{"id":1543,"date":"2012-10-12T16:06:53","date_gmt":"2012-10-12T21:06:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/?p=1543"},"modified":"2012-10-12T17:34:59","modified_gmt":"2012-10-12T22:34:59","slug":"slipping-out-of-the-demographic-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/2012\/10\/slipping-out-of-the-demographic-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Slipping Out of the Demographic"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the past month of September I have been enjoying a daily bowl of raspberries, harvested from the bushes along our screened porch.\u00a0 A previous essay nattered on about the beauty of raspberries, and positioned the seeds and thorny bushes as only minor annoyances that could not diminish their perfection. \u00a0But enough about me, a better story is about one of nature\u2019s many ingenious solutions to seed dispersal \u2013 attractively packaging the indigestible seed in a luscious, brightly colored fruit that is then defecated.\u00a0 Well, okay, \"\"<\/a>this strategy is more effective for birds and bears than for suburbanites, but the basic fact is that from the raspberry\u2019s evolutionary point of view, fruit is nothing more disposable advertising, and I am delighted to be the willing pawn in this scheme.\u00a0 That is not the case with another form of seed dispersal, pretentiously called epizoochory, which basically describes seeds with little hooks on them that attach to your fur (or clothing), an idea co-opted by the clever folks at Velcro.\u00a0 The other day I came in from gardening covered with hundreds of minute seeds embedded in my shirt and pants.\u00a0 The clothes sat in a crumpled mass on my floor until I realized that extracting the seeds was the perfect multi-tasking activity while I stood in multiple airport lines as I headed toPhoenix. \u00a0I plucked and deposited seeds in the airport van, in the security line (where one seed accidentally got \"\"<\/a>stuck on the suit jacket of the man in front of me), a few got lost in the airplane itself, in the Super Shuttle van in Phoenix, and the last few went down the drain at my final destination in Scottsdale.\u00a0 I was the dream seed dispersal agent for my unassuming back yard weed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Fall is progressing and sadly my raspberries are petering out.\u00a0 As I watch Sunday night football, my thoughts have turned to the human equivalent of seed packaging and dispersal.\u00a0 Here the terminology has flip-flopped.\u00a0 The TV advertisements are essentially the seeds, representing the ultimate agenda, and the programming is just trying to lure us in to digest the ads.\u00a0 But unlike the raspberry, where I am barely aware of the seeds, the enticing TV show is full of large, ugly and indigestible seed\/ads.\u00a0 I am reminded of the Woody Allen joke in the movie Annie Hall where he tells his psychiatrist that his live-in brother thinks he is a chicken.\u00a0 He is driving Woody crazy by pecking around the house, building a nest, and the constant cackling is driving the entire household crazy.\u00a0 \u00a0The psychiatrist points out the obvious solution of asking his brother to leave, but Woody replies, \u201cI would ask him to leave, but we need the eggs.\u201d\u00a0 Woody was referring to his tortured relationships with women, but he could also be describing my relationship to TV.<\/p>\n

Lately, I feel like a slightly different version of Woody.\u00a0 The television ads are cackling away, but they not providing any eggs, at least not eggs that I find palatable. \u00a0At age 60, I have just entered my third third, and I am experiencing first hand the effects of falling out the target demographic. \u00a0Marketing experts have concluded I am fallow ground, and whatever seed they might present, however attractively packaged, will remain infertile, spawning no impulse purchases, no wild spending, no change in habits.\u00a0 I have blown by age 54, the age when most advertisers start regarding you as nothing but worthless chaff as they hone in on the more desirable 18 to 54 age range.\u00a0 Increasingly TV shows are a total puzzlement and even the advertisements themselves are indecipherable.\u00a0 Nick, who spent the early part of his career in marketing, has a simple explanation \u2013 the ads are creation of twenty somethings, who have an entirely different outlook on life and definitely a different sense of humor. \u00a0It is an amusing game to put the TV on mute and then try to guess the advertiser.\u00a0 If the ad is totally incomprehensible, it is probably an ad for Geico insurance.<\/p>\n

I hesitate to admit this, but I have subscribed to People magazine for about 20 years, and now I am falling out of this demographic also, and I would like to let the subscription subscription lapse.\u00a0 My litmus test is whether or not I can name any of the starlets showcased in their skimpy dresses, plunging necklines and teetering heels.\u00a0 Recently I have been batting less than .500, in part due to the innumerable reality shows who anoint their pathetically bickering participants as \u201cstars,\u201d worthy of a breathless People profile.\u00a0 However, I hesitate to dump the magazine based on my mother\u2019s experience with the Sunday NY Times crossword puzzle.\u00a0 It was one of her favorite activities, until one day she just quit, saying that she could no longer keep up with all of the new contemporary references \u2013 TV shows and movies that she had never heard of.\u00a0 The ritual of the Sunday crossword is one of the many ways I have followed in my mother\u2019s footsteps.\u00a0 Since People magazine is my main source for contemporary pop culture, I think that I should stick with it for a while longer.<\/p>\n

