NEW SHINGLES VACCINE FOR ELDERS

I'm betting that most TGB readers had chicken pox when they were kids. That means we are at risk for shingles. The vaccine that has been available, [Zostavax], is not all that effective but a new one, called Shingrix, is:

”In clinical trials,” reports the Washington Post, “Shingrix was 96.6 percent effective in adults ages 50 to 59, while Zostavax was 70 percent effective.

“The differences were even more marked with age: Effectiveness in adults 70 and older was 91.3 percent for Shingrix, compared with 38 percent for Zostavax. Shingrix also provided longer-lasting protection than Zostavax, whose effectiveness waned after the first year.”

For those reasons and others, I've never taken the Zostavax shot but Shingrix will be at the top of my questions for my primary care physician when I see him in a few weeks.

”The [Centers for Disease Control] CDC,” reports AARP, “estimates that for every 1 million people 60 to 69 years old who receive Shingrix, there will be 87,000 fewer cases of shingles, as well as 10,000 fewer cases of postherpetic neuralgia (severe pain in the location of a previous shingles rash).”

Shingrix can be pricey - $280 for the two-shot series – so check your drug coverage.

IT'S OFFICIAL – I WILL NEVER FLY AGAIN

At a trade show in Hamburg, Germany, in April, a new kind of airline seat – actually a sort of standing saddle – was offered as a way for airlines to cram more passengers into economy class.

As the video notes toward the end, certain existing rules probably won't allow this new “seating” to be installed in planes anytime soon. But if you live in the United States these days, you know how easily regulations can ben ignored or ditched entirely.

Photos and more information at Newsweek.

3D PRINTED HOMES FOR THE WORLD'S 1 BILLION HOMELESS

On the brighter side, a company is making very low-cost 3D printed homes that could provide that could provide affordable, sustainable and customizable homes for the one billion global homeless population. Here's a video:

You can read more and see other videos at the websites of the two companies who created this project, New Story and Icon.

THEY KEEP TRYING TO TELL US BRAIN GAMES WORK, BUT...

Study after study says they don't, as I've mentioned here many times.

Last fall, the fellow-blogger Chuck Nyren had had just enough when the latest overblown research claimed that brain games could ward off dementia:

”Those who did the speed of processing training” Chuck quotes, “were 29 per cent less likely to have developed dementia than people in the ”control group.”

But…

“It is possible that any improvements seen in the processing speed training group may have been due to chance, and not directly caused by the training itself.”

And then he laid out his own inimitable thoughts:

”I’m having trouble directly speed processing the above information. It sounds to me like you could’ve had them all play tiddlywinks for ten years and had the same results – a chance that a certain percentage might or might not have developed dementia, but not necessarily because they played tiddlywinks.”

There is more at Chuck's Huffpost piece.

THE PUPPETEER BEHIND YODA AND JABBA THE HUT

I've lost track of the more recent Star Wars movies (are there nine films in the series now?), but the first three? I'm still a fan of those – particularly of Yoda, Jabba the Hut and I'm one of the few people on earth, apparently, who thinks Jar Jar Binks is a hoot.

Here's a new video about David Barclay, the puppeteer behind Star Wars characters.

HOW THE DIGESTIVE SYSTEM WORKS

You can understand, after having my gall bladder, duodenum, part of my pancreas and a few other bits and pieces surgically removed a year ago, why I'm interested in how the digestive system generally works. Maybe you are too. Here's a good TEDed Talk on that.

NET NEUTRALITY WIN IN THE SENATE

On Wednesday, Senate Democrats, joined by three Republicans, pulled off 52-47 vote approving a resolution that would undo the FCC’s 2017 repeal of Obama-era net neutrality rules.

To reinstate the net neutrality rules, the House now needs to vote on the bill. Even though polls show that 86 percent of Americans want to keep the net neutrality rules, Congressional Republicans

”...described the effort to reinstate 'net neutrality' rules as 'political theater' because the GOP-controlled House is not expected to take up the issue and the Senate’s margin could not overcome a presidential veto,” reported Talking Points Memo.

“Democrats, however, were undeterred, saying their push would energize young voters who are tech savvy and value unfettered access to the internet.”

Maybe once again you could call your Congressional representative and urge him or her to help bring the bill to the floor of the House and vote for it. You can do that here.

LIVE ANIMAL CAMS

Just what you need, right – more sites to keep you glued to your screens.

I've just discovered explore.com which bill itself as the “world's leading philanthropic live nature cam network and documentary film channel.” There many live cams include dozens of kinds of animals. Here is the famous Decorah Eagle came with this year's brood of chicks.

At explore.org, you'll find live cams for many types of birds and fish; walruses and seals brown, grizzly, polar and panda bears; tigers, lions and elephants; farm animals; even dogs and cats and much more along with highlight reels from the hundreds of cams.

Interesting Stuff is a weekly listing of short takes and links to web items that have caught my attention; some related to aging and some not, some useful and others just for fun.

You are all encouraged to submit items for inclusion. Just click “Contact” at the top of any Time Goes By page to send them. I'm sorry that I won't have time to acknowledge receipt and there is no guarantee of publication. But when I do include them, you will be credited and I will link to your blog IF you include the name of the blog and its URL.

It's been an overly serious week at TGB or, at least, heavy going on Monday and Wednesday so I feel the need to lighten up.

How about this? We all love quotations. They are short, easy to read and sometimes they clarify or illuminate thoughts and ideas we (well, me anyway) have but have not articulated satisfactorily.

Today's quotations are mostly from entertainers – those people, especially women actors, whose livelihoods depend on being beautiful or handsome or some facsimile thereof. In Hollywood, even 35-year-old actors – again, especially women - are considered too old to cast.

The men usually have a longer shelf life but sooner or later, every one of them, male and female, will see their opportunities decline because they are not 20-something anymore.

Among the most interesting quotations about growing old as an entertainer, men spoke about advantages – maybe because they don't experience much work-related ageism.

