Old folk: The question on the lips of the nation recently, I gather, was: “What do you think of Madonna at 50?”

After dismissing the Hand of God moment from someone with a similar name who once played international football, I found the question about the lady’s appearance to be quite unnecessary.

Does it really matter what Madonna-watchers think, when it’s what she thinks of herself that counts?

Nobody, as far as I’m aware, had ever thought to offer an opinion about me when I hit 50. If anyone did, I dread to think of what the response might have been. ‘Frail’, ‘stooped’, ‘wizened’, ‘crotchety’, ‘showing his age’, ‘bearing up’, ‘not so bad’, ‘not what he was’, ‘seen better days’… Or, on a good day,’ dapper’, ‘wearing well’, ‘still perky’, ‘proud bearing’… A second story I spotted on the same subject was a council guide suggesting that the word ‘old’ should be avoided, as in ‘old woman’, ‘old fool’ and 'old codger’.

As a member of the Old Curmudgeon Club (Penpergwm branch), perhaps the good burghers would prefer ‘aged’, ‘getting on a bit’ or ‘antiquated’.

Even the road signs depicting pensioners as hunched and slow are said to be insulting. Campaigners want the sign scrapped in view of today's healthier and fitter oldies.

The time may come, it seems, when the bowed figure of an OAP hobbling on a walking stick will be swapped for a slow-down message to motorists.

In the meantime, those who know me should, in future, address me as Norm, an acronym for ‘No Retirement for Me’.

l Thanks to Ken Mumford, secretary of Abergavenny Steam Society and editor of the group’s Coal Tank newsletter, I spotted this little gem.

Above the washbasin at a rail depot, someone had put a large ‘THINK’ notice. Directly below it hung another, untidily written, sign put up by a railman with a sense of humour, saying ‘THOAP’.