How to tell the phonies from your real friends.

Not that I’m an expert, or anything, but I’ve had a lot of experience with this topic. 

Recently, a friend of mine was in the hospital for a week in Boston with meningitis. Her mom lovingly called the names in her cell phone, telling them that A. was in the hospital and could we call her to calm her down. Not only did I call right away and leave a message, I kept calling until I got her on the phone.

She seemed surprised that not everyone listed in her cell phone called her back. Not even close. It seemed that a lot of people simply avoided the situation entirely, or called to see if A’s absence would ruin her friend’s upcoming wedding (in which A was a bridesmaid). Um. Maybe not an appropriate way to look at someone getting a rare disease, but at least the woman called back, right?

When my mom died over twenty years ago, I was only 14. I expected that my friends would show up with chocolate or pizza and we would hang out. In short, I needed some things to seem normal in order to go about grieving my mother without losing my mind. My best friend, C, was at summer camp. She begged her mom to let her come back, but her mom refused. Everyone else – all of my so-called best friends – disappeared. 

I think I got one condolence card from one of my friend’s moms. That was it. No phone calls, no drop-bys to see how I was, no attendence at the funeral. It sucked. I realized that I was utterly alone and that no one apart from me really gave a damn about my mother’s death.

The truth is – they were all scared stupid of touching death by seeing me. They didn’t know what to say or do, so they just left me alone.

I never forgave them, and the majority of them have scattered out of my life like windblown leaves. 

Almost the same thing happened when my father died 10 years later.

When bad shit happens, you find out what your ‘friends’ are made of. Even something as little as a new job that takes you away from daily interaction with your ‘friend/coworkers’ can be an eye-opening experience if you don’t see it coming. The majority of people in our lives are acquaintences or people we know – not our friends. Friends are there through the years, through the laughter and tears, through the moves half-way around the world, through the death of a spouse, friend, lover, or dog. No matter how busy they are, they make time to call, email, send a note or an unexpected present. They do not forget that you exist because it is inconvienant. Nor do they fail to return your mother’s call when you are in the hospital with a raging headache and a fear that something worse is going to happen to you.

How did we get here? As a society?

Are we so market driven that friendship has become all about quantity instead of quality? 

Sometimes I’m amazed at how many ‘friends’ I have on Facebook. And how many ‘friends’ other people have. Really? Or is this like climbing the Mt. Everest of friendship and planting your flag, shouting, “I have more friends than you, which means I’m the better person.”

Sometimes I worry that I don’t have enough ‘friends’. Or that people don’t really like me, they are just nice to me.

Nevermind that half the people I think ‘hate’ me or don’t like me are people that I wouldn’t actually want to be friends with – it’s just that I want to make the decision not to be their friends. Not vice versa.

This is, of course, a lot like grade school. 

An acquaintence of mine recently put up a post about how the Obama/McCain showdown is really about promising people the most goodies. Exactly like running for president in high school when the kid who handed out the full-size Snickers bars won the election. It wasn’t about substance, it was about show. We have a tendency to like people who give us candy bars. And we dislike people who don’t.

Then again, no one who likes me for a grown-up version of a candy bar will come to the hospital when I am sick or call me after I have moved away. Those are my temporary acquaintences in life, and I won’t mourn them when they go away either.

Remembrance of Things Past – for Memorial Day

Proust, as a writer, rambled. In his six-volume opus, he took pages and pages to describe a room or an outdoor scene. He got his timelines mixed up, and often had someone talking to his main character in book four that had died in book two. He was clearly an insufferable snob. But, he is probably my favorite author of all time. Simply because if you stick with him to the end, you feel a sense of comfort about love and loss and the troubled majesty of humanity.

One of the reasons that I love In Search of Lost Time is Proust’s attempt to recover sensations, memories, himself in an earlier time. Reading the novel, one gets the sense that the young Marcel is not the same as the old Marcel – something has been lost. Time ravages not only the outward form of the body, but the inward solidity of the mind. By the end of our lives, we are scattered personalities, having left pieces of ourselves in the past.

For Proust, it is the tiniest thing that sparks a memory: the taste of a favorite food, the sound of a bell, the smell of a perfume, the light falling across a room in a particular way. However, when he wants to conjure up a feeling from the past, he fails – it falls flat. Desiring a return to the past can do nothing; the mind will go where it wants.

It is as though he fears that all the intense emotions that he has felt throughout his life – especially for those who have died – were never really real at all. All the moments of intense joy and pain are chimerical, he cannot recall them in enough detail. That is why, I think, that Proust spends so much of his time in description. It’s as though he is trying to submerse himself in the past in order to recover his loves.

Even his grandmother’s memory has faded. He mourns the fact that he no longer feels the pain of her loss so intensely, that he is able to go on without her. As well as without his great love, Albertine. He questions if his love for these women – his mother, too – was authentic. If it was, then why doesn’t it remain with him? He rebukes himself for living long after they have gone.

On Memorial Day, I think that this sentiment is apropos.

My mother died on Memorial Day a very long 22 years ago. Today, when reading a story about the absence of red, plastic poppy flowers, the traditional button-hole flower of remembrance, I wept. In Peet’s coffee, of all places. I had a Proustian moment of memory – unbidden, unsought, vividly and instantly recalled. I thought of a Memorial Day in the distant past, long before my mother’s untimely death, when she had purchased us both a poppy from a Veteran selling them in front of a store. As I read, I suddenly remembered the old man’s grizzled hands, the white box that held all the artificial poppies, the collection jar. I remembered the thin, green-paper wrapped wire stem that I bent around my finger like a ring. I remembered the black, round center of the flower, and strange feel of the fake petals. I remembered the old man’s cap, and the rows of pins on his uniform.

In essence, I remembered what it used to feel like to be a young child with her mother on an early summer afternoon.

Often, I worry that I have forgotten her completely. Over time, I lost her slowly: first, the tenor of her voice; then, the contours of her face and the color of her hair; finally, what she liked or how she moved. Everything faded into the memory files of my mind, in places that I can no longer access easily – if at all. It sometimes feels as if I birthed myself, as though I never had a mother or a life before the accident. As though everything that happens to me is always in a post-loss framework.

Those moments when I do suddenly remember the past – like today in Peet’s – are extremely painful, but necessary.

The truth is, we never stop missing those we have lost. But we do forget, if not completely. As I age, I realize that nostalgia is a powerful force. The past beckons to all of us, good or bad, and we all – at some point – go in search of lost time or things past.

Read Proust this summer if you haven’t already. There are bits of comfort and wisdom in there, if you are patient enough to discover them. And while you are frolicking on your day off, remember for just a moment those that you have loved, as well as those brave soldiers and civilians that others have loved and lost.