"I feel the older I get, the more I'm learning to handle life ... being on this quest for a long time, it's all about finding yourself." - Ringo Starr, age 77

"Getting old is a fascinating thing. The older you get, the older you want to get!" - Keith Richards, 74

"Aging is an extraordinary process where you become the person you always should have been." - David Bowie, died in 2016 at age 69

"I find that as you get older, you start to simplify things in general." - George Clooney, 57

It is four women actors who sounded most angry about the discrimination against them in Hollywood:

“Ageism is alive and well.” It is okay for men to get older, because men become more desirable by being powerful. With women, it’s all about how we look. Men are very visual, they want young women. So, for us, it’s all about trying to stay young.” - Jane Fonda, 80

“I do think that when it comes to aging, we’re held to a different standard than men. Some guy said to me: ‘Don’t you think you’re too old to sing rock n’ roll?’ I said: ‘You’d better check with Mick Jagger’.” - Cher, 71

“Ageism is pervasive in this industry. It’s not a level playing field. You don’t often see women in their 60s playing romantic leads, yet you will see men in their 60s playing romantic leads with costars who are decades younger.” - Jessica Lang, 69

The fourth is only 28 years old but has two good reasons to resent Hollywood's age bias:

“This industry is f—ing brutal,” Dakota Johnson told British Vogue. “Why isn’t my mother [Melanie Griffith] in movies? She’s an extraordinary actress! Why isn’t my grandmother [Tippi Hedron] in movies?”

Most of the women actors bravely talked about ageing naturally – whatever may come with it.

“I want to be a role model for not only younger men and women — and not just in my profession. I think that cosmetic enhancements in my profession are just an occupational hazard. But I think, more culturally, I’m interested in starting the conversation about aging gracefully and how, instead of making it a cultural problem, we make it individuals’ problems. I think that ageism is a cultural illness; it’s not a personal illness.” - Frances McDormand, 60

“There is a saying that with age, you look outside what you are inside. If you are someone who never smiles, your face gets saggy. If you’re a person who smiles a lot, you will have more smile lines. Your wrinkles reflect the roads you have taken; they form the map of your life.” - Diane von Furstenberg, 71

“All my life I’ve been looking at 16-year-old girls selling beauty, so I think it’s fabulous that they’re using a 70-year-old woman to sell products to other 60 to 80-year-old women.” Helen Mirren on representing L'Oreal cosmetics in France, 72

“The older you are, the more interesting you are as a character. There’s a whole life history and knowledge of the world and self-possession that come from someone who has seen more. That experienced point of view is always more exciting. Yes, things may start to sag and shift, but the older you are, the wiser, the funnier, the smarter you are. You become more you.” - Melissa McCarthy, 47

"I am appalled that the term we use to talk about aging is 'anti.' Aging is as natural as a baby's softness and scent. Aging is human evolution in its pure form. Death, taxes, and aging." - Jamie Lee Curtis, 59

“Please don't touch my wrinkles. It took me so long to earn them.” - Anna Magnani, died in 1973 at age 65

"I think your whole life shows in your face and you should be proud of that." - Lauren Bacall, died in 2014 at age 89

"Nothing makes a woman look so old as trying desperately hard to look young." - Coco Chanel, died in 1971 at age 87

"I'm very f*cking grateful to be alive. I have so many friends who are sick or gone, and I'm here. Are you kidding? No complaints!" - Meryl Streep, 68

And one man:

"As you get older, you feel you need to pay more attention to what is around you and relish it. I'm greedy for beauty." - Bill Nighy, 68

It is only in recent years that Hollywood actors have begun to speak out about ageism in their business. It comes up more and more frequently in the media nowadays and that is a good thing for rest of us – the more attention it gets, the higher general consciousness becomes and with any luck, then, corrections are made.

Meanwhile, I give Truman Capote's the last word about growing old:

“Life is a moderately good play with a badly written third act.” Capote died in 1984 at age 59

Feel free to join in with your own favorite quotations about age – from celebrities, anyone else or even yourselves.

Depending on how you define the phrase, probably not.

As we have always reported at Time Goes By, people age at remarkably different rates and any gerontologist or geriatrician worth his/her salt, will tell you that people, as they grow older, become more individual from one another than when they were younger.

Because those two, four-day hospital visits in April interrupted my blog life, there are several topics that got lost in the shuffle that I want us to catch up on. One is a story from the highly respected Kaiser Health News (KHN) titled, Is There Such a Thing as Normal Aging?

They don't really answer their question. Instead, the KHN reporter consulted with Dr. Thomas Gill, a geriatric professor at Yale University, and three other geriatric experts to identify

”...examples of what are often — but not always – considered to be signposts of normal aging for folks who practice good health habits and get recommended preventive care.

In doing so, they break down ageing into decades containing these typical changes. My short version – the subheads in the story:

• The 50s: Stamina Declines
• The 60s: Susceptibility Increases
• The 70s: Chronic Conditions Fester
• The 80s: Fear Of Falling Grows
• The 90s & Up: Relying On Others

Those are the generalities of “normal ageing.” (There are fuller explanations at the links to Kaiser above.) Except for noting that the oldest old feel happier than young people, KHN defines normal ageing from only one point of view: negative health issues. I wondered how others approach the idea of normal ageing and checked out the usual suspects:

The Mayo Clinic website provides a long list of what physical things can go wrong in late years and supplies suggestions on how to prevent them.

WebMD has a similar list that's not quite as thorough as the Mayo Clinic.

Area Agency on Aging (in St. Petersburg, Florida) has a long but succinct list of physical changes and the reasons for them.

The Merck Manual Consumer Version online has the most usable, useful and informative version of health issues that can be expected in old age. And I like their pullquotes of these little nuggets of information:

“Disorders, not aging, usually account for most loss of function.”

“To make up for the muscle mass lost during each day of strict bed rest, older people may need to exercise for up to 2 weeks.”

“Most 60-year-olds need 3 times more light to read than 20-year-olds.”

However, all four web pages, each from a reputable health organization, deal only with those negative health developments of growing old, reinforcing the widespread but erroneous belief that to be old is to be sick.

It's a tricky thing to balance curiosity about what “normal” physical changes might turn up in old age without feeling you are being defined as sickly. While surfing around the web on these topics, I came across a blogger named Brian Alger who has some different thoughts on “normal aging”:

Aging doesn’t just place a limit our our lifespan, it also constantly alters the physical, emotional, spiritual, and social context of being alive. In this sense, aging is a medium, a total surround, of our experiences in life.”

That resonates with me for putting into words some feelings I've been having about growing old but haven't been able to articulate even to myself. Further, writes Alger,

”We can confidently expect that every aspect of our life will be touched by the direct felt experience of aging. Normal aging makes time increasingly precious. As a form of communication, aging inspires a conversation with time, impermanence, and the great flow of life that we are immersed in.”

From another page at Alger's blog:

”Aging is our most intimate connection [to] the natural world; it is a source of unity and essential belonging with all life everywhere at once. The very essence of elderhood originates entirely in nature.”

Regular TGB readers would be disappointed, I'm sure, if I didn't bring up how the language of old age reinforces negative beliefs about it in both elders and younger people.

