Countdown for Dannie - she's only got 2 weeks left of being 39!

[Cam]

Sorry Dannie, can't resist! For anyone who's never seen her she looks 29 and is a v. slim mother of 3 [jealous]

Whoops, I mean

Wait. Just wait.

Aargh. Antiquity looms. I do think fondly back to my 30th birthday party, in a city now deep in civil war, where I met a very nice American who's now dead. Can't believe it's been 10 years. But I don't think I look 29. Most 29 year olds don't have grey streaks and a wardrobe of safe Boden separates covered in baby snot. Cam looks 10x better than me cos she goes to the gym and the hairdresser. I gave up the gym when I went back to work and the hairdresser after ds2 arrived.

Oh dear, she's already living in the past.....please everyone who's already in the club (no not that club, I mean the 40+ club)let's help Dannie to look to the future and realise that life BEGINS at 40

such as....
40 means you're at the start of a new decade so you feel young again

(Managed to get it in there 3 times)

It really does, Dannie. Definitely focus on the beginning of a new decade. And if Cam thinks you look soignee, then to the pair of you!!
(fat, frantic & happy forty-nothing)

If you've had your babies BEFORE 40, you count as young on Mumsnet, girl.

40 is deeply fab. Mind you I personally am now 41...

Does this mean I can be middle aged now? I had a dreadful Victor Meldrew moment this morning when I completely lost my temper with some poor child from the BBC who called to ask me for a phone number (look it up, ffs)

i'm quite looking forward to being 40. Have yet to reach 39 though .

No, Dannie, that is Normal Irritation with Moppet Researcher as experienced by many of us.

But can I wear baggy cardies and read Good Housekeeping (all those useful Christmas recipes, I'm not entirely being sarcastic here)
Pleasingly, DD's friend's mum is having a second child at 42, making me feel a bit less like Antique Breeding Person, and also very pleased for them.

I was recently in one of the world's very poorest countries and people were giving my mobile phone pitying looks. If that isn't an indicator of being middle aged, I don't know what is! I met a bloke who runs a big infrastructure project and he was boasting that his workers hadn't used a phone in their lives and now they all had picture phones. And I had to grit my teeth really hard to stop myself saying "So are you teaching their wives to read and giving their kids antimalarials, or are you just giving them picture phones?"
Actually I like being old. There are swathes of contemporary music I won't have to worry about until my kids are old enough to explain them to me.

Could you delete the word 'old' in that post, please, and replace it with 'pleasingly mature'??

I turned [whispers] 40 a couple of months ago. I don't want to imply its all down hill from here, but I went to the opticians yesterday for an annual check up (I wear very fashionable tinted contact lenses). I mentioned in passing that I found it took a nanosecond longer to focus when, for example, I looked up at the telly from a magazine and she asked whether I would I like to consider [gulp] bifocals!!!!

Yep. I went for an eye test a couple of weeks ago cos I work at a computer and the scarily young woman testing me said "Oh yes most people's eyes start to deteriorate between 40 and 45". Don't need glasses yet though

I keep going for eye-tests hoping they'll give me some glasses so that I can hide the wrinkles around my eyes

The glasses magnify them, Cam

Young People should be banned from opticians IMO.

7 days and counting........how are you doing Dannie?

Tick

Tick

Tick

(evil cackles from the Crone Brigade)

So? The last week of my 30s is shaping up to look much like every other week of my 30s. The office has conveniently forgotten I'm on holiday (booked leave cos my kids' nanny is on holiday, which I thought was a solid reason for not attempting to work) and I'm up to my neck in stuff. I have a horrible suspicion that an unspecified number of people will arrive for lunch on Sunday to discover I've completely forgotten about them. I think DS2 must have swallowed the cap of the hydrocortisone cream, but can't be sure. Am I supposed to believe next week will be worse than this cos I'm 40? Hah!

Aha, you see, life will suddenly become a serene vista of manageablity when you reach the Age Of Maturity. Just look at Cam.

You're right. The lid turned up. No need to report me to social services as Too Senile To Care For a Baby (yet...)

Lol motherinferior! If only.....

Anyway back to the subject in hand, 5 days to go.....

Glad to see you're trying to brazen it out now Dannie, see it's just as I said, it won't make any difference at all (except you'll look 30)

I mean 5 days to go......

Four and a half, now...

At least you can get drunk on the ahem Big Day. I was hugely, distendedly pregnant on my 40th.

Yes, she's stopped breastfeeding specially....