AGED TO PERFECTION!

Old Timers...

Hi again, friends!
     It's not hard to see that people are living longer these
days -- all you need to do is look at the newspaper.  So many
people are doing incredible things at what used to be considered
old age.  Late in the last century the first retirement programs
set the pension age at 65.  The secret was, at the time, VERY few
industrial workers lived to an age anything like 65.  The
equivalent age today would be something like 96.  These days, we
have problems with retirement funding because so very many people
are living so much longer.  And leading productive lives, too.
     After all, this is the year that ex-Senator John Glenn
rockets back into space.  One of America's original astronauts,
Glenn was 40 the last time he went up -- in 1962.  When he flies
on the Space Shuttle Discovery late this October, the 77-year-old
Glenn will be the oldest person to ever have flown in space by at
least 13 years.
     Here on earth, we baby boomers are beginning to see the
effects of so many of us going through middle age at once.  Can
it be any wonder that Propecia (the baldness cure) and Viagra
(Oh... you know!) where introduced at nearly the same time? 
Despite the normal infirmities that come as we get older, we keep
stumbling along.  Not like there's much of a choice, really.  In
the movie "Citizen Kane," one very elderly character says about
old age, "It's the only disease, Mr. Thompson, that you don't
look forward to being cured of."  But the extra time we have
these days gives us the time to have more choices in careers. 
And more time to see how things are going to turn out, which is
the real reason life is interesting, anyway.
     Thanks and greetings this week to our very young old
friends:  Beth Butler, Sue Yan, John & Ellen Peterson, Laura Hong
Li & Derek Li Harden, Etsuko Hori, Sylvia Libin He & Selene
Rubino, Kiyomi Kanazawa, Jerry Taff, Margaret Champley, Timothy
McChain, Kerry Miller, Yasmin Leischer and Carol Becwar.  OK, on
to the Funnies stuff before we get any older...
     Have a great week!


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SIGNS...
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     There are three sure signs of advancing age.

     1)  Failing memory.

     2)  ...  
          ... Ah -- I can't remember the other two.


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THE AGE OF CHAMPIONS...
--------------------
      On way to win in sports is to keep on competing after
everyone else has given up.  You could say that has worked for
Joginder Singh of India, who made a clean sweep of prizes in his
age class at an athletic competition held recently in Wellington,
New Zealand.  We have to admit that the win was almost a
certainty by the fact that he was the only competitor in his age
class -- Singh is 105 years old.
      Of the tournament's 500 competitors, Singh was the oldest
by at least 20 years, but still competed in the running, jumping
and throwing events.  He also holds the world record for the
Men's 95-years-and-over long jump of 4.15 meters (about 13.5
feet), which he set in 1990.  (Reuters)
          [ ... And the folks from Energizer want to
          sign him up to replace that pink bunny. ]


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THE SECRET TO A LONG MARRIAGE...
-----------------------------
     We have this picture of old folks who are married for a long
time as having blissful, quiet lives of complete peace, right? 
Hardly so, according to Mary Onesi, the woman who holds the
record for having had the longest marriage in America.  The
recently widowed Mrs. Onesi was married to her husband Paul for
80 years, having tied the knot in 1917 when she was just 13.  But
life for the Niagara Falls, New York couple wasn't blissful in
the way we usually picture, despite living together for more than
three-quarters of a century.
     "We always fought," Mrs. Onesi said in an interview in 1995. 
"Before, we'd stay mad and I wouldn't talk with him for a while. 
Now we get over it in two minutes."  (Reuters)


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SENIOR (CITIZENS) PROM?
----------------------
     Talk about second chances...  Ana Molina Osorio of San Juan,
Puerto Rico finally found the time to graduate from high school. 
She'd quit school years ago to take a job in a movie house -- one
showing silent movies.  Mrs. Osorio is old enough that she
remembers hiding from soldiers during the Spanish-American War in
1898.
     Even more surprising is the reason the 102-year-old
great-great grandmother decided to finish her high school
education only 86 years late.  It was a career move.  Keeping
active despite her advanced years, she needed the diploma to take
a teacher's aide position at a local pre-school.  "They need
someone to tell them stories -- nobody tells the children stories
anymore," Osorio told the San Juan Star.  (Reuters)


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YOU KNOW YOU'RE GETTING OLD WHEN...
--------------------------------

   - A dripping faucet causes you to seek the nearest bathroom.

