matter where he goes. It's thanks to my Granda that this country still has eggs today.
( crackhouseceilidhband Fuck off back to Mumsnet, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 15:01, 3 replies)

My granny warned me to always wash my face in the morning
in case people thought I was a nigger.

She gave this advice through the medium of SONG.
( WormuIus, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:58, 2 replies)

Dont knock it
My dad - hes not particularly old.. but always and usually inappropriately utters "dont knock it unless you've tried it!"
case A
Brother had lots of accusations of being gay as a teen (based on him having long hair.. i dont understand it either) sat around dinner table and hes protesting that hes not gay.. dad utters those words, with a worrying (to me and my bro) look on his face.
case B
Friend from school died in a motorcycle incident, got home and was telling parents about it mum says "thats awful" and dad says "dont knock it till you've tried it"

not sure about you but dieing in a motorcycle accident isnt high on my list of priorities despite being advised it might be better than i think
(Fluffylegend, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:58, 2 replies)

I have long hair
I'm going to talk about my hair again to wind up those who found it so offensive last time..

I'm a regular at an old man type pub. I'm a lot younger than most of the other regulars but I don't mind because it's the only place in town I can just turn up on my own and have random conversations with people I hardly know without getting strange looks. The real ale is excellent and I get a lot of kudos for drinking it.

I also have long hair. For people like Spimf's benefit, I will describe it: it's like three-times Bill Bailey's hair; it extends below my man-boobs; it is thick, dense and luxuriantly streaked with what look like blonde highlights but are just the effect of sun on it; it is a mane. Understandably it gets a lot of attention; less understandably (to me) a lot of this attention is hostile.

This last week one particular duffer has made it his mission to drum into my head the virtues of his own crew cut. He's not just taking the piss; he's actually offended by the hair and wants to convert me to his way of thinking. Last night he stared at me in amazement for a full ten minutes in a drunken stupor before shouting loudly, "you know if you just got a proper haircut you'd be pulling all the ladies like me!" and making an Alan Partridge-style gurn while motioning aggressively with clenched fist in what I assumed was a gesture of virility.

Now I wonder if that is good advice or not. On the one hand the number of times I have ever got laid hardly reaches double figures; on the other he is married to the ugliest troglodyte with the nastiest screechiest voice imaginable. Plus I do like my hair - it gives me a sense of security somehow.

At any rate I look forward to winding him up about it in the near future. So if I am to get my hair cut, it will have to be delayed.
(lost, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:53, 16 replies)

Uncle Pat
'You can pick your friends, and you can pick your nose - but never pick your friends nose'
(Tugnut Ex of this parish, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:50, 3 replies)

A great man...
My old Uncle Bill told me the following just before he shot me full of smack and raped my arse:

Never interfere in a boy and girl fight.

Beware of whores who say they don't want money. The hell they don't. What they mean is they want more money. Much more.

If you're doing business with a religious son of a bitch, get it in writing. His word isn't worth shit, not with the good Lord telling him how to fuck you on the deal.

Avoid fuckups. You all know the type. Anything they have anything to do with, no matter how good it sounds, turns into a disaster.

Do not offer sympathy to the mentally ill. Tell them firmly, "I am not paid to listen to this drivel. You are a terminal fool."

Now some of you may encounter the devil's bargain if you get that far. Any old soul is worth saving at least to a priest, but not every soul is worth buying. So you can take the offer as a compliment. They charge the easy ones first, you know, like money, all the money there is. But who wants to be the richest guy in some cemetery? Not much to spend it on, eh, Gramps? Getting too old to cut the mustard. Have you forgotten something, Gramps? In order to feel something, you have to be there. You have to be 18. You're not 18, you are 78. Old fool sold his soul for a strap-on.

How about an honorable bargain? "You always wanted to become a doctor. Now's your chance. Why, you could have become a great healer and benefit humanity. What's wrong with that?" Just about everything. There are no honorable bargains involving exchange of qualitative merchandise like souls. Just quantitative merchandise like time and money. So piss off, Satan, and don't take me for dumber than I look. As an old junk pusher told me, "Watch whose money you pick up."

