Blissdom, budgets, and baby boomer beauty

This is what 53 looks like.
(Photo by Rachel)

OK, guys, I know I'm way behind on my Blissdom recaps, but I've been so tired. First I go to Nashville and exhaust everyone by blabbing my fool head off to anyone who'll listen.

Then I come back and have to scale Mount Washmore. (For the non-English-majors: I did laundry. Lots of it.)

Then there was a Girl Scout meeting to teach the wee tots about budgets. (A true case of the blind leading the blind. I'm just sayin.)

The whole time, my head was in a whirl. Lack of sleep, excitement, blabbing, Karaoke, and cocktails will do that to me. But on top of those, something has been percolating.

Partly it was seeing hundreds of Tea Party types at the Opryland and wanting so badly to give them a makeover. Partly it's someone at Blissdom advising us to blog our passions--the things we'd be thinking about even if we weren't blogging. And partly it's seeing so many women who need a nudge. They've been focusing on careers, graduate school, or children, and they look up and ten years have gone by and they have no idea about style. Their bodies, complexions, and hair have changed, and they don't know what to do about it.

I've been thinking about this for a long time. Five years ago, I went to a college reunion and was shocked at the way so many of my classmates had just given up. They didn't color their hair. They didn't even style it. They didn't use makeup. They didn't worry about what kinds of clothing would flatter them. And this wasn't the politics of frumpiness. They had given up.

Then and there I vowed never to give up. "As God is my witness," I vowed to my friend Liz, "they'll have to pry my lipstick out of my cold, dead hand."

So I'm going to start blogging about midlife beauty and style. How to take our hard-won wisdom and discernment and use them to defy the aging process.

I'm going to start with a 30 day series: Turn back time in 10 minutes a day.

While I cudgel my brains thinking of 30 days worth of posts, do me a favor and think of questions. Or just tell me this is a good idea. Or tell me where I should be doing it. Should I put it on Poppy Shops? Or start a new blog? And does "baby boomer beauty" sound as dorky as I think it does?

Help me Obi Wan Invisible Internet friends! You're my only help!

You would never believe I'm on vacation

Because yes, I'm still in New Hampshire, but I have no pretty pictures for you. I'm too busy discovering the difference between renting and owning.

Renting means that if there are problems with the septic tank, they are someone else's. Owning means you are delighted to discover that you can actually buy Septic-Aid (or whatever it's called) on Amazon.com. I didn't really know much about septic tanks, and oh, Internet, I didn't want to. But now I've discovered that I can have it delivered in 24 hours--plenty of time for the millions and millions of bacteria to convert the contents of the septic tank into sweet-smelling yogurt, or whatever it is that these bacteria turn things into--before a bunch of guests arrive on Saturday.

See, I still don't know much about septic tanks, but I beleve someone has been flushing penicillin or some substance that septic tanks don't like, and now our toilets feel mournful and sluggish. And so I will be giving them the equivalent of a spoonful of Geritol, and you don't even know what that is, Internet, because you are too young.

I will never be as young as you are, Internet.

My sister's getting married on Saturday, did I forget to tell you? Well, it's right that this is coming as something of a surprise to you, Internet, because I just found out that I have to give some kind of luncheon on Saturday. Luckily for me a couple of local catering joints have what quaint elderly types like me call An On-Line Presence, so I can shop for caterers while I drink wine and try to decide whether I'm just imagining things about the toilet.

And now, to end on a more positive note, the Plat du Jour.

I took this picture while I was on my way to Sears to buy a new dryer, as the old one is acting even older than I am, and it's time to send it off to the Bide-A-Wee Rest Home for Discarded Appliances and install the hip young trophy dryer. Naturally, I was not in a good mood. Another time when I was feeling like a home owner, and not in a good way. But then! I saw this:

It's a Ford Cobra. And check out the plate!

I did really well not to rear end him while I was trying to get close enough to take the picture.