Fuck football

Based on increased advertising for taco chips, TVs and frozen pizza, I think the Super Bowl game is today. I think one of the teams which will be playing is called the "Pats." I think they are based somewhere in New England (where I live).

If you paid me a billion dollars I could not name the city where the game will be played -- or the other team. I think it may be the New York Giants or San Francisco Giants or Indianapolis or Dallas Somethings. Or maybe Miami Something. Or Toronto?

Am I the only man in the country who doesn't know -- or care -- who's playing?

I can name exactly two football players: Joe Namath and Roosevelt Greer. I have eight flat-screen TVs in my house and none of them have ever been used to display a football game. I plan to keep it that way. After I die, I won't know or care what the TVs are used for.

...

When death can be productive

Deaths -- at least deaths of good people -- are undeniably sad. Even if the newly deceased suffered greatly, and might have caused suffering to family and friends, the death causes grieving, not just relief.

Despite the grief, some funeral procedures -- such as Irish wakes and New Orleans jazz funerals -- seem downright jubilant.

Many years ago, I attended the funeral of an elderly relative, and it was the first funeral I attended. After the religious service, the "mourners" gathered in a large room in the funeral home, and chatted as if they were at a cocktail party. There was little seriousness, and no tears, and I was shocked.

As I have gotten older, I have had to attend more funerals, and the behavior -- despite differences in religion, ethnicity and location -- has been the same.

A few days ago I attended the funeral of a woman who was about 95 years old. Her time, clearly, was up. She died in her sleep, with no suffering. There was a mass in a Catholic church followed by a service at a cemetery. These sessions, led by priests and with words added by family, were appropriately solemn. But afterwards, we went to a very nice restaurant, and it was PARTY TIME.

The mood was undeniably jovial. There was little "celebration of life" of the deceased, nor looking ahead to Heaven as touted by the priests.

Instead, it was a family reunion, and an occasion for people who were connected by the cadaver but had never met, to get to know each other.

At events like this, there are always comments like "How come we can get together at funerals, but never at happy times?"

That question made me think about a possible "purpose" of death.

Just as decaying flesh and vegetation fertilize the fields to feed a new generation of plants, animals and people, maybe the celebration after a human death leads to a renewal and reinvigoration of the human community, the coming together of friends, relatives and even strangers who would not be in the same place if someone had not died.

Maybe it's important and useful -- not frivolous and wasteful -- for some of the insurance money to pay for food and drink, and not just scholarships and medical research and new clothes, cars and homes.

Party on.


...










(photo from http://www.bestofneworleans.com/. Thanks.)

Winter shminter!

Today is the winter soltstice. It's said to be "the shortest day of the year." Actually, today is just as long as other days -- but there is less daylight time.
 
Starting tomorrow, we get about a minute or two more sunlight each day. It can be confusing, because we're just starting winter, but the extra sunlight will be warming up the planet.

Before long, the crocuses will be popping up, and then the '78 Fiat comes out of the garage and the cover comes off the pool.

As I kid, I hated November, because there was so little daylight for playing after school. That didn't matter in December, because of the focus on holidays.

This morning the temperature reached 57 here in Connecticut. I drove with my sun roof and windows open. I'm focusing on spring. Winter hasn't been much fun since around 1966.

...

The ultimate indignity

Years ago, when young nieces and nephews wanted to stay at our house, Marilyn and I established a simple rule: "If you want to sleep here, you have to learn how to wipe your own ass. We don't change diapers." (We have no children to practice on.)

The kids learned fast.

I am now nearly halfway into into my 66th year. Lately, as I've visited elderly friends and relatives who are on the downward slope of the bell curve, and are in nursing homes and wear diapers, I've contemplated my own inevitable decline.

If I ever become unable to wipe my own ass, and must display my private parts to strangers in order to obtain assistance for a very basic human function, will I have lost my humanity as well as my dignity? Will I be willing to go on? Is there living without wiping? I don't know.


(photo from http://www.1800recycling.com/)  

Old?

I'm awake. I'd like to go the office early. I can’t find my main set of keys. The keys may be locked in the office. I also lost a card from my camera yesterday. I think my car is still in the driveway. I think the driveway is still in front of the house. I think my brain is still in my head.

