Signs that you are getting older.

Oh, and an increased fear of death. Where's me dylar?

I'm becoming more and more afraid of death too, which sounds stupid considering I'm 24. It doesn't help that I'm an atheist as well.

Realizing that as much as i would like to play with flashcards on the floor of the school library with those schoolgirls that mary provided a link to and realizing too that their short skirts do in fact make me feel young again if you know what i mean, that part of me looks at them and thinks it's a shame that so many kids are on drugs and makes me wonder if it's too late for me to learn another language.

Ear hair growing.

yeah, what's up with that? That part of the brain is the first to go, i guess.

(and yeah, the eyebrow thing. It's so sudden!)

Yes, quite. I am rather annoyed with this manifestation.

Not to forget arse hair and, most conspicuously, palm hair.

: ((((((((((((((((((((((

Seems like folks turn into things that they'd never want
the only thing to live for is today...
I'm gonna put a hole in my T.V. set
I don't wanna grow up
open up the medicine chest
and I don't wanna gow up
I don't wanna have to shout it out
I don't wanna be filled with doubt
I don't wanna be a good boy scout
I don't wannt have to learn to count
I don't wanna have the biggest amount
I don't wanna grow up

Well when I see my parents fight
I don't wanna gow up
they all go out and drinking all night
and I don't wanna grow up
I'd rather stay here in my room
nothin' out there but sad and gloom
I don't wanna live in a big old tomb
on Grand Street

When I see the 5 o'clock news
I don't wanna grow up
comb their hair and shine their shoes
I don't wanna grow up
stay around in my old hometown
I don't wanna put no money down
I don't wanna get me a big old loan
work them fingers to the bone
I don't wanna float a broom
fall in love and get married then boom
how the hell did it get here so soon
I don't wanna grow up

I've got two big old white streaks in my beard. On either side of my chin. I'm not even 27! (and I've actually had random white hairs since I was 17, but now they're getting organized!)

When I stop and try to remember all I've done and felt in 49 years, I seem as old as Methuselah, but it is a rare day that I enter into such retrospections. If I recall correctly, the above statement applied with almost equal force when I was 25 - with almost equal truth, too. A lot of living can be squeezeed into a life. Actually, I recommend it. Boredom is something of a self-inflicted crime.

And grey pubes. Dead give-away.

I think a major turning point is getting very excited by rock shows where you can SIT DOWN.

Teeny OTM. I really enjoy shows here in the UK because they are (mostly) done by 11 or earlier. Back in Toronto I'd be lucky if the headliner was starting by then. Very tiring on a work night...

When you get past thirty, you really do think that you're going to have a heart-attack.

Yeah, but clearly you are not listening to Michael Bolton CDs and marvelling in the pristene/cocaine-like shine of his digitally recorded voice, for a start.

You wanna see Low? Again? Great!!!!

seconded.

I've got a few coming in. Doesn't bother me. They give me that frazzled/dignified "Susan Sontag" look.

When policemen seem to be about 14?

went to bed at 9 last night

try as I might, I just can't seem to get excited over anything with a 'best new music' tag on it

You guys, I went to a Fitz and the Tantrums show the other night, and he had us do a crouch move FROM WHICH I COULD NOT ARISE. I had to be help'd up. That sucked.

went to bed at 9 last night

this sounds awesome

I think I am older than the entire SNL cast now?

Started volunteering at a middle school (ages 11-13 ish) and some college students (18+, I guess) were also volunteering and I could not tell the difference :(

oh man my knees have really been hurting lately, a friend of mine asked "what did you do to them?" and I said "get old".

also the college students at my radio station seem to get younger and dumber every year.

going to bed at 9 = total classic, esp when you get up at 6.

Instant dislike of anyone wearing one of those floppy Rasta-y Smurf-looking caps, regardless of how cute/nice they actually are.

You catch the lines on your face in the corner of your eye as you walk past shop windows. :-(

You find out things that seemed recent, actually happened before Oasis released their first single

Haha, I'm still getting used to the idea that OK Computer isn't still quite-a-new album any more.

That said I did get ID'd by a shopgirl when I went to buy a bottle of Tiger on my 30th birthday. Walked out the shop barely able to contain a grin.

Ha ha, the last time I saw Magnus (once of this parish) he was moaning "I have long accepted that the police are now younger than me. I refuse to accept MPs THAT ARE YOUNGER THAN ME, DAMMIT."

Pretty sure all this is in the head and self perpetuated but my biggest trigger for feeling old is when you talk to someone and find yourself saying/thinking "yeah I used to do that" or slipping into advisory mode.

As I type this I feel I should jump out of bed now and do something youthful...but it would be a desperate lunge...

Ha, my moment was "ah, but I'm old enough to be your...GRANDAD???"

Oh and jesus yeah, losing hair, getting fat, ffs. Tho since starting running I'm losing weight which is sweet. What bothers me about this whole thing is that I feel like refraining from going out for 30 hours taking bags of drugs makes me feel old, but I don't want to do that. Then it's like..what else makes you feel young?

You stop taking drugs regularly to get off your head, and start taking drugs regularly just to keep your body in something resembling working order. :-/

sux to be old

I imagine

nah, not being ded is alright.

I still have my hair, not fat, not grey, etc..

- you start reading the business pages

- you take up smoking a pipe

- when your wife cooks dinner imperfectly, you scream at her and hold her hand down on the open flame of the stove

- you take up heroin

- when a pretty girl smiles at you, you mutter "this country!!"