Right on Uncle Bill!
(Tugnut Ex of this parish, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:48, 4 replies)

My Nana
passed away a good few years ago now. She used this gem often....

She may be sweet and she may be fine
but her arsehole smells the same as mine.

Genius.
( baw__bag contains traces of nuts on, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:45, Reply)

Belfast Wisdom
We've clearly all had those moments where the urge to drop whatever you're doing and lovetap some old doll in the face. So I'll add mine.

Standing in the quese in some random corner shop years back (near Glandore for anyone curious) I had the misfortune of hearing the following conversation.

Old Bint 1: "So how was your holiday? Did you take the kids to the beach?"
Old Bint 2: "Aye I did, they loved it. But there were to many people there. I think more people would go if it wasn't so crowded"

...
(Lusiphur, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:39, Reply)

Another old one
A closed mouth gathers no foot.
(Reverend Fister "a disciplined fuckwit", Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:34, 2 replies)

Like 'twistngo' below:
That's like the advice of the guy who owned the pet-shop my mate used to work in when we were at school:

"Just because you own a Rolls Royce it doesn't mean you can't admire a Porsche" - to which I'd add: "...but don't take it for a test-drive, unless you are seriously thinking of buying."
(Che Grimsdale Best before:, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:25, Reply)

My mantra......
Speak softly but always carry a big stick.
( girlinthehole, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:23, 8 replies)

"Don't marry your own cousin, son,
or you'll end up with the sorts of kids your mother and I had."

Cheers, Dad.
( Matoosh would rather like a biscuit, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:15, Reply)

Take up golf,
says Anne (86), because - as she rightly points out - it's the only sport you can carry on playing well into your 80s, so that makes it a good hobby to invest in now to ensure you remain healthy well into your latter years.

I bleddy hate golf
( teedyay, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:08, Reply)

Career Choices
A good mate of mine was about embark on an apprenticeship fixing helicopters for the MOD at the tender age of sixteen, having previously worked at a third-rate over-priced hardware store, run by two militant lesbians with a lawnmower fixation. Upon finding out about this, a mate who shall remain nameless issues forth

"Jacko, mate. You don't want to fix helicopters for a living. The real money's in lawnmowing. Everyone's got a lawnmower. Not everyone's got a helicopter"

I can't argue with the logic, but have often challenged him to name a lawnmower that is valued at several millions of pounds. Sage advice from the man who once thought that Halfords sold bearded seat covers. Nuff said.
(Nimrod's Son Boredom provokes some interesting habits..., Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:03, 2 replies)

Some old guy gave me the following advice
Do:

* Have fun and join in with the conversations
* Post pictures you have made
* Post links to your new web projects
* Say nice things about the pictures you like.

Don't:

* Post stuff that is, or looks like porn - (see NSFW section)
* Post pictures from sites that are not your own
* Repost your old pictures - that's what the 'View Older Messages' link is for.
* Spam your website over and over again.
* Be nasty or offensive to other boarders
* Be boring
( TGB checking Off Topic is still shit at, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:03, 3 replies)

Not so much advice from an old person
as an old book.

I once found a diary which had belonged to my uncle as a boy, and on each page was a Scottish proverb.

Some were dialectical versions of English proverbs and some were common sense, but others were hilarious. But the one which sticks in my mind most, is the invaluable advice:

Bring not bagpipes to a man in trouble.

Which is indeed true. I mean, could you imagine the situation when Jock falls into a pool of quicksand. Upon hearing his cries, his pal shouts, "Jimmy - Jock's in a bit o bother. C'mon ower here wi yer bagpipes!"

It just wouldn't work.
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 14:03, 3 replies)

Can I see the menu please
Whilst I was buying a pint of guinness in a pub in Dublin an older irish man next to me commented on the fitness of the barmaid as she went to till. I said something along the lines of "you're a married man" and he said

"It doesn't where you whet your appetite son, as long as you eat your dinner at home."

wise words indeed and words I have repeated on numerous occasions when caught a-glancing by me other half.
(twistngo, Fri 20 Jun 2008, 13:54, 1 reply)