When silly words die

Languages change. New words, like "texting," frequently appear. Old words, like "austerulous," fade away.

For a while, Time magazine and Bill Buckley made an effort to popularize ancient words (or maybe it was just intellectual snobism), and SaveTheWords.org is devoted to keeping old words alive.

But SaveTheWords is devoted to real words -- words that appeared in newspapers, magazines, TV shows and dictionaries.

I recently wondered what happens to the wonderful silly words that are used within families, often for generations, but die when there is no next generation.

When I was a kid, we said "boompsie" for fart. Does anyone else still use the word? Urban Dictionary says it means a behind, but that's not what it meant in my family.

Sometimes these family words evolve from baby talk. When I was young, apple juice was called "fibbling juice." My little sister, Meryl, and I used to blow air through a straw in the juice glass to make bubbles at the bottom, and the sound of the bubbles seemed like "fibble." Urban Dictionary has a much naughtier definition of "fibbling."

When I was at Lehigh University in the mid-60s, one of the engineers from the student radio station built a primitive wired remote muting control that could be used to silence the commercials on the geek lounge TV. It was called the "scrovney."

The kid in the room with the lowest status was put on scrovney duty, and it was his job to anticipate the onset of a commercial during "Batman" or "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea." (We said, "bottom of the sink to acknowledge the cheesy, unconvincing special effects and monsters.) Scrovney Boy was supposed to press the scrovney button just-in-time to avoid the ads. If he was late -- or early -- by even a fraction of a second, the others in the room would harass him with loud shouts of "SCROVNEY!" and pelt him with wads of paper saved for the purpose.

For nearly 40 years, my wife and I have always referred to our TV remote controls as "scrovneys." Our scrovneys are now wireless and they control fast-forwarding on our TiVos, but the term and the purpose have survived.

Before this blog post, "scrovney" has not been on Google. I thought Marilyn and I would be the last people to ever shout "SCROVNEY!" But, thanks to search engines, maybe the silly word will survive on the web.

That's nice.

Read what a friend says about almost kicking the bucket

The Neon Lounge

Redecorating

I became 65 on April 15th. That's still middle-aged. I was thinking of getting a tattoo to assert something. But I don't like pain or infections -- and it would really piss off my wife. Marilyn was sure I would get AIDs, toxic shock or typhoid.

I made an appointment with a local tattooista. I planned on something subtle: "TA-2." The tattoo guy didn't get it.

On the morning of my birthday, wife thought I was going to the urologist ("dick doc"), but I actually went to a hair salon for a cranial redecoration.

In lieu of tattoo, I settled for a shaven head and a trimmed beard. I've been married since 1971, but my wife had never seen my cheeks before. Not those, cheeks, anyway. I'm not sure if I'll keep the new look, but I do like it. (DAMN -- my nose looks huge and I never realized my head was so thick.)

Shortly after my trim, I was due to rendezvous with my bride at the snack bar at Costco. She was already on the line. I got behind her. I bumped my cart into her cart. She turned around and SCREAMED.

UPDATE: A few weeks later, I temporarily dyed the beard dark brown, like it was years earlier. This time Marilyn screamed again -- and ran away. 

OLD joke

(from Harry Newton, slightly modified).


An 86-year-old man goes for a physical. All of his test results come back normal.

The doctor says, “George. everything looks great. How are you doing mentally and emotionally? Are you at peace with God?”

George replies, “God and I are tight. He knows I have poor eyesight, so he’s fixed it so when I get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, *poof* the light goes on. When I’m done, *poof* the light goes off.”

“Wow, that’s great,” the doctor says.

A little later in the day, the doctor calls George's wife. “Marianne," he says, "George is doing fine but I had to call you because I’m in awe of his relationship with God. Is it true that he gets up during the night and *poof * the light goes on in the bathroom, and when he’s done, *poof* the light goes off?”

“OH NO!” Marianne exclaims. “He’s peeing in the refrigerator again!!!!”

When is it time to move into a nursing home?

During a visit to my doctor, I asked him, “How do you determine whether or not an older person should be put in a nursinge home?”