In response to sickliness being the most common definition of growing old, in 2014, Science Daily reported on a study from the University of Alberta. One of the researchers says such terms as “normal” or “healthy” aging themselves fall short how elders actually live:

”"The implication is that if you have a chronic illness as an older adult, you've somehow failed in this goal of aging without chronic disease, which is perhaps not that realistic a goal."

"When aging is just defined as 'healthy' and 'devoid of disease,' it doesn't leave a place for what to do with all of these older adults who are still aging with chronic illnesses..."

I have long contended that issues relating to aging should always include input from someone who is old, as this quotation from a subject of the Alberta study makes clear:

"'I don't know what would be considered normal aging,' said [80-year-old Diana] McIntyre, past president of the Seniors Association of Greater Edmonton. 'What's normal for a 45-year-old? What's normal for an 80-year-old? Those are really irrelevant terms as far as I'm concerned.

“'My own philosophy is I would like to do as much as I can, for as long as I can, as well as I can.'”

That last sentence from McIntyre works for me. How about you? Do you think you're ageing “normally”?

EDITORIAL NOTE: This is long-ish and gets a bit wonky in places but it is important to know this stuff.

We have all known or have read about elders who don't fill medication prescriptions or cut them in half because the cost forces them to make the choice between life-saving drugs and food.

Just recently, I had a personal encounter with such an issue. A newly prescribed drug I inject twice a day costs me hundreds of out-of-pocket dollars a month which is way beyond my means and at first I told the doctors it was out of the question; find something else to help me that I can afford.

Then someone in the meeting realized they had neglected to note that I need the drug for only three months. I don't like dipping into my emergency fund for that much money, but I suppose that's why I call it an emergency fund. And I can handle three months.

I'm lucky to have that fund. Millions of American adults who can't afford their prescriptions with or without insurance converage just don't fill them, endangering their health and their lives.

Why, do you suppose, are prescription drugs so expensive in the United States, higher than in other countries. Here is an explanation from CNN:

What reporter Christine Romans overlooks in this video is that pharmaceutical companies do not bear the entire of burden of new drug development. A great deal of money and help comes from the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH).

In the White House Rose Garden on Friday, President Donald Trump unveiled a proposal he says will lower the prices of prescription drugs for consumers. It tells us something that minutes later, the stock market price of pharmaceutical companies soared:

”The stock prices of Pfizer, Merck, Gilead Sciences, and Amgen all spiked after Trump’s speech,” reported STATnews. “Wall Street analysts said the speech posed few threats to the drug industry on the whole.”

Do you think that outcome could that have anything to do with input from the man accompanying Trump at the podium Friday, the one who will be in charge of implementing Trump's proposed drug plan, Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary Alex Azar?

Until last year, Azar spent a decade employed at pharmaceutical giant, Eli Lilly and Company first as the firm's top lobbyist and later as president of Lilly USA LLC.

So what does Trump's proposal, disingenuously titled American Patients First, include? NBC News reports:

”The plan, presented as a thinly described set of executive actions...focuses on four elements, according to the Health and Human Services Department:

• Increasing competition
• Better negotiation
• Creating incentives to lower list prices
• Reducing patient out-of-pocket spending."

That is a far cry from Trump's campaign promise to

”...allow Medicare to negotiate directly with drug manufacturers... The industry is now having the last laugh,” reports The Atlantic. “In a speech Friday on drug pricing, President Trump completed his 180-degree turn on Candidate Trump’s promises.

“The White House’s new plan, as outlined, does seek to address high prescription-drug costs. 'We will not rest until this job of unfair pricing is a total victory,' Trump said. But it doesn’t directly challenge the pharmaceutical industry and the direct role it plays in setting prices.

“Indeed, the new policy largely meets the goals of big pharma, signaling an ever-tightening bond between Trump and drug manufacturers.”

Trump didn't say much about how his proposals will lower prices and what is conspicuously missing, despite the second item on that list, is any plan to allow Medicare to directly negotiate drug prices with pharmaceutical companies.

Big Pharma won that one when Medicare's prescription drug plan, Part D, was introduced in 2003; the legislation specifically disallows price negotiations between Medicare and the pharmaceutical companies. Trump's proposal does not change that.

During the Rose Garden speech, Trump attacked what he called “global freeloading” by countries where citizens often pay much less than Americans for the same brand-name drugs:

“He directed his trade representative to make fixing this injustice a top priority in negotiations with every trading partner,” reports Robert Pear in The New York Times...

“It is not clear,” continues Pear, “why higher profits in other countries would be passed on to American consumers in the form of lower prices, and officials in those countries pushed back hard.”

The Times also reported on another of the proposal's items:

”Alex M. Azar II, the secretary of health and human services, said the Food and Drug Administration would explore requiring drug companies to disclose list prices in their television advertisements.”

It is equally unclear how that would reduce the cost of advertised drugs. It is worth quoting Robert Reich, Professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley who served as President Bill Clinton's secretary of labor, at some length on this:

While it’s true that Americans spend far more on medications per person than do citizens in any other rich country – even though Americans are no healthier – that’s not because other nations freeload on American drug companies’ research,” writes Reich in Eurasia Review.

“Big Pharma in America spends more on advertising and marketing than it does on research – often tens of millions to promote a single drug.

“The U.S. government supplies much of the research Big Pharma relies on through the National Institutes of Health. This is a form of corporate welfare. No other industry gets this sort of help.

“Besides flogging their drugs, American drug companies also spend hundreds of millions lobbying the government. Last year alone, their lobbying tab came to $171.5 million, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

“That’s more than oil and gas, insurance, or any other American industry. It’s more than the formidable lobbying expenditures of America’s military contractors. Big Pharma spends tens of millions more on campaign expenditures.”

And you wonder why your drugs cost so much.

"'This [proposal] is not doing anything to fundamentally change the drug supply chain or the drug pricing system,' said Gerard Anderson, a health policy professor at Johns Hopkins University,” quoted at CNN.

The so-called American Patients First proposal is not a bill and while a small number of the proposals would require Congressional legislation, most can be put into effect with regulations or guidance documents.

So much for lowering the price of prescription pharmaceuticals. Like most everything else in the Trump administration, this proposal is gift to big business.

You can read the full, 44-page proposal here [pdf].

This Sunday Elder Music column was launched in December of 2008. By May of the following year, one commenter, Peter Tibbles, had added so much knowledge and value to my poor attempts at musical presentations that I asked him to take over the column. He's been here each week ever since delighting us with his astonishing grasp of just about everything musical, his humor and sense of fun. You can read Peter's bio here and find links to all his columns here.

Here’s some more music that struck my fancy over the last few weeks.