Does Spoiling Your Kids Heal Your Own Childhood Scars?

Now that I’m in my 30s, most of my friends have at least one child. Most have more than one. I, however, remain on the fence with my biological clock ready to push me firmly into either camp. I remain decidedly undecided about the prospect of having my own, for several reasons.

When I was younger, I never fantasized about having a baby or getting married. I was more into playing with Barbie than with dolls. Barbie was something I thought I could become (which is another problem altogether), and I seemed to skip that age-old process of fetishizing motherhood that goes along with being a girl. Heck, even my Barbies remained committedly single, and played the Ken field.

Also, American mothers don’t exactly make it look good these days. Is it me, or are people collectively more into their children in the 00s than parents were in the 70s? I just watched a documentary on Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt, and one of their sons remarked that he recalled fondly every single day he spent with his parents, since it was so rare. That kind of parenting would be akin to child abuse today. I see some of my friends carting their children to and from music lessons and soccer practice, play dates and birthday parties, and I wonder how much energy – if any – they have left for themselves. They tell me, quite adamantly, that it’s worth it. But I remain skeptical.

I also remember all the things my friends wanted to do before they had children, and I don’t see many of them doing any of them. No novels, no paintings, no political careers. Now, I realize that some people manage to carry on with their lives and raise happy children. I just don’t see many people actually DOING that. Mostly, I see people either using their children as a quite valid excuse for not dreaming big for themselves anymore, or people who have simply moved on from and/or have forgotten their own dreams. Sometimes I think that if I don’t have a child by choice, that my substitute will be a dedication to producing something else – like a body of work that’s worth a damn. It seems to be a “production choice” one has to make these days – a baby or a book. Because let’s face it, you can’t really do it all. At least not well.

But perhaps the most striking thing that makes me hesitate about joining the parental ranks is that kids just seem plain spoiled these days. I worry that my own brand of mothering might be considered, well, lacking. I know myself, and I wouldn’t bake a 2-year-old a fantastically designed cake (that she won’t remember) or commit myself to being a perpetual kid chauffeur (for which she wouldn’t really be grateful). I know that, for the most part, I would still put myself and my husband-to-be first. Oh, we’d love our child, but not in the “weekly trips to Chuck-E-Cheese” way. In the old-fashioned way, where the kid was expected to leave mommy alone when she was working on her book. Like Eleanor Roosevelt, I would hope to remain myself first, mommy second.

Sometimes I wonder if my friends are trying to heal old wounds. Not many of us had perfect childhoods. And with all the gifts, activities, trips, clothes, toys that they give to their own children, I wonder if it is comforting to them, if it eases their inner 10-year-old. Because I don’t think that their kids particularly care if they have seen France by age 8, or have a baseball diamond constructed in the backyard.

Back in Indiana, I had more fun with sticks and leaves than any kid today would think was humanly possible. Maybe that is where I got my imagination. I didn’t have 9000 toys, and I was allowed to get bored. And to de-bore myself. I remember being told to entertain myself, and I did. Oh, sure, I resented it at times, but I learned the lesson that I was responsible for myself. Thank god, since my own mother died so early that if I had been overly attached, it might have literally killed me. (I’d be smoking meth right now, I’m almost certain.)

My own childhood sucked in many ways. It did – I won’t lie. But would I feel better trying to concoct the ‘perfect’ family now? Would I? Again, I remain dubious.

Maybe by trying to give our children everything, we err on the side of excess. Maybe they will be lacking coping skills as adults. Maybe they will feel entitled to accolades and praise all their lives – by doing nothing more than what they should be doing. Maybe, ironically, they will be less happy later in their lives because of all we seem hell-bent on doing to make them happy now.

Maybe there is no winning. Maybe kids are going to get scars no matter what we do. But it seems to me that there should be some middle ground. A space where we can be good parents without sacrificing ourselves. A space where we don’t end up living vicariously through our children.

We are their role models; do we really want them to grow up – especially the girls – thinking that their lives are just about growing up, getting a job, getting married, and then being parents? Isn’t there something else? Or, in a German accent, “Is zat all der ist?”

I do have one friend – one of my best friends – that has managed to open her own successful business with 2 small children in tow. I don’t know how, but she makes it work. Oh, sure, her marriage stinks, but I think it always did. Her kids aren’t spoiled. They don’t take a lot of vacations. They don’t go on play dates every ten minutes. They don’t have elaborate birthday parties. Often, they are asked to play by themselves in a supervised setting, entertaining themselves. They don’t have a ton of money, but they are making it work. She is finding herself again, and it’s wonderful to see. She stopped worrying about whether she was a good-enough mother, a good-enough wife, and a good-enough artist and just built her own world with her own rules. And, in the end, her kids seem perfectly well-adjusted. They are great kids – the best I know. (Although maybe it’s genetics, since she was a great kid, too. She was the “good kid” my mom used as a comparison for me when she was exasperated with my behavior.)

My only worry is that I wouldn’t be like her. And that my own children would need therapy. And continue the cycle.

If I don’t have a kid, if that’s the choice I’m making, then at least I’ll have a life of my own. That’s the compromise I’m making with myself. But, as that amazing friend above also pointed out to me:

“Extraordinary lives have exorbitant prices.”

I just need to work out if I’m willing and able to pay for one.

10 Ways to Raise a Spoiled Child

Plus tips to reverse the damage by fine-tuning your approach to child discipline

By Sherry Rauh
WebMD Feature

Reviewed by Charlotte E. Grayson Mathis, MD

When you picture a spoiled child, you may think of a kid with a house full of extravagant toys. But child discipline experts say its behaviors — not possessions — that define the spoiled child.

“A spoiled child is one who’s demanding, self-centered, and unreasonable,” says Harvey Karp, MD, creator of The Happiest Toddler on the Block DVD and book. He tells WebMD spoiled children may be easier to get along with when they get their way, but giving in to their demands ultimately makes them feel isolated and confused. “There is a seed of discontent that you sow when you allow a child to be spoiled,” he says. “They’ve used so much manipulation to get what they want, they don’t know when someone is genuinely giving to them.”

Psychologist Ruth A. Peters, PhD, author of the child discipline manual Laying Down the Law, agrees. “Spoiling doesn’t prepare them for anything but heartache later in life,” she says, adding that a spoiled child typically grows into a spoiled adult, and spoiled adults have trouble maintaining a job, a spouse, and friendships.

So how can you tell if you’re spoiling? Read on to learn 10 common mistakes parents make that can allow a child to become spoiled. If some of these sound familiar, don’t worry — it’s never too late to change course.

