Don’t Know How to Convey Your Annoyance Via Text? Go With a PoEmoji

Posted on by thepoelog

FAKT: I have never used an emoji. I actually don’t even know how to. Are they on my phone somewhere? I am old and decrepit and have no idea. Maybe they’re housed on my Life Alert.

Emoji Life Alert

I recently read that some new emojis are being considered and it got me thinking about which ones I would use, if in fact, I was about 25 years younger and had more than four friends who will actually attempt to text with me.

Also, it got me thinking, “How do I get a spot on that emoji judging panel because I bet the discussions are amazing and intense and just awesomely nerdy.”

One of the PoEmojis that immediately popped into my mind was in fact a taco, and lo and behold, the taco emoji is one of the ones currently being considered for release. Whew. Because I do think I would truly use a taco one. Pretty much anytime my personal-chef-for-life XFE asks me what I want him to make me for dinner, the answers are invariably: tacos and/or ice cream sandwiches. Breakfast, lunch or dinner. Tacos are the perfect food. And ice cream sandwiches are just delicious.

Mmmmm, tacos.

Anyway, without further ado, my contributions to the emoji world, or PoEmojis, if you will.

Soysauced emoji. This one is useful for times you want to tell your friends that you fell and made a spectacle of yourself. (See origination of soysauced here.)

Sample use: “Oh girl. I was walking down the street minding my own business and then wham! <soysauce> I think I recovered pretty well, though.”

Cheese and wine emoji. I’m sure there’s already a wine emoji and probably a cheese emoji, but I really need them to be together. That would be my emoji to indicate that XFE is out of town and single girl debauchery is about to commence.

Sample use: “Hey, sorry you can’t come over for <cheese and wine>. Please be on standby to call Cat Protective Services in case I oversleep and forget to feed the cat.”

Crazy cat lady emoji. Speaking of cats, I know quite a few ladies who could use this one. I would expect to receive this one on birthdays, and especially after a friend fights with her boyfriend.

Sample use: “Hey girl, you better straighten up and act right or you’re going to end up <a crazy cat lady>.”

I always joke that I’m one boyfriend and a caftan away from crazy cat lady status. Actually, I do have a few things in my wardrobe that qualify as caftan-esque, so maybe I’m only one boyfriend away from crazy cat lady.

Real Housewives emoji. I think this one would either be like an eye-rolling emoji or maybe a shocked open-mouthed one. I can’t decide.

Sample use: “So then she said that I was being too dramatic and maybe I should reconsider my position that Texas is the best state, and I was all like, <Real Housewives>. I mean, can you believe her??”

Kim’s butt emoji. This emoji is meant to convey something truly large, perhaps, suspiciously so. Like, maybe, too good to be true? A total fake out.

Sample use: “Well, I thought we were going to get out of having to go to that baby shower, but it turned out it was a total <Kim’s butt> and now I feel like an idiot because we obviously have to go.”

Honey badger emoji. Because I was watching this show the other day on National Geographic (let me tell you….unless you want to watch Sex and the City reruns—on two channels, no less– you are basically screwed on daytime television viewing), and it reinforced once again how badass honey badgers are. I think this emoji would come in handy when you’re trying to tell someone that they best not mess with you or you will open up a whole bag of snake-killing honey badger on them.

honey badger

Sample use: “I got so angry when CVS didn’t have the most recent edition of Us Weekly, I almost went all <honey badger> on the unhelpful and uninterested clerk. Instead, I bought last week’s and read it again. Bye, Felicia.”

Speaking of, I don’t think a “bye, Felicia” emoji would sit in the emoji school yard unused. I see that one as a face with a side eye and a hand up dismissal sort of movement. Like “talk to the hand,” but with side eye.

Bye Felicia

Does Anyone Know How I Can Subscribe to ‘Less?’

Posted on by thepoelog

This is what I came home to today:

Act my age? What the hell does that mean? I’m 40. What am I supposed to be acting like? Seriously? What is a 40 year old supposed to be acting like? As far as I know, I am in fact acting my age. As a marketing ploy, so far, I’m not on board.

