Retirement!

Retirement has arrived and after three months is finally beginning to set in. I know that seems like a long time for something to sink in, but after 32 years it's hard to imagine a way of life that doesn't include answering to someone who is somewhere "above" me. Since April 1st, I've caught up on lost sleep, started to exercise, and watched a lot of C-Span. This last activity has stirred an amazement with how far we have slipped back into the '50's. You now back when things were Andy Griffith good. In other words, when no one questioned their good luck and poo-pooed those who were on the bottom of the pile. This country is much more like a family than most people admit. We really can't escape our family, we have to learn to get along, learn to take care of each other, learn how to make it work. Currently, we are not doing a great job of that. Listening to a hearing about Mountain Top Removal on C-Span this morning, I am amazed at how the House Subcommittee on Natural Resources and the Chamber of Commerce can turn a blind eye to the effects of this destructive form of mining. Is this commercial activity more important to the current and future health of the Mountaineers that live near their mines.

Rock out to this random group, check out the video on youtube.

Random thoughts on readings

"So, do you have any grandchildren?" An innocent question, that I was asked, that slapped me in the face! I'm old, so there Part Two What causes crime and violence? Societal disempowerment, to start, makes a good explanation. If you are essentially marginalized and cut out by your "society" and there are a lot of you, then it's frontier justice that directs your travel through life and not the law and order of the society. Affronts to your personhood and the personhood of your peers are treated as threats to your honor, and honor is all that you can claim. Income disparity,and the attendant societal disempowerment, has been shown to make life miserable for EVERYONE in the disparate societies. Shorter lives, less happiness, and less certainly. Just a few thoughts for a cool November end.

On the un-age related front . . .

One of my two favorite bloggers has returned, revealed her identity, lost her job, and then ripped off some of her wonderful posts. Go see for yourself because PittGirl (a.k.a. JanePitt) is back as her true self Ginny Montanez! She is worth a read anyday, all we need to do know is figure out a way to help her make a living at it.

The old age rant continues . .

You may ask yourself, "How will I know that I'm getting old?" And you would be wise to do so. Here is my answer, the operational definition of growing old is this: the mail man delivers your brand new automatic blood pressure monitor!

My new doc, a wonderfully bright late 20, early 30 something suggested that I monitor the old BP and I assured her that I would do that whenever I'm in Kroger, they have those nifty BP chairs. At least they used to, before the big remodel of every Kroger within 50 miles of Macon. So, after some online accuracy research I ordered one and it came today.

The good news is that it seems to be as accurate as advertised, there were not reading of 300 over 200. The better news is that after a few minutes of breathing slowly I tricked it into giving me a nice reading. As one who works with numbers, loves amateurish research, and has a new automatic blood pressure monitor, this could be fun. Thanks Doc!

More on age, oh boy!

OK, I love it when two worlds collide.

Age and iPod listing is today's collision.

Here's my theory: we all have a real age that is determined by subtracting our date of birth from today's date (something that you easily accomplish in Excel), but we also have what I want to call an "attempted" age. This is less easily calculated but there may be many ways to accomplish it.

For example, at what age do you dress? Adults that dress like teenagers or young adults who dress like "Wall Street Bankers" might be one way, sort of difficult to quantify.

My suggestion, based on the assumption that you select the music that is on your iPod, is to average the year that each song was written or recorded (it maybe more efficient to use a random sample of some percent of songs) and then subtract 17 from the average (that assumption is that 17 seems to be age at which our musical taste becomes fixed). This could be an estimate of your 'attempted' age birth year. By subtracting that date from today's date you could get your attempted age or the age at which you place yourself, at least in regard to your musical interests.

I've got to see if iTunes will generate a list of the songs' dates, BRB.

OK, so you can view the 'year' in your music list and you can sort by year. A quick review of the years seems to indicate that the iPod's year is the year it was recorded, I'll have to check that, too. Not all songs have a year listed, but I did notice that the earliest year listed (1970) was exactly 17 years from my birth year. I know that at least some of the undated songs come from before 1970, so I'll have to hunt down some of the missing data.

Growing old, all of a sudden.

OK, I get that Lance Armstrong's returning to cycling and Tom Watson showing up at the British Open are pretty big deals. What I don't get, on the eve of my annual birthday ride at the 24 Hours of Booty, is just how did 59, never mind 37, get to be considered 'OLD' all of a sudden.

I mean, I've gone to weekend running events where 80 year olds finish the 5k or 10k and don't look like they broke a sweat.

I think the baby boomers may be beginning to whimp out on the whole live a long, healthy life thing. Maybe the economic crisis, the financial market crisis, and the unemployment crisis, have found us BBs ill equipped to handle things.

Hopefully, we'll get a second wind and push on! But, it doesn't help that old just got younger.