“Well,” he said, “we fill up a bathtub. Then we offer a teaspoon, a teacup and a bucket to the person to empty the bathtub.”

“Oh, I understand,” I said. “A normal person would use the bucket because it is bigger than the spoon or the teacup.”

“No” he said. “A normal person would pull the plug. Do you want a bed near the window?”

(photo from http://www.thingsforoldpeople.com/)

Is 90 the new 50?

(By Susan Jacoby -- Reposted with appreciation but without permissaon from the New York Daily News.)

A surprise appearance at this year's Academy Awards ceremony by the frail 94-year-old actor Kirk Douglas, his speech slurred by the effects of a stroke, offered a rare revelation about the American public's real attitude about advanced old age. A contributor to a movie blog could not decide whether the appearance was "classy or crass." The word "embarrassing" was most frequently used in living rooms.

Indeed, Americans should be embarrassed on their own behalf for being disturbed by a glimpse of what embattled "old old" age really looks like - a sharp contrast to the relentless propaganda of longevity hucksters who claim that we can all enjoy an "ageless" life well into our 90s. If we are unsettled by the sight of a valiant old man with the will to regain his speech after a catastrophic stroke, that only underscores our denial about the challenges associated with an aging population.

In just 20 years, the sprightly baby boomers now turning 65 to the tune of "Forever Young" will be leaving the relatively hardy country of what sociologists call the "young old" - those under 85 - for the much harsher terrain of the "old old."

The boomer fantasy is that we will die of a heart attack in our ninth or tenth decade, without ever having been sick a day, and while blissfully engaged in love making, skydiving or paragliding.
Now, the truth: Most Americans who live beyond 85 - there will be 8.5 million by 2030 - will die after a period of extended mental or physical disability. Nearly half of those now over 85 suffer from dementia, of which Alzheimer's is the leading cause. Half will spend some time in a long-term care institution before they die.

And yet anyone who has not been confined to a cave without Internet access is surely aware of the media blitz touting the "new old age" as a phenomenon that will let boomers enjoy the kind of healthy, sexy, adventurous old age that their ancestors could never have imagined.

The myth of a radically new old age is based partly on faith in imminent medical miracles. At a panel titled "90 is the New 50," held at the World Science Festival in New York several years ago, an audience with the fervor of an old-time religious revival meeting was told that advances to conquer the most feared age-related diseases - and even to reverse aging itself! - would arrive in time for this generation.

No one has more confidence than I do in science, especially in the promise of embryonic stem cells and other cutting-edge biomedical research. But it is clear that the more scientists learn about genetically complicated, age-linked diseases like Alzheimer's, the more they realize that the quest for effective treatment, much less a cure, is likely to be a long-term effort. The dreaded brain disease progresses inexorably for years or decades before most people experience symptoms. And it is hardly the only illness that afflicts the elderly.

The second element in the myth of agelessness is the belief that the aging process can be "defied" by habits such as exercise, eating right, not smoking and drinking moderately. Such behaviors do promote healthier lives at any age and enable people to cope more successfully with diseases, like diabetes, that can be treated but not cured. But good health habits are no magic shield against the worst vicissitudes of age. To think that jogging and orange juice will stave off the corrosion of time is a pleasant belief - but ultimately a false one.

Finally, a major obstacle to a satisfying old age is money - or, rather, the lack of it. According to the most recent figures supplied by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service, three-quarters of households with a head over 65 live on less than $34,0000 annually. Half of such households get by on less than $19,000 a year - and Social Security accounts for 80% of that depressing figure. Income drops precipitously with every decade, because the vast majority of the oldest survivors are women. Most widows become poorer when their husbands die, and women generally retire with lower pensions and Social Security benefits. Douglas offers an excellent example of what money means in old age. As one of the leading actors of his generation, he had the resources to pay for expensive rehabilitation needed to make the most of life after a stroke. Medicare pays only a fraction of the cost. If he were poor, such care would have been out of his reach.

Amid talk about cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, no one is talking realistically about how to pay for the much longer lives that the generation now blowing out 65 birthday candles can expect.
The fantasy of a new old age - which denies the physical degeneration that eventually overtakes everyone and the cost of real old age - is a dangerous and seductive delusion. If 90 really were the new 50, (or even the new 70), society could rest easy as baby boomers worked, played and shopped into eternity. But that's just a fairy tale.