You bury your first dead man in the woods

- you pass draconian benefits cuts

- you get nostalgic for your second wife

- your second-in-command betrays you for a visa to turkey

- you stop caring about your toenails

you stop trading green stocks, start trading oil and defense contractors

- you "join em"

- you stop posting to joek list threads

you snap at your kid for bouncing around so goddamn much

before realizing you don't have a kid

-you appreciate the value of things

- you suddenly remember you were involved in "the war"

Ronan - I was talking to some, well I suppose they were basically children who told me they never went to the pubs and only went out to free parties. They asked me if I'd like to go to one and I just heard myself saying "Well, yeah I'd love to, but you'd have to give me at least three weeks' notice so I can prepare". By prepare, I mean make sure I get a good night's sleep every night for the preceding week, do plenty of sit-ups, stock up on remedies from Holland & Barrats, and in general mentally prepare myself for staying up for 12 hours in a field full of crusties and scallawags. Then I realised I probably won't ever attend a free party ever again and the next time I probably get to dance to music in a field I'll probably have to make some sort of creche arrangment or something...

The fallacy is that these "young'uns" have all the energy and can keep going past 3am.

Actually, we felt like shite back then, we've just forgotten.

I did my knee in a couple of years ago and now whenever I get into the work minibus I have to haul myself up with hands on the floor/seats instead of just letting my legs do all the work. This embarrasses me! I remember being a child and thinking how grown-up for walking all the way up a staircase without dropping to hands and knees - feel like I have regressed again now

xpost or remember all too well, mark.

- you think you can jump from the top of an 8-foot fence without injuring yourself for months

2009 taught me that a lot of these are just "Signs you're out of shape"

That said I did get ID'd by a shopgirl when I went to buy a bottle of Tiger on my 30th birthday. Walked out the shop barely able to contain a grin.

I didn't stop getting carded until I was 40.

Kerm otm - still I take sadistic pleasure in thinking of young ilxors who have a horror of aging reading this thread and breaking into a cold sweat

We were talking about getting old at work yesterday and 25yo coworker says "yeah my knees are really getting to me" and 60yo coworker says "you hiked the entire Appalachian Trail last year. My elbows are killing me because me and Kerm picked up a [24" square slab of limestone] yesterday" and we lolled.

taking sadistic pleasure in thinking of young ilxors- signs u are old

my hairline and wrinkly forehead are signs that i'm getting old tbh, plus all music on the radio since 1997 is rubbish

God it really is, isn't it? Bring back good bands like Fluffy I say.

eagle eye cherry was the peak of human sonic achievement

- Hipsters mouth off about your Grammy-winning audiobook.

I'm talking about real songs, the ones people actually WANT to listen to.

- you suddenly (don't) remember you were involved in "the war"

- your "nanny incident" ruins your chances of becoming attorney general

you (30+) have more things to talk about with 40+ than with 20+.

- your "nanny incident" ruins your chances of becoming attorney general

sign that yr child is the devil, iirc

xp you (late 30's) are in a room with people aged 50+, and you don't feel awkward because they are talking with you like you're an adult.

- your anachronistic quips ("i'd wager..." or "time to sally forth") no longer sound ironic

Especially when you realize you're really saying "Time to read Sally Forth."

Whatever, Greg.

your story of having seen nirvana in concert is now the equivalent of some guy in 1986 telling you he'd seen hendrix.

good morning Ned

Hahah

you throw your back out and walk around with a cane, if you can walk. I actually had to use a walker. I was going to put tennis balls on the ends.

when you go to the hospital last night for physical therapy and walk past a presentation from the hospitals orthopedic staff on hip pain and bursitis and you actually sit down with all the elderly and listen to said presentation because you have hip pain and bursitis at 36.

next year there will be people at pubs 10 years younger than me

I've started to groan when i bend own for something or stretch to put socks on :(

xpost pff, I reached legal drinking age limit, and that happened.

xxp: in two weeks I turn 32, which I realized while talking with my wife last night is 11 years older than 21. She's 36, which is how old my mom was the first time I asked her.

http://i54.tinypic.com/t0hw6o.jpg

asked her what?

The first time I asked my mom how old she was, she was 36. Now my wife is 36.

i realized when i turned 36 that my stepfather was my age when he started dating my mom 18 years ago.

In a little more than 2 weeks, I will be 41. That's how old my father was when I graduated from high school, and I thought he was kinda old then.

Also, my earliest memories of my grandparents, they were in their early 50s, which seemed terribly old to me at the time. Not only is that only about 10 years older than I am now, it's 15 years younger than my parents are now.

when my dad was the age i am now he had 4 kids. Crazy

both my parents were 21 when they had me.

I've started to groan when i bend own for something or stretch to put socks on :(

― not_goodwin, Friday, 12 November 2010 14:38 (2 hours ago)

YES. every physical move has a sound effect these days - esp at 9months pregnant. you should hear me get out of a low chair.

haha, try THROWING OUT YOUR BACK BENDING OVER!

I've been posting on this goddamn messageboard since I was 20. I am now 30.

I threw my back out for a week whilst brushing my teeth.

wow.

hell yeah i started here when i was 26, 10 years ago.

- You think "I'll start working on that diet/exercise thing after my first heart attack." (I have seriously reached that point.)

hair growing in places where it previously did not ugh

stalagtite nose hair - oh, kill me! hair growing on top of my ears that i try in vain to shave but just end up with incriminatingly-place shaving cuts - fuck you!

"so, doug, how'd you cut your ear?"

oh man and wild nose hairs that curl out and tickle the front of your nostril. I've also got hair growing on the pieces of cartelidge near my ear canal.

When I was a kid I made some comment to my family elders during a restaurant meal about how all they talked about during a meal was the food. Now I am talking about the food right along with them.

