Age

I’m sitting at the kitchen table typing this. I have no alcohol on a Friday night. They’re practising bell-ringing at the church and still haven’t progressed beyond a Figaro/Three Blind Mice mash-up.

What is it that makes me angry tonight though?

It’s the fact that I’m happy to be sitting here, sans booze, rambling on about this and that.

That’s right, I’m getting old.

The thing is, it was no better when I was younger.

I hated pubs where you had to shout over the noise of Dutch techno to make yourself heard. I hated pubs that were incredibly busy and had only bothered to put half a dozen seats in the place. In fact I found a reason to hate pretty much all pubs and pretty much every person in them.

I used to go out on a Friday because it’s just what you do, but now I’ve had enough.

As a man who is now officially old, I feel that I should visit a local menswear shop and buy lots of clothes in brown. Then I can go into the woods with all my non-brown clothes and burn them in a ritual ceremony.

I can also now legitimately complain about modern music. “Pah! It hasn’t even got a tune you can whistle along to,” I will yell as some young upstart blasts a song by a trendy chart-topper from his passing car. Pointing out that “you couldn’t sing along to that around the piano,” is mandatory too. Although unless you’re one of Chas ‘n’ Dave, I don’t imagine you’ve ever considered seeing if you can segue into an Ed Sheeran song from Down at the Old Bull and Bush.

Mild xenophobia is another thing that comes with being old. “Bloody [insert nationality here],” I can say about almost anything, without any reason. In fact the less reason the better. Car won’t start? Blame the Americans. No beans left in the supermarket? That’ll be the fault of the French. Yes, it makes no sense, but it’s a perk of being old.

Once I’ve got the hang of that I’ll presumably be given a badge and be allowed to advance to the “I’m not racist, but…” stage, even though that’s purely for experts.

Of course, it’s still another twenty some years before I can claim my winter fuel allowance, free prescriptions and pension. I imagine by then they’ll all have been done away with and we’ll have to work until we’re 120. We won’t be allowed to die before then and if we do we’ll be fined.

There’s never been a better time to get old.