I put it off as long as I could, but I’ve officially entered Geezerville. There were signs along the way, but lately the signs have been billboards and flashing neon signals “you’re old.”
Some are subtle. For example, I have completely lost control of my telephone. Last night, I set it down on the table and walked into the kitchen. Fortunately, my husband was still sitting at the table, as he heard a voice from the phone saying, “Sheriff’s Department, what is your emergency?” Apparently, in placing the phone on the table, I dialed 911. Now, how is that even possible? I would have chalked it up to a weird one-time thing, but a similar event occurred this morning.
I put my phone on the dresser and walked into the bathroom. Suddenly, I heard music. I exited the bathroom and looked to see if the alarm clock has somehow turned on, or if my husband was playing the radio. No, nothing so logical. My phone decided to play some jazzy music for my trip to the john.
Why? I have no idea. There must be buttons or apps or something that I inadvertently press in completing the action of putting the phone down. I want to believe the phone is possessed, but it’s far more likely that I am just getting old and have no clue what is happening.
Another example is my inability to get through to anyone (or any robot) on an important call, like for example, scheduling a routine doctor’s appointment. I patiently waited on the line, as they were experiencing “an unusually high call rate” to speak to a real person. This was after I’d pressed “1” because I’m a patient, pressed “1” again because I wanted to schedule a test, and pressed “1” a final time because I wanted to speak to a scheduler. I waited. And waited. After a number of minutes, and reminders that “we value your time” (all evidence to the contrary), I got a real voice on the phone. Unfortunately, she didn’t want to schedule my test, because she thought the order was incorrect. She assured me she would contact the doctor’s office to get the order corrected and call me back.
That didn’t happen that day. Or the next. At this point, I have no idea when she might call, but I’m absolutely sure it will be (a) when I’m driving and (b) when I don’t have my calendar available to schedule it. After all, it’s Geezerville.
Our physicians’ network uses a digital charting system. This system is routinely incorrect. This week, for example, I sent a message to my doctor saying that my chart says “the doctor contacted you to discuss blood work on Tuesday,” but that didn’t happen. The doctor didn’t call me and I haven’t had blood work done this year.
I got a message back that says “that just means he ordered your blood work.” Why doesn’t it say that, then? I only worry because in a true emergency, if the medical staff is depending on my digital chart for treatment planning, it’s got a lot of errors. I don’t have the family history it indicates, I don’t take the medicines it says I do, and I haven’t talked to my doctor on the phone this year. Despite my repeated efforts to correct these errors, there they are. I guess I should just not worry about it, but again, Geezerville.
The saddest sign has been our latest delivery to the house. I used to get excited for flowers, jewelry, or other trinkets of romance and love. Today, we got a new vacuum cleaner! We put it together, took it for a spin, and spent hours extolling the cleanliness of our carpets.
It’s inescapable. I live in Geezerville.

I have a long-time friend who volunteered several years ago to help me declutter my attic. We had generations of stuff up there – literally. My husband’s grandparents, his parents, and our own junk plus stuff we are “saving” for our adult son.
So, I was honored that she volunteered to help with this horrible and time-intensive task (three flights of stairs up, drag stuff down three flights of stairs, pile it up, make that trip about 25 more times, then start sorting the paraphernalia in the boxes….you get the idea). Honored, but not excited.
You see, my friend is a hoarder. Not only that, she is a messy hoarder. Things aren’t in neatly labeled boxes or tubs, stacked in her basement or garage. No, no, they are in bags of all material, in open stacks, piled on top of each other and all over the place. On countertops, on tables, jammed in closets and on bookshelves bowed in the middle from the weight. You can’t walk through her basement except in a tiny path from one end to the other. You can’t get a car in her garage. There’s just too much stuff. Too. Much. Stuff.
So I had this awful feeling that to accept her help would mean she would put my junk into her car and pile it all over the place at her house. Having her help is like sending a match to put out a fire.
I’ve observed similar contradictory behavior in my life. It’s usually amusing, and sometimes scary. A few years ago, we had a big snowfall. The person operating the snowplow that year opted to run the blade about two or three feet into our yard at the corner. We realize that snow plowing is a difficult job, but the intersection at our corner is the absolute widest in the county. You could have three or four cars turn around it a circle – side by side and simultaneously – and not touch any of the four corners. But the plow managed to carve up our corner and all the way up one side of our front yard. Gravel and dirt under the snow were piled up ten inches. We had to rake and reseed in the spring a fairly large portion.
So I took pictures and sent it to the county, merely asking for them to point out to their driver that it wasn’t necessary to go that deeply into a yard.
We heard nothing.
Well, until July. Then, I got an email stating that the supervisor had visited the “scene” and had found no damage to our yard.
Duh. After we raked and seeded and spring/summer had gone by, of course there was no “evidence of damage.” They sent someone to look at snow plow damage in July?
It reminded me of a great movie – Pillow Talk. In this movie Doris Day (an interior decorator) and Rock Hudson (a womanizing song-writer) share a party line. Let me digress to say if you know what a party line is, you’ve likely seen this movie and if you don’t know – you’ll have to google it.
At any rate, Doris can’t get a call in or out because Rock is always singing to some woman. So she complains to the phone company and they send an investigator out to see what Rock is doing. The phone company subsequently notifies Doris that her claim is unfounded. You know why?
Because they sent a woman investigator.
You don’t ask a hoarder to help you redd up. You don’t send a supervisor to observe snow plow damage in July. And you don’t send a woman to “investigate” a womanizer. At least not in the movies!