   - A fortune teller offers to read your face.

   - You find short-term memory means writing things down.

   - After painting the town red, you have to take a long rest
     before applying a second coat.

   - All your favorite music groups now only have "The Best Of
     ..." compilation CD's at the stores.

   - Dialing long distance wears you out.

   - The parts that don't hurt don't work.

   - Instead of strawberries, you put prunes on your cereal.

   - The best part of your day is over when your alarm clock goes
     off.

   - The gleam in your eyes is from the sun hitting your
     bifocals.

   - The little old gray-headed lady you help across the street
     is your wife.

   - You are startled the first time you are addressed as an old-
     timer.

   - You are still chasing women, but can't remember why.

   - You burn the midnight oil until 9PM.

   - You feel like the morning after and you haven't been
     anywhere.

   - You get out of breath playing cards.

   - You have too much room in the house and not enough in the
     medicine cabinet.

   - You know all the answers, but nobody asks you the questions.

   - You get your exercise acting as a pallbearer for your
     friends who exercised.

   - You look forward to a dull evening.

   - You regret all those mistakes resisting temptation.

   - You finally reach the top of the corporate ladder and find
     it was leaning against the wrong wall.

   - You have already gone to two Woodstock Festivals in your
     lifetime.

   - You own the same music recording in 78 RPM, 8-track,
     cassette tape, 45 RPM, 33 RPM, and Compact Disc formats.

   - You sink your teeth into a steak and they stay there.

   - You sit in a rocking chair and can't get it going.

   - You find short-term memory means writing things down.

   - You turn down the lights more for economic than romantic
     reasons.

   - You walk with your head high trying to get used to your
     bifocals.

   - YOU WONDER WHY MORE PEOPLE DON'T USE THIS SIZE PRINT.

   - Your back goes out more than you do.

   - Your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles.

   - Your children begin to look middle-aged.

   - Your favorite part of the newspaper is "25 Years Ago
     Today..."

   - Your knees buckle, but your belt won't.

   - Your little black book contains only names ending in M. D.

   - You start answering to "Geezer".


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EASY TARGET?
-----------
     One thing older people fear is that their age makes them the
targets of criminals.  But not always...
     Take the case last year of a young car-jacking suspect named
Charles Hoelzer in Bellefontaine Neighbors, Missouri, who picked
a 77-year-old woman because she seemed so frail and helpless. 
She must have seemed like an easy victim as she approached her
car in a suburban parking lot.
     Approaching her with a knife, he apparently attempted to
take her money and steal her car.  Instead, the elderly
grandmother turned Rambo on her attacker and punched him
repeatedly, causing Hoelzer to cut himself with his own knife. 
Luckily for the accused criminal, police responded quickly --
before the old woman did him too much damage.
     "I told one of those nice officers that if I'd have had a
few more minutes, I would've really kicked his butt," the elderly
woman said.  (USA Today)
          [  And, if convicted of the multiple charges,
          Hoelzer may be her age before he gets out. ]


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     "I don't do drugs anymore 'cause I find I get the same
     effect just by standing up really fast."
                                 - Jonathan Katz 

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OF MEN AND MEMORY...
-----------------
     An old man of ninety was sitting on a park bench crying.  
A policeman noticed this and asked what was wrong.  
     "Well," the old fellow said, "I just got married to a woman
who's only 25.  Every morning she makes me a wonderful breakfast
and then we make love.  In the afternoon she makes me a wonderful
lunch and then we make love.  At dinner time she makes me a
wonderful supper and then we make love."
     The policeman looks at the old man and says, "You shouldn't
be crying.  You should be the happiest man in the world!"
     "I know!," the old man said.  I'm crying because I can't
remember where I live!"


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