Rules for Aging: A Wry and Witty Guide to Life

Author: Roger Rosenblatt
List Price: $11.00
Our Price: Click to see the latest and low price
ISBN: 0156013606
Publisher: Harvest Books (01 November, 2001)
Sales Rank: 19,816
Average Customer Rating: 4.57 out of 5

Customer Reviews

Rating: 5 out of 5
If you are over 50, you will LOVE this book!
"Rules for Aging" is a short book, with rules you will never find written anywhere else but here, but it will make you smile and fill your day with humour and wit. And, how true it is! As I first glanced at the book, I thought, "OK, we are all aging, maybe there is something useful here." As I started to read with riskless joy and wonder, a phenominal concept finally hit me like a ton of bricks, "I'm really not losing my mind after all, I'm simply growing old" - rather like the lesser of two evils! While I loved all the rules, my favourites were #2, "Nobody is thinking about you... and #26, "Never go to a cocktail party....

The sad part is that if you are under fifty you may not have lived long enough to completely understand the rules in this book, and if you are over fifty, well.... you may have to remember where you left your glasses before you can read it! Find your glasses, you will not regret the time it took, the book is terrific.


Rating: 4 out of 5
Buy it You'll Like It
This book jumped out at me because 1) It sounded funny, 2) I believe I had read something by Roger Rosenblatt before and liked it, 3) It's short, and 4) There's a comical recommendation by Jim Lehrer of all people on the back.

I was very satisfied. It probably didn't take me more than a couple of hours in total to read, but I literally laughed out loud a number of times, and grinned throughout. His introduction is "This little guide is intended for people who wish to age successfully, or at all....... What follows then, is mainly a list of "don't"s and "not"s, not unlike the Ten Commandments, but without the moral base."

He has 58 short 1-3 page chapters with titles like "If something is boring you, it is probably you," "The unexamined life lasts longer," "Just because the person who criticizes you is an idiot doesn't make him wrong," and "Live in the past, but don't remember too much."

After you're done this is a good book to have around to read to friends, or to pick up when you realize you are taking things too seriously and want to laugh at life.

Excerpt: "A long happy life last five minutes. One would think that this rule would go without stating, but many people actually believe that a long life of uninterrupted happiness is a real possibility. And they act on this belief! They change families, careers, the structure of their faces, countries, everything, for no more substantial reason than they recall five minutes of uninterrupted happiness in the past, and now they wish to re-create the moment in perpetuity. They even convince themselves that the five-minute period they recall was really five years and giddily substitute the exception (bliss) for the rule (confusion, doubt, misery, fear, confusion, and confusion). Happiness is wonderful, but if you have had more than five consecutive minutes of it, it means you weren't thinking."


Rating: 5 out of 5
Rules For Aging
This book is very funny and full of wisdom about aging. It is a great book to take on a flight as it is a quick read. I highly recommend it.



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