<p>“Basically deal with the things that you can deal with and don’t worry about the things that you can’t change anyway.”</p>
<p>That makes sense to me.</p>
<p>BCE, my running partner (62) has been a medical lab technician for 35+ years. She really dislikes the work, but it’s a job. She’s on her feet a lot. The techs have to deal with nurses and doctors who aren’t always the nicest. They also have medical residents (“baby docs,” they call them) who order many unnecessary tests and hound them constantly for results. She never knows her schedule more than a few weeks in advance, and it’s frustrating planning vacations and time off. I don’t think my friend would recommend this job to anybody.</p>
<p>67- that’s it. Been working since 11 years old. If I can’t afford to live in my town in retirement then I will move anywhere in the country I can afford. I am NOT giving up my retirement just because corporations got greedy and cut our pensions, wall street and banks abused the mortgage system, and polticians finger point rather than solving real problems. I will not give them the satisfaction :)</p>
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<p>I looked it up and it’s actually one of the many variants of the Serenity Prayer:</p>
<p>[Serenity</a> Prayer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer]Serenity”>Serenity Prayer - Wikipedia)</p>
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<p>There are types of jobs in my area (Computer Science) that aren’t so pleasant too but there are lots of jobs that are really nice in terms of work environment, pay, benefits, flexible hours. I assume that there are good lab tech jobs and bad ones but the mix may skew towards the bad for medical techs.</p>
<p>I don’t think that the lab techs where my son works has it that bad given what they do but I’m once removed from knowing about them. In the current environment, I think that having a bad job is better than having no job as you have something going so that you can figure out how to move to a better job, perhaps with additional education.</p>
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<p>In the <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/internships-careers-employment/1121619-university-graduate-career-surveys.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/internships-careers-employment/1121619-university-graduate-career-surveys.html</a> , Berkeley, Cal Poly, Virginia Tech, MIT, and CMU surveys are among the more detailed. However, the survey questions and time frame are not necessarily the same at each school (though you can compare majors at each school).</p>
<p>Unfortunately, most universities’ career centers have little or no career survey information specific to students graduating from their own campuses; they often just point to the NACE survey.</p>
<p>“God grant me the pigheadness to not accept there are things I cannot change, the fortitude to work to change them, and the creativity and wisdom to figure out how.”</p>
<p>I saw my cardiologist yesterday. He said I’m like a teenager (now I didn’t like being a teenager, but that’s another story.) Says I’m in better shape than 95% of men my age (scary thought!). But I’m in yoga class with all those young women, and they have to put up with the fact that when they are doing “plank”, I’m doing “sphinx”. </p>
<p>Today, planning trip to Ethiopia, for “work”. “Played” my violin (it’s a euphemism) last night - I have to play all the wrong notes, so that the right ones can shine through.</p>
<p>^^sounds interesting especially if I knew what you’re saying</p>
<p>^^No doubt he’s wearing leopard spotted spandex while doing it.</p>
<p>Sigh. Everlast boxing pants.</p>
<p>But I’ll bet you look better than 95% of the old guys in your class.