Susan Jacoby is the author of the recently published "Never Say Die: The Myth and Marketing of the New Old Age."

I'm getting old. HOORAY!

Getting old sure beats dying young.

Two months from today is April 15th. That's Income Tax Day, the deadline for lots of people to send checks to the Feds.

It's also my 65th birthday.

If the Feds and I are still functioning at the beginning of the month, on 4/1/2011 (APRIL FOOL'S DAY!!!), Medicare will pay my doctors and pharmacists, and my company will reduce its medical insurance bill by over a thousand bucks each month!

I used to say that "we are middle-aged until they start shoveling dirt on us." But, if admitting that I am old means that I get money from Washington, I'll admit it.

This is the year that the first Baby Boomers -- including me, Donny Trump, Billy Clinton, Georgie Bush, Dolly Parton and Candy Bergen -- hit 65.

Maybe over the hill isn't such a bad place to be. I wonder if I'll run into Trump in the Medicare office.

(A warning for you 20-somethings who won't hit 65 until mid-century: By then Medicare and Social Security may be a distant memory, like prohibition and marriage. NYAH-NYAH, NYAH-NYAH-NYAH.)

Happy 65th birthday to the first baby of the baby boom

Happy 65th birthday to the very first baby boomer, Al Nachreiner. Starting today, about 10,000 boomers will reach 65 each day.

When you're 16, 65 seems disgusting and depressing.

When you're 64, 65 means Medicare, and 66 means Social Security.

Surviving is the best revenge. This is the year we boomers start cashing in -- unless Congress screws it up.

Looking Seeing Hearing SpeakingCommunicating DistractingLusting Living

At lunch today, my order was taken by an attractive young lady with deep cleavage (that's a euphemism for large breasts).

She had to repeat her questions about my meal several times before I answered properly.

I'm not sure if she was speaking very softly, or if I don't hear well.

OTOH, it's highly likely that I was concentrating on her chest -- not her words.

I'm not dead yet.

(photo  by shira gal from Kfar Saba, Israel, via Wikipedia)

Will work keep you alive?

"Arbeit macht frei" is a German phrase that can be translated as "work will make you free."  The phrase was posted at the entrances to several Nazi concentration camps, most notably Auschwitz.

Most of the slave workers who avoided the ovens, gas chambers and deprivation were freed by the Allied armies -- not by the work they were forced to do for Hitler.

However, some of the workers who had special skills -- ranging from singing to missile-making and forgery -- were kept alive by their important work, and ultimately freed when the Nazis surrendered.

Even outside concentration camps, work can keep people alive. And, perhaps the lack of work hastens death.

I’m scheduled to become 65 next spring and thought I’d be retiring — not running a new book publishing  business.

OTOH my father’s father sold his shirt-making business to another company when he was 80. He was forced to retire at age 85, and within a few months he was in a nursing home, and then dead.

He told us he had no reason to get up in the morning.

Last year my father announced that there was nothing left on his to-do list, and he was ready to die, and he did (at 86).

It’s important to have a reason to get out of bed — and I think writing and publishing are great reasons. I get out of bed to start my workday at 3:30 a.m. — but that’s probably not right for normal people.

Arbeit macht mich lebendig  (work makes me alive).

Ways to go

Here's a list of the 15 most common causes of death in the United States, provided by CDC/NHS, National Vital Statistics System. Pick a good one.

Cause	Percent of Total
1. Diseases of the heart	28.5
2. Malignant tumors	22.8
3. Cerebrovascular diseases	6.7
4. Chronic lower respiratory diseases	5.1
5. Accidents (unintentional injuries)	4.4
6. Diabetes mellitus	3.0
7. Influenza and pneumonia	2.7
8. Alzheimer's disease	2.4
9. Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome, and nephrosis	1.7
10. Septicemia (blood poisoning)	1.4
11. Suicide	1.3
12. Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis	1.1
13. Primary hypertension and hypertensive renal disease	0.8
14. Parkinson's disease (tied)	0.7
15. Homicide (tied)	0.7

And for the entire world (from the World Health Organization):