Carefully studying food labels for cholesterol content, swiftly followed by

Needing bifocals to study food labels

My doctor told me I had to get a bunch of lab work, saying pointedly "You're 34."

Also still thinking the 80's were 20 years ago but being corrected that they were 30 years ago really sucks

i haven't had a physical is 18 years, im scared the dr will tell me i have some terminal disease.

I had managed to avoid because I'd just go in when something was wrong & doc would say "is everything else okay?" and I'd say "yup!" and hightail it out of there.
But when I went in for my bronchitis I got the new doctor, and he was all "you know we don't have much of a history on you, have you had a physical lately?"
"Sigh. No...."
Stupid newbie doctor. Happier not knowing what's wrong with me.

here's one that happened a few weeks ago: when you go on a hike with some of your old hiking buddies, and one of them passes out from exertion near the top of the mountain. granted, he's older than me and pretty overweight. but we've done mountains before. it's just freaky to see a friend hit that kind of wall. (he didn't actually hit a wall, mind you. but he did fall down on the trail.)

Wow, that would be scary to see.

yeah when i went in for my back issues, he was like we need to set up a physical. AWESOME. Im a baby.

I've seen friends tear acl's playing golf...

stretching out prior to activity has become crucial. couple years ago met some friends at a baseball field. they were already playing around, so I jumped in. initial attempt to sprint towards a fly ball resulted in pulled muscle. so lame ha.

Mr Veg thought he had tendonitis in his foot, turned out to be gout...which pissed him off no end. Ultimate old person ailment, as far as he's concerned. (His 75 yo Dad gets it)

2009 taught me that a lot of these are just "Signs you're out of shape"

worthy of another OTM

One of the few consolations of decrepitude is watching the fitness bar sink lower and lower ... if you stay moderately active and mobile, you begin to feel like a bad ass compared to others your age.

Whoa, xxps

I knew I was getting old when I started admiring the edging on other people's lawns. Good lord what's wrong with me???

Yeah in that vein I might say something like "Getting quite so much enjoyment out of the performance of household chores" but actually it turns out that's more of a sign that I'm really really bored, not necessarily old.

fancying older (ie, of my age) people

my friend has had gout for years, he started at 25!

I feel like the #1 "getting older" for me is not being carded at bars. Fucking crazy! I still feel like I look like I'm 14. Just in my face though. They're probably looking at my ass before not carding me.

Losing the ability to metabolize gin.

• You start noticing that in movies like Up In the Air and that horror movie where Elizabeth Banks is an evil step-mom, the "older women" are as old you are.

• You realize that when Paul McCartney was your age, "Coming Up (Live in Glasgow)" was his latest hit.

• You show pictures of your grandfather to people and they say, "Yup, I can see the resemblance."

• You watch "The Sting", a movie released the year you were born, and realize that 1936 is to 1973 as 1973 is to 2010.

hangovers last two days minimum once you hit 30+

You watch "The Sting", a movie released the year you were born, and realize that 1936 is to 1973 as 1973 is to 2010.

Argh, I did not realize that until you pointed it out.

i refuse to believe that 1936 to you as a kid is the same as 1973 to a kid today. olden days were just more olden back then.

Funny thing is, this wardrobe could have come from either of those years:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_04kZGR_ltmE/S8sTKkw4-oI/AAAAAAAAHGI/UYmZmEOLDrE/s800/The-Sting-Movie-Robert-Redford.jpg

"i already know how to drink"

I fall asleep after a glass of wine.
A few beers give me a hangover. Sierra Nevada gives me a headache so I drink Stella.
It fucking sucks.

staying up late is 10pm.

i just started eating the big turtle food

*sniff sniff*
everyone's growing up so fast...

You realize the "new" Fleetwood Mac (Buckingham Nicks edition) is 35 years old.

Realizing the crash of the Hindenburg to Led Zeppelin I was 32 years, whereas from Led Zeppelin I till now has been 41 years.

you have reservations about 20-year old actresses as objects of desire

i realized when i turned 36 that my stepfather was my age when he started dating my mom 18 years ago.

In a year or two I'll be the same age my husband was when we first started dating 19 years ago.

Ugh the age thing has really been bothering me lately. I'm on the cusp of some major life changes that have just been driving it home. My birthday is also coming up which probably doesn't help. I don't feel my age which makes me think there's something wrong with me or that I'm emotionally stunted or something.

i'm looking forward to years of being told i don't act my age.

I don't feel my age which makes me think there's something wrong with me or that I'm emotionally stunted or something

there's nothing wrong with feeling this way. many -- if not most -- people feel this way, i think, at least from time-to-time.

In a year or two I'll be the same age my husband was when we first started dating 19 years ago.

― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Friday, November 12, 2010 7:23 PM (55 minutes ago) Bookmark

say what now

my mom got married at my age! not that I feel old because of that.

My grandmother to her dying day would tell me, "Tre, I just can't believe that I'm 85." She'd tell me something like how she remembered the night Memphis dimmed its lights the week Thomas Edison died, and then say, "how could I be 85? Your daddy was just your age five minutes ago."

Then I'd remind her that 1839 was to 1924 as 1924 was to 2009, and that one would really set her off.

awwww

my grandfather died when he was 70, and i was 10. my grandmother lived until she was 94. she used to say, some nights, she still imagined she was dancing with him.

i miss them both terribly.

-- Thinking about your parents dying becomes a scary, all-too-possible fear rather than a trifling exercise in the hypothetical.

jesus yeah, i keep meaning to bring up will/burial plans with my dad next time he's over

on a lighter note:

-- When your classmates propose a night of club-hopping and "doing shots" and you think "oh god can't we just stay in and watch a movie or something?" but then I have never been big into that kind of thing. Except now it doesn't seem annoying, just exhausting.

