Truths, Half-truths, and Sea Stories

Everyone recognizes the signs of an “older adult”. On the first official weekend of the Christmas season, while youth goes to the movies, buys an Ipod, or imagines what new 20-inch rims and tires look like on their Nissan, an unshaved old chief and his wife are looking at a dryer at the Navy Exchange. OK, so I wasn’t the one imagining the steam cycle setting of the fancy thousand-dollar dryer, but I did imagine what an LCD TV / Blueray / wall cabinet might look like in my office.
At the same time that grizzled veterans are shopping for dryers, young sports-fan families are dreaming of the complete Chargers outfit for Junior -size 2 Nikes, team -logo hoodies, looking at the bigger-than-last-year’s LCD TVs. But young and old alike have something in common this year. There’s darn little confidence that anyone will have any money to live on over the next several years – so anyone buying anything at the stores this season is as much a gambler as the Casino patrons on the various indian resorts around the county.