64and a half

Okay you. Since you asked. What is it like to be 64 and a half? Years? Old?? If you didn't ask, well then pook, I am going to tell you anyway. My grandmother didn't tell me. I thought you just got old, wrinkly and eventually white. Then one day your heart went kerthump one last time. Mother told me, but I largely ignored her in spite of seeing how distressing true some of her predictions were. I wasn't going to be that way. But --- I discovered that I did postpone a lot of random pain until I reached the double nickel (55) but it caught up with me. Random pain is pain you get when you are minding your own business and all the of sudden a category 4 twinge courses up your knee. Or you get the bursitis and it goes away in two days but now you have heartburn. Then that stops but your toes hurt. You get the idea. Random -- no obvious earthly cause. You get those, and the docs blithely label em as arthritis. Then of course some of your friends you grew up with die. Keel over with Cancer or a motorcycle accident. You go to reunions to see who is still alive. You read the obituaries because you don't wanna go around saying "How's ol so-an-so?" and find out he's been dead for a month. You go to doctors more often and find that they don't know much either. All the know is tests, and more tests which may or may not pinpoint the problem. I find, for instance that one 'sign of Cancer' is coughing. Well, that's a sign for a lot of stuff -- much of it annoying but harmless. Symptoms tell you less than you think they should. "It hurts when I do this!" "Don't do it!"
And then my favorite... stay in bed. Look doc, I live alone. Who's going to be my nurse and errand runner and maid?? You volunteering? Something has to be done with assisted living. Our society is very uncaring for the elderly. "Take a Pill! be Young again" and some 65 year old freak is running down the road 'exercising' with a grin on his face. Yep. Take the camera away and he comes to a screeching halt, they carry him away, and the smile on his face is gone, only coaxed back by a big paycheck. Look. Build houses with mommy-in -law apartments on. Educate via guys like Dr. Phil that it isn't cool to abandon mommy and poppy in a state home. People sometimes take better care of their animals! Make it a socially acceptable thing to have some old folks in residence!! Pay 'em a little! Getting old is not for wimps, people. Those venerable people need your respect and admiration! We will all go there if we keep breathing. Okay I did my monthly rant. Take care of your Moms.

MidOctober mutterings

laffin
Originally uploaded by Popokiknut.

Every day this happens. Some human somewhere gets himself or herself in a dilly of a fix. If by some chance you have not, it's because you can't get out, or even off your chair, bed, whatever. It's good to see that scary costumes are popular again on Halloween. We've kinda gotten over the most immediate scare of 911. What we have going now is earthquakes and hurricanes. Kinda hard to dress up as those. Read that people should have their DNA analyzed to see just what they should eat. Danged good idea. Too bad that most people who need this service can't afford it. Some people just can eat cake! Gorge on it!! Some of us should never even get downwind from one. Did you know your sense of smell makes your body anticipate what it perceives? Then the digestive apparatus gears up for the food?? You can gain weight on weeds if you are smelling chocolate, gravy, and hot dogs.