We're thinking about starting a Podcast - this is only a test.

Newsweek recently issued Boomer Files, Part 2. Very nice stuff for a trip into the past. But Alan Ehrenhalt's essay,The Faustian Generation, comparing the Boomer experience to Faust's deal with the Devil, is a bit of a stretch.

I'm a huge Steely Dan fan. I even know where they got the name. So, I appreciated this story on a Billboard.com blog about the snarky duo's letter to Luke Wilson about brother Owen ripping off their Cousin Dupree character in his new movie.

By the way, if your appreciation for the band exceeds all reasonable limits (or you just like aging hipster bands), check out Stealin' Dan.

Another request from a journalist--this one for Money Magazine. Pretty specific requirements, so if you fit and want your 3 seconds in the limelight, please contact the writer directly.

I'm looking to chat with a baby boomer couple and
their retired parent(s). Here's the details:

Arnesa Howell
arnesah@yahoo.com

Does anyone but me think it's a bit creepy that Chrysler is using Dr. Z (complete with heavy German accent) to pitch Jeeps? My father, God rest his soul, would be throwing shoes at the TV if he could see this.

Dad traipsed all over Europe in the back of the venerable Jeep. Now, as if we Boomers don't remember WWII, we're asked to believe that because Mercedes owns Jeep, we should be comforted by the fact that it now has all this great German Engineering.

Ptoowie!

Simply ignore it, I said to myself, and it will just go away. No, not Bush, his 60th birthday. Confronted with the stark reality that this man is actually a member of the Baby Boomer Generation I shuddered, retched slightly and tried to avoid it. We even sabotaged two interviews (one with CNN, the other with CBS) because most of our responses weren't fit for prime time news.

I was jolted back to reality today by this diary on dailykos. I guess, based on this thesis, I can comfortably deny GWB inclusion in the Baby Boomer Generation (I feel better already). The writer's point: "we were in the mist (sic) of a REAL, full-blown culture war, not like the bizzaro-world one that goes on politically today, and like in any war, people wore uniforms to tell friend from foe. Our uniform was "freak." The opposition ... take a look at young Karl there."

Back then, we fought "The Man" and recognized "The Establishment" as the enemy. I guess we knew there were spies among us, but the battle front was drawn mostly along generational lines, so we ignored the rare exceptions. How foolish that was!

Thirty years later we have a generational Tory (and his right-wing Tory militia) running our country. Geeze, couldn't we have introduced George and Karl to Alice B. Toklas' brownie recipe back in 1969?

One of the advantages of growing older is that I forget what I read six months ago, so humor columns are funny all over again. Like the one I had stumbled upon last winter. In case you missed it...

OK--we've done it now. Because of our failure to elect a competent president, England is revoking our independence. Now we'll have to do that tea party thing all over again.

This has nothing to do with being a boomer--I just stumbled on a site about the World Championships of Sand Sculpture in Harrison Hot Springs, British Columbia. The sculpture is absolutely amazing and most are much more elaborate than the example here. This one just appealed to my politics.