Madoodle and Chevy Chase

 “Try this,” my dad said, holding out a spoon. “It’s called Madoodle.”

I was young and dumb and willing to try anything once. He had just moved back to Michigan after seven years in California, where he told us he had learned to cook authentic Mexican food. Madoodle didn’t sound particularly Latino, but it did sound like a fun and festive dish. Like a party in my mouth. 

My sisters were less trusting. “What’s in it?” one of them asked.

“Onion, pepper, hominy, tripe –”

“What’s tripe?” she persisted.

“Cow stomach.”

Oddly enough the sound I made as I hawked that substance out of my throat and halfway across the room sounded a bit like I was shouting “Madoodle!” 

That was the beginning of my education concerning my father’s cooking. Lesson one: the man was almost completely deaf, so he usually just took a stab at pronunciation of words. Madoodle was Menudo.

Lesson two: Don’t eat anything at Dad’s house.

He was a meat cutter. He had no problem eating parts of animals that there is just no reason to eat. Stomach, tongue, heart, liver, you name it, he served it to us. He even kept a jar of pickled pigs feet in his fridge for special occasions. 

And the problem wasn’t just the parts that he ate. It was also the animals from which he got those parts. At any given moment, he might have possums, squirrels or raccoons in his freezer. 

I am not a fussy eater. Obviously. If I were, this book would probably have to be called Thin, Fifty, and Menopausal.  But still, there are just some things that I am not going to eat. Wild rodent-type animals? No. No squirrels or possums. Organ meats? Hell no. Animal parts that haven’t been fully cooked? Yuck. If it’s still bleeding when it hits my plate, I’m not touching it. 

Pretty simple. However, as I get older, the list of foods I won’t eat seems to be growing. It’s not that I like food any less, or that I’m becoming more selective for some kind of moral or ethical reasons.

It’s that I now have a fifty year-old digestive system. Certain foods now have a tendency to party down in my lower intestine, and like most parties, the clean-up can be rather unpleasant.

Not too long ago, some friends and I got together for an evening of what we like to call “kitchen bitchin’.” Some of us bring wine, some of us bring snacks, and all of us bring attitude. And one of my friends brought something that completely changed my perception of food while making me uncomfortably aware of just exactly how old I really am.

She is a lovely Latina lady who likes to make authentic Mexican foods for these get togethers.  I thought at first that her dish that night was her delicious homemade salsa or pico de gallo because she served it with crispy tostadas and tortilla chips. She brought an enormous bowl of this amazing concoction that involved tomatoes, peppers, avocado, olives and shrimp, with just a touch of lime. 

It was beyond incredible. My tastebuds spent the entire evening having tiny orgasms.  

Oh, it was spicy, but it was the kind of spicy that doesn’t hit until you stop eating it. It was chilled to perfection, cool and tangy at the same time in my mouth. It tasted so good that I didn’t want to swallow each delicious mouthful and make the moment end. My friends and I gobbled that stuff as though our lives depended on it.

Then I took a little break.

Holy hell.

That’s when the peppers hit, and they hit hard. Each incoming breath hit the inside of my mouth like a blast from a flame thrower. I gulped my wine, but I might as well have been throwing the alcohol on an open flame. 

My friend helpfully handed me a Mexican beer, which not only increased the burning sensation but left a taste in my mouth that made me wonder if I had had just swallowed beer or licked a skunk’s butt.

She laughed and squeezed a lime into my beer.  “Try it now,” she suggested.

Oh, man. Like the food I had been eating, the lime-enhanced beer changed my perspective on flavor. It was just so undeniably good. Beyond good. Amazing. Indescribable.

But here’s the part that got me in trouble. The more I drank of the lime-enhanced Mexican beer, the more I had to eat of the shrimp-tomato-avocado delight. Every time I stopped consuming either one, my mouth burned. The only thing that could take away the burning sensation was the cool, refreshing application of copious amounts of beer and food. I was afraid to stop. I couldn’t stop.

“Wh-what is this — hic — called?” I stammered, scooping out more from the bottom of the bowl.

I swear to God she said, “Chevy Chase,” which struck me as being really, really funny.

There was nothing funny about what happened in my lower intestine a few hours later.

In my younger days, I could eat spicy food and not have any problems. I could drink beer. Hell, I could drink just about anything with the very notable exception of Schnapps, which is just hot snot in a bottle that comes up in one big, gooey ball if you happen to throw it up. Other than that, nothing really bothered my stomach back then. I could digest anything.