For much of the 20th century ERICH KORNGOLD was probably best known as a composer of film scores (“Captain Blood”, “Robin Hood”, “The Sea Hawk” “King’s Row” and many others).

However, he was also a composer of “serious” music as those who like to think in these terms have a wont to say. He wrote sonatas, chamber music of various sorts, concertos and many other things including several operas, one of which is “Die Kathrin”.

From that opera, the wonderful RENÉE FLEMING presents Ich soll ihn niemals, niemals mehr sehn.

♫ Korngold Die Kathrin - Ich soll ihn niemals niemals mehr sehn

MICHAEL HAYDN was Joseph Haydn’s younger brother and has always lived in the shadow one of the greatest composers of all time.

Mike was no slouch at the composing biz; his style, not too surprisingly, is quite similar to his brother’s. Indeed, until recently, a number of his compositions were attributed to Jo.

Fortunately, evidence has shown that these works were really Mike’s. As far as I can tell, this isn’t one of those, it’s the second movement of his String Quintet in F Major, P. 112, MH 411.

♫ Haydn M - String Quintet in F Major P. 112 MH 411 (2)

KATIE MOSS was an English Composer, violinist, pianist and singer.

She wrote the words and music to The Floral Dance in 1911 after visiting the Cornish town of Helston, where she attended the town’s traditional Flora Day celebration.

The song has been recorded many times over the years, but most notably by the Australian bass-baritone PETER DAWSON, who was also a composer, in 1912.

♫ Moss - The Floral Dance

FRANCESCO DURANTE was born in Naples in the latter half of the 17th century.

His father died when he was about 15, and his uncle, who was a musician, took over teaching young Frank. He later became a pupil of the great Alessandro Scarlatti. Frank later became renowned as a musical teacher, and many of his pupils went on to great things.

He is most noted for composing sacred music, but he did other things as well, including his Concerto No 2 G Minor (which seems to be for violin). This is the third movement.

♫ Durante - Concerto n° 2 G Minor (3)

Little is known of the life of GIOVANNI PANDOLFI MEALL other than he was born in Tuscany about 1630. Also, it seems there was no one was around to take a photo of him either.

Well, there is a bit more known: it seems that he murdered a castrato during an argument and he then decided to hightail it to France and then Spain. There he was employed in the Royal Chapel where, I assume, they didn’t care about his previous misdeeds.

All that survives of his compositions is about 30 violin sonatas. This is one of them, Sonata for violin & continuo, Op. 3 No. 1 'La Stella'.

♫ Pandolfi - Sonata for violin & continuo Op. 3 No. 1 'La Stella'

JAMES OSWALD was a Scottish composer about whom we know little before he moved to London in 1741.

He composed a lot of short works, including minuets and Scottish folk songs. He was also a music publisher which is probably how we know these things. He caught the ear of mad king George, who appointed him chamber composer.

Here is a composition for cello called Steer Her up and Had Her Gaun (whatever all that means).

♫ Oswald - Steer Her up & Had Her Gaun

CLARA SCHUMANN was born Clara Wieck and she was a child prodigy on piano, violin and singing.

The piano became her main instrument and she toured extensively giving concerts throughout her life – she lived to 76 years old. Robert Schumann was a pupil of her father’s and when Clara was 18 they decided to get married. Dad was against the union and Robert and Clara sued dad to allow this to happen. They won the case.

Robert seems to have been a troubled lad, but they stayed together until he died. Clara outlived him by 40 years.

She composed quite a few pieces, mostly for piano and was held in high esteem for her playing. Here is one of her pieces for solo piano, one of Four Polonaises, Opus 1. It’s the second of those.

To me it seems to anticipate the compositions of Scott Joplin by many years.

♫ Schumann Clara - Quatre Polonoises Op.1 No 2 in C major

Although often referred to as FRANCESCO LANDINI, that almost certainly wasn’t his name (as he wasn’t a member of the Landini family).

Nitpicking scholars usually refer to him as Francesco da Firenze. He’s also been called Francesco degli Organi, Francesco il Cieco or Francesco Cecus.

He was born in Florence sometime between 1325 and 1335, and was blind from childhood due to smallpox (thus one of the aforementioned names, for the Italian speakers among us).

He was the most famous composer in Italy in the 14th century and he wrote much sacred music, but none survives today. What have survived are some madrigals, ballads, and music for various combinations of voices. One of those is Sì dolce non sonò chol lir' Orfeo.

♫ Francesco da Firenze - Sì Dolce Non Sonò Chol Lir' Orfeo

FRANZ KROMMER was a Czech composer who was contemporaneous with Mozart, although he outlived him by a considerable amount – even outliving Beethoven.

He was a really prolific composer, with over 300 compositions to his name in just about every field that composers of the time indulged in, except operas. He was especially prolific at chamber music, quartets, quintets, duos, trios, sonatas and the like.

We’ve already had some of those sorts of things today, so I thought I’d include his Concerto for Two Clarinets, Op 91, because I like it. This is the first movement.

♫ Krommer - Concert for Two Clarinets Op 91 (1)

THE AVERAGE PERSON HIDES 13 SECRETS

Secrets, the YouTube page tells us, are not something you should keep locked away. Do that, and they'll eat you from the inside out:

Curiosity reports:

”According to a May 2017 study, you likely have around 13 secrets brewing in that head of yours — five of which you'll never tell a soul. The researchers say that it isn't the number of secrets you keep that's significant. Rather, it's the burden of those secrets — they weigh on you, literally.”

There are other effects you can read at Curiosity and at The Atlantic.

I don't recall 13 secrets, but most of the ones I do have, that I'll never tell you, are the times I behaved badly and am still ashamed of. What about you?

REAL-LIFE RAPUNZELS

The YouTube page tells us that for thousands of years, the Yao women of Huangluo Village have been keeping up an incredible beauty regimen, growing long, luxurious locks.

Believed to symbolize beauty, wealth and longevity, long hair is considered sacred, and women in the village only cut their hair once in a lifetime. Take a look:

REANIMATING PIG BRAINS

This story freaks me out, a nightmare to end all nightmares. MIT Technology Review explains:

”In a step that could change the definition of death, researchers have restored circulation to the brains of decapitated pigs and kept the reanimated organs alive for as long as 36 hours...

“The work was described on March 28 at a meeting held at the National Institutes of Health to investigate ethical issues arising as US neuroscience centers explore the limits of brain science.”

Ethical issues? No shit. Imagine your living brain sitting in a box somewhere – wait. It's better if I quote MIT:

The setup, jokingly dubbed the 'brain in a bucket,' would quickly raise serious ethical and legal questions if it were tried on a human.