That old expression “strike three and you’re out” pertains to more than just baseball. My mom used it to cover a multitude of sins, or in my case, lapses in judgment, mistakes, and just plain foolishness. Recently, I’ve decided that this needs to apply to the health-care field as regards the universal, digital “chart” that everyone uses.
Maybe the chart system is just fine and dandy, and errors made are human. That’s totally possible. But in any event, errors can cause quite a lot of stress, and I, for one, do not need additional or unwarranted stress as regards my overall health.
It’s bad enough just getting old.
Strike one happened last year when I went for my annual physical. The perky nurse, many years my junior, administered the “Medicare wellness check-up.” This was a bit annoying only because I’d already filled out those questions on “my chart” (as instructed prior to coming to the actual appointment).
Then she said, “Well, I see by your blood work that your numbers look good.”
Hmm. I had not had any blood work prior to this visit, as they had not told me to do so. I informed her of this and she smiled, somewhat condescendingly, I thought, and “Said, yes, it’s right here. April 25th, you had blood work.”
I shook my head. “Nope, I didn’t,” I replied and then said, “is this another ‘Medicare’ check question?”
She looked at the computer again, and then realized that blood work had been the PREVIOUS year. So, who knows what my numbers were? (I mean, we found out – I went and had blood work taken the next day, but still).
Strike two occurred months later, and to my sister-in-law. She called the week after Christmas to find out some follow up that she had been assured would happen before the holidays.
A rather snippy worker in the doctor’s office (a different doctor than mine), said to her, “The doctor talked to you about this on December 22nd.”
My sister-in-law assured her that she had received no such call and was told, “It’s right here in the chart. I’m reading it right now.”
Sis found that note in “her chart,” but December 22nd was a Sunday. It’s possible she “forgot” that the doctor called her, but seriously, when has a doctor ever called a patient about a routine follow up on a SUNDAY?
This week, my husband received a voice message from Sabrina (not her real name) about his upcoming annual physical. Sabrina was clearly NOT hired for her phone voice. She had a high-pitched, breathy voice that alternated between uncertainty and incoherency. We had to play the tape three times to hear what time the appointment was supposed to occur. Finally, my husband called the office to confirm.
He was told to answer the Medicare wellness check questions in “his chart” online. So, he proceeded to do so, and in this chart he found a message that said “based on your recent blood work, you have high glucose.”
He has not had recent blood work. Unless eleven months ago is considered “recent,” and those results were normal, according to the chart. He attempted to contact the office again, but it was 5:05 p.m. and the office was closed.
Someone, somewhere, has high glucose, but it isn’t being addressed. Strike 3.
I’m scheduled for my annual in three weeks. I’m looking forward to seeing how it all works out.

Last week, I watched a video of George Carlin talking about redundant comments made on a recent airplane flight. He started with the safety talk: “in the event of an emergency situation…” His thinking was an emergency was already a situation, so you didn’t need to be told so. It was pretty funny and reminded me of an old boss I had once, who used to frequently use the expression “component part pieces.”
Aren’t components already parts of something? And aren’t the both pieces? It always made me roll my eyes. He would say things like, “Let’s be sure we include all the component part pieces.” My smart-aleck mind would think, “Why don’t we include the component pieces, but leave the parts out?” but I wisely didn’t say that out loud.
So I went down this rabbit hole in my head and started looking at the many ways we Americans use redundant speech. I didn’t have to look far, in fact, just going to my recipe book gave me quite a few unnecessary words. It started with a pie crust recipe – “combine these together.” “Combine” literally means “mix together.” Do we have to say them both? The next recipe was for cherry compote and told me to “reduce down” a mixture. “Reduce” literally means to make less, or “down.” Totally unneeded words there.
Isn’t a “result” always the “end” of something? So why do folks use the phrase “end result”? Is there a partial result of something? Or a beginning result? This is similar to “sum total.” The “sum” is a “total.” We’re using both for no reason (note that I did NOT say “both together” because again…redundant).
I enjoyed reading an article about taking vacations, and couldn’t help noticing that the author used the phrase “first started.” Can you have a second start? Or a “last start” to a trip? The same writer penned “final destination.” Well, I guess you can have a stop along the way, but a “destination” is typically where you want to end up, therefore it’s “final.” The poor writer gave the advice to “plan ahead.” Again, I don’t typically plan “behind” or “after.” The only way to “plan” is ahead, isn’t it?
Then I read a different article about going to a local amusement park. They used the phrase “added bonus.” Now, a bonus is something inherently added, so again, an uncalled-for adjective in that expression. The author of this piece said that the lines would call for waiting a “period of time.” As opposed to a “period of what,” I thought. This poor guy also said “increasingly more” which only marginally bothered me, because I actually think there can be increasingly less of something. Overall, however, it’s more word surplus to get the point across.
The amusement park article made me think of the ride operators who almost every time, say “Stay seated until the ride comes to a complete stop.” Is there any other kind of “stop?” Are there “partial” stops? “Incomplete” stops? “Half” stops?
I think we need to rise up and stop these superfluous words in our speech and writing. Did any of you catch the redundancy I used in this post? Kudos if you did, but if not, it’s not an emergency situation!