That was then, this is now. 

I spent the rest of the night in the bathroom. When I wasn’t expelling mass quantities of pure evil, I was curled up on the floor, moaning. I would have called for help, but I had lost all knowledge of the English language by then. Couldn’t have spoken anyway, because as the alcohol wore off I began to believe that I no longer had lips or tongue. They’d been burned off. 

By three a.m., I was crying for my mommy. 

On the positive side, I’m pretty sure I lost a pants size that night, along with a few internal organs.  It came out of my body with such force that I’m fairly certain I levitated over the toilet a few times. It’s entirely possible that my head spun all the way around. By four a.m., I was wondering whether or not my insurance would cover reconstruction of my sphincter, or at the very least a skin graft on what was left of my ass. 

There was not enough coffee in the world to deal with the hangover that hit me the following day. Believe me when I say I tried. I drank my body weight in strong, black coffee.

Which was really a mistake after the damage done by the spicy food. It just sort of greased the skids. It would have been kinder to my digestive system to pour the coffee straight from the pot into the toilet and just eliminate the middleman entirely. 

It turns out that the dish my friend made that night was Ceviche, and it really wasn’t all that spicy. It was actually pretty mild. Her children eat it all the time. My children have tasted it and declared it “wimpy”. 

And apparently “wimpy” is what I am now. My body is no longer capable of processing the kinds of things I could consume without a second thought when I was younger. 

I have officially reached the “bland foods” stage of life. Bland foods and sensible shoes. I have this sudden fear that I am going to look into the mirror someday soon and see one of my aunts looking back at me. With a “fiber bar” in one hand and a soothing cup of warm milk in the other. 

On the positive side, I now have an excellent excuse in case anyone ever offers me a nice hot bowl of Madoodle.

“No thanks,” I’ll tell them. “At my age, I just can’t handle spicy foods any more.”

 

Today’s post is an excerpt from my book Fat, Fifty, and Menopausal. If you’d like to read more ridiculousness like this, please check out my Goode For a Laugh series!

Finally!

Well, after an unexpected delay that I still don’t understand, My Mirror Lies to Me is finally available on Amazon — only nine days later than the date I had promised. Better late than never, right?

Just to give you a little taste, I’m sharing a small sample of my new book. If you enjoy the sample, you can read the rest through Kindle Unlimited or buy it here for only $2.99.

My Mirror Lies to Me

My Aunt Marian always told people that when I was a small child I would wake up from naps, blink a few times, and say, “…and, um–” before launching into a story of some sort.

I’ve always been a talker. A storyteller. Most of my stories are true, or at the very least possess a small kernel of truth somewhere in either the exposition or fine details. What can I say? I like to make people smile. Maybe even make them laugh out loud. If I can make them laugh so hard they pee, that’s just a bonus.

“Amy stories” have prompted a lot of eye-rolling and grimacing over the years, along with polite suggestions that I write them down in a book someday. Suggestions which, let’s be honest, are less about encouraging me to share my tales than about asking me to please, for the love of God, shut up for five minutes.

“I know, Mom,” my kids will groan. “You’ve told this one, like, a thousand times.”

“Is this another one about your aunts? Yes, I’ve heard them all before,” a more polite co-worker might say. “You should really write a book, you know.”

I used to get embarrassed or offended when people said things like that. Now? Now, I just nod and smile and probably tell yet another story, perhaps about a time when I embarrassed myself by talking too much.

Like the time my soft-spoken, very intelligent sister took me to hear one of her favorite authors speak. She is the quintessential big sister, one of the most organized and efficient people I have ever met. On that particular night, she took care of everything, from getting the tickets to arranging a babysitter to driving us to the theater. In return, she asked for only one thing from me.

“Please let me go ahead of you in the line to meet him,” she asked. “Let me talk to him first and get his autograph. Please?”

Of course I agreed. In spirit, anyway. But as my sister, she should have known she was asking the impossible.

Several moments later, we stood at the table, looking down at David Sedaris. And let me just say here that he was an amiable gentleman who seemed to go out of his way to greet his fans in a friendly, conversational manner. He was all about putting us at ease. Just a very normal, ordinary, approachable man.

And luck was on our side that night. Out of all the people in that line, he turned to my sister with a very simple question.

“Where’s a good place around here to go for breakfast?”

