SWCAMBORNE

Here are a few more tips for aging well.  Or at least not to badly.

• Accept help graciously.  When people offer accept. Say thank you.
• Learn to not try to do everything for yourself.
• Stop worrying about money.  You saved it for a rainy day.  It is now a rainy day.

The terrible saga of Jack attempts to recover from hip replacement surgery that went bad continues.  I’m glad I’m able to help a little and learn from the mistakes of others.

Unfortunately the skills that work in the prime of life are not the skills you need when you are bed ridden and 85.

Nurit and I went to Santa Fe last week with our friends Gretchen and Randy.

We shopped, I wrote postcards, we looked at art and we ate great food.  Mostly what we did was soak in the atmosphere of a place that is different.

It was an excellent trip and a great relief from the elder management issues we are currently dealing with in Pasadena.  You can see all of our pictures from the trip here.

You can see more of our Santa Fe pictures Here.

Our comfortable middle class world is full of caring groups that want to for instance: stop genocide in Darfur without armed intervention or end the use of animal testing in drug development.  These groups use code words that if you know them indicate that they are powerless but are unwilling to admit it.  Here are three examples for your consideration:

“Educate yourself” Means: you are without influence in this matter give us money.

“Raise Awareness” Means: The entire group has no influence give us money.

“Core group” Means: Not many people came to the event give us money.

Caring groups tend to disregard the real trade-offs that changing outcomes will entail. They focus on the benefit not the cost.  Caring is over-rated as a strategy. For instance: if there is a genocide in Darfur, although Doctors without Borders says there is not, the way to end it is with an army poised to invade and take out the perpertrators.  Caring couldn’t stop Stalin or Hitler and it can’t stop the generals in Sudan.

Lillian saw this one in San Diego:

The fares are the same as the “Grumpy Cab”

Don’t let the pessimists get you down:

“History shows that things get better not worse over time.”

Robert Harris

Author of 101 Things Not to do Before You Die