This was the back of the envelope. What do I want to be when I grow up? Hell if I know! And, I’m sorry, but is that Kendra Wilkenson, former bedmate of that old fogey, Hugh Hefner? Now bedmate of some football player and tabloid favorite/E! personality? I’m not really planning to take any advice from her except maybe advice on the best double-sided tape to keep your bathing suit in place.

I’m not really familiar with More Magazine. According to their website, this magazine, “Celebrates women of style and substance with articles on style, health, work, spirituality and relationships.”

Basically, a bunch of stuff I’m not really interested in reading about.

Here are some of the women they used in the materials inside the envelope:

Kyra Sedgewick: Age 46

Diane Lane: Age 47

Jodi Foster: Age 49

Jeanne Triplehorn: Age 49

All of these women are years older than me! I am not your target audience, More Magazine!

Here’s how the letter starts (after the “Dear Friend” greeting)

I have a confession to make….I still feel like I’m 25.

Guess what? I don’t. I wouldn’t want to go back to 25 for all the tea in China. (What a dumb saying, by the way. I mean, I like tea, but I’m not lusting for shiploads of it or anything). Back to my main point, 25 sucked. 40 isn’t exactly a picnic, but in now way do I put 25 on some pedestal either.

Basically, I don’t think about “what age I feel.” It’s ridiculous.

I’m especially not interested at all in a feature called “Second Acts,” featuring women “fulfilling or pursuing a dream in midlife.” Ugh. My midlife dream is to not be subjected to phrases like “dream in midlife.”

I know this is all meant to be reassuring. “Don’t worry. You’re still vibrant and needed.” But it’s really kind of demoralizing. Just when you think aging is no big deal, these guys swoop in and tell you it is actually a big deal, requiring it’s very own magazine, but don’t worry, we still find you valuable. For the price of a subscription.

What will I find in the mail next? A catalog from As We Change?

Now I’m Too Old to Run?

Posted on by thepoelog

Young people of the Internet: I am the voice of the future. Heed my warning. Do everything in your power to stop aging.

Aging is not good for you. It’s really not. Your metabolism will desert you (10 years ago, I was a size 4. Today…well. I’m not a size 4.) You’ll have to go to the restroom before you get in the car. That’s every time you get in the car. Don’t test that one even once. You’ll fall asleep on the couch before 10 p.m. every night. Well before 10 p.m. Eating blue cheese will give you heartburn.

The latest symptom in my downward spiral into decrepitude (that’s a word, right?) occurred Monday morning. I got up at 5:40 (one of the perks of going to bed before the sun has disappeared is that you wake up before the sun rises) to go for a run. I coated my entire body in a layer of Body Glide, got dressed and went downstairs for a little stretching/petting Petunia while she eats session (oh, another thing: with age, you have to stretch before AND after exercise to avoid injury. It’s exhausting and time consuming.)

I left the house, synched up my watch and put my iPod onto “blaring” (did I mention that you’re hearing slowly disappears as you get older? Just a tiny bit at first. You’ll notice yourself saying “huh?” and “what?” a lot. That’s how you’ll know.)

I went literally 10 steps and about died. I had a sharp stabbing pain in my back on the left side, kinda close to my spine. It basically felt like my liver was trying to escape my body. I hit pause on the iPod and did a few upper body stretches. When it felt like I could breathe without doubling over, I tried to run a few more steps. Nope. Excrutiating, radiating pain. I turned back the 20 paces and went back inside the house.

This stock image is so freaking disturbing. How do I know I DON’T have some face on my back?

During this whole escapade, one of my neighbors had pulled up, gotten out of his car, witnessed my entire “run,” and walked to his front door, shaking his head as if to say, “Yep, another one down.”

I hobbled through my morning routine. I was just in so much pain. I even considered going to the doctor, something I never do since my physician has the bedside manner of Frankenstein. My own personal WebMD XFE told me that it was probably just a spasm and I’d be fine.

