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Balsamic Dreams

by Joe Queenan

Baby boomers the most self-absorbed, most avaricious and most annoying generation ever. One reason they are so annoying is that they never grow up - like BB icon Robin Williams who keeps popping up in films about middle-aged men who still think they are adorable little scamps.

75 million Americans born 1944-60 persist in the delusion that they are really smart, really good and really cool, despite the fact that the BB generation gave us Cher, Abba and George Bush.

They blame parents for embarassments such as Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra, but they've given us musical atrocities like Carole King, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Elton John and Bette Midler.

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Can say some nice things about BBs: may not have eliminated poverty, AIDS or nuclear weapons, but at least have made it possible to get a good cup of coffee anywhere in the world, and probably a good salad with balsamic and coriander.

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Started out bringing down Richard Nixon, and ended up raising the price of proscuito and buffalo mozarella.

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Queenan had an apothesis with a death scare - immediately started worrying about all the things he hadn't done: learning to fly, do tai chi etc, and where his ashes should be scattered (the Seine got the tick) Then after his cancer scare over, he realized how selfish his reaction was - rather than try to make the world a better place, actually embarked on a mad binge of self-aggrandizement.

"Despite the lovingly constructed facade of charm, wit, sophistication and class that masqueraded as personality, I was basically worthless."

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Reputation Control .......................................................................................Client William Flew