^^^the worst thing about this is this proposed night of shots is a "Harry Potter party" – that's what made me feel old, that our grad school peers are throwing Harry Potter parties

that would make me feel like they sucked at parties, more than anything else

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

My niece wears acid wash jeans. When childhood/teen fashion trends re-emerge, oldness is upon thee

I was out driving this morning and saw someone driving the same car my mom did when I was in 3rd grade. It had a "Historic" plate on it.

Talking cultural references with anyone non-geeky born before Live Aid is pointless.

I remember being amused back in 1980 when my dad turned forty and all his Navy buddies did this whole wheelchair/shawl/Grecian Formula number on him at the party at our house.

Now March is coming closer and I'm all "Hmm..."

My dad has a giant size coffee mug he got on his 40th bday, I remember him getting it, "haha you're old lol"...it's not that funny now.

My little brother has a law degree, a beard, a marriage and a house, enjoys Prairie Home Companion and mid-century architecture, and uses the word "kitsch" to describe furniture.

I am anywhere from five to nine years older than my biological parents were when they conceived me.

I found a couple of white hairs yesterday. My body has apparently decided to become Jim Jarmusch without consulting me.

Discussions like this don't make me think "haha u old" so much as "oh god OH GOD".

I gotta admit that the fact that neither my sis nor I have kids (nor are really inclined for it) has been pretty damn handy at staving off immediate confrontations with the cycle of life and the like. That said:

Thinking about your parents dying becomes a scary, all-too-possible fear rather than a trifling exercise in the hypothetical.

...yeah. I suspect (and of course hope) not for some time yet, but my dad IS turning 70 next month and all, so the reflections on the subject get stronger now.

I feel that creeping dread more and more, heightened by being on another continent. Seeing the slow build and then snowball effect of aging-related health issues in my husband's parents has been pretty eye-opening.

My own parents are pretty hardy and quite a bit younger than my inlaws, but still... I hate thinking about it.

I was out driving this morning and saw someone driving the same car my mom did when I was in 3rd grade. It had a "Historic" plate on it.

― kkvgz, Sunday, November 14, 2010 3:27 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

sorry but i lolled

In a year or two I'll be the same age my husband was when we first started dating 19 years ago.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Friday, November 12, 2010 7:23 PM (55 minutes ago) Bookmark

say what now

I'm 19 years younger than he is.

i get sad -- not weepy or depressed; just sad (melancholy, i guess) -- more often now. i think that's a sign, in its own way.

When you read a post of your own marked thusly:

Aimless (Aimless), Tuesday, March 9, 2004 8:11 AM (6 years ago)

...in which you reveal that you are 49 years old, and you recall it from the present as a time when you were clearly a younger man with more hair and fewer and shallower wrinkles.

i refuse to believe that 1936 to you as a kid is the same as 1973 to a kid today. olden days were just more olden back then.

I understand the thinking here, but I don't think it's true. I mean, to an 8-year-old right now, any year that starts with 19- must seem like some ancient time.

you still think of the Rolling Stones as "England's Newest Hit Makers"

Their music is too loud.

When the hairs that haven't fallen out go grey.

You tut and shake your head at something rather than just say you don't agree with or like it.

- you start reading the business pages

― progressive cuts (Tracer Hand), Friday, November 12, 2010 9:27 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^ : (

90 is too young to die these days, there is too much to do. When you have family who live into their nineties, 71 seems young. I don't think about aging a whole lot, it means you have a lot of memories. I'm really jealous of people who remember the fifties and sixties!!

I'm really jealous of people who remember the fifties and sixties!!

I do, and it's over-rated. For the most part, it was boring old Shirly Bassey variety shows, which were like the SandieShaw/Dusty/Cliff ones, without *any* funnies and more singing boring songs.

And b&w soaps and documentaries about barrel making, and so on.

I was hoping "barrel making" was some sort of sexual euphemism, but a Google search has not borne this out.

The 'interlude' was for when they had run out of programmes on the BBC or something had ended a bit early, so they'd show a bit of film of someone making a vase on a Potter's Wheel. Went on for ages, or so it seemed to a six-year0old as I was at the time.

i refuse to believe that 1936 to you as a kid is the same as 1973 to a kid today. olden days were just more olden back then.

but then this weekend I watched a complete Top of the Pops from 1981, and it's all very well treasuring the bits that still have relevance to you, but they are not necessarily representative - taken as a whole it really did seem like another age: fashions that nobody has dug up; dance troupe from Essex in ludicrously shiny dresses gyrating wordlessly to hits with no video

and the sheer number of 60s reissues in the charts and knockoff Motownish numbers reminding me that, yes, the 60s were old in the 80s (to me as a kid they seemed as remote and abstract as the Romans or King Arthur), but they were a cool kind of old which people were still buying and still finding inspiration from - just like I find in the 80s

so, in short, by thinking that the kidz should all be listening to monotonprodukt07, I am about as cool as my dad being excited to tell me about Carl Perkins records which came out when he was 7. which I'm sure were p. good, tbh, but...

Man that was long. See last paragraph only.

Basically, the one thing that is usually missing from any 're-imagined' 1980's setting is usually the 1970's, which were still hanging around greatly.

i.e. when anyone recasts a scene set in 1977, you are more likely to see things from 1978 than 1974.

What happened to all the flared trousers everyone threw out in the late '70s to be replaced uniformally by white tennis shorts a la Police?

