Baby Boomers Envy

By Larry Teren

Now that Baby boomers are becoming the dominant generational segment of society, the others are
trying to scare us. These are some of the headlines making news on the Internet concerning Baby Boomers:

1) 80% of baby boomers have saved less than $100,000 and are not prepared for forced retirement.

2) Baby Boomers deal more than any other age group with body clock changes that cause insomnia, excess weight, and uncooperative sleep cycles.

3) The Center for Disease Control (CDC) says one in five boomers are susceptible to hepatitis and liver disease. All baby boomers should immediately get tested.

4) More Baby Boomers are going to jail than ever and demand more health care while behind bars.

Comments:

1) Regarding retirement savings, most people don’t save enough for retirement- not just baby boomers. Duh. It has to do with the government taking away too much in taxes, gasoline costing too much, health insurance premiums being out of control, etc. Baby boomers are easy targets to put down about savings because we are the next in line closest to retirement.

It has become fashionable for the media to now try to paint baby boomers as greedy about wanting our fair share of social security benefits. They want us to sacrifice for the sake of the following generations. Except these media crybabies forget a few things:

The so-called selfish boomer parents and grandparents are the ones who helped pay for their children and grandchildren’s education and lifestyles. These same boomers didn’t complain when their own parents and grandparents were receiving social security benefits while having put in less than they received.

Many of the boomers were obligated to serve in the Armed Forces while subsequent generations because of a voluntary military were able to start and build careers earlier. If anything, it is the later generations that have been pampered more.

2) Anybody over the age of 50 starts to experience body clock changes. So, why pick on baby boomers? Forget about body clock. Heck, I know what time it is when I look at the clock radio each time I wake up in the middle of the night from so-called sleep disorder. It ain’t sleep disorder- it’s my doohickey pushing against the thingamajig that holds my you-know-what telling me to pull the flusher in my body. Believe me- I wish it were sleep disorder.

Again, there is a conspiracy among certain media elements to plant seeds of contempt for baby boomers in order to legitimize further bashing down the road. If you read a story- whether true or not- enough times on different websites, you tend to believe what you read.

70 million people, regardless of age, suffer from sleep problems. That’s why you hear those radio commercials for sleep number beds.

The CDC says almost half of the adults snore and more than one third accidentally fall asleep
during the day. Again- nothing to do with how old you are. Yawn, what- what was I saying?

3) I don’t see how baby boomers are more susceptible to hepatitis than any other age group. I recall what happened when getting a ‘hepatitis a’ shot before going on my first trip overseas as I was warned of the dangers of drinking the local water and contracting a poison in my system that leads to liver disease.

I went to the doctor’s office and was told to lie on the side as a nurse put a syringe deep into
my left thigh. My left side swelled up and I had to walk awkwardly for a couple of days before commencing on the trip. When I arrived at the destination airport and went to pick up my luggage, I again had to compensate my gait and further strained my torso when picking up a bag lying flat on the conveyor belt.

That evening, while staying at my brother’s house, I decided to go with him and his two year old baby son to the supermarket. When we were finished shopping my brother took the grocery bags out of the shopping cart to put into the trunk. I volunteered to carry my nephew and put him in his car seat. Big mistake. The moment I bent down and compensated for the sore thigh from the damn hepatitis shot, I pulled out my lower back. The shout of pain that went out was so emphatic, that five other guys in the parking lot pulled out guns thinking we were under a terrorist attack.

I spent the first four days of my visit lying flat on my back and taking pain killers. I’m not belittling a concern for liver disease. As for body clock- is that any worse than jet lag?

4) I’m not sure if the point that there are more convicts under medical care in jail because there are more baby boomers under incarceration is true. Maybe there are more diabetics committing crimes? Why doesn’t somebody do a study on that, huh? Anyways, that’s good for the nursing profession- more job opportunities if you don’t mind having an armed guard standing next to you while examining a patient.

Excuse me, what time is it? My body clock is running slow. Anyways, I have to go to the bank now and count my money.

3 thoughts on “Baby Boomers Envy”

  1. I had to trade my surf board for a camera.
    I sold my rock climbing gear and bought a hammock and a rock climbing poster.
    I turned my sea kyak into a garden bed and my snow skis are now a post for the tomatoe plants to climb.
    My through hiking packs are now storage bins and my tent is a fort for my nephew.
    BUT, I have managed to stay out of jail.

  2. Baby Boomer my ass! I’m 72. I paid in all my life and the rest of you sorry ass cry babys are gonna have to pay up too!
    Get your sorry ass out to work! I need the spending money!
    Else I’ll take my walking cane and whip the crap out of you!
    Jail my ass! I’m gonna be out chasing good looking women!

  3. I’ve often wished I had been a baby boomer instead of being after then. Boomers had cheap housing, steady jobs, affordable education which laid the base for their wealth later in life. They are really lucky and often don’t know how lucky….also there were fewer people on earth in the 1950’s, for example, meaning less competition for absolutely everything that the baby boomers did not have to deal with as we do today.

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