“For instance, if a person’s brain were reanimated outside the body, would that person awake in what would amount to the ultimate sensory deprivation chamber, without ears, eyes, or a way to communicate? Would someone retain memories, an identity, or legal rights? Could researchers ethically dissect or dispose of such a brain?”

It is madness to contemplate this act, even on a pig or any other animal.

More at MIT Technology Review and at Alternet.

WHAT ARE BITCOIN AND BLOCKCHAIN?

According to The New York Times, Goldman Sachs will open a Bitcoin trading operation on the New York Stock Exchange:

”Some of the biggest names on Wall Street are warming up to Bitcoin, a virtual currency that for nearly a decade has been consigned to the unregulated fringes of the financial world...

“Many corporations and governments have expressed interest in the technology that Bitcoin introduced, particularly a form of database known as the blockchain.

“The moves by Goldman and Intercontinental Exchange, or ICE, the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, mark a dramatic shift toward the mainstream for a digital token that has been known primarily for its underworld associations and status as a high-risk, speculative investment.”

Oh dear. Apparently the time has come for me to figure out what Bitcoin and blockchain are.

I've tried to understand this without much success. It's a huge puzzle. But this New York Times video gave me my first inkling that with some more work, I might just figure it out.

Clear as mud, right? Read more at The New York Times.

FAKE FOOD FOR REAL RESTAURANTS

In Japan, it's customary for restaurants to display their offerings inside their front windows. Think restaurant window shopping.

The displays come from one city only: Gujo. This ancient town is the epicenter of artificial food. The people who make the displays are real artists, but the "food" they create is not.

It may be one city in Japan, but I have seen this amazingly real-looking food in U.S. restaurant windows in several cities.

SAVING DUCKLINGS FROM CERTAIN DEATH

Is bad news the only kind there is these days? It sure feels that way but then TGB reader Joan McMullin sent this video. My god, there just keep coming and coming and coming.

(This is getting irritating. You may need to click the link in the video to watch on YouTube. If I had time, I would substitute another video but not today. I'll be more careful with my choices in the future to avoid this.)

LETTER TO MY BOSS

All of Congress, both houses, even those members who are not rabid opportunists feeding at the public trough, enrage me these days. A handful come out of their caves now and then to “bravely” denounce the president's latest stupidity or outrage, but then scurry back to hibernation bunkers.

They do nothing at all and every one of them deserves to be booted. So this email from Darlene Costner that is making the rounds gave me some relief for a few moments:

“I have enjoyed working here these past several years. You have paid me very well, given me benefits beyond belief. I have 3-4 months off per year and a pension plan that will pay my salary till the day I die and a health plan that most people can only dream about.

“Despite this I plan to take the next 12-18 months to find a new position. During this time I will show up for work when it is convenient. In addition I fully expect to draw my full salary and all the other perks associated with my current job.

“Oh yes, if my search for this new job proves fruitless, I will be back with no loss in pay or status. Before you say anything, remember that you have no choice in the matter. I can and will do this.

“Sincerely,
Every Senator or Congressman running for President."

Try that at your job and tell me how it works out.”

ANOTHER FROM DARLENE COSTNER

A baby elephant who appears to believe he is a lapdog. Irresistible.

THE WORLD'S TOUGHEST JOB

Interviews for the world's toughest job. Yes, it's a joke, but it's a good one. Stick around for the ending.

Interesting Stuff is a weekly listing of short takes and links to web items that have caught my attention; some related to aging and some not, some useful and others just for fun.

You are all encouraged to submit items for inclusion. Just click “Contact” at the top of any Time Goes By page to send them. I'm sorry that I won't have time to acknowledge receipt and there is no guarantee of publication. But when I do include them, you will be credited and I will link to your blog IF you include the name of the blog and its URL.

Often I run across stories of interest to elders that are too long for an item in Saturday's Interesting Stuff and too short for a full blog post. Here today are a three of those.

CAFFEINE CAUSES BRAIN ENTROPY...
and although counter-intuitive, that's a good thing, according to a new study, especially for elders.

”There's not much debate on the subject,” reports Curiosity, “a more chaotic brain is a more effective brain. They call the quality 'brain entropy,' and it measures the complexity and irregularity of brain activity from one moment to the next...

“We generally associate entropy with chaos or decay, but in this case, it's a sign of a brain working correctly...An effective brain is one that doesn't always rely on the same patterns of thinking, and one that can solve problems in unexpected ways.

“By contrast, a brain with lower entropy is characterized by order and repetition. The most orderly brains of all? They belong to comatose people and people in the deepest sleep.”

More than 90 percent of American adults regularly consume caffeine, reports Big Think:

“Despite decreasing blood flow to the brain, caffeine leaves individual regions more stimulated. The stimulating effects are uneven, however, creating a chaotic balance of energy when the stimulant is in full force. The greater unevenness in stimulation throughout the brain, the higher the entropy.”

In addition to drinking coffee, Curiosity notes that there is one sure way to increase entropy in your brain:

”All you need to do is age. Yes, entropy naturally increases with age — we suppose that's just the wisdom of the years accumulating. After all, the longer you've been alive, the more types of thinking you'll have encountered or come up with on your own.

“And with that kind of broad experience, your brain will have a million different possible ways to think.

For the scientifically-minded among you, there is more detailed information about the study at PLOS and at nature.com

MAGAZINE'S AGEIST HEADLINE
Earlier this week we discussed one type of ageism, age discrimination in the workplace. But ageism manifests itself in many other obvious and/or devious ways which hardly anyone recognizes as demeaning to elders.

The latest I came across was published at New York magazine this week.

Before I show it to you, let me say I am far from being a Rudy Giuliani fan, never have been going back to his mayoral stint in New York City. That, however, does not make this headline acceptable:

”Trump Worried Aging, Loudmouth New Yorker Can’t Stay on Message”

“Aging loudmouth.” “Can't stay on message.” The slur is repeated in the story's lede: “Donald Trump is starting to wonder if it was a mistake to trust an elderly, New York celebrity...”

These are among the most common insults – nay, beliefs – regularly used against elders: that we are forgetful and untrustworthy. Further, that "loudmouth" crack is just another version of "get off my lawn" gibes. Even the word "elderly" is used disparagingly in this instance.

The byline on the story is Eric Levitz, a young reporter at the magazine but youth does not absolve him. I'm pretty sure that were he writing about a black person or a woman, Levitz would not have used the N word or "chick' as a description.