Christine, when you throw random factoids into threads like these that demand further explanation/clarification can you just go ahead and clarify up front and/or clarify further on your clarification? You are like the reverse Tuomas.

the reverse Tuomas

worst sex position ever

today i played some online trivia game with a 23 years old:

"who is jimmy page?"

"he was the guitarist of led zeppelyn"

"wow! how did you know that?!"

(i'm old.)

In a year or two I'll be the same age my husband was when we first started dating 19 years ago.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Friday, November 12, 2010 7:23 PM (55 minutes ago) Bookmark

say what now

I'm 19 years younger than he is.

christine if you're a year or two away from being how old he was 19 years ago, then you're 17 or 18 years younger than him. if you're 19 years younger than him, then you're already how old he was 19 years ago.

20 or 21 years younger than him, rather pfft

also, i didn't know what was the name of lady gaga debut album and she did.

xxpost

xxpost we have now entered the SAT portion of the thread

"If a married couple travels back in time to the moment of neither of their births..."

lol

owwww my head

Just put me down as an F

Whenever I start getting a little too down about this subject, I go to this website and mess around.

For me, Frank and Dave haven't realized something's up with HAL yet.

Ooh I like that. Dorothy and the Scarecrow just met the Tin Man!

My Ghostbusters result is a crotch shot. Which is amusing me, but I have no idea what it means plot-wise.

The percentage on the bottom left is bumming me out, though. No way have I done 39% of the things I want to. I haven't even done 39% of all the sitting on the couch doing nothing I want to do.

Bunch of xps:

I tried the reverse Tuomas last night, but kept bumping my head against the headboard. Never again.

My husband was born in 1949, and I was born in 1968, 19 years apart. We married in 1993, making this November our...18th wedding anniversary, I was wrong. He was 43 when we married (61 now) and I turned 42 this year. Sorry for the confusion and the errors, I posted without figuring the math involved.

My parents were both born in 1949 and were married in 1968.

The 'interlude' was for when they had run out of programmes on the BBC or something had ended a bit early, so they'd show a bit of film of someone making a vase on a Potter's Wheel.

Ha, the ABC used to do interludes in the 70s and 80s as well; I dont know why, did we not have enough shows back then?

Anyway I can remember one that was morris dancers. Bloody morris dancers. WHY. Also, that "Butterfly Ball" song by Dio or whoever it was, complete with animation of insects having a party or some shit.

And sometimes, they'd play "Talking to a Stranger" by Hunters and Collectors if they had 5 mins to fill in between shows. Of all things to use as filler. You wouldn't get it these days, tell you what.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sn1UqbbbqQ

this?

Yes!!! Why did I thnk it was Dio?

recently got excited about a chair

Kajagoogoo's "Too Shy" video was used once as a fill-in during kids TV, it became their "big break"

And sometimes, "Talking to a Stranger" by Hunters and Collectors

fuck yes, this was my jam

when I bend over to tie my shoes, I get a mild case of "the bends"

2 friends and I we were talking about how young the new students appeared to be this year, and came to the realisation that we were becoming the three old bearded men supping our real ale at the back of the pub. this was confirmed when the old bearded man sat next to us lowered his newspaper and gave us a knowing nod.

that kind of thing is a reward for getting older.

Especially if the other dude bought the next round.

i chose "the princess bride" and it's a still of wesley when he's "mostly dead"

o_O

xp nah, he went back to his pint of mild and Yorkshire Post.

this ties in with amazon wishlist......but: asking for "something for the kitchen" in response to all christmas present queries.

when you say or do things to your child that your parents did or said to you. i find myself playing games with my son that are just like the games my dad and i played.

recently got excited about a chair

this can also be a sign that you are young and penniless, btw. if it's, like, your only chair.

Yeah, Christmas wishlist isn't even "some nice clothes" any more, it's furniture or handy doobries for our house, which I'd be thankful for. Just so long as they don't give me any ornaments or useless jars as we don't have the room. I need (and am genuinely excited by) space-saving SOLUTIONS here.

thought that said "doobies" and lol'd

oh yes, send those too by all means.

lotsa xposts: Trayce, omg the ABC musical interludes. What was that morris-dancing song? I can still hum the tune from memory, which is fairly frightening.

The animated frog song, "Love is All" --- it was Ronnie James Dio singing with Roger Glover, which is probably where "Dio" came from. I had no idea it was Ronnie til a few years ago, I dug it up and played it for my husband, like "lol this was my favorite song when I was a kid" and he goes "Holy shit that's Ronnie singing" and I was all "GTFO" and now I love it even more bc it's Ronnie. Haha.

But whenever I hear it I think, "Yay, Catweasel's on next!" (or Worzel Gummidge/Playschool/Dr Snuggles/Sesame Street/The Famous Five)

Another sign: Getting a text from a friend on the East Coast at 11pm PST (1 am EST), stating simply, "Your wife got my wife drunk."

Sorry - 11pm PST (2 am EST)

Everyone your age or older in the bar is an alcoholic, and so are you.

Less patience w/ morons

only two stations I listen to on the radio: NPR and the new NPR music station

fuck yes, this was my jam

i <3 u JD.

VegeGrrl: hahha you know what it was all about! I can remember the morris dancing song too - in fact having posted about it upthread means I've had the fucking thing stuck in my head the last 24 hours.

Catweazel, Grange Hill, the Goodies, Roger Ramjet, Dangermouse... sigh. Now I want some fish fingers and mashed potatoes.

...so I guess "nostalgia for old BBC TV shows" is another answer for me, heh.