1. Making Your Child the Center of the World

Making your child’s wishes the top priority in every circumstance teaches her that the world revolves around her. This could prevent her from learning to consider other people’s needs and desires, says Susan Buttross, MD, chief of the Division of Child Development and Behavioral Pediatrics at the University of Mississippi Medical Center. “Children need to understand give and take,” she tells WebMD. “When take is the only function they know, they tend to be frustrated.”

2. Ignoring Positive Behavior

Today’s busy parents may not notice when children play quietly or stay out of trouble. If you never let them know when you are pleased, Karp says, you miss the opportunity to reinforce positive behavior.

3. Accidently Rewarding Negative Behavior

Karp tells WebMD many parents make the mistake of simultaneously ignoring the positive and rewarding the negative. If you only notice your kids when they whine and cry, you send the message that tantrums and tears are the best way to get your attention.

4. Failing to put Clear Limits on Your Child’s Behavior

If you don’t set and enforce guidelines for good behavior, Buttross says, you’re likely to raise a child who is rude, uncooperative, and disrespectful. Karp adds that young kids are uncivilized by nature — part of your job as a parent is to teach social virtues, such as patience and respect.

continued…

5. Not Enforcing Rules Consistently

While some parents fail to set limits, others set “mushy or inconsistent” ones, Karp says. This occurs when you tell your kids, “Don’t do that,” but allow them to do it anyway. Examples of inconsistent limits are allowing your toddler to play with his food on some days but not on others or allowing an older child to violate her curfew when you just can’t muster the energy to fight about it. If you don’t enforce rules consistently, you give your child the message that they’re really not that important. And of course what you really want to teach your child is the opposite.

6. Picking Fights You Can’t Win

“You can win the battle of not giving your child candy,” Karp says, so no-candy rules are worth upholding. But there are many other standards that are much harder to enforce — such as making your child eat broccoli. “They can close their mouths or spit it out,” Karp points out. In cases like this, you are destined to lose the battle before it begins. And unfortunately, the consequences of this loss go far beyond wasted broccoli — picking fights you can’t win proves to your kids that they can defy you and get away with it.

7. Not Holding Your Child Accountable

Refusing to hold your child accountable when he does something wrong sends the message that he never makes a mistake, Buttross says. This teaches your child to blame others whenever problems arise. Instead, teach your child the importance of taking responsibility for his own actions and then user firm boundaries to make sure he does so.

8. Giving Your Child Gifts for the Wrong Reasons

What you buy your children is not as important as why, Peters tells WebMD. She cautions against making “unreasonable” purchases, such as buying your child a new bike because she is bored with the one you bought her a few months ago.

Another common mistake is buying out of guilt, Karp says. When a child makes a pitiful face or says, “You’re the worst mother in the world,” this is not the time to buy a gift. Allowing yourself to be manipulated won’t do your kid any favors. She may get what she wants, but her joy will be diminished in knowing that you bought the gift because she goaded you into it.

9. Giving in to Temper Tantrums

Relenting when your child throws a temper tantrum is an extreme form of rewarding negative behavior. It proves to kids that they can get whatever they want by throwing a fit — which is not how things work in the real world. “If you throw a temper tantrum as an adult, bad things happen,” Peters points out.

10. Acting Like a Spoiled Child Yourself

How you interact with your family serves as a model for how your children will behave with others, Karp says. “If you whine and complain in front of [your kids], they will emulate that.” He says the proverb has it right — “They do what you do, not what you say.”

Spoiled for Life

Spoiling has consequences that go beyond the immediate trouble of managing an unruly, spoiled child. It sets up patterns that can last a lifetime.

“Probably one of the greatest disadvantages that spoiled children face is the fact that they have not learned to work for something that they really want,” Buttross tells WebMD. “There is no work ethic, no lesson to really strive for something.”

Since spoiled people get what they want through manipulation, they develop “a dysfunctional way of relating to people,” Karp says. “Those habits can take 10 years of therapy to break.”

Reforming a Spoiled Child

Don’t panic if you’re just realized your child may be on the path to becoming spoiled. Child discipline experts say you can repair the damage.

“Tell your child the truth,” Peters advises. “Say, ‘I’ve blown it’ and explain why there are going to be some changes.” When setting new rules, be clear about the consequences. “The less nagging, the more action, the better.”

The experts we consulted suggest the following strategies to get a spoiled child back on track:

• Set consistent limits — Give your child clear rules and boundaries. If you decide to bend a rule every now and then, explain that it is a special exception.
• Establish consequences for breaking the rules – Consequences can range from revoking privileges to confiscating a favorite possession.
• Create incentives for good behavior – Depending on your child’s age, you may want to try a “star chart.” The child gets stars for good behavior, with 10 stars earning a coveted prize.
• Teach that giving is as important as receiving – Encourage your children to participate in activities that help others. Take them shopping to choose gifts for friends and family members.
• Help your child learn to take “no” for an answer — If you have decided to decline your child’s request, don’t let temper tantrums or any other form of manipulative behavior change your mind.
• Be a positive role model — Show respect and consideration toward others and your child will follow your lead.

Toddler Tips

If your chld is in the under-three age bracket, it may not be time to worry yet. “It’s common in the beginning of the toddler period for kids to have some of the characteristics of being spoiled,” Karp says, “but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are.” In The Happiest Toddler on the Block, he explains that toddlers are primitive and uncivilized, like little “cavemen.”

In addition to clear limits and positive role models, toddlers need a crash course in civilized behavior. “Think of yourself as an ambassador from the 21^st century to the Neanderthal people,” Karp suggests. This means you must learn to speak your child’s language and respectfully show him your ways. A couple of Karp’s tips for taming toddlers:

• The fast food rule – When you order food at the drive through, the cashier always repeats your order to let you know she got it right. Karp recommends doing this with frustrated toddlers. Before reprimanding them, “first repeat back what they want. Say, ‘You really want that ball? You’re mad that Billy took it away? OK, but that voice hurts my ears.’” This lets them know you empathize with them, while conveying that whining is unacceptable.
• Catch them being good – Acknowledge your toddler’s accomplishments throughout the day, whether it’s stacking blocks or sharing a toy with a sibling. This will help identify positive behaviors, rather than just singling out negative ones.

Lifelong Benefits

Maintaining a consistent and effective approach to child discipline isn’t easy, but it bestows lifelong benefits. “You raise a child who is loving and self-loving, who empathizes with others, who is honest and not manipulative,” Karp says. “You teach them how to pick their friends and their spouses, because if they learn how respectful people communicate, they’ll look for that in their own relationships.”

The next time your child throws a tantrum at the supermarket or tries to guilt you into bending the rules, think about the long-term consequences of giving in. But don’t worry about being perfect all the time. Karp says the overall pattern is more important than any given moment. “Do it right 80% of the time and you’ll end up with a really good kid.”

Hooray! Someone else hates the so-called “Millennial” Generation, too!