She knew the answer. She knew that town inside and out, was familiar with most of the businesses. It was her job to know the answers to questions like that as part of her daily 9-5. She was perhaps the single best person in that room that he could have chosen for that question.

And what did she do?

She went full goldfish on him.

She blinked. She opened her mouth and closed it. And again. She gaped at him and blinked some more.

“Maybe a Denny’s?” he ventured.

Now, I’m told that I behaved in a perfectly composed and normal manner after that, but that’s not how I remember it. I remember shoving my dog-eared copy of Me Talk Pretty One Day in front of him and babbling something about never looking at Great Danes the same way again.

My sister says he laughed. If there’s any truth to that, then I can die happily any time now, content in the knowledge that I once made David Sedaris laugh.

Have you ever shaken up a bottle of Diet Coke and then released the built-up pressure? That’s exactly what happens to my words when I try to hold them inside and behave myself. And it’s what happened that night, standing in front of David Sedaris.

The dam burst. I babbled. I giggled. I chattered like an idiot. Once I start, I don’t have an “off” switch.

Of course, Mr. Sedaris was very gracious about it. I can only assume someone got him some food at some point after we left. I’ll never know for sure, because my sister and I turned and fled, laughing like idiots.

That’s what My Mirror Lies to Me is all about: Finding the “funny” in an otherwise mortifying moment. Looking at myself and seeing only the best that I have to offer to the world. Instead of seeing a double chin or close-set eyes and a mouth that runs too much, I want to see a woman who is capable of always looking for the good where others see flaws.

If I’ve learned anything about life, it’s that it’s too short to waste time dwelling on the negative stuff. I always want to look past the lies my mirror tells me. I want to enjoy telling “Amy stories” that make people laugh. If I can make a few people pee or spray coffee out their noses, then I’ve done my job.

And David Sedaris, if you ever happen to read this book, the Kalamazoo Denny’s is on Cork Street, just off Sprinkle Road near I-94. Tell them A.J. and the Goldfish sent you.

 

 

 

IWSG: Working Without A Net

One of my friends from long-ago is the unrivaled King of Snark. He prefers to think of himself as the Crown Prince, but I think he’s being modest. And right now, even as I write this, I am working my way into a full-blown crisis of confidence because of him.

Okay, well it’s not really his fault. I was already in mid-crisis long before I contacted him.

I just asked him to read a chapter from my newest book and give me honest feedback, and now I’m freaking out while I wait for him to get back to me. Not because I’m afraid he’ll hate it and tear it to shreds, but because I’m afraid he’ll say he likes it and I won’t believe him.

You see, in Fat, Fifty, and Menopausal, I don’t have a lot of filters. One would think that should be fairly obvious from the title, but now I’m not so sure. It seemed funny when I thought of it; it seemed funny when I wrote the first draft. But now? Now I’m starting to have doubts. I’m scared I’ve gone too far. Even the title might be too much, I’m afraid.

 

I’m from a generation of women who don’t talk about personal things like Menopause. Women who lie about their age. Who refer to themselves as “curvy” or “voluptuous” but never ever come right out and say the “f” word. What the heck is wrong with me? Why in God’s name would I write a book about being fat, fifty and menopausal? I’m afraid this is all too personal, too much. That I’ve crossed the line into an uncomfortable level of self-disclosure.

What if no one finds it funny? What if the King of Snark comes back to me later tonight with nothing more than a patronizing comment like, “It’s cute. Thanks for sharing”?

Part of me hopes the book comes out and disappears without a trace like my other book in the “Humor” category. That no one ever reads it and we can all just politely agree to pretend that it never happened.

At the same time, I really do believe in this project. I wanted to write it because the last five years of my life have been sheer hell, and I feel as though the only thing that got me through it was my sense of humor. There were days when finding a reason to laugh became a survival technique, and that’s what I’m trying to convey with this book —  that it’s crucial to be able to laugh even when things are looking pretty dark.

My inner critic is telling me to cancel the pre-order on Amazon and stick to the relative safety of writing romance novels about people who don’t really exist outside of my  imagination. My inner critic is a bit of a jerk, to be totally honest. I’m not listening to her.

I want to be the kind of writer who takes risks. Who pushes the envelope. Who walks that really fine line between doing something brilliant or something really, incredibly stupid.

