So now do you feel old? Well, do you...punk?

My friend Frank recently posted on his Facebook page this photo of TV's MASH characters Cpl Maxwell Klinger, now 83, and Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan, now 80.  (The title is a nod to 87-year-old Clint Eastwood if you didn't catch it.)

And if you're curious, Marilyn Monroe would have recently turned 92, Neil Armstrong would have been 88, Elvis would have been 83, Sophia Loren is 83, and youngsters Raquel Welch and Roger Staubach are 77 and 76 respectively.  Yikes!  And to add insult to injury, this year will mark the 50th anniversary of me being honorably discharged from high school.  These are things you don't really think much about, until you think about them.  Then it's like, "Sumbitch, where has the time gone?"

This is not meant to be a downer post.  Just the opposite.  I've seen some pretty amazing things that Generation XYZer's might have only heard about on Twitter, maybe.  I DON'T envy them at all.

Now consider this:  The average American today lives to be 78.7 years old, which has dropped recently and is below the 80.3 year average of other OECD advanced nations.  Some of that is due, they say, to poor lifestyle choices, and some due to lack of adequate healthcare.  Regardless, all of us are one day closer to kicking off today than we were yesterday. 

All the recent prescription drugs that are advertised on TV got me to thinking.  One is a treatment for those who have non-small-cell cancer that has spread.  It says Optivolumovoriousoptomoline (marketed as YippieJuice*) can "give you a chance to live longer".  That concept, "living longer", baffles me. Why does everyone want to "live longer"?  Is that some great virtue?  Why would you want to squeeze out a couple of more months/years of feeling like crap?  Just to prolong the inevitable?

We seem to put way too much time and effort in trying to hold on.  Just think of Max, Hot Lips, Marilyn, Elvis, Sophia, and all the rest of your childhood icons as forever young.  Then just live right, be kind, help those you can, hurt no one, and go on about your business.  What's gonna happen is gonna happen. ;)

S

* Now don't go running to your pharmacy asking for some YippieJuice.  I might have just made that name up.

Youth and vigor are no match for old age and treachery

Do you recognize her?  I'll bet not, unless you read the same obscure "Where are they now" article online I did yesterday.

I've never been too conscious of age, or birthdays, or getting old.  It's gonna happen anyway, so just roll with it, right?  Wrinkles happen, hair takes a vacation, sometimes teeth take up residence in a glass in the bathroom overnight.  It's all good.

But that article yesterday really got me to thinking about how old all the sports / entertainment / news icons of my yoot are, or would have been, today.  Yikes!

Elvis, had he lived, would have been 79.

Captain Kangaroo (Bob Keeshan) would have been 89.

Paul Newman would have been 89 also.  Paul Newman!

 

Sophia Loren is 79.  Lemme say it again....SEVENTY NINE!

Henry Winkler, aka Fonzi, aka The Fonz....68.

Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, would have been 88.

Roger Staubach (Dallas QB) is 72.

 

Raquel Welch is 73.

  

Diane Sawyer, the TV news anchor, is 68.

Frankie Avalon is 73.

Little Richard is 81.

This old geezer is 63.

Chubby Checker is 72.

Terry Bradshaw (Pittsburgh QB) acts a forever young 65.

One of my main teenage crushes, Leslie Gore, is 67.  (Unfortunately for me I wasn't "her type".)

And this beautiful lady, whose picture adorned many a young boy's room back in the 1960's, is the same as the first photo shown above....79 year old Bridget Bardot.

Tick Tock Tick Tock Tick....just roll with it.  

All my "beautiful people" are....umm....still beautiful. ;)

S

Come help me re-name some airports....

The BBC headline read, "Baby born on Armenia plane named after stewardess".  The story went on to say the baby was named Hasmik after Hasmik Ghevondyan, who helped deliver her.  Ms. Ghevondyan later modestly recounted how "the whole crew helped deliver the baby."

Two comments:  Apparently political correctness hasn't yet made it to Armenia.  Years ago (before K) I dated a "flight attendant" and I can tell you they are very touchy about being called "stewardesses".

Secondly, if "the whole crew helped deliver the baby", who was flying the friggin' airplane?  I always feel better when my airline keeps one pilot (minimum) up front looking at least a little interested in keeping the wings level and pointed in the right direction.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And in keeping with this post's aviation theme, have you ever thought about airport names?  New York has John F. Kennedy, Washington has Ronald Reagan, Houston has George Bush, New Orleans has Louis Armstrong, OK City has Will Rogers, and even some hole in Pennsylvania has an airport named after their hometown King of Pork, Congressman John Murtha.  

Paris has Charles De Gaulle, Tel Aviv has Ben Gurion, Warsaw has Frederic Chopin, and Istanbul has Mustafa Ataturk Airport.  Now I read  (again via the BBC) that Birmingham, England is considering re-naming their airport Ozzy Osbourne International Airport after the Black Sabbath musician and former resident.

Let me throw another few proposals into the ring:

Dallas/Ft. Worth could re-name their airport JR Ewing International.

  

Seattle's SeaTac could become Starbucks/Howard Schultz International.

Memphis...."The King".  Just The King.

Detroit Metro could become MoTown/Berry Gordy International.  

Las Vegas' McCarran could be re-named the Bugsy Siegel Casino, Wedding Chapel and Elvis Venue.  And Airport. 

Miami could re-name theirs the Ricky Ricardo World SmugglePort.

Newark Liberty could become Joe Pesci International.

Bogata, Colombia's El Dorado could become Juan Valdez International.

Astana, Kazakhstan could re-name their airport Borat Field ('cause, you know, it's just a mowed field).

Rome's Leonardo da Vinci could become the Sophia Loren Fountain of Eternal Youth and World Airport.  (Come on Leonardo....you and Michelangelo have Rome pretty well sewn up.  Share, OK?)

Help me out here.  There's bound to be lots more.  Dazzle me!  ;)

S