February 02, 2008

• Ah, is this why you've been in a bad mood?
• I just celebrated 41 and I feel awful. Stupid Middle Age.
• Basically you've realised life is a pointless waste and all your dreams turned out shit, there is no saving us from the morass of stupidity we know as the human condition and the next generation are only going to repeat old mistakes in new ways, but you haven't yet made the Nirvanic move of giving up worrying and coasting onwards to death taking each day as it comes.
• I'm available to host charity glee nights too, you know.
• *decides to give up worrying and start coasting a few years early* Another thing about the 40s is generational squeeze. For a lot of people, their kids are very dependent and suddenly their parents start to need help too. Quite stressful.
• I will be 45 this summer, so things are starting to look up for me. Of course, I've been down so long, anything looks like up to me.
• I guess they didn't include the nations where the life expectancy is less than 40.
• And then you are with all those people you scorned just a few years before. Lifes a bitch, then you die.
• I turn fucking 50 tomorrow, so thank you very much for this fucking cheery topic and the ensuing fucking fabulous conversation. Makes my fucking day.
• I don't know if it takes til 70 to feel good about things. I live in a south Fl. gated community that is made up of mostly 50+ people. A pretty happy bunch we seem to be. Party at the drop of a hat. The fact that most of us are retired probably is key. When your morning committment is to a tennis match and your afternoon committment is to a round of golf it just kind of makes you mellow out. So don't give up all you forty year olds. Besides. We need your continued support of social security :) A lot of people are really looking forward to that first s.s. check.(an excuse for another party)
• "He does not help himself, nor this site by his extreme comments." Jes' sayin'.
• LOLOLDIES
• My mother said that her 40's were the best years of her life.
• first of all, I'm not reading that article, because I am turning 40 in about 1.5 months. also, I have to say that I have only felt better, more positive etc., about my life as I've gotten older. I know many other women who have enthusiastically claimed the same. I'm happier than I've ever been, more confident, more focused, more productive. I'm not broke, I still look half-way decent... and in some ways I feel that I have recently been attaining another level of maturity (in terms of attitude mostly) that I never really envisioned...it's really awesome. I feel for the first time that I can truly see the "light at the end of the tunnel" of being hung up about looks, and the other neurotic chick stuff. that maybe I am done with "objectifying" myself, if that makes any sense. I find I am really a lot more interested in what I am doing than what I am, and it's awesome. It only makes me look more eagerly into my own future, even if I never lose those 15 lbs I gained after getting married :P
• also, happy birthday RTD! I am sure you are still a total stud ;)
• Any depression I might feel about my age (I'm a few years from turning 40, but not many) is totally defused by the thought that "Hey, I made it this far!" Seriously, when I think about all the close calls I've had, it's amazing I'm still here. All depressed over-40 monkeys, remember! You made it this far! Think about your last close call, then think about everything you'd have missed if you'd shuffled off the mortal coil at that point. You'll feel better, I promise you. Anything, even bad stuff, is better than nothing.* * Note: athiest. YRBMV.** ** Your Religious Beliefs May Vary.
• I'm 53. The pathetic whingeing of you under-50 kids is pitiable indeed. Just wait till your conversational topics are dominated by bunions, gout, gallstones, kidney stones, memorial service details, prostate health, moles, aches, pain medication, how far you walked to school, bifocals and not least, how the young people of today are totally clueless. And have no respect. And are always walking on the damn lawn. That's enough for now as I gotta reapply some Preparation H.
• Another thing about the 40s is generational squeeze. Whoo, thought you said gravitational squeeze. Yup, that'll getcha. Every damn thing sags. Wrinkles, kamus, you forgot the damn wrinkles, too. Making that "uunh" noise when you get up sometimes. Yeah, the bifocals. F*&@ing bifocals. Happy Birthday, Ralph. Come join us on the porch.
• Damn Medusa - I'd count yourself as more than halfway decent looking. 40 would've been pretty far off my guess.
• Happy Birthday, Ralph!
• Happy birthday tomorrow Ralph. You'll be 9.25 in human years, according to this site.