I don’t know about the other writers out there, but this — this feeling of terror mingled with anticipation, of pride mixed with panic, of hope muddled with doubt — this feeling that I have right now is why I wanted to be a writer when I was a little girl pounding out short stories on a toy typewriter.

Sometimes in life, you just have to take a risk and work without a net.

If it scares you, it might be a good thing to try.  — Seth Godin

This was written as part of the Insecure Writers Support Group. To find out more about this wonderfully supportive group and find out how to join the blog hop, click here.

 

Fat, Fifty, and Menopausal: A Look Inside

Time for another sneak peek!

I’m getting closer to publishing “Fat, Fifty, and Menopausal” and I wanted to share another look at the cover, as well as a sneak peek at one of the inside chapters.

Didn’t Martha do a fabulous job?

Just to get you up to speed on the new book, it’s a collection of thoughts and stories about hitting middle age and learning to be okay with the realization that life is never going to be perfect. It’s about commiserating with other women at this stage in life, finding humor in things like hot flashes and weight gain, and wondering if there is sex after the age of fifty. (Spoiler alert: there is!)

Fat, Fifty, and Menopausal is nothing at all like my romance novels. It’s a bit like Have a Goode One, but with a bit more focus. And while Have a Goode One was a collection of posts that had already appeared on my blog, the new book is all new material that I’ve never shared.

The chapter I’m sharing today is all about my issues with modern technology.  About feeling old because I struggle with something that seems so easy for everyone else. Specifically, I’m whining about some of my experiences with text messaging on my ancient, embarrassing flip phone.

Enjoy!

 

4-4-3-3-5-5-5-7-#-6-3-3-menu-symbols-4-send

The text messages started about a week ago, coming from a number I didn’t recognize. I need a plot for Phillip. How much do you charge for burial? the text message said.

I think you sent this to the wrong person, I replied.

I want to bury Phillip beside John.

I am sorry for your loss, I typed in. But I think you have the wrong number.

I have the measurements.

Wrong number, I repeated.

You don’t work for the cemetery?

No.

I assumed that was the end of that particular odd conversation. I hoped so, anyway, since I hate texting.

Okay, that’s not entirely true. I have no problem with text messaging under some circumstances, such as telling my kids to do their chores or getting school closing updates in bad weather. I am not completely incapable of working with modern technology.

Texting is not the problem.  My phone is the problem.

I hate texting on the phone I have now. I used to have a smartphone with a QWERTY keypad and all the bells and whistles. But when my income went down, so did my budget for that sort of thing. I now use a cheap, prepaid, bottom-of-the-barrel flip phone that is just that: a phone. I can’t use it to check my email or visit Facebook because it’s just a phone. What can I use it for? To call or text people because it’s just a phone.

My phone does slightly more than two Solo cups and a piece of string. The cups and string would probably have better sound quality; besides, I have so few minutes of talk-time that I can pretty much say “Hello, this is–” before I run out of minutes.  Texting is unlimited, though, and seems to work pretty well as long as I face true north on a windless day without a cloud in the sky.

But it’s a tiny flip phone. With itty-bitty keys that seem microscopic to my giant sausage-like fingers. And it’s got one of those old-fashioned numeric keypads, which means that even sending the simplest text message requires a level of fingertip gymnastics and concentration that I can’t always manage. For example, I have to type in *-4-6-6-6 wait-6-6-6-3-#-6 wait-6-6-6-7-7-7-6-6-4-4-4-6-6-4-4-4-6-6-4-menu-symbols-4-send  just to say Good morning!

My kids say it’s because I’m too old to learn how to text. I am here to tell you that it has nothing to do with my age. This is not operator error. It is equipment malfunction, and I don’t think I am out of line to expect people in my life to understand that my text messages are going to be wonky from time to time as long as I have this particular phone.

Case in point: Mother’s Day, 2014, when I tore my hand apart with the food processor. I knew immediately that I needed to get to the emergency room ASAP, and I also knew that I needed my daughter to drive me there. She was sunbathing in the back yard, so I tried to text her instead of frightening her brothers by shouting for help. I wrapped my bloody hand in a dishtowel, propped the phone against the cookie jar, and tried to text with my good hand.

hdlp

???? she responded.

I wrapped a second towel around my bleeding hand and tried again. gekp

Are you having a stroke, Mother? Lol

Ignoring the fact that my offspring seemed to find the possibility of my having a stroke to be somewhat lol-worthy, I went into my phone’s menu and programmed it to let me text numbers instead of letters.

