Time Flies

Two things happened recently that made me feel old.

First, I turned 36. Birthdays hadn't bothered me much in the past, but, when I started doing the multiplication -- I think that this was one day when I was walking over to play softball, the sport that claimed my right ankle last year and has recently broken the bones of at least three guys I either know personally or was watching during the incident -- I realized that 36 is 18 times 2. O-kaayy, twice as old as 18. Still better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, though.

Second, Bob Barker retired. Yes, retired, after 1,543 years of game-show-hosting. I believe that Grandpa Bob actually started his career as one of the Irish monks who helped saved civilization during the Dark Ages. Bob saved the part about the prices of dinette sets, washers, driers and hot dogs carts and spaying and neutering your pets.

But, really . . . I watched The Price Is Right almost literally from infancy. One of my earliest non-Watergate memories is sitting in our living room trying to talk to Bob (OK, maybe one of the hostesses) through the TV and having my mom tell me that the people on TV can't hear you. (But what if they could? Pleeaaase, Jack, Sawyer and Kate, go away for a while. Chloe, go to the CTU cafeteria and get a nice chocolate-vanilla swirl soft serve, it will make you feel better.) As a teenager, I loved The Price Is Right. I spent way, way too much time during the summer watching Bob on the show. One of my greatest accomplishments is that, on one magical day when I was about 14, I guessed within $100 on both showcases. Dude, man! My freshman year of college, I was sitting in my dorm room one day minding my own business when, suddenly, the small guy with the really loud voice (no, not me, the other one) yelled "OH MY GOD!!!" down the hall I leapt out of my room, looking to see who had set something on fire now, when the guy then yelled, "THE BITCH OVERBID ON THE WASHER!!!" Yes, he was watching The Price.

And who held that cultural jewel together? Bob. For 877 years, Bob hosted that show. When it was on during the day. When it was on at night. With the dark, natural hair. With the dark, dyed hair. With the white, natural hair. Saying something other than "spay and neuter your pets" at the end. Saying that every single day at the end. Watching as women busted out of their tube tops running down to contestants row. Running away from Samoans who wanted to put a death grip on him. Bob was there, the Walter Cronkite of game shows.

Then about 1992 or so, Bob started showing us his more human depth. "Depth" in lots of senses. Acting depth, in his classic turn in Happy Gilmore, slugging Adam Sandler. Personal depth (as is "god, how low can you go?") in that he apparently had been harassing the hostesses for years, according to the hostesses at least. No longer was Bob just the guy who had hosted game shows during the Crusades. Now we knew Bob to be a game show host with feet of clay.

And now he has retired. It is the end of an epoch, a geologic age. I suppose that this had to happen at some point. Mike Wallace retired from 60 Minutes, right? Storm Thurmond retired from the Senate, right? The Rolling Stones retired from touring, right? (Oh, sorry. But that does remind me, when will we finally learn why Keith Richards was in the coconut tree?!? It's a cover-up of Mulderian portion.) So Grandpa Bob's bowing-out made me feel old, too.

But, of course, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Standing in line at Safeway yesterday, I saw on Soap Opera Digest that Bo and Hope are back together on Days of Our Lives. What is this, 1985?