November 08, 2007

AAADD



I was reading one of my favorite blogs,The Torn Pages ,and the subject of that post reminded me of the following email I received a few days ago. This is not to imply, of course, that my friend is suffering from this affliction, but I thought it might, at least, give her some comfort.

Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder.

This is how it manifests:

I decide to water my garden.

As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I look over at my car and decide it needs washing.

As I start toward the garage, I notice mail on the porch table that I brought up from the mail box earlier.

I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.

I lay my car keys on the table, put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table, and notice that the can is full.

So, I decide to put the bills back on the table and take out the garbage first.

But then I think, since I'm going to be near the mailbox when I take out the garbage anyway, I may as well pay the bills first.

I take my check book off the table, and see that there is only one check left.

My extra checks are in my desk in the study, so I go inside the house to my desk where I find the can of Coke I'd been drinking. I'm going to look for my checks, but first I need to push the Coke aside so that I don't accidentally knock it over.

The Coke is getting warm, and I decide to put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.

As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke, a vase of flowers on the counter catches my eye--they need water.

I put the Coke on the counter and discover my reading glasses that I've been searching for all morning.

I decide I better put them back on my desk, but first I'm going to water the flowers. I set the glasses back down on the counter, fill a container with water and suddenly spot the TV remote. Someone left it on the kitchen table.

I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV, I'll be looking for the remote, but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table, so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs, but first I'll water the flowers.

I pour some water in the flowers, but quite a bit of it spills on the floor.

So, I set the remote back on the table, get some towels and wipe up the spill.

Then, I head down the hall trying to remember what I was planning to do. At the end of the day: the car isn't washed the bills aren't paid, there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter, the flowers don't have enough water, there is still only 1 check in my check book, I can't find the remote, I can't find my glasses, and I don't remember what I did with the car keys.

Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all stinking day, and I'm really tired.

This is a serious problem, and just think -- if this isn't you yet, your day is coming!

Here's To More Fun

Working people frequently ask retired people what they do to make their days interesting. Well, for example, the other day I went down town and went into a shop. I was only in there for about 5 minutes and when I came out there was a cop writing out a parking ticket.

I went up to him and said, "Come on,man, how about giving a senior citizen a break"? He ignored me and continued writing the ticket.

I called him a Nazi. He glared at me and started writing another ticket for having worn tires. So then I called him a #%"#*. He finished the second ticket and put it on the windshield with the first. Then he started writing a third ticket.

This went on for about 20 minutes. The more I abused him, the more tickets he wrote. Personally, I didn't care. I came down town on the bus and the car that he was putting the tickets on had a bumper sticker that said"Hillary in '08." I try to have a little fun each day now that I'm retired.

*Well, I think that guy would have even more fun if he looked for stickers supporting Obama, Edwards, and Kucinich, too!