And some of the young ladies too. :)</p>
<p>There ain’t no other old guys. And only a rare younger one. I do have an all men’s class too, but only three ever show up, so they’re canceling it (the men’s class is MUCH easier than the mixed one.)</p>
<p>Hey, it’s better than Jazzercise:</p>
<p>Poetry in Motion</p>
<p>Yeow! I’m sore!</p>
<p>I just got home from my Jazzercise class at the city parks and recreation center, and have tumbled into my writing chair. Don’t laugh – it’s not funny! (yet!) I haven’t so far managed to say anything at all witty, and my bones and muscles don’t feel amused.</p>
<p>All right, it is an entertaining sight. Me and 35 sweaty women. Big ones and little ones. Fat ones and skinny ones and svelte ones and odd-shaped ones. Young ones and…young-at-hearts. One or two pregnant. (I, of course, am the oddest shaped of all!) They’ve decided I’m just one of the girls. Good thing, too, because I’m not sure how I could deal with it otherwise.</p>
<p>Jazzercise is “a cardio-enhancing combination of dance and exercise.” Or at least they tell me it is cardio-enhancing – at the moment, I’m not sure I could find a pulse. There are some fine dancers in the class who are also in great shape. There are some folks in great shape who don’t dance worth beans. There are also some out-of-shape dancers. Then there is the back row. I’m in the back row. We don’t dance too good (I’m being kind), and after about 20 minutes, we have trouble lifting our feet. </p>
<p>There are two women, both in their 60s I think, who have been doing this three times a week for 20 years. Sigh. I can’t imagine doing this for 20 years. I’ll have to push myself to go back on Thursday. One day at a time. That’s why I bought the big 16-session pass. I’m a cheapskate, and having spent the dough in advance, there’s no way I’m not going to get my money’s worth, even if I die in the attempt. “We Shall Overcome,” I keep wanting to sing after each session.</p>
<p>Sadly, the music isn’t jazz. Up-tempo disco mostly, the kind I deliberately missed the polyester years to avoid. The high point is some of the songs from “Flashdance” (no Jennifer Beals anywhere in the vicinity); then there’s assorted “disco-country” (does such a category exist, or did I just make that up? What do you call ‘Tanya Tucker’? I am well beyond my range of cultural competence here.) Something called “Irish Techno” (?) My new favorite is an “education” song by a guy named Thomas Dolby, “She Blinded Me with Science”:</p>
<pre><code> It’s poetry in motion
And when she turned her eyes to me
As deep as any ocean
As sweet as any harmony
She blinded me with science
And failed me in biology.
</code></pre>
<p>I don’t think I’d ever get into an automobile with someone who played this stuff on the car stereo. But here I am. </p>
<p>I do need to find a way to get some exercise that doesn’t involve round things. In my early-to-mid 40s, I used to play full-court basketball three times a week. Don’t get the wrong impression: it’s not what it seems. I’m short, slow, and can’t jump, all three being congenital, which I think means they had to let me play under the Americans with Disabilities Act. I was certainly no worse in my 40s than I was in my 20s, which doesn’t say much, and I could hear the cheers of the mythical multitude every time I managed to get a shot off, which was rather rare, or even succeed in running up and down the court twice without gasping for breath. But, alas, the body wouldn’t heal fast enough from all the elbows and hip checks, and I had to hang ‘em up.</p>
<p>I also liked to play softball. I styled myself a good infielder, with slick hands, and a relatively weak bat. Scrappy! Alack, now when I play catch, I see the ball perfectly up until it gets about two feet away, and then I lose it. More often than not, the ball bounces off the heel of the glove…or worse. Softball has simply become too hazardous.</p>
<p>And so, at least for the present, it’s Jazzercise. I’d be hardpressed to say I actually like it, but for now, I can get by with a detached and sweaty amusement, and there’s no question me and the girls get quite a workout. The instructor, who never seems to approach even moist (though I can’t see that well from where I sweat), calls out steps and counts, but I have no idea what the steps are called or what she is counting. And she can talk and dance and bend and sway and jump all at the same time! She follows baseball, and Barry Bonds. Doesn’t care for Paris Hilton. (“Skankoid,” she says.) I mostly “copy” (all right – that’s a little euphemistic), and smile a bunch and sweat a lot. She comments that I’m a really happy guy. I’m trying to convince myself that I am, or at least that I can talk myself into it. I look around. We are all smiling. We are poetry in motion! And the gym floor moves. </p>