1. Ischemic heart disease	12.6
2. Cerebrovascular diseases	9.7
3. Lower respiratory infections (e.g., pneumonia)	6.8
4. HIV/AIDS	4.9
5. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease	4.8
6. Diarrheal diseases	3.2
7. Tuberculosis	2.7
8. Malaria (tied)	2.2
9. Cancer of trachea/bronchus/lung (tied)	2.2
10. Road traffic accidents	2.1
11. Childhood diseases	2.0
12. other unintentional injuries (tied)	1.6
13. Hypertensive heart disease (tied)	1.6
14. Suicide (tied)	1.5 1.5

15. Stomach cancer (tied)

(burger photo from http://www.burgerbusiness.com/)

Can there be a funny book about widowhood? Sure.

A female reviewer said that Barbara Barth's The Unfaithful Widow: Fragmented Memoirs Of My First Year Alone "is a book for anyone who has a void to fill in her life."

That's much too limiting.

No void is necessary, and the book is not just for females. It's a book for anyone seeking entertainment and anyone who might benefit from inspiration to keep going. It's also for everyone who likes dogs and soft-core dirty talk.

Barbara Barth is a master (mistress?) storyteller, with an uncanny ability to recall or recreate dialog. She is able to pluck humor from sadness. She shows proper respect for the past without being a prisoner of the past. Barbara demonstrates impressive resilience, strength and the ability to keep looking ahead despite widowhood, bad dates, and the death of a dog. Her unwillingness to accept cliche roles dictated by age, custom or gender are important lessons for everyone.

I don't want to concentrate only on the inspirational aspects of the book, because it is a LOT OF FUN.

I read the Kindle version on a bumpy train ride. I was tired and woozy. A lesser book would have made me turn off my iPad. With Barbara's book, I kept tapping to turn the electronic pages to see what happens next. The woman sitting next to me wondered what was making me laugh and she started reading along with me. I read faster than she did, and let her catch up before I turned the pages.

Although I didn't "get" the cover illustration (it's apparently a chick thing) and at times I thought I was overhearing a conversation that was meant just for women (number of bras owned, evaluating a man's butt), at other times I thought Barbara was talking directly to me.

Buy the book and hear what Barbara has to say to you. You won't be disappointed.

His dying words

The wife and I were sitting at the breakfast table one Sunday morning.

I said to her, “When I die, I want you to immediately sell all of my stuff.”

“Now why would you want me to do that?” she asked.

“I figure that you would eventually remarry and I don’t want some asshole using my stuff.”

She looked at me and said, “What makes you think I’d marry another asshole?”

(Thank you, Harry.)

You know you're old when...

Here are some benchmarks of aging:

At age 5, you love playing on the floor. At age 50 you hate getting down on the floor because it's hard to get up.

At age 6, a nap is a punishment. At age 40, a nap is a mini-vacation.

At age 8, you need help with complicated things. At age 18, you provide help to others. At age 58, you need help again.

At age 10, you're insulted if a waitress calls you "honey." At age 30 it feels nice. At age 50 you call the waitress "honey."

At age 16, you hate needing a parent to drive you in the car. At age 60, it's nice to have a driver.

Around age 20 in rural areas or 22 in more developed areas, you first notice cops who are younger than you are.

By age 24 you notice teachers and bus drivers who are younger than you are.

By age 30 you notice doctors and clergypeople who are younger than you are.

By age 32 you notice elected officials who are younger than you are.

By age 35, store clerks and restaurant servers start calling you "sir" or "ma'am."

By age 40 you notice college presidents who are younger than you are.

By age 45 you realize that some people whom you always thought were older than you, are really younger.

By age 47 you start getting asked if you have a senior citizens discount card.

By age 50 there are heads of nations who are younger than you are.

By age 52 you talk more about the things you've done than about the things you want to do.

By age 55 you realize that that "new" restaurant has been around for 50 years.

By age 57 you start watching TV commercials you never cared about before.

By age 58, you realize that some of your contemporaries have retired--or died.

By age 59, some old friends don't recognize you--or you don't recognize them.

By age 60 you look forward to hitting 65 and collecting Social Security.

By age 61 you realize that you are not immortal.

