The ultimate time waster?

What to do when you’re stuck waiting for the doctor to come into the exam room?

Ooh, ooh! I’ve got one. It’s what you do when you’re waiting to board an airplane.

Or definitely what you might want to do when the plane is tearing down the runway.

Facebook reels, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube…choose your poison. The reality is that there are dozens of ways to waste our time with the smart phone of your choice. What did we do before smart phones? Crossword puzzles? Still do those but a bit of a drag to carry pencil and paper around all the time. Oh, wait. You can also do them on your smart phone. Solitaire? A deck of cards is hardly portable, and you can play that game on your phone as well.

Now I know the book people are thinking, why not read a good book. A paperback is relatively portable and an iPad mini or Kindle makes it even easier. Plus, you can read in the dark. Okay, I accept that option as a great way to fill the downtime. But what if you are just trying to avoid any intellectual engagement and just want mindless fun? Then you’re off to the app store to get Angry Birds, Tetris, Sudoku, Words with Friends, Wordscapes, Minecraft, Candy Crush, or Sonic Dash.

If this is all starting to sound like it might be too much work, you might want to try Viridi. You grow and care for a pot of succulents in real time. Seriously. People say it’s great when you’re waiting for the Wi-Fi to kick back in (or there is none).

Gardening not your thing? Try Zen Koi. Yes, you can raise koi on your phone.

You could also try Fluid Monkey, where you drag your fingers through pools of liquid in the quest to make fabulous designs. This is ideal for when you’re on hold with customer service.

How about Prune? Not the fruit. This meditative app lets you retreat from the world in order to trim your digital bonsai tree.

Similarly, you could methodically wrap carved wooden objects with rope in Zen Bound. If you like puzzles, you could try Monument Valley where you get to guide a princess through simple Escher-like structures.

Perhaps the ultimate time waster is going to the app store to find something you like. With any luck, that should help you blow off an entire afternoon.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. You can also visit his author page here. His newest mystery novel, Rio Puerco Demise is available on Amazon. His first mystery novel, Head Above Water, is also available on Amazon. But that’s not all. You can also purchase the Best of BoomSpeak on Amazon.

While it was not exactly pocket-worthy, I did have to pump myself up a bit after I fumbled in the final round of our golf tournament. I still came in second … or as they say in the pageants, runner-up! No tiara for me, but I was hoping I’d play a little better in the final stretch.

So, whew, I’m glad that’s over. In this final stretch of life, I find that competition is overrated. Now is the time on Sprockets when we dance!

Of course, I mean that figuratively, because you know, pain and inflammation and all that. But here we are. Still at it. Finding joy no matter what. Dancing with bad knees.

The aging body is wont to crap out, but I have vowed I will not be part of the club that recites their ailments like baseball stats. Bone-on-bone … that’s my personal favorite. It’s actually a drinking game for old people. Every time someone says bone-on-bone, you take a shot of your protein shake.

I’m sticking with my physical therapy and will save my whining for a professional.

We went to Walgreens to get the new Covid vaccine, and for the first time, we had to check-in using our phones to scan a QR code. We don’t know nothin’ about QR codes. Dale can barely use his phone to text hi, and I say that as his loving partner of 45 years.

It was an unpleasant experience at best. Low-grade profanity was involved, but we finally got it done, and I had to apologize to the pharmacy assistant for my rant about serving old people with technology designed by and for young people. Oh, sorry about you wanting to stay alive, but we’ve got this little test for you first. I do think she was a little rough on the arm. Note to self: Be nice to the people who poke you.

A good number of you have expressed an interest in volunteering – learning more about my personal journey toward deciding what to do – and reaping the rewards of any pearls of wisdom I may uncover during this quest. Did I mention this time of life is also filled with disappointment? As in you will be disappointed I have nothing new to share.

Well, that’s not completely true. I seem to be very good at talking myself out of potential opportunities. Children scare me, animals are unpredictable, I don’t want to go into anyone’s home, I don’t want to actually talk to anyone, no closed up spaces where I’ll catch any virus that’s going around, I can’t sit all day, I can’t stand all day. I’m sure you understand.

Donna Pekar is an aging badass (for real) who lives in California and writes Retirement Confidential.

In case you missed it, we’re approaching “peak 65” which marks the ascension of the youngest baby boomers turning 65. Why is that a big deal? For one thing, it may set off a huge wave of retirements. Good, say younger workers. Get out of our way so we can take those jobs.

Not so fast. Don’t believe the hype. All baby boomers are not rich. In fact, most of these retirees coming up soon are financially unprepared to stop working. According to the latest analysis, these retiring boomers may risk living in poverty.

In the aggregate, boomers are rich, or at least the wealthiest slice of the generation. That is if they are White and have a college degree. Boomers who are women, people of color and who only have a high school education are lagging way behind and will soon realize that their resources are inadequate for retirement. How bad off are they? One in four workers nearing retirement have zero dollars in savings. And with little time to make up that shortfall, their situation only grows worse.