I wish there was a way I could find that bloody video, but the only thing I have to go on is "it goes like this [hums the tune]"

Yeah I know I cant either. This was the best I came up with:

http://www.youtube.com/user/retrooldcommercials#p/u

(whole bunch of station idents in his channel)

- you need to go get some sleep just as ilx is getting busy again

Thats just a sign of "living on the other side of the world" for me :(

well yeah, same as- but i never used to have to go to bed. right now i'm missing the entire keyboard i'm so tired

omg Trayce, prepare to have your dreams haunted

It was Mike Oldfield "Portsmouth"!!! Thank you buried messageboard from godknows what I google searched...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycuT9iFPAvo

- your best mate has two children who were born after the PS3 came out

if they'd been born beforehand you'd feel older

oh god yes

your best mate's kid has a ps3

My niece has a first-generation DS.

my niece just got married

OMG Vege you legend!!! It didn't even occur to me to think it was actually some pop song! In fact I was just telling my friends (asking them in a fit of desperation) that it wasn't one! Mike Oldfield!

I had no freaking idea.

My niece has a Facebook ;_;

telling your dad, "Hey, let me carry that for you"

the "edgy" songs of your youth are played as muzak in grocery stores

YES THIS.

Yeah I was like, "Wait, what?" when it turned out to be Mike Oldfield. But hooray!

Depeche Mode "Everything Counts" at the Whole during primetime (as opposed to the 9-10pm hour before the store closes when the shoppers skew younger) -- major "Wait, what?" moment

Whole = Whole Foods

also - realizing you've spent more of your life not living with your parents

- cannot accept that people would throw a 90's party. I'm still pretending it was only 10 years ago.

It was, wasn't it? /in denial

It was actually only 5 yrs ago /yay denial

http://www.chartstats.com/image/s29174_300.jpg

10 years old in 2 months' time.

Lalalalala I can't hear you

(cries)

The Goodies turned 40 last week. FORTY.

Fuck that is depressing.

The actual chaps themselves are in their 70s now! And gosh Graeme looks old.

yeah, but he always did. To me, anyway,.

Caught a few seconds of The Specials 'Ghost Town' on something or other on the telly last night and had a real Oh fuck moment when I realised that was nearly THIRTY YEARS AGO. Oh and I was 49 yesterday.

Happy Birthday?

I'm having trouble with OK Computer being nearly 14 years old.

That's a problem

yall might be getting old if you find this kind of humour funny: http://vimeo.com/16885715

I'm only 24, but a friend of mine mentioned that if we had ChatRoulette 10 years ago it is exactly the kind of thing we would play around on until 4 AM with a case of Mountain Dew the same way we used to play Goldeneye for like 7 hours straight. Now I realize I have no desire to do anything like that anymore and can't even really drink Mountain Dew because it's too sweet and makes me feel terrible. Yikes.

Even realizing that I don't really have the desire to get drunk and play beer pong all night the way I did when I was 19-20. I guess the truth is those things were never really as great as you remember...

Also seeing all the girls you used to have a crush on getting married and closing the door forever!! Luckily I got married this year because honestly I feel that by the time I'm 27-28 there will be no good single girls left! (that aren't like, 40 and once-divorced)

Oh and jesus...seeing Fred Durst bald and sporting a grey beard...WTFFF

To be fair he always looked like he would be headed down that road.

when you listen to your local oldies station and they play U2 and Madonna...WTF.

For me it's fkkkkkin Sugar Ray!!! The other day I heard "I Want You" by Savage Garden on a 70's/80's/90's station and killed me! That song used to like, take my mind places. Such a unique sound!! P.S. Savage Garden sucks!!

Also seeing all the girls you used to have a crush on getting married and closing the door forever!! Luckily I got married this year because honestly I feel that by the time I'm 27-28 there will be no good single girls left! (that aren't like, 40 and once-divorced)

― frogbs, Wednesday, November 17, 2010 3:37 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

In several years, you will see many of them divorce. Also, some of them will cheat, perhaps with you. You could run into one of them 15 years later. This is one of the many reasons to stay alive.

I think the biggest sign is that I am out of touch with fashion. On top of that I don't care to be "right." I used to hate Uggs, now I am sporting a black pair. I didn't realize Diesel is considered to be "boring." Oops. And thanks to my knitting teacher (<- another sign of being old) I know that SuperDry is very popular.

10 years old in 2 months' time.

WHAT? ARGHHHHHHHH

Another sign: I was having my birthday and told my kids I was 36 now. My parents corrected me saying I am 37. Oops.

You what fucking doesn't make me feel old? Knowing that I've got to go through almost 30 years more of this shit until I can collect social security.

"Remember when you were seven, and you lived in the trailer, and you watched the news the week John Lennon was shot, and your dad took you to see the first Star Trek movie in the theater, and your phone number was simply 2748?

"Yeah, well it's going to be that much longer until the house is paid and you can retire."

i can remember as a kid thinking 'only X more years until i can drive!'

it has been nearly 23 years since i got my license

when you are getting ready to take your son to his first NHL game. WOWEE.

The other day i found myself really admiring some hanging baskets in a pub.

This still kills me

A "90's" radio station popped up recently. Curiosity got the better of me, and my head soon exploded. All that one hit wonder crap mixed in with stuff I actually liked and all of a sudden I understood my husband's complaints about 80's themed radio. It's a lot less fun to listen all that stuff mushed in together if you were there. (At least if you're in the wrong mood to get over yourself.)

when you try to get all sexy and hot and ready for a long love making session in the bed with your wife with the smash 1988 hit by Roger Trautman - I Wanna Be Your Man on the stereo, and you make it 12 pumps in.

not even to the chorus.

irl lols ... sorry dude

The songs you used to love and the clothes you used to wear as a teen are now being appropriated in an ironic way by young people.

