After all that recent doom and gloom about Italy being in the doldrums, this story in yesterday's regional paper Il Sardegna brought a smile to my face.
To Efisio Piras and his devoted wife Silvia, it was just another election.
But the crowd who had turned out to see the elderly couple arrive at the polling station to cast their vote on Monday disagreed.
For between them, Efiso and Silvia Piras have clocked up 200 years, making them the oldest couple to vote in Italy.
Efiso, who celebrated his 101st birthday in January, is an intent follower of politics and insisted on going to vote. Consequently, his 99-year-old wife followed suit.
But as strange as it might seem, the couple, who have been married for 76 years, are not that unusual in the village where they live.
Orroli, set in the heart of Sardinia's Barabagia region, boasts a population of 2,540. Of those, 39 are aged 90 or over and 17 are centenarians.
The village was also home to the oldest man in Europe: Giovanni Frau died in 2003 aged 112.
Longevity in Orroli - and, more generally, Sardinia - is put down to the healthy lifestyle and the red wine produced on the island.
With all the vino rosso I knock back, maybe there is hope for me yet.
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