It's not that I mean to pick only on Mr. Levitz – hundreds of writers and reporters of all ages use these slurs (and worse) against old people every day with nary a consequence. And that is wrong.

NET NEUTRALITY
It's ba-a-a-a-a-ck, net neutrality. It can seem to be a complicated idea but it isn't, really. Here is a succinct explanation from a February post here quoting Engadget:

”'Net neutrality forced ISPs [internet service providers] to treat all content equally; without these rules in place, providers can charge more for certain types of content and can throttle access to specific websites as they see fit.'

"So, for example, big rich companies could afford hefty fees to providers so their web pages arrive faster in your browser than – oh, let's say political groups that depend on donations or blogs like yours and mine that are throttled because they can't bear the increased cost."

After a vote by the Republican-dominated Federal Communications Commission (FCC), regulations to trash net neutrality, the 2015 rules will cease on 11 June.

Now, the Los Angeles Times reports that the fight for net neutrality is back.

"The effort formally begins [last] Wednesday as backers file a petition in the Senate that will force a vote next week to undo the FCC's action. Amazon, Netflix, Facebook, Google and other online giants support the move...

"Although they're poised for a narrow win in the Senate, net neutrality supporters acknowledge the attempt to restore the Obama-era regulations is a long shot. The hurdles include strong opposition from House Republicans and telecommunications companies, such as AT&T Inc. and Comcast Corp., as well as a likely veto from President Trump.

"Regardless of the outcome, the debate over net neutrality — and by extension, the future of the internet — appears headed for a key role in November's congressional midterm elections.

"'There's a political day of reckoning coming against those who vote against net neutrality,' warned Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who is leading the Senate effort to restore the rules."

It is said that despite the FCC and its chair, Agit Pai, 86 percent of Americans support net neutrality. You could do your part to move the initiative to restore the 2015 rules by contacting your representatives in both houses of Congress. You can do that here.

The latest episode of The Alex and Ronni Show is at the bottom of this post.

As noted here in the past, until I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer nearly a year ago, I was lucky enough to be disgustingly healthy.

There were colds and other minor ailments now and then but nothing that kept me down and out for long, nothing that left me with permanent changes to my capabilities.

Not so much anymore. Yes, the doctors say I am now cancer free (whew!) but recovery from the Whipple surgery lasted many months, chemotherapy took its toll on my energy, I had to slack off workouts for too long and recent hospital stays for internal bleeding, a blood clot, placement of a stent, etc. haven't helped.

The bottom line is that everything – everything takes longer than it once did. Yes, yes, I know: just getting older, even without any health difficulties, slows down everyone. Bodies wear out, muscles don't work as efficiently, we tire more easily.

But until this bump in my personal road of life, slowing down wasn't an issue. As far as I could tell, I walked as fast as I always had and particularly after I lost more than 50 pounds some years ago, I could blast through housekeeping chores leaving plenty of time for whatever other plans I had.

No more.

When we get old, I think we understand as never before that our greatest gift is time. Each day now is precious and anything boring that takes up any of that time is stealing hours – even days, cumulatively - from us.

Here are some of the new tasks that eat up even more of my time than a year ago:

• Tracking daily medications, keeping the chart up to date as doctors change meds, getting refills on time and filling the pill holders (plural!)

• Actually remembering to take the pills at the right times of day (Post-it notes are my friends)

• Arranging other events in life around medical visits

• Keeping daily records of health information for the physicians

• Napping (a lot recently) when my body tells me to stop for awhile

• Tracking the cat's medications and trying to get pills down his throat when he would rather shred my skin than swallow.

And those are only some time eaters I can identify. Mysteries abound, such as this one: I thought I could vacuum the entire apartment in 30 minutes. So why does the clock say an hour has passed when I'm finished?

Or why does changing the beds seems so much harder – and therefore slower – than it used to be?

There is only one solution to this time annoyance – something many of you identified last week in that marvelously wise and interesting discussion about aspects of growing old: acceptance.

As Anne said on that post:

”Having just turned 78, maybe I should accept this and live at the tempo I can manage.”

I am not any good at all at this kind of acceptance. You?

Here is the latest episode of The Alex and Ronni Show recorded on Monday 7 May 2018.

If you would like to see Alex's entire two-hour show with other guests after me, you can do that at Facebook or Gabnet on Facebook or on YouTube.

As I have related here in the past, I was laid off from my job of three years, along with eight or 10 decades-younger colleagues, in 2004. I was 63 at the time.

My co-workers found new jobs within a few weeks or, at most, two or three months and all had several offers to choose from.

A year later, with only two in-person interviews behind me (one of which told me the job had been filled between our 4PM phone call the day before and my arrival at the company's office at 9:00AM the next morning) and deeply in debt, I was forced to sell my home and leave New York City.

This is called age discrimination in the workplace, a subcategory of ageism. Many people deny either one exists. That is a lie. It is real and it is every bit as evil and pernicious as racial, religious, gender and every other kind of discrimination.

In fact, age discrimination in the workplace is prohibited by law, administered by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), which is supposed to enforce the laws against workplace discrimination.

Note that I said “supposed” to enforce. In the case of age discrimination, over the years court judges have repeatedly sided with employers, weakening the age discrimination laws to make it more difficult for workers to prove discrimination.

In mid-March, ProPublica published its research into how tech giant IBM has eliminated 20,000 of its American workforce, hitting its oldest employees the hardest - 60 percent of layoffs, firings and required retirements affecting people 40 and older:

”Today,” explains ProPublica, “we are reporting that over the past five years IBM has been removing older U.S. employees from their jobs, replacing some with younger, less experienced, lower-paid American workers and moving many other jobs overseas.

“We’ve got documentation and details — most of which are the direct result of a questionnaire filled out by over 1,100 former IBMers.”

Here is a good video overview of some of the information ProPublica uncovered during their investigation:

ProPublica includes in their written report many personal stories:

”Marjorie Madfis, at the time 57, was a New York-based digital marketing strategist and 17-year IBM employee when she and six other members of her nine-person team — all women in their 40s and 50s — were laid off in July 2013. The two who remained were younger men.

“Since her specialty was one that IBM had said it was expanding, she asked for a written explanation of why she was let go. The company declined to provide it.

Another:

Paul Henry, a 61-year-old IBM sales and technical specialist who loved being on the road, had just returned to his Columbus home from a business trip in August 2016 when he learned he’d been let go. When he asked why, he said an executive told him to 'keep your mouth shut and go quietly.'

“Henry was jobless more than a year, ran through much of his savings to cover the mortgage and health insurance and applied for more than 150 jobs before he found a temporary slot.