OK, Radar magazine. You had me at one glance. I, most definitely, am not a Millennial. Thank GOD, or else everything in this blog would either be misspelled, ungrammatical, or punctuated with ‘like’.

Sign me up for the X revolution!

This is important enough to post in full:

Generation Slap

They’re naive, self-important, and perpetually plugged in. This is a call to arms against Millennials

By Robert Lanham
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AND HE SHALL LEAD THEM ALL Generation Yer Kevin Colvin, caught on Facebook after telling his boss that he had to miss work for a “family emergency”

You Can Do Magic
Like many illustrious individuals before him who inadvertently stumbled into Internet stardom, Kevin Colvin became an overnight Internet celebrity by doing something stupid. In case you missed his five minutes of “fame,” here’s the story in a nutshell. A twentysomething intern, Kevin secured a job at Boston’s Anglo Irish Bank. Using the guise of a family emergency, Kevin decided to take a day off and thus sent the following e-mail to his bosses, Paul and Jill:Paul/Jill,

I just wanted to let you know that I will not be able to come into work tomorrow. Something came up at home and I had to go to New York this morning for the next couple of days. I apologize for the delayed notice.

Kind regards,
Kevin

Millennials are younger. Healthier. They got to do anal in high school. They think updating a spreadsheet while posting to a Twitter account about gossip on perezhilton.com is an essential corporate skillKevin’s boss, Paul Davis, apparently decided to do a little a bit of detective work and found an incriminating photo of Kevin on Facebook. He discovered that Kevin wasn’t in New York attending to an unexpected family crisis, but at a Halloween party in Worcester, Massachusetts.

And this is the clincher: In the picture, Kevin is dressed as Tinker Bell, decked out in a green ballet dress that looks like it was stolen from the wardrobe closet of an elementary school performance of Swan Lake. There’s glitter and blue makeup enveloping his eyes. He’s holding a gold, star-tipped wand in one hand and a can of Busch Light in the other. There are wings. In short, Kevin looks so high I wouldn’t be surprised if he actually used those glittery, Day-Glo wings to fly away like a hummingbird after the picture was snapped.

Mr. Davis’ response was swift and, well, perfect. Attaching Kevin’s incriminating photo to an e-mail and BCCing the entire company, he responded:

Kevin,

Thanks for letting us know—hope everything is ok in New York. (cool wand)

Cheers,
PCD

When the technology blog valleywag.com posted the entire hilarious exchange, the story spread like a San Fernando Valley wildfire. It was everywhere.

STRENGTH IN NUMBERS There are an estimated 80 million bloggers out there. And they are blogging

In Kevin’s defense, most of us have lied to our bosses and played hooky. Still, I found myself hoping that his boss, Mr. Davis, fired him with a pointed “and don’t let the door hit your wand on the way out!” for good measure. But before you dismiss me as cruel, let me explain my reasons.My lack of empathy for Kevin comes from my sense of loyalty to the generation born between the years of 1961 and 1981. Generation X. Kevin is part of the generation born between 1982 and 2002—a Millennial, formerly known as Generation Y. (They got renamed after whining too much.) They’re younger. They’re healthier. They got to do anal in high school. They think updating a spreadsheet while simultaneously posting to a Twitter account about the latest gossip on perezhilton.com is an essential corporate skill. And, like Kevin, they’re always doing stupid shit, but rarely getting called on it.

What’s more, Millennials pose a vital threat to my generation’s cultural legitimacy, not to mention our position in the workplace. A recent article in Time warns: “Older workers—that is, anyone over 30—need to know how to adapt to the values and demands of their newest colleagues. Before too long, they’ll be the bosses.”

You see? They’re out to get us.

If you look at the sheer number of Millennials, the outlook is grim. While Gen X boasts only around 30 million members, there are an estimated 80 million Millennials out there. They’re like pod people with Facebook accounts. We’re outnumbered.

MECCA The Apple Store, where Gen Yers congregate to kneel at the foot of Steve Jobs

That’s why the time has come for Generation X to unite. We need to call bullshit on these naive, self-important crybabies trying to rob us of what is rightly our own. Remember how the Baby Boomers all turned into self-serving, narcissistic assholes who deified Michael Douglas in the ’80s? The time has come for us to turn into assholes, too, minus the Michael Douglas part.My generation must follow the lead of heroes like Anglo Irish Bank’s Paul Davis and clear the air of the Millennial’s generational fairy dust. Sure, the Millennials think they’re magic, but the time has come for Generation X to band together proudly and proclaim on high: “COOL WAND!”

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POSITIVE REINFORCEMENT Do today’s Gen Yers believe in themselves a little too much?

A Conspiracy of Doting
It’s not really the Millennials who are to blame; it’s their parents. We’re talking about a generation of boomers who posted “My Child Is an Honor Roll Student” bumper stickers on their minivans and wanted to designate playing volleyball as being a cruel and unusual punishment. Of course the Millennials think they’re magic. They were spoiled.Generation X survived AIDS, Reagan, the Cold War. But consider the stress Millennials face today: simultaneously maintaining Facebook, MySpace, and Flickr accountsNow the boomers are teaming up with the younger generation in a new campaign to further render us obsolete. Where a Gen Xer was likely to get a tongue-lashing for borrowing a stapler from his/her boomer boss, the Millennials are finding boomers to be loving mentors, eager to show them the ropes. After all, the kids who are now coming of age and entering the workplace are, well, their babies. Boomers were doting parents from the get-go, and now, as they’re beginning to retire, they want to ensure that their children hold the keys to the throne. Even younger Gen Xers, who were in many cases also raised by boomers, are getting screwed. They have to sit back and watch their younger, Millennial siblings bask in a generational conspiracy of doting.

Let’s face facts: The boomers always detested Generation X. They felt threatened by our youth, confused by our lack of earnestness, and deeply troubled by our lack of appreciation for James Taylor. The boomers’ entire identity was wrapped around being young and progressive. Gen X was an affront to their place in the world. What’s more, they never understood us, instead insisting that our archetypal achievement—the blueprint for what made us tick—was a tawdry Ben Stiller film that featured Ethan Hawke as a pouty, manically depressed James Dean.

Since the ’90s, boomers have plotted to turn us into the redheaded stepchild of generations. We were slackers. Cynical. We loved Pauly Shore. (Okay, their animosity is legitimate here.) Even our name, Generation X, was a slur, indicating namelessness and the feeling of being overshadowed by the boom. As defined in Wikipedia, “X referred to the namelessness of a generation that was coming into an awareness of its existence as a separate group but feeling overshadowed by the boomer generation.” Overshadowed? How about kicked to the curb with nothing but the jewel case from In Utero to keep us warm?

