like when a rag gets wet...

My new boss is slightly younger than me.  If I had to guess, I would say that she's a little older than thirty-five but younger than forty.  I have no problem being managed by someone younger than me, and certainly no issue with being managed by a woman - three of the best four managers I've ever had were women - but it's just that I have noticed that she has a certain tone of phrase that makes her sound a bit middle-aged.

I'll give you an example: whenever she says "last minute", my boss doesn't just say "last minute", she always says "last minute dot com".  Okay, I grant you.... that doesn't make her sound middle-aged as much as dating her very specifically to a period of time in the mid-1990s, but that basically amounts to the same thing, doesn't it?  It's as if her linguistic development froze when she was at some point in her twenties, and she's never felt the need to move on.  It's a bit like those hippies who persisted in saying things like "groovy" and "man" all the time, although I'm pretty certain involving a lot less marijuana.

There's nothing particularly wrong with it, and nor is it particularly strange that someone of that age might begin to sound a little middle-aged.... it's just that I'm not really ready to sound middle-aged myself just yet and I'm dismayed to watch it happening to people around me who are of around my age.  I might *be* middle-aged, but I'd like to think that I don't sound it.  At least not yet.

It's happening to some of my friends too (although I'm sure not you): when viewed through the prism of Facebook, some of my best friends suddenly seem very dull indeed.  It's not that they *are* dull, you understand, only that they have a grasp of the medium that is something akin to my father's, and they post update after update to which the only possible response is "cool story, bro....".

When did this happen?  When did these people move into middle-age?  Why did it happen? How did it happen so fast?

Please tell me that it hasn't happened to me.

Maybe it already has, and maybe worrying about something like this is the first sign of a mid-life crisis.

Damn.

I need to buy a flashier car.