"Losing It: In which an Aging Professor laments his shrinking Brain..."

That's the name of new book — buy it here — by Michigan lawprof William Ian Miller, who has ripened to the age of 65 years. He gives a fascinating (and not decrepit) interview:

Because we no longer have mandatory retirement, we... must take ourselves out of the game; we have to figure out when we no longer are up to it, no longer worth our salary, no longer wanted, no longer really count for much. How can you rightly read where you stand when your ability to think is decaying at an accelerating pace?...

The book has six parts. The first deals with mental decay.... The second takes on wisdom and casts a fairly jaundiced eye in that direction. What wisdom is to be expected from people whose brains are shrinking, who cannot remember much very well, and who tediously repeat stories, or in the manner of Polonius, give advice the young find boring and manifestly ignorable?...

The third part deals with complaining, the various styles of complaint, such as pissing and moaning, kvetching, lamenting, whining, etc.... The fourth is about retirements from revenge; it is the medieval stuff that got me going on this project.... The fifth part has me dealing with going soft... And last: how to go out in style....

This sounds great. I'm going to read this book. Miller is very sharp, despite his advanced age. You could also read this excerpt from the book if you don't have much time (left).

Miller scoffs at the studies that purport to show that oldies are especially happy folk: "My suspicion is that if there is in fact happiness, it is a symptom of the brain shrinkage that comes with old age, of no longer being able to think very precisely. "