"Chicago is up in the house!"/"He's never nipped at anybody but he barks and growls"/"I wanna be your dog"...

... "Everyone left is from Chicago"/"It's the love-in of a lifetime"/"People are going to be really embarrassed some day to look back and realize that they had joined in on something that was really a mistake and they chose the wrong side and that they joined it with such fervor"/"Did you ever do that when you were young?"



All this video was recorded yesterday... except the flashback. (That was originally blogged on February 17th.)

And here's the NYT article on "self-compassion" that I talk about in the car.

"So here’s what over 20 years of law teaching does to a man."

Oh, no!

Ruth Bader Ginsburg says "I am certainly not going to retire before I get my Albers back."

(Via CNS.)

"If men are honest, everything they do and everywhere they go is for a chance to see women."

"There were points in my life where I felt oddly irresistible to women. I’m not in that state now and that makes me sad. But I also believe that a lot of the improvements in my character have come through ageing and the diminishing of powers. It’s all a balancing act; you just have to get used to the ride."

Jack Nicholson.

In the future, everyone will be...

... 36.

"Three years into his first term as president, though, I was feeling the first shivers of concern that something beyond mellowing was affecting my father..."

Ron Reagan speculates and expectorates a juicy lump. Please notice him. Please. He has a book.

I almost forgot! It's my bloggiversary!

I'm surprised that slipped my mind. Maybe because I turned 60 on the 12th. And I don't mean I'm getting old and therefore forgetful. I just got distracted by the big 0 birthday. Anyway, I'm getting in under the wire here in the Central Time Zone.

The blog is 7 years old today.

AND: I should note, once again, that I have posted every single day — including weekends, holidays, etc. — in each of the 7 years.

It's my birthday. I'm 60!

Don't worry, young people. The view looks great from here.

Tomorrow is my birthday.

I will be 60.

Any ideas?

"The Internet is now the main national and international news source for people ages 18 to 29..."

"In 2010, 65% of people younger than 30 cited the Internet as their go-to source for news, nearly doubling from 34% in 2007. The number who consider television as their main news source dropped from 68% to 52% during that time."

Good lord, I can't believe the switch over to the internet is going so slowly. Who on earth is watching TV news? I'm checking out the internet all day long, and I never watch TV news. And I'm nearly 60 (I say on the 7th day of my countdown to age 60).

"Are you over 50 and enjoying life? Then you may well be a mappie."

"The acronym stands for Mature, Affluent, Pioneering People and has been coined to describe a growing social group of active, fun-loving fifty- and sixty-somethings."

Oh, lord, must there be a cute name for everything? I say that on Day 9 of my countdown to age 60.

The truth is, it's surprisingly good to be old — if you don't mind that closer-to-death part. But no one knows how many days are left. Are you alive and paying attention and not suffering too much today? Then this is a good day you have as a human being. Are you richer today with more lived days behind you or with the odds of more days ahead? You can't be in the future days any more than you can be in the past days. The past days can be remembered. The future days are unknown, even in number.

Chuck Berry — who is 84 but still plays "Sweet Little 16" in concert — collapsed on stage last night.

It was a packed house in Chicago:

The show had started promisingly. Taking the stage in a red sequined shirt, black slacks and a white sailor hat, Berry began with "Roll Over Beethoven"...

Although Berry played this and following songs - "Sweet Little Sixteen" and "School Days" -- at slower tempos than the original recordings, he filled them with his classic guitar riffs and sang them with weathered authority....

Things then quickly began going off the rails. Berry played snippets of blues songs and an unsteady version of " Memphis Tennessee," before taking an extended pause to try to retune his guitar, complaining that it was out of key with the piano. He made several unsuccessful attempts at "Let It Rock," in part seated at the piano, and performed disjointed bits of "Carol" and "Johnny B. Goode."

Berry revived to lead the crowd in a sing-along of "My Ding-a-Ling" and acknowledged things weren't going well, telling the crowd he'd try to do better at entertaining them. It was not to be. After a version of "Reelin' and Rockin'" they found the band gamely following his inconsistent tempo, Berry made his way to the piano, where the show came to an end completely at odds with the joy in his music.

He tried to resume playing, but paramedics arrived, and he was taken off for examination. The fans waited, and he came back again, thanked the people and left — "using a bit of his signature 'duck walk.'"



Chuck Berry.

Pictured on the front page of the NYT: "Scott Walker, the governor elect, brings his lunch to work."