• HBRTD! Oh, and kamus - aside from the gout and prostate, you've pretty much nailed my daily conversation, and I'm in my 30's.
• I'm 42 and probably as happy as I've ever been. I must be doing it wrong.
• Happy Birthday Ralph. Remember, it's never too early to start planning for the disposal of your remains. Enjoy the day!
• MonkeyFilter: aside from the gout and prostate, you've pretty much nailed my daily conversation
• I guess they didn't include the nations where the life expectancy is less than 40. posted by metaflippant at 02:51PM UTC on February 02, 2008 That's not how life-expectancy works. 40 years was middle aged in the Middle Ages as well. Life expectancy is an average. So if you have someone who dies as a baby, and someone who lives to 70 (old age in the middle ages), the average life expectancy of the two is 35. Same with populations - a life expectancy in the 30s usually reflects high infant mortality mixed with a fair number of youngish people dying of accidents, warfare or childbirth, but the expectation of old age is usually still in the 60s-80s.
• Dang, TUM, you're in your 30s? Way to make me feel like a failure! I'm 33 and I can only dream about attaining your level of coolness.
• The 40s can be wunnerful - I've thoroughly enjoyed them thus far and have only a little over a year left. Sags and wrinkles, sure, but nice to look at life a little more placidly, and enjoy the good stuff with a bit more appreciation. Happy Groundhog Day, all, and Happy Birthday Doggy!
• Actually I'm 44 and quite happy these days. Bit of a tough time around my 40th, though. And happy 50th, RtD, you old bastard!
• And thanks for the summary, Abiezer. Sounds about right to me.
• i am 48, have a fine family, have paid off all of my debts (including my mortgage), am getting all the sex I can handle, and can make people laugh. It has been a pretty satisfactory decade.
• Wingo: approaching 40 was painful for me. I had my obligatory "this is not what I was going to do with my life" identity crisis at 39, quit my job and dragged my family to Mexico, where I thought I would write a book. But, hey, I'm an accountant, and, while I'm a decent writer, I forgot that you need a plot. None occurred to me, and Mexico was not a good place for me, so I moved back to the US, went back to college for a while,and worked for 13 years in a job I loved before I retired. There is good life after 40, folks. I now think of my crisis as the stubborn end of forgotten adolescence. I was pretty good at adolescence at around 16 but was pretty stupid at 40.
• I would have read your book.
• I think I'll just stay 37.
• Most of my forties were pretty damn good but so far, the fifties, - meh. However, the second half of the game is usually the most interesting.
• I forgot that you need a plot You should have stolen one - Shakespeare pinched most of his. In fact, you could have stolen one from Shakespeare. I'm 50. I think personally I did begin to experience a new kind of fed-upness around 40, though certain earlier sources of depression like relationship and money problems receded. And I do expect to get a lot cheerier in about ten years, because I'll have stopped working, the children will have left home, and I'll be able to do whatever the hell I like, notably including nothing.
• Actually it sounds like you had a plot all along- maybe two: Scenario A: "The Bulls of Chiapas Province" A frustrated writer in a dead end job reaches breaking point one day. She tells off the boss, bringing up a few of the boss' indiscretions in the process. Unfortunately, the boss has mob connections. Fearing for her life, she and her family flee to Mexico. As her husband sinks into depression and alcoholism, she befriends a local bullfighter who injects romance and passion back into her life. But when word arrives of her former boss's sudden heart attack, she realizes that she misses home and that her affair was just covering her homesickness. After a tearful split with the bullfighter, she returns to the US where she becomes a drug and alcohol counselor. Through her dedicated effort, she manages to turn her husband around after a near divorce and they spend the remainder of their days with the knowledge that happiness was available to them in front of their noses all along. Starring Meryl Streep, Antonio Banderas, Kevin Spacey Scenario B: "The Deadly Bookkeeper" A mild mannered but brilliant accountant, after being fed up with his stifling job, snaps one day and decides to embezzle most of the company's money. Fleeing to Mexico with his family, he sets up a new life and identity for himself. Meanwhile, the CIA who got wind of the brilliant embezzlement scheme, sends a seductive agent down to Mexico to recruit our hero for a daring overseas operation to bring down the business empire of a rich Saudi known to be funding terrorism. After a harrowing penetration of a top security Saudi bank, our hero barely survives, killing a few terrorists along the way out of necessity- now realizes that action was the missing element from his life all along. After going to CIA School of the Americas, he becomes a top assassin. Sequels ensue. Starring Steven Segal, Kevin Costner, Cameron Diaz
• Stop that.