BOOK OF THE TIMES New book Millennials Rising crowns Generation Y as the new “greatest generation”

One need look no further than the local newsstand to see the favoritism the Millennials have received. Whereas Generation X was routinely denigrated by the press, the Millennials have been compared to World War II’s Greatest Generation. In Robert Strauss and Neil Howe’s Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation, the authors state authoritatively that “over the next decade, the Millennial Generation will entirely recast the image of youth from downbeat and alienated to upbeat and engaged.”Sure, Generation X survived AIDS, Reagan, the Cold War, Tipper Gore, and A Flock of Seagulls, but those adversities, suggest Strauss and Howe, pale in comparison to what Millennials face today. Consider the stress of having to juggle a 30-hour work week while simultaneously maintaining Facebook, MySpace, and Flickr accounts. It’s enough to make your head spin! And maybe the Millennials never faced Hitler’s forces on the beaches of Normandy, but had they been around in 1944 (and had the technology existed), you can bet they would have blogged about it.

Plus, who could forget 9/11? Not the Millennials. With an oh-so-precious, post-ironic earnestness, they collectively transform into Giuliani and bring up 9/11 should you question their fortitude.

Millennials Rising catalyzed the media’s love for the Millennials and the adoration has been spreading ever since. Conducting an interview for a recent edition of 60 Minutes titled “The ‘Millennials’ Are Coming,” Morley Safer asks a younger Wall Street Journal columnist rhetorically, “But isn’t this generation [the Millennials], particularly of middle-class kids, really quite special? Aren’t they, in some ways, much better than your generation, certainly mine?”

Great … Morley thinks they’re magic, too.

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X’ED OUT Even Generation X’s magazine covers were hostile

Black Becomes White, X Becomes Y
The boomers’ decades-long spin campaign against Generation X has entered a new phase as they’ve begun to promote Millennials at our expense. Lest you think I’m paranoid, the proof of their plot to elevate the so-called “Internet generation” can be discovered by anyone who knows how to use Google. As it turns out, my generation founded the company. So, to prove my point, let’s Google back in time to provide a little context.On Monday, July 16, 1990, the largely baby boomer–run Time published a cover story called “Twentysomething.” It was the one of the magazine’s best-selling covers in history, and introduced Generation X—we were known as the baby busters then—to the public, largely defining how we were perceived as a generation. Those who read it will recall that the piece possessed the journalistic muster of a Dateline story on poisonous dog food imports from China. In short, “Twentysomething” was meant to alarm the public into believing they’d raised a generation of stoic nihilists who, as one interviewee stated, were destined to be America’s “carpenters and janitors.” The only thing preventing us from flushing America’s future down the toilet was our lack of initiative. We were too slack to flush.

Time hired two twentysomething turncoats to pen the piece, Ivy league alumni David M. Gross and Sophfronia Scott, two hack artists who were in no way representative of Generation X. During much of the ’90s, Gross was a corporate finance lawyer. Scott, on the other hand, contributed to cover stories for People, including “The 50 Most Beautiful People,” before becoming an online writing coach known as the “Book Sistah.” For the sake of conciseness, I’ll refer to Gross and Scott as GrossBookSistah from this point forward.

BREAK TIME The slacker stereotype dogs Generation Xers

“They have trouble making decisions,” sneered GrossBookSistah’s opening sentence. “They have few heroes, no anthems, no style to call their own … their anxious indecision creates a kind of ominous fog around them.”GrossBookSistah stopped just short of accusing Generation X of hating rainbows. The article managed to throw us a couple of bones, complimenting our “realism” and “good intentions,” but GrossBookSistah’s meager praise came across as a transparent attempt to provide “balance” in an article that essentially labeled Generation X as being pathetic.

Normally, I’d be content to let sleeping dogs lie—it has been nearly two decades, after all, since “Twentysomething” was published. But an onslaught of press praising Millennials for the very things my generation was despised for has begun to emerge. The double standards have opened old wounds.

Many of the generational double standards involve our shared reluctance to conform to the rules of a traditional nine-to-five job. Generation X, for instance, was derided as “inflexible” slackers who possessed no desire to climb the corporate ladder. “At a time when they should be graduating, entering the work force and starting families of their own,” scoffed GrossBookSistah, “the twentysomething crowd is balking at those rites of passage.” Those of us who did join the workforce, said GrossBookSistah, were “overly sensitive at best and lazy at worst.” One expert interviewed for the article called us a generation that “refuses to pay its dues,” while another said our reluctance to embrace the dying work ethic of the former generation left us “sounding like whiners.”

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DREAMS DEFERRED The cast of seminal Gen X film Reality Bites

Jump ahead 17 years, and my generation’s incessant “whining” (which, incidentally, is responsible for today’s transformed workplace) has been reframed as a sort of rugged individualism when applied to the Millennials. “Generation Y is forcing companies to think more creatively about work-life balance,” praises an article published in Time last year. Advertising Age takes things a step further, saying, “[A]gencies need to find a new employment model that better caters to Gen Y’s 21st-century skill set, enviable ambition and vibrant desire for recognition … Our job is to find new ways to motivate, inspire and reward them.” Maybe they can set up pony rides and free face-painters in the break room, right next to the Big Buck Hunter machine.

Weighing in on the Millennial’s “newfangled” workplace idealism, 60 Minutes suggests that bosses should accommodate Millennials who want to want to “roll into work with their iPods and flip-flops around noon.” An expert interviewed for the CBS program suggests that bosses should talk to Millennials “like a therapist on television might speak to a patient.”

An equally egregious example of generational bias lies in Gen X’s stigma as the “MTV Generation,” a title that was always intended as a pejorative. GrossBookSistah’s article accused Generation X of having been dumbed down by MTV, charging us with incubating a severe case of attention deficit disorder. “Their attention span,” wrote GrossBookSistah, “is as short as one zap of a TV dial.” Ironically, when applied to the Millennials, who are similarly affected by the Internet, possessing a short attention span becomes an accolade. They just call it multitasking.

In reality, logging on to Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace 15 times per hour to see how many friends you’ve accumulated is clearly nothing short of obsessive compulsive. Perhaps the Millennial’s addiction to Adderall and Red Bull are to blame, but the media has been too busy singing their praises (or doing cutting-edge exposés on “cyberstalkers”) to notice the Millennial’s chronic case of generational OCD.

GENERATION MTV Back in the day when Kennedy’s antics seemed shocking

Outside of the office, the assault against Gen X was even worse. GrossBookSistah accused us of being “too detached to form caring relationships.” And instead of praising us for sneering at “Range Rovers, Rolexes, and red suspenders,” GrossBookSistah emphasized how marketers were “confounded” by a “generation so rootless and noncommittal,” transforming our frugality and anticommercialism into cheapness.

