Let's get one thing straight, once and for all: age is RELATIVE. I recently tried telling that to some 40-somethings and they started falling back on the same old BULLSHIT that subconciously tries to imply that I'm somehow inferior to them for being 10-15 years younger, but that their "old" age makes me obligated to give these whiners some mercy. Sorry, but I give no sympathy to whiners.

Anyway, age IS relative. When you get right down to it, there is no "old" age line or "young" age line. IT'S ALL ABOUT WHO'S IN THE ROOM WITH YOU. (Yes, that sentence deserves to be in all-caps, because I'm screaming it.) How do I know this? Because I've experienced it all my life. I go visit my fraternity house, and I'm considered "an old guy". Hell, even when I was there on campus and in grad school at age 23, I was considered "old". I talk to the baby boomer assholes at work, and they say "Oh, but you're still really young." Some people think I'm older than I really am, after taking a look at some of my close friends and what's in my music collection. In fact, some time last year, a friend's friend at a small party was going into his tragic tale how "old" he was now. Then I told him that I was the same age. He didn't have much to say after that.

I got together for a family brunch last Sunday, in joint honor of mothers' day and my great-aunt's birthday. My great aunt is now 85. Definitely old, right? Well she told me about somebody in her convent (yes, she's a nun) who just turned 95. And this lady asked her "How old are you? 85? Bah -- I'd like to be 10 years younger." So is there a chance that this 95 year-old nun will meet somebody who's 105? Probably not, but that still doesn't exactly give everybody else the right to bitch to me about their age. It's fucking relative. Period. Get over it.

And don't give me any of that shit about "Well I need to get married and have kids before I turn [whatever]." First of all, if you insist you "need" these things, you're obviously somebody who doesn't have any other purpose in life, so I probably wouldn't be associating with you in the first place. Second of all, there are plenty of people who get married over the age of [whatever] and even adopt kids.

Was this rant of mine driven by the fact that my age now ends in a "9"? No, but it does amuse me how people place such an importance on multiples of 10. But I digress.