<p>So what do we have to teach the kids so that they can live to be 105? I don’t think I should be the one to ask, as my particular genetic inheritance makes the possibility of such an accomplishment very doubtful. Still, I always enjoy the advice passed down in the newspaper by those who have managed this particular feat of longevity. You know, “Smoke a cigar after dinner every night; drink two shots of vodka before lunch; sing in the bathtub; always vote for the challenger; don’t read depressing newspaper stories, etc., etc.” (I’ve discovered you can even scramble them: “Smoke a cigar in the bathtub every night; drink two shots of vodka after reading a depressing newspaper story; always vote before lunch….”)</p>
<p>Don’t preach. Let your kids see you taking good care of yourself. Or at least look like you’re trying. Eat right, and enjoy that extra piece of cheesecake. Stay in shape (what shape is yet to be determined; but I’m clearly more “well-rounded” than I used to be.) Imbibe a little if you like, or abstain, but don’t make a big deal about it either way. Make walking to the supermarket, rather than driving, a religious observance. Sleep occasionally. Do something that feeds your soul, and do something that feeds other people’s. Know at least a few of your neighbors. Always stretch beyond your comfort zone. If you already know how to country line-dance, learn to tango. Live with intention.</p>
<p>Don’t sweat the small stuff. That’s what the Jazzercise class is for, and, if you’re like me, you’ll forget it every time you try to raise your left knee.</p>
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<p>P.S. I am offering $5.00 off any of my books to any homeschooling parent of the masculine persuasion who sends me a receipt from having attended a Jazzercise class. I need a support group.</p>
<p>My fantasy job is serving ice cream to tourists in a little shop. Just scoop out ice cream and chat with the tourists</p>
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<p>My D scooped out ice cream all through high school & most summers during college. It’s HARD work!! :)</p>
<p>Kelsmom,</p>
<p>Fun though, right?</p>
<p>There’s no way that scooping ice cream is fun. Those people are always working hard and never smiling, too busy to talk.</p>
<p>Okay mini, I think you’ve motivated me to look into some of those classes I’ve been avoiding at the gym. They have all sorts of exercise classes that appear only to be for the highly coordinated, but it’s free, so what the heck. Just as long as video cameras for heckling and amusement aren’t allowed. In lieu of that, time to go running on the canal. Plenty of homeless and gangbanger looking types around here, so I’m sure that will increase my speed. But jazzercise and yoga sound more fun. Would be nice to live deep into those retirement years.</p>
<p>Mini, I like your post #150. </p>
<p>You have a good attitude.</p>
<p>Exactly, dstark! Sounds like fun. Hard work is not a concern. Thats fine! Probably good exercise too!</p>
<p>Busdriver:
The reason this is my dream job is because I had a lovely chat (as a tourist) with a retiree doing this at a place I was visiting. It wasn’t a frenetic, line-out-the-door place, it was a charming place that served ice cream, light snacks, tea/coffee at the counter and had a little gift shop.</p>
<p>** ok- next dream job- work in a wine shop.</p>
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<p>Mini, unless it’s a remix, that’s from the 80’s, and I 'm guilty of buying the album, putting it on cassette, and playing it all the time in my car!! <em>blush</em></p>
<p>(Have you tried Zumba? (disclaimer, I’m an instructor), you might like the music better…)</p>
<p>JustaMom, maybe you can clarify this for me. This lady in the gym told me that when she listens to the Zumba classes, that she hears all these ladies shrieking and hollering, and that it sounds like, well…have you seen Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally? And though it sounds like amazing exercise, I just don’t think I’m uninhibited enough to be in a group of ladies yelling.</p>
<p>Though I’m sure many of the guys here would be fine with that.</p>
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I scooped ice cream in high school and it was a ball … it was a neighborhood place that wasn’t too busy and I saw lots of my freinds. I agree for it it would have not been fun in some amazingly high traffic tourist location for example.</p>
<p>Busdriver…I’ve heard of classes like that…my classes do their share of hootin’ & hollerin’, but it’s kind of like a “whoo” or a “yeah” or (if they’re totally into it) singing along. And, plenty of my students never make a peep! Up here in the New England suburbs, we’re a little more reserved than some others. I’ve got a couple middle aged men who come to almost every class, and they keep up with all the “chicas”!</p>