The boomer’s animosity seems particularly misplaced when you consider that Gen X’s values mirrored those of the antiestablishment hippies. One iconic example is our trademark wariness of commercialism. We were the no-logo generation, famously skeptical of marketers who tried to pigeonhole us. We created independent rock and ostracized artists who “sold out” for capital gain.

Today, when a hip band allows Outback Steakhouse to co-opt one of their most beloved songs, Millennials don’t call it selling out. It’s a cogent business decision. To Millennials, it’s perfectly acceptable to transform the lyric “Let’s pretend we don’t exist / Let’s pretend we’re in Antarctica” into the jingle “Let’s go Outback tonight / Life will still be there tomorrow.” (Et tu, Of Montreal.)

Perhaps most troubling, the Millennials have effectively transformed the no-logo idealism of Gen X into the mantra “no logo except Apple.” Embracing “hip” brands is what often passes for cool with today’s trendsetters. Still, boomers continue to debase the values of my “downbeat” and “cynical” generation, perhaps tricked into thinking they have more in common with the Millennials since ponchos and hippie beards have become popular once again.

Sure, GrossBookSistah accused Gen X of being too alienated to have role models, but perhaps that’s preferable to an entire generation worshiping with bended knee at Steve Jobs’ immaculately designed Apple-shaped cathedral. Have you heard the news, they chant soundlessly, with iPods clogging their eardrums, the new MacBook has arrived! It’s magic. It’s so light it can fly!

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TIME WARP Nirvana’s In Utero

The Doom Generation?
While praise for the Millennials continues to be spread as generously as margarine on an Denny’s English muffin, it’s surreal in hindsight to see how antagonistic the media was to Generation X. “Down deep, what frustrates today’s young people—and those who observe them—is their failure to create an original youth culture,” GrossBookSistah wrote, shifting from snark to antagonism. “What young adults have managed to come up with is either nuevo hipster or ultra-nerd, but almost always a bland imitation of the past.”

Ouch. Criticizing our work ethic was one thing, but our culture? That’s below the belt. (Comically, GrossBookSistah immediately discredit themselves by insisting that Bret Easton Ellis pales in comparison to boomer “originals like Tom Robbins.”)

The animosity seems particularly ill-placed given what passes for an “original youth culture” today. Namely, the cult of celebrity for which the Millennials will be remembered. Star magazine has become a more essential accoutrement for today’s aspiring hipsterati than Chuck Taylors. Sure, there are those who defend the Millennials against the accusations of superficiality, generally by suggesting that they’re more politically engaged than the disenfranchised Gen X. But let’s be honest, had George Bush, Jr., been in office when we turned 21, my generation would have sweat through our flannel shirts running to the voting booth to replace him.

Still, it’s never been sexy to be a Gen Xer. And that’s the problem. Maybe we’re responsible for the Spin Doctors, but if you cut through the bullshit, you’ll see that we’re not merely sexy. We’re fucking hot:

THEIR SPACE MySpace, the virtual Gen Y compound

We were the first bloggers. We created rap music. Silicon Valley. McSweeney’s. Indie rock.

And we are the Internet generation. We founded Google. Wikipedia. DailyKos. Gawker. Meet-Up. MySpace. Ebay. YouTube.

We’re not slackers. We are Tiger Woods, Snoop Dogg, Parker Posey, Tina Fey, Johnny Depp, Michael Jordan, Dr. Dre and Lance Armstrong, to name a few.

You’ve earned your retirement, boomers. So rest assured that your babies are in good hands as you go. As a member of the nowhere generation, now come of age, I’m proud to announce that our time has arrived. We may not be the next Greatest Generation, but we’re pretty good at calling bullshit. So in the immortal words of Paul Davis: Cool wand.

Not drinking alcohol, and what I’ve discovered.

1. I’ve discovered that I want a drink. Badly. Especially when I’m having a horrible day. I never thought of myself as one to self-medicate, but there it is. This begins to make me realize that a month off from all booze is maybe a good thing.

2. I’ve learned that almost EVERY social engagement has something to do with alcohol. From bowling to dinner, people push drinks on you. Not intentionally. They just offer. And wonder why you’re not having any.

3. Thus, I’ve realized just how hard it must be for an alcoholic to have friends who still drink. It feels shitty to be around slightly drunk people and be the only one sober. Refer back to #1.

4. Some people are cool with it – the experiment of not drinking. Some people aren’t. They get defensive. Like I’m judging them for still drinking. It gets worse when I say that I “might” have a problem with alcohol.

5. At first, I didn’t like going to social events anymore. Because I was scared that I wouldn’t be funny or social without a glass of wine to relax me. Alcohol is a social lubricant, right?

6. I discovered that after awhile, it’s normal not to drink anymore. I’m on week 4, and it’s turning into a normal night for me to just have a glass of water with dinner.

7. I’m losing a ton of weight by doing nothing other than avoiding my usual one or two drinks every other night. Seriously. It’s like magic.

8. I’ve also discovered that I look better and I feel better. My body, especially as it gets older, just can’t handle the booze anymore. Even a glass later, and my head starts to buzz. I think that my liver is older, too, because it felt like longer to process the alcohol in my system. I felt, in essence, drunk faster and longer. Now, I don’t get as many headaches or upset stomachs. Coincidence? Maybe. But see below.

9. I sleep better. Drinking at night was making me restless. I know it’s a depressant, but a glass or two at night was making it more difficult for me to get a solid night of actual rest. Now I wake up feeling like I actually slept.

10. I’m less depressed. And dark. And moody. Which, although it makes me funnier, is better off dead. (Remember that movie with John Cusack, and the kid on the bike? And the French chick? It’s still great, by the way.)

Procrastination: I’m supposed to be working, but instead, I’m wasting more of my potential.

Alas, it is a beautiful day here in Berkeley, California.

The sun is shining. I can hear the bells of the ice cream truck outside my window. The kids that live next door are enjoying their plastic pool. It’s 75° and a cool breeze is blowing.

I am inside.

Why?

Because I’m supposed to be writing my first field statement – about the anthropology of science. I know, that sounds really cool, right? Well, maybe not exactly.

Instead of actually writing, I’m still “researching”, which involves a lot of Google searches. And it also involves checking my email 20 times even though no one is writing to me because it’s a gorgeous day and other people have things called “lives”. Apparently, they exist somewhere out there, outside the walls of academe.

Also, it involves opening the refrigerator just to “look”. And think about eating an orange. And getting some more water, or coffee, or diet coke. And sitting back down in front of the computer with a firm resolution to: “Just write something already!”

In the back of my head, I keep telling myself that writing this is no big deal. If it sucks, I rewrite it. Emphasis on “re”, after having actually written something. Oh, I have 38 pages of notes and a complete bibliography. But no text. Nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Zero.