“'If you’re over 55, forget about preparing for retirement,' he said in an interview. 'You have to prepare for losing your job and burning through every cent you’ve saved just to get to retirement.”

There are hundreds of heartbreaking personal stories from laid off IBM workers here. I know how awful it is. I've been where these people are.

Once I realized that I had no choice but to sell my apartment, it took a three-day weekend in bed in the fetal position, weeping uncontrollably until I could pull myself together and make plans to leave the city that had been my home for 40 years. I've never quite gotten over that.

The ProPublica story shows the viciousness with which IBM has jettisoned many of their most experienced and loyal workers. And make no mistake: although ProPublica concentrated their research on IBM, hundreds, maybe thousands of other companies do this every day.

”In making these cuts,” explain the ProPublica reporters, “IBM has flouted or outflanked U.S. laws and regulations intended to protect later-career workers from age discrimination, according to a ProPublica review of internal company documents, legal filings and public records, as well as information provided via interviews and questionnaires filled out by more than 1,000 former IBM employees.”

ProPublica doesn't have a solution and neither do I. But they have put together a crucially important investigative report and a subject you might want to bring up with your local candidates for Congress as the midterm election campaign heats up.

At minimum, the EEOC regulations weakened by court decisions should be restored.

In a followup report two weeks ago, ProPublica had this to say:

”We haven’t received further explanation or response from [IBM] in the weeks since we published. We know these layoffs haven’t ended. Watching IBM Facebook group members have reported that IBM sent a wave of layoff notices in just the past few weeks.”

Here are the links to the parts of the ProPublica investigation report:

Cutting “Old Heads” at IBM
Eroding Protection of Older Workers Under the Law
How the Crowd Led Us to Investigate IBM
Followup to Original Report

Do you or anyone you know have experience with age discrimination in the workplace?

This Sunday Elder Music column was launched in December of 2008. By May of the following year, one commenter, Peter Tibbles, had added so much knowledge and value to my poor attempts at musical presentations that I asked him to take over the column. He's been here each week ever since delighting us with his astonishing grasp of just about everything musical, his humor and sense of fun. You can read Peter's bio here and find links to all his columns here.

JUDY COLLINS started out as a classical pianist; indeed she performed one of Mozart’s piano pieces when she was just 13. She was destined for great things in this realm. Then she discovered the music of Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger and the like and picked up a guitar.

Somewhat later her piano teacher was reported to have said, "Little Judy, you really could have gone places”. Oh well, what goes around, comes around.

I’ll start with something from Judy’s fifth album, which she imaginatively titled “Fifth Album”. The Coming of the Roads was written by Billy Edd Wheeler, who was a serious songwriter covered by many country artists - Johnny Cash and June Carter spring to mind as well as Neil Young, Elvis, Nancy Sinatra, Bobby Darin, the Jefferson Airplane, and on it goes.

♫ The Coming of the Roads

Way back, JOAN BAEZ wrote one of her finest songs about a phone call she received from Bob Dylan. She called it Diamonds and Rust and it was on the album of the same name. She rerecorded it with Judy on an album called "Paradise".

Here they are singing together helped by The Nashville Rhythm Section. I think Joan's original version is just a bit better, but this one isn't bad.

♫ Diamonds and Rust

I consider “In My Life” to be her finest album. She was still performing folk material, but also show tunes (serious ones), rock & roll and everything in between. One song she performed was Pirate Jenny, written by Kurt Weill, Bertolt Brecht and Marc Blitzstein.

This album marked the start of her musical evolution into interesting and quite challenging material.

♫ Pirate Jenny

Ian Tyson wrote the song Some Day Soon and he recorded it with his wife (at the time) Sylvia Fricker (they were known as Ian and Sylvia).

Not too long after that Judy recorded a really fine version on her album "Who Knows Where the Time Goes". I was going to use that one until I came across this one she recorded with JIMMY BUFFETT.

♫ Someday Soon (Feat. Jimmy Buffett)

Judy was an early champion of Leonard Cohen – she recorded many of his songs before anyone else (including Leonard himself). From the rather gorgeous album “Wildflowers”, here is Sisters of Mercy.

♫ Sisters of Mercy

Like a lot of performers, Judy was fond of the songs of Jimmy Webb. The one I’ve chosen is one that was unfamiliar to me before I researched this column. It’s Campo de Encino. She has a little help from SHAWN COLVIN.

♫ Campo de Encino

It's easier just to call the next song Marat-Sade. Of course, people who have been around this column for a while will know that I won't be satisfied with that. The song is actually called The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade.

I don't know if this came out as a single, but I suspect not – they'd have trouble getting all that on the label. Okay, they could have gone for the short version.

The music was written by Richard Peaslee, and Judy sings a medley of songs from the production. Anyway, is it just me, or does the tune sound like a couple of the arias from Puccini's “Madama Butterfly”? Probably just me.

♫ Marat-Sade

The “Fifth Album” was Judy’s last straight folk album, if you include contemporary songwriters such as Bob Dylan, Gordon Lightfoot and Richard Fariña in the folk category. The song I’ve chosen was written by Richard (Fariña) and Pauline Marden and is called Pack up Your Sorrows. Richard plays the dulcimer on this one.

♫ Pack up Your Sorrows

It surprised me to discover that she had covered a song of the Traveling Wilburys, the greatest super group in history. She has the help of STEPHEN STILLS on this one.

Stephen has helped her on several of her albums over the years. The song is the best known of the Wilburys songs, Handle With Care.

♫ Handle With Care

One of the members of the Wilburys was George Harrison who, for those people who have been living on Saturn for the last 60 years, was a member of The Beatles, a rather successful group from the sixties.

One of the songs that group wrote and recorded was In My Life. It's rare that someone can cover a Beatles song and equal their version, but I think Judy does so. She makes it more wistful and regretful than John's version.

♫ In My Life

[EDITORIAL NOTE: At last, a new Interesting Stuff that has been missing for two Saturdays in a row due to my hospital visits. I always have fun doing this so I'm glad to be back at it.]

OLDER VOTERS LEANING AWAY FROM THE REPUBLICAN PARTY

Particularly since the 2016 election, it has baffled and embarrassed me that the majority of elder voters identify as conservatives and/or Republicans often when it is in their own best interests to vote otherwise.

Now, after more than a year of President Donald Trump, that may be changing. Here is a new survey from Reuters about how Americans 60 and older are moving toward the Democrats:

”The potential impact of any swing to Democrats is magnified given that older, educated adults are reliable voters. They also make up a sizeable portion of the voting population in many districts where elections are close.

“How they vote could decide elections in as many as 26 competitive congressional districts where Democrats have a shot at winning a seat.”

