Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder

You know how, for a while now, they need to find acronyms, or a bunch of letters put together to shorten conversations? It’s been particularly true since the invention of texting, or social media. It seems like people don’t know how to spell words anymore. And because of it, at times, trying to follow a conversation can be… challenging, at best. You don’t believe me? Take this example.

Here’s a new one for us, older folks. It is called the Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder, or AAADD for short. Just don’t ask us to remember that though… But here’s how AAADD works.

I decide to wash the car. I start toward the garage and notice the mail on the table. OK, I’m going to wash the car…but first, I’m going to go through the mail.

I lay the car keys down on the desk, discard the junk mail…and notice the trash can is full. OK, I’ll just put the bills on the desk and take the trash out, but since I’m going to be near the mailbox anyway, I’ll pay these few bills first.

Now where is the checkbook? Oops…there’s only one check left. My extra checks are in the desk. As I start looking for the checks, I see the coke I was drinking sitting on the desk…I’m going to look for those checks…

But first I need to put my coke further away from the computer… oh, maybe I’ll pop it into the fridge to keep it cold for a while… I head toward the kitchen and the plants catch my eye, they need some water… I set the coke on the counter and uh oh! There’s my glasses… I was looking for them all morning!  I’m pretty sure I really don’t have age activated attention deficit disorder.

I’d better put the glasses away first. I fill a container with water and head for the flowerpots. Aaaaaagh! Someone left the TV remote in the kitchen. We’ll never think to look in the kitchen tonight when we want to watch television so I’d better put it back in the family room where it belongs.

I splash some water into the pots and onto the floor, I throw the remote onto a soft cushion on the sofa and I head back down the hall trying to figure out what it was I was going to do…!!??!!  And it’s NOT an aging disorder, or deficit, or anything like that, I think.

It’s the end of the day: The car isn’t washed, the bills are unpaid, the coke is sitting on the kitchen counter, flowers are half watered, the checkbook still only has one check in it and I can’t seem to find my car keys!

When I try to figure out how come nothing got done today, I’m baffled because I KNOW I WAS BUSY ALL DAY LONG!!! I realize this Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder is a serious condition and I’d better get help, BUT FIRST I think I’ll check my e-mail…