This is a thread for ILXORS IN THEIR 50's

Happy 52! One year for every card in the deck.

I'm 56 next week! Ugh. I've crested the pivot point of the decade and now it'll be into the long slow slide towards oblivion. Hurrah! I may listen to Cop Shoot Cop on the big day to make myself feel better.

Anyone else got a permanent ringing in the lugholes?

oh yeah

plus a low frequency flutter in my left ear that is entirely Gary Numan's fault

XXXP - Thank you! :)

I have a very high frequency airy hissing sound in the right ear but otherwise not too much damage, and I know you know, Matt, how loud the racket coming from the rehearsal room was back in the day, so it's a minor miracle.

The Buzzcocks used to rehearse in that studio too and they were all deaf as a post! They were even louder than you lot were to be fair.

I don't think my hearing ever fully recovered from a Borbetomagus / Ultrasonic Attack Wave Pestrepeller double bill at the Spitz about 25 years ago, maybe there's someone I could sue?

One of my old bands used the same rehearsal space as DC gogo legend Chuck Brown; we'd sometimes bump into them. There was once a microphone shortage (because gogo bands are large and require a lot of mics), but they were always supremely controlled. The loudest bands I ever heard were Firehose and Bob Mould solo.

One year for every card in the deck.

Then, as a bonus, next year is The Joker!

53 is a sort of rubbish-sounding number

It's prime!

haha I never thought about celebrating prime number birthdays before, I will be 59 in 2025

Ive bitched frequently about my tinnitus on here I'm sure. I blame Mogwai (in part anyway).

Mine is attributable to Daniel Ash, the Chamber, Atlanta, 2002.

worst my hearing ever got wrecked by a show was . . . son volt?

i'd somehow forgotten my earplugs and despite having shoved toilet paper into my ears i simply couldn't handle it

I saw MMJ a few years ago, they had the kick drum turned up so loud it literally hurt.

Tall, wanting to be near the front at shows but not obstruct other views had me at the speaker stack side at a lot of shows. Steady right ear whine, happily mostly annoying vs incapacitating.

My most lasting hearing damage from a show was Mastodon and Baroness in a venue too small for their sound system. It took my left ear about a year to mostly recover, and I doubt it ever fully has.

I don't think I can assign responsibility for my hearing damage to any one show, but I saw some fucking loud ones in my day, many of them at Tonic. Both Khanate and Borbetomagus (who were co-billed with Merzbow) literally caused amps to catch fire. I saw Sunn O))) and Fushitsusha there, too. I remember I could hear Borbetomagus soundchecking from Houston Street (about three blocks away). And when Merzbow's set started, he hit the space bar on his laptop and instantly it was like standing next to a jet engine. Keiji Haino and John Zorn at CBGB (Haino solo guitar at first, then a duo) was pretty eardrum-frying too, and I wasn't wearing earplugs that night.

Worst time was when I went to a club already so riotously drunk that I didn't even notice how loud the music was. I woke up the next morning with both ears whistling and they didn't stop whistling for three days. That was back in the early 2000s. Currently there's a slight hearing loss in my right ear, mainly top end frequencies. I had a lot of earwax when I was younger and I attribute the relative lack of hearing loss to that.

when Merzbow's set started, he hit the space bar on his laptop and instantly it was like standing next to a jet engine

That sounds so awesome I woudn't care about the potential hearing loss.

How many pills do you take every day?

only band that really hurt and left a mark was of all bands the jayhawks in the earlymid 90s. from then i take care at shows. and use an ear trumpet in quieter places, as classy graybeards do

Mine were Dino Jr. back in the day and GBV on the 2011 classic lineup tour. I only started going to shows again regularly in 2019 (doh).

A while ago, I realized that when my ears ring, they ring in the key of E. Which is mildly disappointing, because it is such a stereotypical rock guitar key.

I would prefer a folkier key, like G or D. Even C would be okay.

I bet Peter Buck’s ears ring in Em.

(They’re called REm for a reason)

PEmter Buck

REmckoning

Fables of the REmconstruction

Emonster

Out of TiEm

Etc.

