At 13, I aspired have a figure like Twiggy’s — and I wasn’t far off, either. Twiggy and I were both built like, well, twigs, and keeping that thin was disgustingly effortless. Well, things have changed, and even Twiggy isn’t immune from middle-aged spread. She limits her diet to one chocolate square at a time, […]
Yes, John McCain, I’m talking to you. Lest you and Cindy decide that a fifth child would provide, ala Palin, a political advantage, I direct your attention to this new study that shows that children of fathers over 55 are more likely to develop bipolar disorder and other mental illnesses. Maternal age, I hasten to […]
There is a kind of girl who’s always liked to talk about her period: How she can’t wait to get it, when she’s having it, how bad her cramps are, where she buys her tampax, whether she’s late, how heavy her flow is, when it’s slowing down, and what it feels like when it stops […]
This tip comes from my pal Amy Edelman, author of Manless in Montclair, a wonderful memoir novel about a widow in the suburbs in search of a new husband. Amy’s advice: Don’t wear more than one pair of glasses at a time. The young among you may say, Duh! But I sense you over-45s out […]
Here’s a counterintuitive directive: If you want not to act old, you’ve got to knock off all that surfing, skating, basketball-playing and cardio-kickboxing you’ve evidently been doing. Lying on the couch, staying out of the gym, and sitting on the sidelines are the sports of the young, while middle-aged and older people are the ones […]
During the three or four hours I spent last night at the emergency room (Don’t ask: You know I am forbidden by the Rules of Not Acting Old to talk about my health), I read a really great passage in a novel called In The Woods by Tana French that goes like this: “We think […]
Breaking July 4th warning: Eating watermelon, says a new study, can have the same effect as popping Viagra. Yes, ladies and gents, the aging males at your holiday picnic may discover a new fondness for the large pink fruit. The secret ingredient is something called citrulline, according to news reports, and eating a lot of […]
At the risk of breaking one of my own rules nearly as soon as I set it down, getting up when it’s still dark outside is what Seinfeld’s parents did. Remember? Jerry goes to visit and is awakened in the dark to find his parents in the kitchen making coffee and squeezing juice. “We thought […]
If you want to avoid acting old, do not discuss your digestive tract in any way, ever, says my friend and fellow writer Christina Baker Kline. That means no talk of bran muffins or lactose intolerance, no references to regularity or heartburn, no jokes about gas or “tummy troubles.” We all know it happens, but […]
This is an obvious one, though it’s way down at #24 because I kept forgetting it. I’m not kidding. It was one of the first ones I thought of, a whole week ago when I started this blog and I went into the kitchen to tell my son, who asked me what platform (I think […]
