Cockles are little fireplace like thingies in your heart. You have four, although people with big hearts may have as many as five or six. I�m not implying that you the reader in particular have only four and therefore a small heart but the average person has four. Now I�m not implying that you are average, you might be an extraordinary person and I don�t mean extra ordinary but I�m assuming that you are average for the sake of argument and therefore have four cockles.

Now why do cockles need warming? Actually they don�t. Cockles actually are important in that they do the warming. Everyone is told that they need to eat roughage because it�s important for their daily constitutional but roughage is also what fuels the cockles so that they in turn heat up your blood as it pumps through your heart. It�s all very scientific. You can verify it in Wikipaedia. So to warm the cockles of your heart really is an expression used to get you to eat plenty of roughage so that you can stay warm from the inside. As Lily Tomlin used to say �And that�s the truth.�

�To warm the cockles of your heart!�

As anyone can easily see, this is a medical topic. Therefore, I am uniquely placed to comment, because for many years I served in a personal, medical capacity in my community.  (I delivered the daily newspaper to our local Nurse.)

She often told me about strange medical complaints, and about our local Doctor�s patients, so I shall recount some incidents here!

Just in case you are concerned about personal privacy, or a breach of confidence under the Data Protection Act, I shall reveal no names of ESLP Members, but shall describe them under a �nom de plume�, (or a �nom d� ordinateur�, since I�m using a computer and not a pen).

One local chap suffered badly from Depression and he was advised to join a Support Group, �Apathy Anonymous�.  However, he didn�t join because, I was told, �He couldn�t be bothered!�.

I was talking yesterday about music.  Did you know that Johann Strauss could compose music only in three-four-time?  Apparently, he had Waltz Timer�s Disease.

It is not generally known that, at one time, Johann Sebastian Bach had absolutely no money.  �I haven�t 2 pfennigs to rub together�, he is reputed to have said, when trying to invent a new percussion instrument.

That is why he wrote his most famous composition, �Air on the G String�, for an inexpensive instrument.  It required only a one-string fiddle, with, (�Surprise! �Surprise!�), one string, the G String!

Another composer, Ludwig Beethoven had many health problems.  He grew his hair very long and used to drive to all his gigs in a white camper-van, so he adopted the stage-name, �Ludwig Van Beethoven�.

Unfortunately, he felt a driving compulsion to park his Van illegally.  It was then that his Doctor discovered that he had Parking Zones Disease.

He was jealous of Bach�s success, so he stripped nude and tried to compose a comparable piece: �Hair and a G-String�, but it didn�t make the charts!  He changed the title to �Erotica�, but no success!  It was only when he re-titled it, �Eroica�, that it became world-famous.

Nevertheless, the worry caused his hair to fall out.  He complained to his Doctor: �I�m beginning to lose my hair.  Can you give me something to keep it in?�  The Doctor suggested, �How about a plastic bag?�

However, as a consolation, the Doctor reminded him that: �A balding man and his hair are soon parted!�

 In our village, there was a chap who had the whole of the left side of his body amputated --- fortunately he�s alright now!

My brother broke his arm in 2 places.  Naturally, our Doctor advised him that, to avoid further accidents, he should stay away from those places.

I had a very good friend who swallowed a pillow.  The Hospital told me that he was comfortable.  But I wasn�t satisfied.  I thought that he looked a little down in the mouth.

One of our neighbours snored so loudly that he always woke himself up.  Eventually, he had to sleep in the next room so that he could get some peace.  He occasionally had insomnia.  The Doctor advised him to sleep on the edge of the bed: that way, he�d soon drop off.  He also advised him to try to grow taller, because tall people sleep longer in bed.

And so, we come to our definition.

�To warm the cockles of your heart!� was originally a cure for ear-ache, devised by Boyle, (Robert Boyle, 1662), famous for Boyle�s Law: �If you Hete water long Enuff, it will Boyle�.

The Patient had to apply a hot-water-bottle to the ear to relieve the pain.  This was described as: �To warm the cochlea of your ear!�  (The �cochlea� is an inner part of the ear). Unfortunately, due to the variety of the pronunciations of the period, and the fact that the Spell-Checker had not been invented for the computer, the phrase became:

�To warm the COCkles of your hEARt!