I try to trick myself into writing by thinking that at least I’m not in Haiti lining up for food. That this is ridiculous compared to most people’s troubles. I’m not a hemophiliac, right? Things aren’t so bad. So far, no cancer.

Then why am I making myself miserable?

Do I like being miserable?

I must. Because I LOVE procrastinating.

I also love thinking about all my ‘wasted potential’ while I’m doing it.

‘Potential’ sucks.

It’s overrated.

I think I’m going to dedicate a couple of postings, or maybe another whole page on “Wasted Potential”. Maybe I’ll share stories of famously wasted potentials. Or how to get over the envy that comes along with it, while you are watching other people, not laden with ‘potential’, actually out there doing things and – gasp! – succeeding. While you, me, us, whoever, are all frozen by our collective incapacity to actualize any of our so-called ‘potential’.

Oh, if only I could procrastinate the self-doubt, self-criticism, uncertainty and fear. Or FUSS, for a nice acronym.

If only I could stop all the FUSS, and get down to work.

In honor of the new baseball season, an old favorite.

I don’t know – third base!

That’s right!

I don’t even know what I’m talking about!

(The forerunners of academese – the language of the anti-masses.)

Paris Hilton is boring, and I’m not going to take it anymore. . . .

I used to frequent gossip sites. You know, those nasty, vituperative sites that catalogue absolutely everything that a celebrity, or quasi-celebrity, does, then mocks it? (For those of you who do not frequent, here is a sample.)

Now, I’m no stranger to judgment. It’s my favorite game. Especially when it comes to women.

Except that recently, I’ve realized that being bitter or happy about other people’s successes or failures is probably the stupidest waste of time ever. Basically, it means that I procrastinate – one might say it is a symbol of my larger procrastination problem – and I don’t actually have many successes or failures of my own. Paris Hilton, Miley Cyrus, and Angelina Jolie are ruining my life.

Or, rather, my obsession with checking out DAILY what is going on with THEIR lives is ruining MY life.

So, no more.

I am throwing out my trashy magazines (you know who you are), and I am not going to be clicking on any gossip sites from now on. Because what do I really care if Angelina is pregnant or no? Is my own life so boring that these people seem more interesting?

Hell, I have friends more messed up and interesting than these people. Maybe we should start blogging about real people, since their lives are completely more complicated, intense and fascinating than “fake” lives being lived out in NYC or LA.

Plus, it might make us all feel better about ourselves. We’ve lost all touch with what ‘reality’ is, with all of these psuedo ‘reality’ shows. I, for one, live in reality and there are no TV camera crews here.

Now, I’m not going to stop watching Rock of Love II, because that’s just good TV. But everything else? Going.

I’ll have to find another way to procrastinate not living my own life or doing my own work. And I’ll have to stop fantasizing that if I were (pick one or any that apply for yourself), rich, skinny, beautiful, had a hot boyfriend, traveled to Bali or Hawaii whenever I wanted – that i would be happier.

Um, have you seen how “happy” these people are?

Finally, some sanity about eggs, drinking 8 glasses of water per day, and other health fears that our grandparents never thought twice about . . .

One of the things that boggles my mind is the fact that some people will do anything to be “healthier”, where “healthier” is a stand-in for one or all of the following:

1. Look younger.

2. Stave off aging in all forms. Haven’t you heard that 50 is the new 30? (Or so people who are 50 hope.)

3. Stay attractive to the opposite sex.

4. Remain fit enough and attractive enough to get laid, either before or after your divorce.

5. Never get cancer. Or anything else scary.

6. Live forever. No, seriously. Forever.

Obviously, these are impossible dreams.

One of my friends argued with me the other day about his parents, who are nearing 60, still being middle-age and “active”. Not unless they plan on living until 120 and hiking part of the Appalachian Trail. Which, as far as I know, is neigh-on impossible*. (*Note: not the hiking part, the living to 120 part.)

In New York, when I worked in fashion, I used to see skinny women dragging liter bottles of water around with them. Because it was healthy, and good for their skin and kidneys. Apparently, both myths.

So, it is with some sort of pride in my “common sense” attitude about things I eat, drink, and do to keep myself reasonably fit for my age, that I share with you the following myth-busting story. Enjoy. And enjoy the coffee and eggs for breakfast for once, why don’t you?

By Dorothy Foltz-Gray, Health

Myth #1: Drink eight glasses of water a day
In 1945, the U.S. Food and Nutrition Board told people to consume eight glasses of fluid daily. Before long, most of us believed we needed eight glasses of water, in addition to what we eat and drink, every day.

The truth: Water’s great, but you also whet your whistle with juice, tea, milk, fruits and vegetables — quite enough to keep you hydrated. Even coffee quenches thirst, despite its reputation as a diuretic; the caffeine makes you lose some liquid, but you’re still getting plenty.

Contrary to common belief, urine color is not a great sign of dehydration, says Rachel Vreeman, MD, a fellow in Children’s Health Services Research at the Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis: “If you’re thirsty, you should drink.” But don’t overdo it. Drinking too much can lead to hyponatremia, in which sodium levels fall, causing an electrolyte imbalance that can make you very sick.

Myth #2: Stress will turn your hair gray
The carpool, the spilled milk, the deadlines. Who doesn’t believe that stress can shock her locks?

The truth: “Too much stress does age us inside and out,” says Nancy L. Snyderman, MD, chief medical editor for NBC News and author of “Medical Myths that Can Kill You.” It ups the number of free radicals, scavenger molecules that attack healthy cells, and increases the spill of stress hormones in your body. So far, though, no scientific evidence proves a bad day turns your locks silver. “We gray according to genetics,” she says. And, let’s face it, when you do get those gray strands, hair products make covering them a cinch.

Myth #3: Reading in poor light ruins your eyes
It’s the common-sense refrain of mothers everywhere — reading under the covers or by moonlight will ruin your eyesight.

The truth: “Reading in dim light can strain your eyes,” Snyderman explains. “You tend to squint, and that can give you a headache. But you won’t do any permanent damage, except maybe cause crow’s-feet.”

Your overtired eyes can get dry and achy, and may even make your vision seem less clear, but a good night’s rest will help your peepers recover just fine.

Myth #4: Coffee’s really bad for you
Surely something 108 million Americans crave so much each morning couldn’t possibly be good for you? Wrong.