• Happy 50th, Ralph.
• Thanks, all. I blush. MrsTheDog hit a home run by feeding my gadget appetitite with this sweet little thing for a birfday prezzie. Now if I only had somewhere to go.
• Guess your car wasn't so Smart after all.
• (Be careful, everyone. FishTick maintains a dossier on each and every one of us. We can only await her Final Plan in fear.)
• do you really have a Smart, RTD? those things are so cool, they can park perpendicular in a parallel spot!! I have a Honda Fit and I LOVE IT!!!!!!!! fishtick you can add that to yr database...
• I do, Red. They are commonplace here in Canuckistan (and across the pond), but they continue to bedazzle USA-ers. I have taken the little guy on two road trips from Ontario to Virginia, and in the States I have been swamped by horn-honkers, picture-takers, and a legion of questions every time I make a pit stop. But the end of that is near, they go on sale (in a watered-down version) in the US in 2008, I am told. So it goes.
• Happy birfday, Ralph.
• Gol-diggety, RTD - I know there was a thread somewhere wherein you gloated about the Smartypants car. FWIW, since my sprog wrote off my Toyota Echo at xmas, I now enjoy immensely driving a Hyundai Elantra. Ooh, I love this car.
• stop that I hope you wouldn't think it but just in case you do, I was not trying to mock Path's comment. I was pointing out the irony that Path's story of not finding a story was an interesting story in of itself. If my comment made anyone feel negative in anyway whatsoever, I apologize. I hope instead that I'm just being unnecessarily paranoid.
• I, for one, approve your comment.
• Thanks Path-phew! Also thanks for sharing the insights you did in your original post. I should mention (instead of the usual sophomoric comments I'm normally prone to), that I have found life to be satisfying in my 50s. Having children (especially as late in life as we chose to have them- I was 48 when we adopted our first child) makes one very conscious of the passing of time. As a result, and in combination with increased awareness of pending mortality, I'm finding that I'm much more efficient and motivated now. When I think of the vast swaths of time I wasted in my 20s and 30s (a bit less in my 40s) I get sick. Video games were an unfortunate obsession during a lot of that time, I'm ashamed to admit, and I could have trained myself in a whole other career or gotten a lot better at the present one with the time I wasted doing that. The Chess playing, I don't feel so bad about, at least I was exercising my mental muscles. Somewhere in my 40's I went from, "I have all the time in the world" to "My life is almost over!" with little in the way of an interim step. I have to say that my relationship with my wife has matured and deepened too in the past few years. At some point the differences we had (still have 'em) seemed stupidly petty and not worth the childish squabbling and resulting resentments we used to indulge ourselves in. So all in all, except for being a bit closer to that inevitable date with Dr. Oblivion and the looming prospect of having to deal with our parents impending mortality (I have to admit, I'm really dreading that part), life is pretty damn good.
• Watching my mother deal with her mother's death was hard because I could see myself in thirty years.
• "I have all the time in the world" to "My life is almost over!" Ah. Mmh. Yes, that morning one wakes up and realizes it's late, it's late, so very late... The death of my father, 5 years ago, was the tipping point at a very bad moment. But I think it did stall the impending, huge depression. Just entering the 40s now and I've managed to weather smaller problems and accomplish a few things I've always wanted to. But yes, now it's just so clear where I went wrong so many times, and which times I did the right thing. Or at least it seems so. Anyway, I feel this decade will be more pleasant that the last 3. Perhaps now I know how to enjoy things more. I hope so. Plus, congrats, Ralph. The image of a dog on a Smart is priceless!