YOUR ANTI-AGING CARD

It's bad enough AARP sends you a card before you even turn 50. Never mind your sophomoric tastes. Never mind that 50 is the new 40. Never mind that you're doing yoga and eating bran. Never mind you won't be able to retire until you're 90. Fasten your seatbelt, 'cause you're heading for the Pearly Gates and for a fee, AARP will ease the way.

They might as well have called it HARP. The Grim Reaper shows up in your mailbox looking like just another official document; like a social security card, or tax audit. Death and taxes. It's a foregone conclusion you will send them twelve bucks, if you believe their official-looking literature. But you are being robbed, you idiot.

AARP is just another thieving company reaching into your pocket. And once you sign on, you will be robbed every year 'til death do you part. Worse still, you won't even use your group discounts because you will never admit you are AARP material.

And what are the discounts to? "Oh look hon, there's a 10% discount on Bingo tonight," or, "Quick, get in the car, the last Howard Johnsons in Massachusetts is having an AARP special on the turkey with stuffing Saturday nite."

The only people proudly flashing their AARP cards are those who can't remember turning 50. Hello? I take my Gingko just so I can remember turning 50.

As if it wasn't bad enough that my "going problem" is a "growing problem," my TV tells me I must toss AVADARTs at my bladder 'til I walk around like a human sprinkler. Who the hell thought up that name? But not to worry, DEPENZ will allow me to dash to the pharmacy to buy METAMUCIL so I can move my bowels, before wetting my whistle.

As if it wasn't bad enough I must inject snake venum to BOTOXify the nerves wrinkling my forehead, I must now wear a lampshade to cover up my 12-hour erections.

Face lifts, breast lifts, and dick lifts have lifted us to the point where, if we weren't "GELLIN," our toes would barely touch the ground. With everything heading north, it's not hard to see why our bank accounts are going south. Imagine explaining to your daughter, "I''m sorry honey, but you'll be stiffed out of your inheritance because daddy overdosed on VIAGRA."

Thank heaven they've given us more sleep medicines because old farts (formerly Baby Boomers) can't fall asleep. The names alone will put you to sleep: LUNESTA, AMBIEN, SOMINEX. The only side effects are "drowsiness while operating heavy equipment," and with the new time-release version, "death." Thank God I don't operate heavy equipment!

"Death" isn't so bad: It's what they call your last payment at AARP.

That's it. I'm starting a new company. CARP. On their 30th birthday, I'll send every citizen and illegal alien a little CARP membership card and charge them only six bucks -- a savings of 50%. They'll be no unnecessary discounts (indeed, no discounts at all) and best of all, the brochure won't have Paul Newman's face on the cover.

In fact, CARP literature will contain no rhetoric at all about being as young as you feel, which only made you feel older. Until your ALIEVE kicked in.

Hell, why don't we just get started? Mail $6, (no pennies or pesos please) to PO Box 17793240871902447, Laguna Beach CA, and you'll receive your very own anti-AARP CARP card.

One free lifetime membership will go to the winning entry in the "What Does CARP Stand For?" contest.