50

An hour ago, I turned 50, making me eligible for the AARP and presumably qualifying me for all of the jobs that baby boomers have been keeping me out of all of my life. Or maybe not. Those guys are probably going to keep working until I die. Hell, they’ll probably kill me.

Frankly, I’m not one of those people who cares much about my own birthday. I learned that as a kid, no one’s ever around the last week of August to help you celebrate. But if you’re lying on a tropical beach somewhere, to paraphrase Wreckless Eric, tip a margarita in my honor and enjoy it, and think about the millions of Generation Xers moving their way forward.

If you are a member of the millennial generation, take heart. Unlike our parents’ generation, we actually like you guys and want to help you out.

12 Comments.

  • “If you are a member of the millennial generation, take heart. Unlike our parents’ generation, we actually like you guys and want to help you out.”

    No, no, no. Fuck Millenials. They are — bar none — the most entitled group of brats in history, modern or ancient.

    Try this on: Pay for your own fucking college education. Stop trying to soak me (and other responsible people) for YOUR life choices. Stop trying to paint this country as one big hippie commune with a communal pot of money. Take responsibility for YOU. Stop soaking ME.

  • Shorter exkiodexian: “Hey all you kids: Get off the lawn!”

    Economies work better with an educated populace, and there is many a precedent for publicly funded education – including higher education.

    Demanding that students either enter serfdom to pay for an education or go through life without is sort of like cutting our culture’s nose off to spite it’s face.

  • @ Liebchen –

    Ich liebe Dich!
    .
    I fully embrace what you said. I’m now 70-years-old and I had to beg, borrow, & steal to get my B.A. degree in 1966. I declared bankruptcy to escape the debt owed to the U.S. National Defense Fund; and that is no longer an option for today’s graduates.
    .
    It amazes me that the U.S. populace is so willing to flush potential down the toilet, instead of financing higher education to promote the general welfare.
    .
    I guess I’ll go to the grave without a solution to that puzzle.

  • Happy Birthday, Ted.

  • aaronwilliams135
    August 26, 2013 4:03 PM

    “Imagine all the people, sharing all the world.” – John Lennon, Imagine

    Happy Birthday Ted

  • alex_the_tired
    August 26, 2013 7:34 PM

    Ted,

    Happy birthday.

    Exkiodexian, I grant myself permission, just this once, to violate my rule about not engaging you in discussion (a rule I set because 1. you’re fucking nuts, and 2. you can never sustain your brief bouts of sanity for long enough to make for a good discussion). Just once.

    It’s Ted’s birthday. Read what you wrote. Would you behave like that at someone’s birthday party? Sorry, rephrase. Would an adult behave like that? Would someone who isn’t hearing voices and talking to God on a two-way radio act like that? No.

    Show some goddamned manners and some goddamn style. Steal it if you have to. That your host tolerates your boorish behavior should not be seen as encouragement to continue it.

    And I’m not interested in your reply. I suspect no one is.

  • The Baby Boomer self-obsession and the resulting selfishness has had a prominent statistical effect:

    http://freethoughtblogs.com/hetpat/2013/07/19/goodbye-baby-boomers-the-most-criminal-generation-of-them-all/

    The Boomers, of course, didn’t pay for their own college education; taxpayers helped them out, and the government helped keep costs down. Now, the boomers have helped into offices thieves, murderers, and traitors who have stolen those gains from the next generation and, having grown fat, worthless and lazy on ill-gotten gains, these decrepit wretches cry out “pay for your own college education” — when that is exactly what they are motherfucking doing, which is why the economy is so slow. The vocal boomers are so fucking irresponsible that they pin the fruits of their irresponsible behavior on the responsible behavior of the generation after them.

  • Twenty-three trillion dollars to bail out the privileged, and most charitable put, ignorant bankers; and nothing to educate the young people who will be buried bearing the consequences of Boomer ignorance and indifference.

    Some here will seek the charity of the privileged by blaming their victims.

    And on that cheery note, Happy Birthday Ted.

  • Oh yeah, happy BDay, Ted.

    BTW, I routinely throw mail from AARP into the recycle bin.

  • Ted you were about my age when I first heard you on KFI AM 640 in the 90s.
    Keep it up until I can think of something clever to say about this (ie. a long time)

    @ex:
    “Take responsibility for YOU”

    lmao but seriously, thanks for referencing this constant myth. There’s a huge superfluous working population for whom there simply is no place in the economy. It is growing. When, as your statement requires, all the prisoners are released, all the soldiers are brought home, the fuel and food subsidies end, and the roads fall apart, what makes you think your particular constellation of talents qualifies you to be persistently self reliant (to the extent we can say anyone can even be self-reliant)?

  • Ted,

    From one Virgo to another,

    !!!Happy Birthday !!!

    Think time is flashing by now?

    Just wait a decade or two.

    Best. We all love you and your right-thinking reminders.

    Bill M

  • I’m a little late to the party, but, for what it’s worth, we celebrate ya!

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