By age 62 you stop making long-term investments for retirement.

By age 63 you attend more funerals than weddings.

By age 64 you start giving away more than you buy.

By age 66 you decide that wearing a hearing aid wouldn't be so terrible.

By age 75 you stop buying green bananas or any other fruit that needs time to ripen before eating.

By age 80 you don't give a shit what anyone thinks about you.

This week is weird

Adapted from Wikipedia: In Jewish tradition, The Book of Life is opened on Rosh Hashanah (which started on the evening of September 8), when God begins an annual evaluation of everyone.

Those who will be allowed to live stay in the Book of Life. Others are deleted.

The ten days that start with Rosh Hashanah are known as the Days of Awe, and the Days of Repentance. This is a time to consider the sins of the previous year and repent before Yom Kippur (which ends at sundown on September 18). It can't hurt for non-Jews to try it, too. You can also repent in February or August, or on every day. Off-season repentance may not buy you another year, but maybe it will help.

God is said to have two "books"-- a book of life and a book of death, and records who will live and who will die, who will have a good life and who will have a bad life, for the next year.

It is said that these books are written in on Rosh Hashanah, but our actions during the Days of Awe can alter God's decree. The actions that change the decision are repentance, prayer and good deeds (usually charity). These "books" are sealed on Yom Kippur.

A common greeting at this time of year is L'shanah tovah ("for a good year"). This is a shortening of "L'shanah tovah tikatev v'taihatem" (or to women, "L'shanah tovah tikatevi v'taihatemi"), which means "May you be inscribed and sealed for a good year."

So why is this week weird for me?

Today I'm supposed to get the results of a prostate biopsy and will find out if I have cancer. Later this week I go to the hospital to get my kidney stones zapped, and the next day I see a cardiologist about my extra heartbeat. Life was much simpler when our ancestors got eaten by dinosaurs when they were teenagers.

I hope both the docs and God write good reports--for all of you, and me.

UPDATE (Friday 9/17): Some good news. I don't have prostate cancer and the kidney stone lithotripsy treatment went "very well." I'll be peeing blood for a while and have to pee into a screened funnel to catch crunchy stuff (pulverized kidney stones) for the lab to analyze. I have a prescription for Vicodin ( just like Dr. Gregory House) for when it hurts to pee out the crunchies. Blood and crunchies are much better than cancer.

(Photo from http://www.medical-look.com/)

How come nobody's protesting?

Since 9/11/2001, there have been about 360,000 automotive fatalities in the USA. That's the equivalent of more than one 9/11 massacre each month.               

About 40,000 Americans die because of automotive accidents each year--an average of 114 per day! Only a tiny percentage of the killer-drivers are Arabs or Muslims.

From DisasterCenter.com:

• Motor vehicles accidents account for more deaths than all natural disasters combined. In fact in the United States your chances of being injured in an motor vehicle accident is better than one in a thousand, in any one year.
• If you are a male, than you are twice as likely to die in a motor vehicle accident than if you are a female. Yet, if you are a female you are slightly more likely to be injured.
• The ages of 16 and 24 are the most dangerous for both sexes.
• Between the ages of 16 and 64 alcohol figures into over 20% of all fatal accidents, and between the ages of 21 and 44 almost 50% of all fatalities.
• Between the ages of 16 and 44 the fatality rate has declined since 1975. The most significant decline being in the 16 - 20 age group.
• About half of all property damage accidents result in injuries or fatalities.
• Since 1966 the rate of fatalities by population has fallen around 40%, by numbers of drivers over 50%, and by numbers of miles driven by almost 70%. We are driving a lot more miles and driving is still safer.
• As we are get older we are more likely to die as a pedestrian, but we are more likely to be injured the younger we are.
• Approximately 15% of people who die because of motor vehicle accidents are pedestrians, bicyclists or other wise not in motor vehicles.
• Over two thirds of people who die in vehicles are not properly wearing safety restraints.
• Your risk of dying in a motor vehicle accident is almost five times more likely in Mississippi than in Massachusetts.
• You are ten times more likely to die driving a motorcycle than if you are driving any other motor vehicle.

(photo from http://locksparkfarm.wordpress.com/)