The truth: Too much may give you the jitters, but your daily habit has a lot of positives. “Coffee comes from plants, which have helpful phytochemicals that act as antioxidants,” says Stacy Beeson, RD, a wellness dietitian at St. Luke’s Boise Medical Center in Boise, Idaho. One set of antioxidants appears to increase insulin sensitivity, which might explain a lowered risk of type 2 diabetes in people who sip java. A Harvard study of more than 125,000 coffee drinkers found that women cut their risk of type 2 diabetes by 30 percent. Other studies suggest that coffee cuts the risks of Parkinson’s disease, colon cancer, cirrhosis and gallstones. Drinking joe gives your brain a boost, too. And, despite the jolt of energy it provides, coffee has no effect on heart disease.

Two to three cups a day is fine for most people, Beeson says. But if you take your coffee with a racing heart, anxiety, or wide-eyed nights, cut back or switch to decaf. If you’re pregnant or low on calcium, talk to your doc about the best brew for you.

Myth #5: Feed a cold, starve a fever
The old wives’ tale has been a staple since the 1500s when a dictionary master wrote, “Fasting is a great remedie of feuer.”

The truth: “Colds and fevers are generally caused by viruses that tend to last 7 to 10 days, no matter what you do,” Vreeman says. “And there is no good evidence that diet has any effect on a cold or fever. Even if you don’t feel like eating, you still need fluids, so put a priority on those.” If you’re congested, the fluids will keep mucus thinner and help loosen chest and nasal congestion. A little chicken soup spoons in some nutrients, as well.

Myth #6: Fresh is always better than frozen
Ever since scientists honed in on the benefits of antioxidants, the mantra has been “eat more fresh fruits and veggies” — implying that frozen is second-rate.

The truth: “Frozen can be just as good as fresh because the fruits and vegetables are harvested at the peak of their nutritional content, taken to a plant, and frozen on the spot, locking in nutrients,” Beeson says. “They aren’t trucked far distances to sit on grocery shelves.” And, unless it’s picked and sold the same day, produce at farmers’ markets — though still nutritious — may lose nutrients because of heat, air, and water.

Myth #7: Eggs raise your cholesterol
In the 1960s and 1970s, scientists linked blood cholesterol with heart disease — and eggs (high in cholesterol) were banished to the chicken house.

The truth: Newer studies have found that saturated and trans fats in a person’s diet, not dietary cholesterol, are more likely to raise heart disease risk. (An egg has only 1.6 grams of saturated fat, compared with about 3 grams in a cup of 2 percent milk.) And, at 213 milligrams of cholesterol, one egg slips under the American Heart Association’s recommendation of no more than 300 milligrams a day. “Eggs offer lean protein and vitamins A and D, and they’re inexpensive and convenient,” Beeson says. “If you do have an egg for breakfast, just keep an eye out for the amount of cholesterol in the other foods you eat that day.”

Myth #8: Get cold, and you’ll catch a cold
It must be true because your mother always said so. Right?

The truth: Mom was wrong. “Chilling doesn’t hurt your immunity, unless you’re so cold that your body defenses are destroyed — and that only occurs during hypothermia,” Vreeman says. “And you can’t get a cold unless you’re exposed to a virus that causes a cold.” The reason people get more colds in the winter isn’t because of the temperature, but it may be a result of being cooped up in closed spaces and exposed to the spray of cold viruses. Staying warm may not prevent a cold, but staying cheerful might. A study at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh says positive people exposed to cold viruses have a 13 percent lower risk of getting a cold than gloomier souls.

Myth #9: Your lipstick could make you sick
In 2007, an environmentalist group, the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, had 33 lipsticks tested for lead. Although there’s no lead limit for lipstick, one third of the tubes had more than the limit allowed for candy. That started a scare that spread like wildfire.

The truth: “The reality is that lead is in almost everything,” says Michael Thun, MD, head of epidemiological research for the American Cancer Society. “It’s all around us. But the risk from lead in lipstick is extremely small.” In fact, lead poisoning is most commonly caused by other environmental factors — pipes and paint in older homes, for instance. The bottom line, Thun says: The risk from lipstick is nothing to worry about.

4 big health whoppers
Most of us want to believe in “miracle” cures. But if it sounds too good to be true, it is.

Weight-loss formulas
The National Institutes of Health warns against taking any drug combos sold without U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval, including herbal mixes that promise big results. “The problem is that many contain stimulants and may be dangerous for people with underlying heart disease, high blood pressure, and other chronic illnesses they may not be aware of,” says Marc Siegel, MD, a New York City physician and author of “False Alarm: The Truth About the Epidemic of Fear.” “And you may not know how much stimulant you’re getting.” It’s far better to ask your doctor about FDA-approved appetite suppressants or, best of all, exercise and watch what you eat.

Arthritis fixes
Copper bracelets, shark cartilage, honey-and-vinegar mixtures, magnets. If only they would cure arthritis. But it just isn’t so, Siegel says. In fact, copper can cause an allergic reaction. Although there’s no cure for arthritis, rest, exercise, heat and drugs recommended by your doctor can help.

Colon cleansers
Colonics have been hawked as everything from a toxin remover to a cancer cure. But they only do what your intestinal system does already. Enemas, laxatives, or passing a rubber tube through your rectum and pumping water in and out can be expensive and dangerous. “There’s no evidence that colon cleansing is necessary,” Siegel says. And experts say long-term cleansing can cause anemia, malnutrition, infection, intestinal damage and even heart failure.

Alzheimer’s cures
Removing silver fillings, zapping your brain with electricity, or taking smart pills won’t keep your memory intact, says Stephen Barrett, MD, a retired psychiatrist who operates www.quackwatch.org. “Reputable drugs for slowing memory loss are only in their infancy. If brain tissue is dead, you can’t revive it with something in a bottle.”

Stuff White People Hate: #2 Paying Taxes

Upper and middle-class white people hate paying taxes. Due to the fact that most of them owe money to the government, despite all the sneaky write-offs they do. (Come on, do you really have a “home office”? If we could write off over-filled garages, spare rooms, and attics, we’d be all set.)

Worry about “filling out the taxes” starts just after the haze of the New Year’s hangover. It intensifies after Valentine’s Day, and might be the reason that white people get so drunk on St. Patrick’s Day. (White people love to avoid doing things. They actively practice slacktivism. I guess that makes us all slacktivists.)

If you haven’t begun work on your taxes by Easter, and you are white and have a savings account with more than $500 in it, real panic sets in. People sit down at their desks with stacks of old receipts, paperwork, pencils, a calculator, an abacus and a protractor, and set to work. “Doing the taxes” requires absolute silence, respect and must be interruption-free. It will take a white person anywhere from one 1500 hours to complete their taxes. Depending on their level of education, street smarts, and math skills. (Enron execs did theirs in 15 minutes, a world record!)

When they are done with their taxes, white people spend a lot of time worrying about getting audited. The “audit fear” will last until May, at least, when the person will shrug off the worry and enjoy the summer. Then repeat it all again next year.