Happy birthday, Vortex!

Morgana, much kidney~ma to you.

By and large I'm enjoying my 40s. My health isn't too bad. My finances, while not utterly fabulous, are better than they have been. I like my home, my neighbors, some parts of my job. I have things to work toward and a reasonable expectation of achieving some of them. Would I like to have a Chris Evans look-alike rub my feet while I recline on my velvet chaise lounge in my Victorian mansion? Sure. But even without that, life's pretty good.

If not for the whole unemployment interval, the past five years would have been hands-down my best yet.

Thanks for the pointers to the Ferrari info -- I'm pretty sure the model I saw was the California, which is back-ordered to 2014. Wikipedia even has a sound-clip of the engine revving!

Good luck, Morgana!

My counselor tells me that studies show that the happiest people are single women in their 50s. So, now I'm reaching the best years of my life.

Also here is a story about a woman who makes Derby Hats and races money to help retired thoroughbreds.

ETA: And her website.

You know how you're convinced you're this total dork, and then you go to intense analysis for eleven years, and then you finally start to believe you're not a dork, but then you realize that you're in late middle age, and the best years of your life have completely passed you by?

Right.

Nope. The best years of your life are when you realize that you're pretty cool and decide to go live that way. Unless you're really 110 and aren't sharing your secret for eternal youth (and the appearance thereof), you have a CRAPLOAD of "best years" ahead of you.

I am not exactly an optimist, but the one thing I actually truly believe is that every successive year is a pretty damn good year. My best years are not behind me, and neither are yours. I don't mean that in a rah-rah, blow-sunshine-up-your-ass way. I mean you have some pretty damn good years ahead of you.

My best ass is behind me. Years, on the other hand, are much the same. (I was also born old. I was terrible at being a child/teenager. I have no idea how I am going to support my kids through their teenagerhoods. Thank god they have a dad.)

'ma Morgana!

fingers crossed too.

At 58 I could think that good stuff was behind, but I don't believe it at all. I have to be proactive and fix the physical limitation issues, hence the foot surgery and dieting. My plan is that my 60+ years will be the best years of my life. 30s were career focused, 40s and 50s were family focused. 60+ it is all about mememe. eta: didn't even list before 30 because I didn't even know myself then.

Happy Birthday to Vortex!

Health~ma, Morgana.

Do folks know that The United States Once Planned On Nuking the Moon?

Today I found out the United States once planned on shooting a nuclear bomb at the moon.

If you presumed that the reasoning behind such an act was “because we can”, you are absolutely correct. That is exactly why the U.S. wanted to do it, in order to one-up the Soviet Union, who were perceived as leading the space race at the time.

Carl Sagan was involved!

A young Carl Sagan was one of the scientists hired by Reiffel for this project. Specifically, Sagan was hired to study how exactly the mushroom cloud would expand on the moon, so that they could make sure it would be clearly visible from Earth, which was the whole point of the project.

Of course moon-nukage never took place.

The project was eventually scrapped as it was felt that the public would not respond favorably to the U.S. dropping a nuclear bomb on the moon.

Ya' think?

Moon nukage is weird.

Happy Birthday Vortex! I'm kinda sad we are on opposite sides of the country, I remember several birthdays ago when we weren't and you had grand plans for celebrations.

Tom, in a totally "society is shitty but hey, take what privilege you get", guys are way more allowed to be roguish and attractive in their 40s or 50s than women are...