Rodney

Sorry about that, Cyn. If it's any consolation, I'm not _quite_ at the half-century mark here. In absolute terms, I'm not old. Relative to most of the members of this board, though, I am. I grew up in a different, slow moving world with three television networks, cheap education, laws that bars had to close on election day, pervasive unions, everyone's father in the American Legion, credit cards and consumer debt very rare, most good jobs were in manufacturing, and in which the closest thing to the Internet was the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature in the public library (and they _never_ had the magazine you were trying to find) and mimeographed fanzines, and maybe ham radio. Oh yeah, and big heavy appliances made of metal that lasted forever, until we threw them out while they were still working because we wanted something flashier. People under the age of 25 haven't the faintest idea what that world was like.

So I guess I'm saying that what makes me feel old is the perspective I have. So much water under the bridge. I still bench-press 250, if that's any consolation!

Oh yeah, when I was a teenager, people actually made a living scavenging broken appliances like Sunbeam mixers, fixing them, and reselling them at low prices. Second-hand/fixit stores were everywhere. People with no formal education who liked to tinker with stuff could actually make a (very modest) living at it. That whole part of the economy has gone, thanks to cheap and cheaply-made products that aren't economical to fix.