It's not still on the front page. That was a few hours ago. A nice image of Walker, don't you think? Flattering because he's eating lunch at his desk. It's not conventionally flattering to catch the bald spot like that, but it's politically flattering to have him bending over his work. (On the other hand, what's the big deal? I eat lunch while working almost every day. Don't you? Breakfast too, and often dinner. But I like to see my public servant working, and it's nice of the NYT to offer political support to a new governor who doesn't represent the newspaper's political preference.

Here's the article:

Mr. Walker, who has said publicly that he hopes to force public employees’ wages and benefits “into line” with everyone else’s, urged leaders against the session, saying he needed “maximum flexibility” to handle the state’s coming budgets, but Democrats argued that the contracts were not particularly beneficial to workers anyway (they included no raises and furlough time that amounted to a pay cut)....

State workers here are predicting a flood of retirements by those who will not want to bear the uncertainty of it all, and particularly the prospect of shrinking pension benefits. Some employees were already talking about moving elsewhere, getting new jobs, retiring.

I'm one of those state employees. Should I retire? (I'll be 60 on January 12th.) Is that the way to get while the getting is good?

Beautiful and 23...

... Crystal Harris is marrying an 84-year-old man.

ADDED: Or maybe she's 24.

While she was studying psychology at San Diego State University, she started modelling and was noticed by Playboy. She met Hefner on Halloween in 2008 and started dating him in January 2009 while he was also dating identical twin glamour models Kristina and Karissa Shannon. But he ended his relationship with the twins in January this year and has remained monogamous to Crystal since. Crystal once said that she believes she and Hefner were able to bond because she lost a long-time boyfriend in Iraq and he was going through a break up with Holly Madison, whom he dated for 8 years.

It all fits together!

"When I thought my dogs and I were having deep, meaningful conversations, I knew it was time to get out of the house."

"And I needed the money."

"Secretary of State Hillary Clinton grew out her hair."

"It was a fine rebuke to the accepted adage that a woman of a certain age must cut her hair - a symbolic gesture that she is leaving sex appeal and youthful flirtatiousness behind. Clinton's flattering shoulder-length style was a reminder to women who have unhappily submitted to the scissors that they should not allow cultural assumptions to dictate their own perceptions about themselves."

Writes Robin Givhan, collecting the "Best of 2010" items (from her fashion beat). Now, why did Hillary grow her hair out"? ("Grow your hair out" is a funny expression. It's not as if you can grow your hair in. I mean, ingrown hairs aside.) Did she grow her hair to express her perception about herself or to remind other women that they need not adopt the culture's assumptions about themselves? Was she trying to say — via hair — I think I'm sexy or you older women ought to feel that you're sexy and say it with hair? I think she was copying Sarah Palin.

But Sarah is quite a bit younger than Hillary, and the same thing looks different with an older face (and the texture of an older person's hair is different). If you really want to say that long hair on a woman over the age of 60 says sexy, then show us some examples of women that old who look sexier because of their long hair. Or is the point only how you subjectively feel. You don't actually look sexier with that long hair, but we know that it seems that way to you — though maybe signaling that you believe you're sexy is enough to make you look sexier.

But come on! Hillary isn't trying to say I'm sexy. She's trying to say I'm trustworthy and highly competent. Perhaps she's succeeded — look.

"I received a phone call anonymously that my daughter was involved with a guy 40 years older than her."

"You said you couldn't stop him - so I did."

A statement to the police by the father of a 17-year-old girl who saw it as his "duty as a father" to wield a bread knife, strategically.

A racial incident in Milwaukee.

Involving a 100-year-old woman who was working as a Wal-Mart greeter and used the provocative epithet "you people."

"There’s just too much Muslim influence, all this Shariah law..."

"We’re conservative here, old and cantankerous."

Here, being Oklahoma, which just passed the "Save Our State Amendment."

"People my age don’t want to put hats and scarves on in their homes..."

Old people in Britain are cold.

Ironically, I read that while wearing mittens. I've been trying to warm up my hands for the last hour. It's not really a big deal. I keep the thermostat at 62°. I could turn it up, but I don't. It may be true that as you get older, the cold gets to you, and I feel sorry for people who don't have the option to turn up the heat. I think that wears on you psychologically. But, really, it's healthy to keep the air you breathe cool. It's also good for the environment not to burn more fuel for heat. Shouldn't it be normal to warm up your extremities with sweaters, slippers, hats, scarves, and even mittens? Why is there some idea that if you are getting old, you shouldn't have to use clothing to warm yourself?