The young whippersnapper at work told me that the outfit I wore was very �in.� Well, no, actually she asked me if I knew it was very in. I thought about getting very huffy, about puffing up and telling her that I intended to be stylish but someone would have laughed. Of course I didn�t know it was very in to wear a black outfit with white piping or trim. I just knew that this outfit is comfortable but looks professional, a rare combination. I should know that�I�ve had the outfit for years.

Despite having had to teach my spell-checker the twelve letter obscenity and other current slang and swear words, despite my knowledge of gang signs and the distinctions between various gangs, and despite my familiarity with the slang and effects of the latest street drugs, I�m hopelessly out of it. When I was a teenager, I did not know what bands were the latest bands. If I followed the trends, I usually did so just as they were about to fade. Age hasn�t changed me.

My mother�s best friend was someone who used to keep up with trends. My mother was like me but even more so. I still remember the time my mom�s friend called her up and warned her that she�d have to give up her saddle shoes. Apparently, while Mom wasn�t paying attention, they�d come back in style. I guess that�s something like my outfit today.

You�d think I�d have half a chance of knowing trends now that I have a teenager and a preteen. The teenager pays some attention to trends. The preteen pays a lot of attention to trends. They tell me things but I can�t seem to remember them. Either I am lacking the gene that allows one to follow trends or I have only a small part of my intellectual hard drive allocated for such files. Perhaps I have the files but lack the program needed to read them. Is there a place to download it to my brain and if I did would my life be better? Naw, forget it. If I found the program and downloaded it, it immediately would become obsolete.

The only trends I�ve ever been even a peripheral part of in the early phases have been nerdy trends. I learned some computer programming back in high school in the early 1970s. I found online forums fairly early in their development. While computer development has passed me by, I was hot stuff among the computer cowboys who kept the mac pluses running in the olden days at my office. I�m not even a trendy geek any more. I�ve had my fifteen minutes of trendiness.

So, no, I�m not in. I�m not even close, except by accident. But out isn�t so bad. After all, it was 65 degrees out yesterday, even though it was December. But I think it�s the tale end of that trend too.

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