Getting old and forgetful sucks!

[dalee100]

Hi,

I just spent nearly a week trying to fix my Gator because it wouldn't start. Well, the battery was bad, so I replaced that. Installed the new battery, and nothing! Not even so much as a flicker on the dash or the headlights. Fussed and stewed checking fuses multiple times. Figured I would push it in the heated garage and thaw it out.

Bloody tractor refused to start. Nearest new tractor battery is 50 miles one way. Battery for tractor is in the nose under the hood. Not so easy to get at with a loader on and down. Then need to disassemble the hood latch/battery retainer plate. Remind me to make JD engineers fix their own designs just once. Finally get it out and head to town the next day.

Get home, install new battery just before dark in the tractor.

Next morning me and Grandma go out to move the Gator into the shop. Things go well for once this week. Go in the house and let the warm shop do it's thing.

Go out there today and recheck fuses one more time. Still nothing lighting up on the dash. Wonder if I'm missing a fuse or the ignition switch is bad. Decide to look UNDER the gator for a hidden breaker/fuse. See loose wire dangling. Oh, fer carp on a shingle with cat hairballs.......... Hook the wire up to the battery and it fires right up. I'm evidently an idiot that can't remember how many wires I removed.

Grandma thinks it's funny. She is texting all our Daughters. Son-in-Laws AND Grandsons are pointing and laughing at the old man.........

At least I can still make people laugh.

[redlee]

Yup im in the same boat as you, getting older and feeling it .

[RB211]

My John Deere 285, the entire wire harness melted together. Don't think much of them anymore.

[nickel-city-fab]

I used to hate forgetting things.
I put somethg down and lose it within seconds.
Then one day I realized that Zen monks spend their whole lives trying to go blank.
After that, I decided to just go with it and enjoy.
When I get old, other people will have to wipe my bum,
and that will be payback for all the struggle.

[AD5MB]

couple of days ago - cracked an egg. threw the contents in the trash and the shell into the skillet.

twice

[Jim Williams]

Today is one month from my 90th birthday. I never expected to get this far along. Most of my high school friends are gone.

[rickyb]

It’s well known that the memory is the second thing to go... Don’t remember what the first is.

[nickel-city-fab]

It’s well known that the memory is the second thing to go... Don’t remember what the first is.

I think they have a pill for that now. Dunno. I can never remember if I took mine.

[Doozer]

John Deere and Volkswagen are kinda the same.
Expensive POS and yet people keep buying them.
They have some kind of brand image that makes
people want to love them. Like a cute puppy that
keeps crapping on the rug.
Odd.

-D

[gellfex]

My 87 year old mom who can still knit Irish sweaters complains of her memory. I have to tell her I'm not far behind. The difference is I can be a cyborg and use that widget in my pocket to help me remember stuff and she can't. I can find the actor I'm thinking of by remembering an actor they were in a movie with and then search for that movie and then find that actor. I depend on Google Keep's lists to keep track of almost everything I need to do or buy. I use the camera to remember a product I looked at in the store and it's price. It's funny, nearly a century of SF writers speculated about a pocket gadget that could know and do anything, but none called it a phone!

[LKeithR]

My favourite trick is losing stuff in the shop. I'll have something in my hand that I need for a project and
absent-mindedly put it down when I get distracted by a new task. When I go back to look for the first
item it can be a major undertaking to find it. Funny part is if I make a mental note to myself when I put
something down I can home in on it a week later but if I'm in a fog when I put it down good luck.

One day I put my glasses down while I was looking at something else. I looked high and low but could
not find them. Finally had to call my wife and daughter (who happened to be in town shopping) to come
and help me. They found the glasses on a little shelf behind one of the machines--without their help I'd
probably still be looking. 😂 I swear when I put some of this **** down it immediately burrows into whatever
pile I put it on...

[rolland]

HA I can remember everything I ever did...........just can't remember it for very long

[darryl]

Working in the shop one day, and I had to divert to another task. So I put the thing I was working on down on the corner of a bench, then looked at it for a few seconds to fix the image in my mind. That way I'd know where it was when I got back. I remembered the task, remembered the image fixed in my mind, but couldn't find the part. I started looking everywhere, knowing in my mind that I was not going to find it in those places. I gave up in frustration. The next day I recalled the image, went to that spot, and there was the part.

This isn't the first time I looked directly at the thing I was looking for, but didn't find it. Trying to shave one morning, I looked down at the left side of the sink where I keep the shaver, and it wasn't there. I kept looking right there, all the while wondering whether I'd thrown it out- but I knew I hadn't. Opened the drawer and took out a new shaver, used it, then put it down- right on top of the one I'd been looking for.

Sometimes I get a feeling that something strange is cooking. I'll begin to evaluate things, what am I working on, am I doing it right, have I overlooked something important about it, am I about to do something unsafe- almost like some invisible person is in the room with me, just---waiting. I try to figure it out, is my plan wrong, am I about to do something dangerous- I never really get an answer.

Lately I've started to realize that vision is not as simple as the eyes picking it up and the brain saying 'there it is'. The brain can just silently 'not process'. Perhaps a part of the brain that is needed to process signals from the retinae is temporarily busy, or just taking a break. Perhaps what the brain is processing doesn't fit with what it expects, and a reset of some kind has to take place. Ageing doesn't explain it very well, though it does seem to have an effect.

[Fasturn]

Doesn't pay to get old...................there's no money in it !

[4miller1]

Only one alternative to getting old.