We are facing that all too familiar situation where the common misconception is that all baby boomers are filthy rich slugs who are sucking the economy dry while younger workers suffer. The reality plays out much differently. Peak boomers with only a high school degree have saved a median of $75,300 for retirement, compared with $591,158 for college graduates. Social Security is designed to replace only 40% of a person’s working income, while the average benefit is about $23,000 per year — far from enough to provide a comfortable retirement.

The only upside is that younger workers such as Gen X, millennial and even younger workers will finally get what they have been clamoring for – the vacated jobs of baby boomers. The hidden cost of this labor transfer may be higher social security taxes to support struggling boomers.

You can’t say you didn’t see this coming if you read this or followed the news. Boomer poverty is in our near future and it’s real.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. You can also visit his author page here. His newest mystery novel, Rio Puerco Demise is available on Amazon. His first mystery novel, Head Above Water, is also available on Amazon. But that’s not all. You can also purchase the Best of BoomSpeak on Amazon.

Did you ever find yourself in the middle of telling a grandson an exciting, rambling episode from your past when you noticed his eyes glaze over or worse, sneak a peek at the screen in his hand? I have a tendency to reminisce…a lot. I don’t know about you, but my backstories are always bumping my heels like I’m dragging my old Radio Flyer wagon filled with photo albums demanding to be opened and shared. Telling important, and not so important, tales of times and events in my past is a way to extend and prolong my life beyond my years…a kind of spoken diary for grandkids who might never read a hand-written one, let alone a cursive one, when I’m gone.

My grandkids can show just a little interest or even be politely indulgent enough of granddad to listen a bit when I intone, ‘When I was your age…’ Still, I want to try something new, an alternative to my windy oral tradition. How about a revolving display on the family room wall with assorted snapshots from a throw-back data dump—the attic picture box? The challenge would be to change it frequently to compete with the current generation’s high-speed info turnover on handheld screens.

Display#1: Grampa, bare bottom up. Grampa in a buggy. Grampa on a teeter-totter.

Display #2: Grampa fishing on a lake. Playing baseball without uniforms or umpires or snacks brought by cheering moms to the Little League park.

Display #3: Grampa kneeling next to his football helmet. Grampa carrying a protest sign. Grampa in uniform.

You get the idea—parts of our life spread out, but so offered that the child has to ask before we rush to tell, providing too much information unasked. It doesn’t take much to become boring and lose your audience. Not nice. Ask any comedian who has ‘died’ in the middle of his act. Ultimately, less can be more even if it’s the captivating, vivid stuff in our minds.

It’s sad to think that we have so much information to offer, so many exciting experiences, so many educational or cautionary tales that cry to be passed along before our personal heritage gets lost in the fog of time. Perhaps a rotating wall of fame will compete with computer games for the attention if not the absorption of a grandchild’s imagination while rounding out his family history.

Retired trainer, and writing instructor, Joe Novara lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Writings include novels, short stories, a memoir and various poems, plays, anthologies and articles. Read more at https://freefloatingstories.wordpress.com/

I’ll take the tats, the handlebars, the Mennonite beards. But I cast a gimlet eye when you all call me Dear. It may just be wait-person patois among the twentyish or thirtyish. But when it’s applied to diners of a certain age, it’s the D-word. Isn’t the leisure business is in the business of making guests feel like VIPs? Unless the meaning has changed to Vapid, Infirm, and Pitiable, you’re not giving me that vibe! The chummy nickname for kids and grandparents pours a pitcher of ice water on what otherwise might have been a cool night out.

Every year past fifty, women face an increased likelihood of being deared or honeyed by well-meaning people who’ve theoretically been hired to please. Puhl-eze stop it.

Mental health advocate Rona Maynard captures the deflating message of the D-word perfectly. “[It’s distressing when] people young enough to be our children are addressing us as children,” she says in “Don’t Call Me Dear!”

When my 75-year-old self shows up in a hip, new place, I’m very likely to get these chin-chucking, head-patting, cheek-pinching endearments. I often protest them—with mixed results. Even when my ask is granted, the dear tends to lope back at evening’s end, swiped off the table like leftover breadcrumbs.

I’m campaigning to kill this four-letter word in the service-industry. And I’m asking people to join me. We’ll also do in hon, honey, sweetie, sugar (or any other noun that might be suffixed with the word pie).

For the hipster server, the terms might feel like a carefully aged artisanal language, signaling a nod to the Shirls and Bevs who fill bottomless cups in homey, un-self-reflecting locales. But being deared in a culinary hot spot makes the dearie feel not just put off, but put down. A lug nut wrapped in a luxe burrito.

Yet the term’s gone viral. I’ve had dear sightings at restaurants, hotels, and shops in popular destinations with hundreds, even thousands, of miles in between. Venice Beach. Austin. Brooklyn. How dear am I, I have to wonder. Could my dearness have a national reach?
Dear is a fundamental downer. Because age happens. Whoever you are now, whatever your style or social milieu, every one of you is heading in my direction.

I’m talking about you, Cooper!

So why not join my dear kill while you’re young and dear-free? I can guarantee: if you drop the dear my dears, your future will thank you.

Suellen Mayfield is a writer living in Venice, CA