Arlo and Janis by Jimmy Johnson for January 22, 2021

Looks like JJ is trying to paint Janis with that brush.

Hmm. That’s not so much cognitive decline as learned dependence on technology.

Janis has CD-ROM

Cognitive Decline with a Reliance On Maps

This definitely isn’t the normal flavor of strip with Arlo and Janis. Even this subject has been addressed with more humor in the past.

Hmmm… I wonder what Jimmy J is up to this week.

She doesn’t know where she is!

Janis forgot her way home.

With the Boomer Bulge starting to fill that demographic there are going to be a lot more reports of lost seniors. Eventually they will have to consider sub dermal chips and tracking devices.

The boomers caused a lot of schools to be built. Now the country will have to determine how to warehouse the old folk. Then figure out where to get the labor. One adult can’t provide for 25 seniors like one teacher for 25 kids.

Meanwhile the anti-Kevorkians will make sure that we do not leave with dignity even if it is our choice.

Check please!

Thanks to Covid, and we are self-isolating, I went yesterday to run errands like groceries, appointment, post office… Errands that I’ve run multiple times over the last eight-plus years.

I literally got lost and needed Google Maps to get me unlost. Stress Brain sucks.

Getting lost going for your daily walk is a VERY bad sign.

Shortly after we moved, I took the dogs on a long walk. Went by the high school, but when I got to the exit, the cross street wasn’t labeled! Only time I’ve ever used the Maps function on my phone. Left turn, over the hill, and back to familiar territory.

Is Jimmy trying to tell us that either he or someone important in his life is in the beginning stages of some form of dementia?

Janis, go home and remind him that he is still a raging bull of a man!

Of all the things that I have lost, I miss my mind the most.

They are too young for this.

I am slowly losing my mind (and no it is not because I have given people a piece of my mind). To deal with this I have taken to just using the first letter of each of the words in a sentence. Thus no one understands me, I don’t care about anything and I am blissfully happy. iaslmm(aniinbigpapomm). tdwtihttjutfloeotwias. tnoum,idcaaaiabh. thank you texters for making anacronyms popular – now I can make up my own and not be PC and nobody but me knows ROFL. On another note – I have a built-in excuse for all the promises I make – like, I will not discuss politics, religion, or sex again. I just love getting old, it is so relaxing.

Janis is leaning into hers by adapting, using tools. I wish is was that easy for other folks.

I wonder who it reflects more on JJ or us that the “negative utopia” outcomes from the start of this story line is where so many of us commenters lean. Perhaps it represents what we fear as we or those around us get older? I know for myself that I have been extremely fortunate that the older people in my world (including those that have passed) have and did not suffered unduly from the effects of age cognitively. I’m sure that if I had faced that in them, I would see this story differently.

Being an older man, I am offended; er, what was the question…

I’ve always loved this strip. But I really don’t like the MANY ways in which Janis disrespects Arlo.

Why the Maps ap on a walk around her neighborhood? Has she forgotten how to get home?

C’mon, Janis! Let Arlo have this one!

My wife and I have, for 30 years now, walked 1.33 miles nearly every day. Now, thanks to this covid-crap it is all done indoors on the treadmill we bought at a yard sale. (I only know the “mileage” because that what it says on the treadmill after 20 minutes walking 4 MPH)

I’m thinking JJ is showing us how easy it is to see faults in others while not recognizing those same faults in yourself.

I don’t worry much about cognitive decline. If I declined any further, I’d be vegetative.

I sort of feel like Arlo. I loose track of what grocery list, small items, re check to make sure I have locked up the house. But yet remember military forms and call signs. Little things from school, some song lyrics, places and times of the past. But forget the day or what my wife wanted me to remember.

Where the Heckawe?

Can’t males be drama kings?

Yet she needs a map to walk in her neighborhood

When we go on a trip (sometimes even locally) husband puts on his GPS (I was told sat nav is more correct?) devices – yes devices. He runs the one in his cell phone and the one he bought for the car/one built into our RV. Sometimes they argue with each other – “turn here” “turn in 2 blocks”…

We tend to go on the same trips year to year or at least over a period of years for around 50 years. I am not sure why he cannot remember how to go to someplace that we have go to 4 – 6 times a year (except this year of course) over this time – that he first showed me how to get to.

One year he was in a panic as the one device we had with us was not working (pre cell phones). How would we get to where we going – a folk craft fair about 45 minutes north of where we were in PA. I could not believe it. I went through the route with him step by step and each time he agreed with it – but still was concerned about not having a GPS to guide him.

we had to take our small RV (Chevy van) to the dealer and leave it there for work – so we also had to bring our van to come home. He was in a total panic about driving without me. I pointed out to him that we would mostly car roads and would be the two largest, tallest vehicles on the roads and again this was 90% of the way roads we drive on since 1970s – but he was in a total panic. I had to drive the RV while he drove the van so he could see me ahead of him.

Accepting it makes it happen faster.