I can't work out if my sighs of relief when I sit down after a long day are serious or an internalised joke, run so far to the ground that I planted it.

I usually mark my ageing by noting what people younger than I am are achieving. At the moment it's mostly 'getting published'.

Do not go gently into that good night etc

there's no longer a reasonable time or moment for hoovering to be done while i am in the house

doing the hoovering

not doing the hoovering

Quentin Crisp said that after the first four years the dust doesn't get any worse. He was right.

I don't think he had a dog in his house. If I go one day without hoovering the dog hair is everywhere. Tbh the dog hair is usually everywhere one hour after I have hoovered.

"Spice Girls look set to reunite once again to mark 30 years since the release of their debut single, 'Wannabe.'"

(Too easy, I know.)

Old Spice

Nostalgia for Spice Girls music

You search through this thread and find that the last time you posted on it was over 14 years ago when you were in your 30s.

*does so* By a couple of months in my case but yes.

I actually watched spice world last week (don’t ask)

tiktok comments by zoomers expressing deep nostalgia for something from 5 years ago

You rub down your quads and hams with Bengay, get some on your balls and are too tired to do anything about it. This is me today.

I have a golf game in a couple of weeks with my sister and brother-in-law, and as I always do, I go to the driving range (earlier today) and play 9 holes on my own (sometime this week) first. I hit a medium-sized bucket this afternoon, maybe 40 balls in there. My left shoulder is killing me tonight; don't remember this ever happening before.

I heard a friend say the other day it's the distinction between 'falling over' and 'having a fall'.

Mrs aldo had a fall last year.

The three stages of being old: when baseball players are younger than you; when baseball managers are younger than you; when the Pope is younger than you.

Felt it yesterday at a little garden fete, sitting on the grass as I do a lot in the summer, and just how long it took me to get up and adjust to standing fully upright. I used to just, you know, stand up... Now it's a full series of grunts and stretches

When you meet up with friends of around your age, and your default conversation starter is "ailments". That's definitely kicked in since I turned 60.

Haha

Death from old age

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 9 March 2004 02:35 (twenty-one years ago)

My brain is definitely operating in different ways, now. I struggled through my 30s to collate the immense amount of "memory" that my brain had recorded, and since then it feels as if we've decided to run a "greatest hits" reel at all times instead of having any standards of comprehensiveness

The three stages of being old: when baseball players are younger than you; when baseball managers are younger than you; when the Pope is younger than you.

I was just coming to this thread to say I've reached stage 3. You, too?

Second stage for me! I was dismayed when the Guardians hired Stephen Vogt, a whole 1.5 years younger than me.

Still waiting for a president younger than me; Obama was two months a bit older.

"two months and a bit"

When you find out Max Gogarty is 36 years old.

Stiffler's mom in American Pie was 37 (or at least Jennifer Coolidge was)

Anne Bancroft was 36 when The Graduate came out (Nichols tried hard to make her seem older).

Famously Cliff and Norm (and most of the Cheers cast) were in their early 30s when the show started

And Jason Alexander was 29 when Seinfeld debuted

Just because it never fails to freak me out: the age of the Traveling Wilburys when Vol.1 came out.

https://www.perfectduluthday.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/The-Wilbury-Index.jpg

Architect Louis Kahn did not produce his first masterpiece (Richards Medical Research Labs, Philly) until he was 56. Yeah yeah, big deal, I know, just trying to find something to hang onto.

Pauline Kael was 49 when she started at The New Yorker.

xxp holy shit - I'm older than all of them except Roy Orbison, and even then he was only a year older then than I am now.

Aye, same. Rough. Orbison giving big 'my mate's nan' energy in that picture. 52!

Joseph Conrad is the patron saint of procrastinating writers, his first novel coming out when he was 37 I think

posting something on ilx and thinking 'fuck did i already post this on this thread nineteen years ago'

I recently looked an album up on RYM, read the first review and went "I mostly agree with this but man this dude doesn't know how to write" then realized it was a review I had written some 15 years ago

"I recently looked an album up on RYM, read the first review and went "I mostly agree with this but man this dude doesn't know how to write" then realized it was a review I had written some 15 years ago"

I've had that. I remember binge-reading a blog called The Digital Antiquarian a while back. It has a great history of Infocom, which was especially interesting because I never had a chance to play the company's games when I was young. They weren't ported to the ZX Spectrum, so Infocom never developed the same legendary reputation in the UK that it had in the United States.

BUT! the thing that kept me reading is that the site has pretty thorough coverage of Magnetic Scrolls and Level 9 as well. It went the extra mile. It got me to thinking about text adventures again. There's a sadness to them. They were one of the mother sauces of video games, but the genre was doomed.

Doomed to be swept aside by point and click adventures, which in turn were doomed to be swept aside by cat hair. And yet it's hard to feel too sad because Infocom in particular took the genre about as far as it could go. The one with the robots is still very clever. It's not as if text adventures didn't have a good run. And perhaps in the future if a solar flare destroys electricity and we have to communicate with morse code, text adventures will make a comeback. Text adventures, and play-by-mail wargames. Instead of wearing virtual reality glasses, people will wear actual glasses.

That was a deliberate stylistic parody of New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, by the way. "Instead of wearing virtual reality glasses, people will wear actual glasses". It's exactly the kind of thing he would write in one of his columns. "One day China will pull the wool out from under our eyes, and people will stop wearing virtual reality glasses and wear actual glasses". That is him. He is in me.