 

Let me reiterate: I did nothing NOTHING at all that would have caused any kind of muscle spasm or contraction of any sort. Unless you count bending over and petting a cat or pushing a button on an iPod as strenuous activity, I had not done any moves that would cause that kind of blinding, breath-stealing pain. This is purely a case of Random Age Pain. It’s similar to Restless Leg Syndrome, I suspect. Or even, heartburn.

Now I’m on a steady diet of ibuprofen and glum, pitiful looks, accentuated by sharp intakes of breath whenever I move wrong. I had a heating pad on it all morning, but a quick Google search indicated that I had gotten even that course of treatment wrong. You’re supposed to use ice packs, apparently, not heat. Which really bums me out because I hate to be cold.

We have less than four days until vacation and I was really hoping to get my old and slowly-rotting, ancient body in shape for bikini wearing. Because by my calculation, four days totally would have been all it would take to turn back the hands of time and get into a size 4.

Older Women and Younger Men in the News

Posted on by thepoelog

Now (gracefully and without drama) approaching 40 years of age, I am a full five years older than my childlike, plus-one-for-life, XFE. This causes much hilarity on his part. He loves to point out how old I am. He has recently taken to telling people that I’ll be 50 years old in March instead of 40. I’m pretty much immune to his sense of humor, so it really doesn’t bother me–I actually find it pretty funny myself, since he is clearly the more mature one in our relationship.

I've got my old rheumy eye on you.

 However, perhaps I should stop laughing with him and start watching my back.

According to this article in the UK’s Guardian last May, women who are seven to nine years older than their husbands have a 20% higher mortality rate than if they were the same age.

Thankfully, we’re not married and don’t intend to get married, so perhaps I’m safe. Also, I’m only five years older. So again, perhaps I’ve dodged an XFE bullet. I am curious why they chose seven to nine years as the age differences. What odd numbers.

I wonder what the authors of the Danish study mentioned in the Guardian would say about the mortality rate of someone who was 44 years older than her husband? Because from what I hear, it is not good news. 

D.C. is currently being rocked by the story of the murder of a 91-year-old journalist and socialite by her 47-year-old husband. It happened in a very expensive, genteel neighborhood in DC known as Georgetown, and the victim, Viola Drath, was very well known and respected. The details that are emerging are pretty crazy.

This husband, a German who claimed to be an Iraqi general and apparently used the alias Count Albi, was unemployed, and receiving a $2000-a-month allowance from his wife. But apparently, that allowance had recently been reduced. AND police had been called to the house before for other instances of domestic violence, but Drath refused to cooperate and the cases were dropped.

Seriously dude? She was old! You couldn’t just wait it out? What the hell?

Anyway. I guess some older women/younger men situations work out though. Joan Collins, who’s 75, is married to a man 30 years younger than her and she seems happy. And Madonna just this week celebrated her 53rd birthday with a 24-year-old French break dancer (How is that even a job??). His mom, by the way, is 44 years old.

"Now all I need to do is pop-and-lock this beat down and I will be set."

The two lovebirds met in September of last year at a launch party for the clothing line Madonna started with her 14-year-old daughter. Before the break dancer, Madonna was dating a 23-year-old Brazilian DJ, so she’s slowly creeping towards the age-acceptable category, right?

But my favorite recent story about an older woman and her younger man is the mighty eccentric Duchess of Alba who recently announced that she’s getting married at 85 to a civil servant who’s 25 years younger. This is the same woman who married an ex-priest back in the 70s, who was nine years younger than her.

Of course, with this new guy on the scene, her heirs got pissed, thinking this guy must be after the Duchess’ $4.9 billion fortune. They set about trying to stop the marriage, even trying to get the King of Spain involved. To shut them up and marry the man she loves, she made her will public. In it, she’s laid out exactly what each of her six heirs will receive upon her death. That seems to have shut them up and she’s planning on marrying her man in September.

It’s gotta be a love match because honestly, he’s fairly good looking and well, she’s a bit scary looking.

"Honey, is this too much cleavage on an 85-year-old?"

Good luck you crazy kids!