9-1-2.

Mom, your texting isn’t making any sense at all. What are you trying to say?

“Get your ass in the kitchen!” I bellowed.

I headed for the car, grabbing my car keys in my teeth on the way out the door. The Princess met me on the way in. “Why didn’t you just text me that you were hurt?” she demanded.

“I couldn’t manage ‘help’ or ‘9-1-1’ and you think I could have managed ‘Please help me, I am hurt’?”

Now, nearly two years later, I still haven’t gotten much better at texting on my flip phone. So when I started getting even more text messages about burying poor Phillip, there was no reason to expect the conversation to go well.

Look this isn’t funny. Just do your job.

excuse me?

I am going to report you to the better business bureau. 

k

I am serious. I just want you to bury Phillip.

I really wanted to be sensitive to this poor person’s situation, but I just wasn’t up to trying to explain more via text. After all, my text a few days earlier saying I am sorry for your loss but I think you have the wrong number had required two pee breaks, an energy drink, and a short nap.

I tried calling so I could explain that he or she had the wrong number, but no one answered. I got a recorded voice telling me that the person had no voice mailbox set up, so I couldn’t leave a message. I had to text her again. So now I was invested in this conversation with a complete stranger about burying Phillip, and frankly,  I was starting to have some concerns over whether or not he’s actually dead yet.

What cemetery are you trying to reach?  I asked, thinking that perhaps I could find the correct number and pass it along.

You know damn well who you work for you asshole.

I’m going to take a wild guess here and assume that this person has a nicer phone than I have, although his or her grasp of proper comma usage is a bit weak.

i tryin to b nicd hete

Can’t you spell, you idiot?

Enough was enough. bite me, I typed in. Unfortunately, I sent the message to the wrong person.

Mom?!

Whoops. Apparently, that last one had gone out to my daughter. My bad, I told her, after taking a quick break for some water and a protein snack.

Mom, why don’t you just call people instead of texting? At your age, I’m sure people will understand.

you can bite me too

What did I do?

sorry boss

Mom, is supper almost ready? Now my oldest son was going to enter the conversation.

bruttle pouts an rroganofe

What are you trying to say? Mom, did you stick your hand in the food processor again?

jesus h christ i hate this phone

Are you going to answer me about burying Phillip or not? I am still waiting for an answer!

stop texting me you crazy person!!!!  I could feel a migraine starting after that exclamation-point sprint. I stopped for some ibuprofen and another energy drink, but my phone was alerting me again.

I find that a little offensive, Mother.

goddamn fucking phone

Amy, I really don’t think think that last message was meant for me.

i am so sorry reverend

Thankfully, the battery on my phone died at that point, and I have no intention of plugging it back in any time soon. If anyone wants to reach me, I’m rigging up two Solo cups and a piece of string.

****

 

Thanks for reading! “Fat, Fifty, and Menopausal” is now available for pre-order on Amazon for only .99 cents. It will be released on May 1, 2016, after which the price will go up to $2.99. To reserve your copy at the lower price now, click here. 

Flash

I’m getting old, guys.

I went to my son’s Halloween party at school, and one of the other second graders gave me a very sweet smile before asking me, “So, whose grandma are you?”

During my job as a high school lunchlady, I recently offended a teenager who proceeded to call me something in Spanish. I don’t speak Spanish, but my friend Rosa does, and I went to her for translation. When she finally stopped laughing, she told me that the girl was calling me a “mean little old lady.”

Well, at least she said “little.”

I recently ran into a friend from my days as a hairdresser, a friend I hadn’t seen since before my car accident. I have changed a lot since then, and I was expecting her to say something about my posture, my weight gain, or perhaps  the way my right foot drags a bit when I walk. I was ready for anything.  Anything, that is, but “why have you decided not to color your gray?”

The real kicker for me happened this weekend, when I was complaining about the ridiculous heat in my apartment, which I have begun referring to as “the bowels of hell.” I have  yet to turn the heat on in this place, but it’s November in Michigan, and I was sitting in front of a wide-open window, gasping for air as the sweat rolled down my back.

Finally, my seventeen year-old gave me a dirty look and an irritated sigh. “It’s not the apartment, Mom,” he told me. “It’s you.”

Oh . . . .so this is what they mean.

I understand.

Unfortunately.

