I am currently writing a short story about visiting an elderly mother in a home. My mother was in a home for several years before she died: even though it would have been totally impossible to look after her in our house, still you can’t escape the guilt. It’s a dilemma many people face, including, I suspect, a lot of readers of magazines such as The People’s Friend. I have been aware for a number of years that such magazines pay well for stories, but I have not been able to come up with the goods, as it’s just not my natural style. I have now, however, been able to adopt this style – a bit like learning a foreign language, I suppose – and last week I sent off one story to Woman’s Weekly. This week I am working on something for The People’s Friend about the subject of old people in homes. They have lives and interests too – in fact Chris Conway has a really good song about this, called ‘Superheroes Never Die’, which is on this album:
http://chrisconway.bandcamp.com/track/superheroes-never-die
It was written after he did a gig at an old people’s home and, rather than enjoying his selection of old-time music-hall numbers they told him they liked stuff like David Bowie and Pink Floyd.
So my story is called ‘Always Winter and Never Christmas’. The first reader to tell me in a comment where that comes from will get a –
they’ll get a –
a –
a mention!
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 
I think it was ‘The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe’? where it was always winter and never Christmas??
Well done! It was indeed Narnia, where the white witch had cast a spell to make it always winter and never Christmas.