Project Me!

Old Old News

That  president John Tyler (born in 1790) has living grandchildren may be the ultimate in Old Dadness. But the whole recent media discovery is kind of charming, so no judging. Someone needs to get these 80-year-old dads together with the 30-something grandmas for the ultimate reality show.

 

 

The Middle Ages: <47

Winner of the creepiest opening paragraph so far in 2011:

"The first time they had sex, during that initial exploration of unfamiliar flesh, John Ross uttered words to Ann Maloney that would sound to her like prophecy. 'You have the body of a young girl.' You need a baby."

Ross was 54, Maloney 47, a.k.a. "deeply middle-aged."

I thought that I would like men sticking with age appropriate mates rather than procreating with women decades-younger, but this was not what I had in mind.

Older Men Plan the Best Dates

Several months ago, my friend Anna called to complain about her boyfriend of eight months. Bombarded by media warnings about the female biological clock, he wanted to make sure that Anna was fit for childbearing before the relationship moved forward. He had taken her to a fertility clinic where a reproductive endocrinologist drew blood to check her ovarian reserve and injected radioactive iodine into her uterus to ensure that her fallopian tubes were clear.

Anna is 32. Her boyfriend is 52.

--Creepy lede of the week winner is tempered by the meat of the article: old dudes giving their babies autism, schizophrenia, bipolarity, epilepsy, prostate cancer and breast cancer with their decrepit semen.

Baby Jane

Once again, I've been sleeping on the job. And that would be my life's work of getting irrationally outraged by things that have very little to do with me.

But Rod, really? Do we need another 65-year-old dad? Especially, one who already has six kids?

Also, relative youngster, 55-year-old Kelsey Grammar, just impregnated his girlfriend who is 29.

Which reminds me, it's been ages since I've seen the Rod Stewart doppelganger who I used to pass each morning on my way to work while he was bringing kids to school. I wonder if they changed districts or if I've been going to work later?

Rod Stewart - Baby Jane

50 to Life

It's a shame that men have begun to be called out over their lumpen physiques because it gives me fewer unrealistic onscreen hot girl/fat dude pairings to talk about.

Thankfully, old dudes won't stop procreating. I read about this cool club called Over 50, Under 5. A group of guys who puttered around till middle age before deciding to have babies and a few who thought it would be fun to play with infants despite already having children in their 30s, meet regularly in Brooklyn (where else?) to bond over having so much free time to spend with their kids that they can do things like make organic pancakes before taking them to school.

"They count themselves quite lucky to have young children at a time of life when they are not building careers, not seeking fame and fortune, when they are able to put their young sons and daughters at the center of their lives."

Also

"The bonus the Over 50s enjoy is an ability to control their time in a way they never could as young men."

Presumably the mothers of these men's (a "former artist, former comedian, former reporter and former Weatherman" [radical, not meteorologist]) children aren't 65, as well. I suppose they have no interest in career building, fame, fortune and free time?

What's Good for the Goose

Often I hate the New York Times (thanks to columns with out of touch titles like Your Second Home) but sometimes I love them, especially when they validate my petty annoyances. Today there is a bit of bursting the old dads can have it all bubble because yes, after 35 sperm starts going rotten too.

“All those silver-haired sex symbols, and balding sugar daddies, and average-Joe divorced guys who are on their second families because they can be while their exes are raising their first set of kids — what if all of them became, in women’s eyes, too darned old? What if 30-year-old women started looking at 50-year-old men as damaged goods, what with their washed-up sperm, meaning those 50-year-olds might actually have to date (gasp!) women their own age?”

The downside is that the commenters (who are always a bit wacko on the Times—an article about learning to love goat meat, one of the most unexpectedly funny things I’ve ever read in the dining section, kicked up a slew of anger over eating pets and animals in general. You never see such ire over a piece on hamburgers or fried chicken, as if animals weren’t killed for those commonly devoured items) seem to be taking this information to mean that people need to shift their priorities to procreating earlier, not getting so wrapped up in finances, stability, careers and the like…or condemning women over 30 for being so bitter and nasty.

Wrong! People don’t need more babies younger. Old men need to stop thinking it’s their right to knock up multiple generations of females. And women need to stop looking to older men for material security. That’s common sense, not vitriol.

Driven to Distraction

Do you know what happens when a 58-year-old man has a baby with a woman who is 23? The toddler climbs into the front seat of a car and tries driving off while ol’ dad is oblivious. This kind of refutes the lower IQ thing. Not every tot could pull of such a stunt.

Old Dads Make Kids Dumb

It's a proven fact. Children of fathers aged 50+ do less well in IQ tests according to a recent study.

Conversely, children of older mothers fared better in the same thinking and reasoning exams.

Recent old dad offenders:

57-year-old Paul Stanley.

Tommy Hilfiger, also 57, has an expectant wife.

And relative youngster at 55, Tim Allen, improving the home.

Not-so-recent:

James Taylor who'll be 61 in three days has 7-year-old twins? (Ah, via a surrogate since the third wife wasn't wildly age inappropriate.)

Infanticipating

I don’t get too mixed up in politics but when a 70-year-old decides to reproduce, I take notice. It looks like ex-Senator Al D’Amato’s mature, yet twenty-nine years his junior, wife is “infanticipating” as the New York Post puts it.

The Ticking Prostate

I hate those MSN teasers that grab my attention when all I’m trying to do it check my Hotmail. Last week it was “Nontraditional Jobs For Men” (let me guess, librarian made the list? Bingo). Yesterday it was “Too Old to be a Dad,” proving Microsoft’s a little late to the old dad game, though I do have to give them credit for using a subhead like The Ticking Prostate.

I wanted to click the hell out of there and then got further sucked into the hideousness of “Having a Positive Plus-Size Pregnancy.” I was just thinking about that on the subway the other morning, how lately there has been news devoted to all the troubles with being fat and conceiving and I call bullshit. Tub o’lardness has never kept anyone from procreating. Do these writers never set foot outside? I’m not all pudge power, but really wouldn’t you think that if anything people would be more concerned with the consequences of emaciated ladies getting knocked-up? But then, MSN would have no audience for their "40 Flat Belly Foods " (which sadly, I did skim through—how the hell am I supposed to steam green beans for lunch in an office?).