I may have fallen out of the prime demographic, but I haven\u2019t yet felt another one beckoning.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think that I’m ready to become a member of AARP, or investigate that life insurance designed to pay your \u201cfinal expenses.\u201d\u00a0 Last year, I signed up for a Shakespeare class with an organization called the \u201cLife Long Learning Institute,\u201d a name that cleverly disguised the fact that this is basically a senior center.\u00a0 I was the youngest person there.\u00a0 Although my classmates were lovely people, now I am on their mailing list and I get emails announcing ice cream socials, 11 AM trips to the bowling alley, and periodic death announcements.\u00a0\u00a0 I don\u2019t think that anyone eagerly wants to self-identify with the senior citizen demographic, it smacks of defeat.\u00a0 When I asked my very peppy 88 year old father-in-law if he ever went to his local senior center, he said, \u201cWhy would I want to do that?\u00a0 It\u2019s just for old people.\u201d<\/p>\n

While I reject the senior citizen designation, maybe I can take advantage of the meager perks my age would allow.\u00a0 But I strike out here also \u2013 I will have to wait a good 5 to 10 years to be eligible for senior discounts.\u00a0 I remember my mother making a vow to ski until she was at least 70 so that she could get the senior rate, but at about age 65 this began to look like an overly ambitious goal, so she started fudging her age.\u00a0 She would say to me, \u201cLook at this face, it is as well worn as Yogi Berra\u2019s catcher\u2019s mitt, I bet I could pass for 70, don’t you think?\u201d\u00a0 And then she would step up to the ticket window and say, \u201cHow much is a ticket for this old skiing granny?\u201d\u00a0 She was usually successful, but for the moment I am rejecting this strategy.<\/p>\n

Last winter, I finally discovered an arena where I thought I could use my age to my advantage.\u00a0 At age 60, I could enter a senior tennis tournament.\u00a0 I was always a pretty decent tennis player, but not an exceptional one, such that any age-related erosion in physical abilities could be compensated by improvement in my technical skills \u2013 particularly my feeble backhand.\u00a0 In contrast, I assumed that the top tennis players in younger ranks had already peaked in terms of their technical ability, and their game would inevitably decline with age. \u00a0One of my great skills is an old Dobbin type of durability \u2013 no prosthetic joints in this body. \u00a0My goal was to outlast attrition. \u00a0 So I signed up for a series of tennis lessons, and told the pro that I was in the market for a new backhand, and asked him if he could deliver under budget.\u00a0\u00a0 Once or twice a week throughout the winter, I flailed away, but it was harder than I thought.\u00a0 By spring I still didn\u2019t have one good backhand, but rather 5 or 6 mediocre versions, which would have to be enough.\u00a0 I was specifically looking for an over 60 single tennis tournament, preferably one on a clay court, and ideally one that was local.\u00a0 I knew that the draw would be small, and that was all the better \u2013 a regional ranking of 5, for example, would sound very accomplished, even if the total pool consisted only of 10 players.\u00a0 Therefore, I was completely disappointed, shocked and angered to find that such a tournament does not exist; over the age of 50, almost all singles tournaments are based on your USTA ranking.\u00a0 My seniority would not count for anything.\u00a0 There was no way I was going to enter a tournament where everyone had the same ability.\u00a0 I would be instantly humiliated by young 20 and 30 years prancing and dancing around the tennis court while I huffed, puffed and plodded.\u00a0\u00a0 I could only excel if everyone was the same age, and then there would be some chance that I would have one of the higher rankings.<\/p>\n

Okay, so what if I don\u2019t qualify for senior rates, actually that\u2019s great news, and besides they seem more like sympathy discounts.\u00a0 And so what if I have been kicked out of the dominant demographic, it\u2019s probably the best thing could ever happen to me.\u00a0 If networks and advertisers don\u2019t want me, well that\u2019s their loss.\u00a0 I can wean myself off of TV and find other forms of entertainment.\u00a0 A book comes to mind.\u00a0 And then of course a DVR is a great work around, the equivalent of thornless raspberries.\u00a0 The DVR is just the ticket for the intrusive advertising in the few shows that are still worth watching, particularly live events, such as football games.\u00a0 The trick is to start the recording, then take an afternoon nap, perfect if the Bears have the late game, wake up around the third quarter and then start watching the game from the beginning, skimming through the ads.\u00a0 If you have timed it correctly, you will catch up to the live programming in the waning moments of the fourth quarter.\u00a0 Now I\u2019ve got the sweet raspberries without the thorns, and the eggs without the cackling.<\/p>\n

The missing words in the following poem are anagrams (i.e. share the same letters like spot, post, stop) and the number of asterisks indicates the number of letters.\u00a0 Your job is to solve the missing words based on the above rules and the context of the poem.\u00a0 Scroll down for answers.<\/em><\/h6>\n

You might think that turning 50 was bad, but I\u2019ll tell you what is worse,<\/p>\n

When you get to 60, you\u2019ll really want to put the time clock in *******.<\/p>\n

On the basis of focus groups, demographics and many other studies,<\/p>\n

Advertisers ******* their budget for the young and not us fuddy-duddies,<\/p>\n

No penalty is *******, TV has become a wasteland, barely worth a look,<\/p>\n

Rejected, neglected and disaffected, now I just reach for a book.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Answers: \u00a0reverse, reserve, severer<\/p>\nFollow Liza Blue on: \"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>Share: \"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"reddit\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a>\"linkedin\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the past month of September I have been enjoying a daily bowl of raspberries, harvested from the bushes along our screened porch.\u00a0 A previous essay nattered on about the beauty of raspberries, and positioned the seeds and thorny bushes … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-such-is-life"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iVc8-oT","post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1543"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1549,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1543\/revisions\/1549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fanagrams.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}