Good Health Is Soooooo Overrated. Age And Aging In An Aging America (April 12, 2021)
. . .
K “Fifty years ago, we compared PSAT scores and now we contrast PSA scores.”
J “Life goes on. Praying for a high four digit number has matured into praying for a low single digit number.”
K “After reviewing the digit deduced after the blood draw and then inspecting the situation with the digit, she pronounced the verdict with three magic words. ‘Small. Soft. Smooth. You’re good. For now.’ Another temporary reprieve from the grim reaper.”
J “Boys get prostate cancer and girls get breast cancer. Hard to question that God treats everyone equally.”
. . .
J “The grand irony is that a ‘positive’ outcome is a ‘negative’ outcome and a ‘negative’ outcome is a ‘positive’ outcome.”
. . .
J “He voiced the verdict with three malevolent words. ‘Progressive. Debilitating. Incurable’.”
K “The death sentence is not even a complete sentence. Those words should be added to George Carlin’s seven words you can’t say on television and should not hear until very late in your lifetime.”
. . .
K “For the self-unemployed, their last day on the job is also their last day on the planet.”
J “For the truly self-unemployed, their last day on the planet and the day they go may also be the last day they go without a job.”
. . .
K “Trying to make a call using the television remote was unavailing.”
. . .
J “Humans never escape the planet and never escape the hierarchy on the planet. Check out the nursing home hierarchy. A patient may have arrived in a flashy ride suggesting that they have arrived, yet everyone is assigned and navigates the same generic wheel chair without even a distinctive hood ornament.”
K “I hear you. Everyone wears the same loose-fitting sweat suit and is not able to flaunt a Hart Schaffner and Freeman suit or a Kate McCarthy outfit.”
J “Street cred in the facility is a function of the number of visitors. That’s it. Bodies replace dollars as the benchmark of status and power. How many home boys or home girls come to visit you.”
K “I hear you. When I walk in, all eyes are on me as they chalk up another visitor for him. And almost all of the visitors sign in with the same surname sported by the patient. And a few in-laws.”
J “Which is the way status should be calibrated earlier in life. If you have friends, you have cred. You have it made, and you have made it.”
. . .
K “Over the decades, the preferred rides have transitioned from Cadillac to Mercedes to Lexus to an uncertain heir today, yet everyone ends up in the wheel chair before departing in the hearse.”
J “And so far, no one is able to haul a U-Haul behind the hearse.”
. . .
J “The banality of senility is merciful. He does not know what he does not know. If he understood and fully appreciated his plight and circumstance, he would go seriously crazy/insane/nuts.”
. . .
J “Some staggeringly high percentage of the money spent on one’s health care is spent in the last six months of life. And that is the phase of the biography that is the least glowing.”
K “Endure the last six months and then forget about them and remember the earlier years.”
. . .
K “He lost his appetite for life and his appetite. As his last act of free will, he elected to cease eating. He was too old for and refused to get another transplant. Five days later, he transplanted himself to a new place.”
J “I see it all the time. I suggested to someone to inspect the pill box. She passed on Saturday and bequeathed an undisturbed pill box for S (Sunday), for M (Monday), for T (Tuesday), for W (Wednesday), for T (Thursday), for F (Friday) and for deliverance day. Or another fellow gobbled up S and M and T and W and T and F and S and S all at once and obtained his deliverance.”
K “Some folks really know what is best for them. She was tired of the menagerie of red pills and blue pills and ecru pills and looked up at the earnest middle-aged doctor and ventured: ‘Sonny, why don’t you just prescribe medical marijuana and we’ll call it good?’”
J “Medicare should cover medical marijuana.”
. . .
J “The conversation is the same. They talk about their health problems, the health problems of the people they know, and the health problems of people they do not know.”
K “Health problems do come up.”
. . .
K “When the page remains blank for more than a few micro seconds, I will know.”
J “My pages are blanking now.”
. . .
K “The neighborhood is changing at a quicker pace. The folks went out walking and later slowed into strolling. Stollers are replacing walkers. The new kids may only use the stroller once and are only able to afford to install one vehicle in the great American two car garage.”
J “You start on four legs, transition to two, and then transition cum cane to three and then with a walker to four.”
. . .
J “Nature does not make the decision. The MBAs usually make the final decision. When the costs of care for him grew and could not be billed as easily to the inmate or others, the facility ups the level of morphine and opens up a bed/billing platform. They can always justify it by saying the patient was in pain. She was obedient at taking orders but incapable of hiding the lie and the crime.”
K “Technically, it’s murder, but it is also just standard operating procedure.”
J “I know someone who asked the staff to defer administering the dose until morning to allow some family members one last visit, but they administered the dose so that he passed in the early a.m. They could bill for the day and possibly fill the billing platform with another inmate that same day.”
. . .
J “You leave their stuff at the back door this week and then go through the front door to see how much they are charging for the stuff you left at the back door last week.”
. . .
[See the e-commentary at “Oh, And Happy Holidays! (December 24, 2018)” and “On Ambition: “And Then You Die” (June 29, 2009)”.]
Bumper stickers of the week:
“What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, three legs in the evening, and no legs at night?” Answer:
Aging: I can’t recommend it
All the wrong things are stiff
At this point in life, one deals with loss not with gain
At this point in life, I need three months to get into shape and three minutes to get out of shape
Napkin fashioned into a name tag at the Home/Facility: “I am your daughter Lisa”
Everything hurts and I’m dying
I’m as old as the old people
I thought getting older took longer
Growing old is mandatory, growing up is optional
Growing old disgracefully
OK Boomer
“You say that if you have your health, you have everything. You don’t have a Camaro.” Eight year old who is now older
Inside every older person is a younger person wondering what the hell just happened
I may be old but I got to see all the cool bands
Old age comes at an inconvenient time
“The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A Death! What’s that, a bonus? I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you’re too young, you get a gold watch, you go to work. You work forty years until you’re young enough to enjoy your retirement. You do drugs, alcohol, you party, you get ready for high school. You go to grade school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating . . . and you finish off as an orgasm.” George Carlin
“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming ‘Wow! What a Ride!’.” Hunter S. Thompson
“It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old, they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams.” Gabriel Garcia Márquez
“The future’s uncertain, and the end is always near.” “Roadhouse Blues” Doors
“Health is the greatest possession. Contentment is the greatest treasure. Confidence is the greatest friend.” Lao-Tze
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