If there are any men reading this, ya’ll might as well just go make yourself a sandwich or something. Otherwise, things are about to get uncomfortable around here.

Holy hell, when I heard people talk about hot flashes, I thought I knew what they were talking about. Turns out I had no idea. No idea whatsoever.

I’m suddenly remembering all those articles my seventh grade science teacher made us read about spontaneous human combustion.

How in the bloody hell did I get old enough for hot flashes? I’m still getting acne, for God’s sake. Acne. Zits, wrinkles, periods, and hot flashes, all in the same body.

I am so confused.

Can’t I outgrow one stage before I plunge headlong into the next? Hell, I’m still waiting for the last adolescent growth spurt. I’m hoping for 5’7″.

 

My body parts have conversations with each other. My knees creak at my ankles, my toes crackle, and my spine tells them all to shut up. I make these awful grunty noises when I bend over, and every so often my right hip snaps so loudly that people around me start looking for gunmen on grassy knolls.

I’ve reached the age at which naps are a lovely thing. Ten minutes here, twenty minutes there, basically any\where that I can sit down and close my eyes. Of course, thanks to my spinal fusion I can no longer lay my head back against the back of the couch, so my head tends to loll around and fall forward when I  doze off, which totally freaks my kids out.

Okay, that part of getting older is fun.

I think my next romance novel is going to be about a menopausal woman falling in love with an air-conditioner salesman. Instead of writing sex scenes where everything heats up, I’ll describe scenes in which he turns her on by cooling her off.

Why not? At this point, I’d marry any man who showed up with a fan and a large bag of ice.

 

 

Like a Fine Whine

I have come to an unfortunate conclusion recently:

I am getting old.

I’m not so happy about that.  Until recently, I always told the truth about my age because people seemed so stunned to hear it.  “No way!”  They’d say.  “I would have guessed you were only about thirty-five!”

Oh, Baby, I’d gloat.  Tell me more.

I think the downhill slide started when different parts of my body started talking without my permission.  My knees pop, my ankles creak, my hip makes a grinding noise.  My teeth chatter for no apparent reason, and my jaw clicks when I least expect it.  And I’ve started grunting when I bend over; what the hell is that?

Best of all is the snap!crackle!pop! taking place along my spine every time the weather changes.  Give me a good thunderstorm and all that metal in there sounds like an Orville Redenbacher orgasm.

Then, at my son’s pre-school Valentine’s Day party, it finally happened.

I’ve been expecting it since the day the Little Guy was born.  I know I’m older than most of the mommies in his class.  I knew this moment was coming.

But still.

I can still hear that voice, sweet and oh-so-nicely offering me a seat beside her at the party:  “After all, we Grandmas should stick together.”

There was chocolate nearby, so I let her live.

I can accept that. I can take it.  Some women actually are Grandmothers by my age.  When it comes to parenthood, I got started late and just couldn’t figure out when to stop, so I really shouldn’t be offended by being mistaken for the Little Guy’s grandmother.

I can deal with a noisy, achy body and gray hairs that grow in faster than I can color them away, and I can even tolerate the little lines that are starting to show up on my face.  I can smile politely at people who think I’m a grandmother.

But the worst was yet to come.

About a month ago, one of my dearest friends fell at work and shattered her ankle.  Yeah, that’s how she and I do things:  I break my neck, she breaks her leg; I get plates and screws, she gets plates and screws and pins.  We’ve been competing against each other since we were eight years old, and I don’t see either one of us letting up any time soon

Anyway, I contacted a mutual friend to let him know about her injury.   His first question?

“Is she post-menopausal?”

Now, I could have taken that several different ways.  He’s a pharmacist, so he was asking from a medical standpoint, concerned about how well she might heal.  He’s known her almost as long as I have, so he was trying to figure out just how badly her bones might have broken.  Basically, he’s a good guy who was just worried about a friend.

But I didn’t take it that way.

No, I am exactly two weeks older than she is, so I took his question as “are you post-menopausal?”

Like I said, competitive.

Our friend is not allowed to wonder if I am post-menopausal.  He is not allowed to even think that I might be.   He knows damn well exactly how old I am, and that I am definitely not old enough for menopause.

She is not post-menopausal because I am not post-menopausal, and we are both still young and vibrant NON- MENOPAUSAL women.

Who just happen to have lots of metal replacement parts that have nothing to do with age or hormone levels.

We are not old.

Now give me a moment to find my bifocals so I can proofread this.