Personally, I think it is way too early to predict what will happen in the midterm elections – a lot can happen to sway people in different directions between now and then. Here's the Reuters chart:

You can Read more here and here.

HISTORY OF BREAD PACKAGE CLOSURES

I've always been a sucker for the history of small, unimportant things. Here's one about the humble bread bag clip:

”The tiny piece of plastic keeping your bread fresh is all thanks to one family. Through the company Kwik Lok, the Paxton sisters have been carrying on their grandfather’s legacy, selling over a billion bag clips every year.”

Let's go to the video tape:

CHOCOLATE TO GO EXTINCT?

Oh, no. Just because my sweet tooth has inexplicably faded since my Whipple surgery nearly a year ago doesn't mean I don't care about this news. As my Salem, Oregon, friend John Gear says, “this is serious.”

”Cacao plants are slated to disappear by as early as 2050 thanks to warmer temperatures and dryer weather conditions,” reports the World Economic Forum. “Scientists at the University of California are teaming up with Mars company to try to save the crop before it's too late.

“Cacao plants occupy a precarious position on the globe. They can only grow within a narrow strip of rainforested land roughly 20 degrees north and south of the equator, where temperature, rain, and humidity all stay relatively constant throughout the year.

“Over half of the world's chocolate now comes from just two countries in West Africa — Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana.”

You can read more here.

FRIEND AND TGB READER LAUDED FOR ELDER ORPHAN WORK

My long-time friend Wendl Kornfeld has been given the Samuel Sacks Achievement Award for her volunteer work at Temple Emanu-El in New York City.

She also works with and is an expert on elder orphans, people who are without family in their old age. Congratulations, Wendl, for the award and thank you for your ongoing hard work.

You can read more here.

WHERE DO CORPORATE PROFITS REALLY GO?

John Oliver tells us on his HBO program, Last Week Tonight. It's a long-ish video but always worth the time.

MEDICARE CARDS BEING MAILED

U.S. Medicare has begun mailing out the new Medicare cards – the one's that do not expose our Social Security numbers. They look like this:

Medicare has now posted a chart showing whether the cards have been mailed yet to your state. Here is the current update:

You can sign up here to be notified when mailing begins for your state.

LUCKIEST UNLUCKY MAN

Any one of the accidents this man has lived through would be enough for me to consider myself lucky.

LITTLE PINK HOUSE

TGB reader Bill Griffith sent this movie trailer for the film, Little Pink House about the U.S. Supreme Court case, Kelo v. City of New London and the doctrine of eminent domain.

I followed the case closely over the years it was happening, eventually disgusted with the outcome. You might be interested too – that a big, fat, billion-dollar company can take your home just because.

TINY DOORS IN U.S. CAPITOL BUILDING

Here's a little bit of political history for you – the reason for tiny doors throughout the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.

NOTE: For some reason this video refuses to play. There is another video about the tiny doors in the Capitol Building at Roll Call. Just click the link.

Interesting Stuff is a weekly listing of short takes and links to web items that have caught my attention; some related to aging and some not, some useful and others just for fun.

You are all encouraged to submit items for inclusion. Just click “Contact” at the top of any Time Goes By page to send them. I'm sorry that I won't have time to acknowledge receipt and there is no guarantee of publication. But when I do include them, you will be credited and I will link to your blog IF you include the name of the blog and its URL.

“Mmmm. Mmmm. Mmmm. Mmmm.” It surprised me when I heard that little noise. Emanating from?

Me! It was me making that little noise. This is weird.

In recent weeks, I've caught myself several times making strange little noises – mmmm, mmmm, mmmm, mmmm or unh, unh, unh, unh or hooh, hooh, hooh, hooh or something similar.

There seems to be no reason for them. I might be at the computer or watching TV, reading a book or just doing nothing. Then I catch myself going, “unh, unh, unh, unh” and I have no idea if I do it only when I'm alone or when I'm in the grocery store or anywhere else.

It doesn't seem to be connected to any thought or disturbance or related to any kind of feeling or emotion. It just is. And I don't know if I catch it every time or if it goes on without my notice.

Is this an old person thing? I wondered. I've never noticed it in other old people (or people of any other age) and I'm pretty sure it's something new with me. So, of course, I took to the internet.

There isn't much but I found this in a two-year-old discussion at metafilter:

”My grandpa, who was ~65-85 while I knew him, was always making noises,” writes Polycarp. “Little humming breaths, the uhs, tons of mmms...He was playing wiffle ball and mowing the lawn into his early 80s, so it didn't seem to have any health ramifications, and I'm sure he wasn't that way when he was younger...”

Some people say unconscious sounds from old people are related to hearing loss and/or cognitive decline. On the same metafilter page, beagle writes,

”This is also a typical attribute of people with dementia. For that population it often expands to include repeated words or phrases. The author of the linked study suggests that the behavior is associated with anxiety or agitation and that the vocalizations are 'self-soothing.'”

That study link goes to an abstract of a report on dementia only. Almost all the small amount of discussion I could find references old people who are not cognitively impaired.

Here is another, named Mismatchedsock, from the metafilter page:

"I work in a hospital with an almost exclusively retired population. I'm in and out of different rooms all day long for 10-15 minute stretches and I'd say 20 percent of my patients do this. Some of them also have hearing loss but it doesn't always coincide. I used to think it was because they were nervous. But if I asked, most of them said they didn't realize they were doing it."

In general, it is adult children who have commented on this phenomenon, one they universally find annoying, as AMTIRED2 and ugeh37 report at agingcare.com:

”Mom is constant with the same verbal sounds - nothing in the house to trigger it, Oh ho ho- from the moment the little souls [sic] feet hit the floor in the morning to bed time - it is like chalk screeching across a black board in my head.”

”My mother...makes noise constantly. Sometimes it's kind of musical, but when I say musical think of the random, chaotic, insane, melody you might here in a horror movie about a psycho.

“Much of the time it's just random humming. Very loud random humming. She does it constantly, from the time she get's up, until she lays down at night. If she's moving, she's making noise.

“I've tried ignoring it, and sometimes I can manage it, but its like Chinese water torture.”

At another website, commenters discussed the grunts and groans of ageing bodies such as while taking off boots or shoes, getting up from a chair, climbing stairs, etc. but this isn't what I mean.

As far as I can tell, my weird little sounds are unrelated to any physical effort. They just appear and as I noted above, I have no idea if I always hear them or if they happen sometimes without my awareness.

Fortunately, this is no big deal, nothing to get exercised about. Just strange.

Do any of you know what I'm talking about?