Too much writing. If only I wrote less. Why am I writing this. What point was I trying to make. Yes. I remember now. I was reading the site's piece on Firebird and Rainbird when suddenly my name appeared. It was a link to a review of Starglider that I wrote while bored. An awful review. In over thirty years of being on the internet it dawned on me that I had finally made a connection with someone else, but it happened in 2015, ten years ago, and that person probably thinks I am an imbecile. Imagine catching the eye of someone attractive, but you're wearing your clown suit that day. That is how I felt. And yet I paid good money for that clown suit. The gusset is still strong.

Re-reading the review was not a pleasant experience. As mentioned passim I was, in 2006, in theory still a professional writer, but the review is obviously not up to a commercial standard, nowhere near. I was struck by the weirdly robotic avoidance of contractions. I could blame the tranquilisers, or the alcohol. But no, the problem is that it didn't have an editing pass or indeed any care or thought. Without editing, my writing is a self-indulgent, staccato mess of disjointed paragraphs. Bits of ideas that felt clever at the time but deserved better presentation. The fact is that Robin Williams' stream-of-consciousness act doesn't work in writing, and I am not Robin Williams. Podcasting, perhaps that's my natural habitat. Podcasting.

Without editing, I am George Lucas' first cut of Star Wars. I am Star Wars sans the slashing scissors of Marcia Lucas. But, dear reader, the same is true of every writer. That is why so many writers have their hard drives smashed when they die. The difference between self-indulgent nonsense and slashing, insightful prose is a lot of annoying, time-consuming editing. And the difference between a good writer and a mediocre writer is that the former requires less editing = greater throughput = more writing. Until the point where they decide to stop editing their work entirely, at which point they start writing novels about how feminism is taking over America and the only true men are men who eat raw bull testicles. It happened to Anne Rice! It can happen to you.

No, you must be willing to kill the bad plants. Uproot them. The bad plants crowd out the good plants. The good plants will grow to fill the space left behind by the absence of the bad plants. Eventually you will learn to enjoy killing plants. Then you will want to do nothing else. You will find yourself naked, in next door's garden, covered in soil, and then you too will be a writer.

Bands from my youth doing tours or shows to celebrate the 20th or 25th anniversary of an album

xp i thoroughly enjoyed reading that post - maybe it's a sign that i'm getting older.

Liking a band’s midlife crisis albums

farting when you pee

what the, i'm pretty sure i've done that all my life

not being able to remember whether farting during micturation was unusual when younger

pretty sure i've done that all my life

perhaps you're what's known as an 'old soul'

being able to remember times when i thought "i'm too old for this shit" & it was ~30 years ago

an old arse'ole maybe xp

referring to music from 25 years ago as "modern stuff"

I am displeased at how much younger Stephen Vogt is than me. I thought it would be close

xp
On a similar note:

You realize the "new" Fleetwood Mac (Buckingham Nicks edition) is 35 years old.

― nickn, Friday, November 12, 2010 1:48 PM (fourteen years ago)

This observation is now almost 15 years old.

US edition: You are inundated, completely drowning, in mailers from every possible healthcare company about "helping" you to sign up for their Medicare Advantage plan. This will begin approximately 6 months before you turn 65. It may actually never end.

I heard a friend say the other day it's the distinction between 'falling over' and 'having a fall'.

The other week I was at the supermarket and my cart began to roll away in the direction of someone else's vehicle. I reached out to grab it and my feet basically went "Nope" and I fell to my knees in the parking lot. I did manage to catch the cart before it hit the truck it was aiming for, but that was an unexpected moment of old-man frailty.

I recently broke my next to smallest toe (ring toe?) while making the bed. My toe caught the foot of the bed as I turned abruptly with a pillow. I heard a crack and went down on the ground, hugging the pillow and screaming into it for a while. Eventually I tried to move it and screamed into the pillow for a while longer. At some point I was just laying on the ground, looking at the ceiling, breathing hard and thinking about how lame it is to break a toe while making the bed.

Stuff like that happened to me a couple times until I finally broke down and bought a pair of crocs to wear around the house and protect my toes.

A young person offered me their seat on a bus the other day, first time this has happened.

'she sells sanctuary' came out 40 years ago tuesday

but also it's been 20+ years since alex in nyc pointed this out

A young person offered me their seat on a bus the other day, first time this has happened.

this happened me last summer! on the london underground. i am 42 now and was 41 then, so feels a bit premature. the teen kid was very posh and wearing a uniform from a very posh school and so i decided they must have it drilled into them to show deference to adults. it was during a mini-heatwave and i guess i was a bit sweaty also, but mostly i felt there's no way i even deserve the seat. i thanked him and let him stay sitting.

i do have a chronic illness which sometimes means i'd benefit from this but i was feeling great that day and it seldom be visible even if not.

"When the Archbishop of Canterbury start looking younger each time"

I said that 20 years ago ..

they must have it drilled into them to show deference to adults.

Basically yes. One of my childhood friends went to the local private boys school and he said that the rules were that they couldn't take a seat if others were standing, and that if they were already seated and someone got on the bus they had to offer the person their seat. Because I'm the kind of loser who still lives in the same area where they grew up, I see boys from the same school take that to an even greater extreme and more or less never take a seat on the bus if it's more than half full.

I went to the trampoline park and was there about 8 minutes before I injured myself to the point where I had to go to urgent care

that sucks and i'm sorry. reminds me of a little psa for my fellow getting olders, jumping is a really great thing to do regularly, like weekly, as exercise.

Might as well jump.

trampoline park

can't imagine how much they must pay for liability insurance... or do you sign a release?

My cousin broke both legs simultaneously on a trampoline

The Simpsons warned us about trampolines decades ago.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILD_61iAds0

You definitely sign a waiver. I went with my kid and bounced for five minutes and hurt myself. TOO OLD.