It's the Emd of the world as we know it

Okay I will stop now

A while ago, I realized that when my ears ring, they ring in the key of E. Which is mildly disappointing, because it is such a stereotypical rock guitar key.

Would harmonise well with Glenn Branca guitar symphonies however, which I think are all or mostly in that key.

well i never.
for my recent 56th birthday i got a kit from the NHS re bowel cancer checking.
i.e. a poo kit.
had no idea that this was a thing until it turned up.
got the "all clear" letter today, albeit with a lot of legally required caveats.

*Hums riff from Judas Priest's "Breaking the Law"*

SHIT IN A BOX! SHIT IN A BOX!

I didn't get a poo kit.

Everyone aged 60 to 74 years who is registered with a GP and lives in England is automatically sent an NHS bowel cancer screening kit every 2 years.

The programme is expanding so that everyone aged 50 to 59 years will be eligible for screening. This is happening gradually over 4 years and started in April 2021 with 56 year olds.

The programme has also started to include 58 year olds, so you may get a test before you're 60.

weird.
i got the letter a few days after my 56th birthday.
guess it depends on your surgery that you are registered with.

(x-post)

Looks like it's been devised by the same NHS team who decided:

From 1 September 2023, you're eligible for the shingles vaccine when you turn 65....You'll remain eligible until your 80th birthday.

Information:
If you turned 65 before 1 September 2023, you'll be eligible for the shingles vaccine when you turn 70.

oh right 56th birthday - looked like 50th to my 50 year old eyes.

ahh, yeah,
seems to kick in once you get beyond the mid-50s groove.

I'm in Scotland and I got my first poo test in today - less than a week after my 50th birthday.
I find this mildly amusing given I had to have surgery for bowel cancer towards the end of last year.

I feel like poo-kits-in-the-mail is one of those things Fox News will circulate next time there's a debate about universal health care. "In SOCIALIST countries, you have to POOP in a BOX and MAIL it to the GOVERNMENT!!!"

You don't even get pictures of the inside of your colon! Total ripoff. It's like the Willy Wonka experience all over again.

Different chocolate factory.

lol

lol nickn, kudos

I owe it all to tipsy.

New varifocals, had them 24 hours, hello headache.

I was worrying about the state of the planet's ecosystem, as you do, and then I thought "well I won't be around to see the worst of it". And then I thought "Right - I'll be dead in no more than a few decades and will never live to see The Future."

Which isn't in any way profound but it was the first time it had hit me in such an irrefutable manner. Hello middle age fartdom! You kids today etc

I was worrying about the state of the planet's ecosystem, as you do, and then I thought "well I won't be around to see the worst of it". And then I thought "Right - I'll be dead in no more than a few decades and will never live to see The Future."

I had a similar thought right around the time I turned 50, that I am not "middle-aged" but am in fact in the final third of my life. And I'm good with that, I guess. My biggest thought re death is that I wish it would be possible for my wife and me to both die at the exact same moment, because I don't want to be without her and I don't want to leave her alone.

Widows seem to do better than widowers, if that is any consolation.

I just had a thought about where I was a decade ago, after I split up with my ex and moved out.. and I thought how stunningly brief a decade really is. I remember doing laundry after I moved out, and the article I was reading in the laundromat, like it was yesterday. A decade is a blink of an eye, and I'm not sure how many I have left lol

i think i'm finally starting to make my peace with things and people leaving this world. even being okay with people forgetting the things and people that have passed. it used to freak me out that you could be here and then be gone and eveything went on as if nothing had happened. that you could still laugh and joke and eat sandwiches after someone you loved had died. i was talking to my kid who is into fashion and i brought up virgil abloh and i thought damn he was everywhere and blowing up and all that and i can't even remember the last time i heard or saw his name. he's just gone. but its cool. everything goes. people go on. animals crap in the woods and trees fall on them. its all okay. i don't mind the idea of being forgotten anymore.

Widows seem to do better than widowers, if that is any consolation.

thats not consolation for some of us.

sorry Halfway, i am feeling a little fragile at the moment, so that comment hit hard.