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    You Know You're Middle-Aged When...
    You Know You're Middle-Aged When...
    You Know You're Middle-Aged When...
    Ebook140 pages1 hour

    You Know You're Middle-Aged When...

    By Alison Rattle and Allison Vale

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    About this ebook

    Do you feel like all your friends are 'getting old and boring', but you are getting younger by the day? Can you be heard saying the phrase '40 is the new 20'? Is your wardrobe on-trend, but for the second time round? It's official, you're in denial. You are middle-aged! You Know You're Middle-Aged When... is a hilarious collection of stories, anecdotes and quotes about other people's mid-life crises, along with tips on how to spot the telltale signs that youth is no longer on your side.
    Chapters include, You know you're middle aged-when: • You're Too Old to Party • It's Time to Dress Your Age; • You Feel the Need for Speed; • You Hit the Big 4-0.
    Entertaining and engaging, this book is guaranteed to have any old codger laughing out loud about their own descent into the twilight years.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMichael O'Mara
    Release dateFeb 24, 2011
    ISBN9781843176404
    You Know You're Middle-Aged When...

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      Book preview

      You Know You're Middle-Aged When... - Alison Rattle

      First published in Great Britain in 2010 by

      Michael O’Mara Books Limited

      9 Lion Yard

      Tremadoc Road

      London SW4 7NQ

      This electronic edition published in 2011

      ISBN: 978-1-84317-640-4 in EPub format

      ISBN: 978-1-84317- 641-1 in Mobipocket format

      ISBN: 978-1-84317-361-8 in hardback print format

      Copyright © Michael O’Mara Books Limited 2010

      Every reasonable effort has been made to acknowledge all copyright holders. Any errors or omissions that may have occurred are inadvertent, and anyone with any copyright queries is invited to write to the publishers, so that a full acknowledgement may be included in subsequent editions of this work.

      All rights reserved. You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

      A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British

      Library.

      Text design and typesetting by Ana Bjezancevic

      Illustrations by Louise Morgan

      www.mombooks.com

      To Martyn, Jason and Anna. All in various stages of the middle ages. Enjoy!

      A. R.

      With thanks to Colin, who embraced grumpy middle age long ago.

      A. V.

      CONTENTS

      Introduction

      THE BIG 3-0:

      Thirty Early-Warning Signs of the Onset of ‘Middle Youth’

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You’re Too Old to Party

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      All You Want is a Quiet Night In

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Finally Start Acting Like a Grown-Up

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      It’s Time to Dress Your Age

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Start Falling Apart

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      The Crisis Finally Strikes

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Hit the Big 4-0

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Succumb to Midlife Lust

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      Your Eyes Begin to Wander

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Feel the Need for Speed

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You’re All of a Twitter

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Begin Behaving Badly

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Say and Do the Dumbest Things

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      It’s Time for Something Different

      YOU KNOW YOU’RE MIDDLE-AGED WHEN …

      You Turn Into a Klutz

      FOR THE FINAL TIME, FACE IT!

      You Know You’re Middle-Aged When …

      Bibliography

      INTRODUCTION

      If you’re reading this book, you’ve most likely noticed an alarming change in your attitude and behaviour. Nothing major – no sudden symptoms or wholesale transformations – but simply a creeping suspicion that you’re not quite the same person you were, say, five years ago.

      Analysing your recent history, you might even be able to pinpoint the precise moment at which this unnerving condition began to take hold. Perhaps it was when you bought your first squash racquet and stopped driving recklessly. Or that time you lied about being busy in order to stay at home watching DVDs. How about when that spotty kid behind the counter called you ‘sir’ or ‘madam’? When you found yourself strangely attracted to a sensible raincoat? Discovered a grey hair? Bought a lovely throw rug? Uttered the ominous words ‘I can’t drink like I used to’?

      OK, breathe. We have good news and bad news for you. The bad news is that you may well be suffering from the early stages of middle age. The good news is that you no longer have to stay out until dawn, dine at McDonald’s, look sexy in beachwear, understand the latest Facebook layout, go backpacking or have the first clue about popular music. You are allowed – expected, no less – to embarrass your children, appreciate the point of opera, have an ill-advised fling, wear whatever’s comfortable and complain about ‘the youth of today’.

      And those are good things, right? Right?

      So sit back and make the most of this liberating new phase in life. Embrace your midlife crisis, revel in your right to be stridently opinionated, and take comfort in the knowledge that you are too old for fashion but still too young for false teeth.

      As someone very wise and doubtless middle-aged once said, forty is the new black.

      THE BIG 3-0: THIRTY EARLY-WARNING SIGNS OF THE ONSET OF ‘MIDDLE YOUTH’

      1. You leave concerts half an hour before the end ‘to beat the rush’.

      2. You start buying things like nose-hair clippers, and Tupperware in all shapes and sizes.

      3. Instead of throwing out the Innovations catalogue that comes with the Sunday newspaper, you suddenly see both the benefit and the money-saving appeal of an electronic mole-repellent for the garden and a plastic winter cover for your garden table.

      4. You own a lawn mower. And probably have a winter cover for it, too.

      5. You always have enough milk in the fridge and a spare bottle of olive oil in the cupboard.

      6. When sitting outside a bar, you can’t help but admire the establishment’s fine hanging baskets.

      7. You say things like, ‘What lovely wallpaper.’

      8. You own a shed.

      9. You spend a whole weekend organizing your shed, and then invite your friends round to admire the results.

      10. Before going out anywhere, you check what the parking situation will be.

      11. When flicking through the TV channels in search of mindless entertainment, you find yourself unexpectedly drawn in to a really interesting documentary about beetles.

      12. Rather than throwing away old shoes, you keep them in case they come in handy for the garden.

      13. You refuse sex with your husband on laundry day, so as not to sully the clean sheets.

      14. You stop dreaming of becoming a professional athlete and start dreaming of having a child who might become one instead.

      15. You look through the property section before throwing the local newspaper away.

      16. Reading celebrity magazines makes you too exhausted to go out.

      17. You buy your first T-shirt with nothing written on it.

      18. You specifically choose restaurants that don’t have pictures on the menu.

      19. The benefits of a pension scheme suddenly become clear.

      20. You are unable to resist the lure of flat-pack self-assembly furniture.

      21. You try to be in and out of the local curry restaurant by 11 o’clock.

      22. Pop music suddenly sounds likes a load of noise.

      23. You no longer get funny looks when you buy a Disney movie or Barbie-themed rucksack, because the sales assistant assumes you have children.

      24. You find yourself saying things like, ‘Whatever happened to … ?’ and ‘I remember when we only had three TV channels.’

      25.

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