Thanks to everyone who’s posted on this thread so far, particularly those who have shared some pretty strong feelings on the subject under discussion. There are a few posters I would like to respond to here.
elucidator: I understand what you’re saying about the people I see on a near-on daily basis at my place of employment not necessarily being a representative sample of the elderly. I once read that aged care workers are, somewhat ironically, more likely to have ageist attitudes than the rest of the population since they tend to deal with the worst cases of ageing on a regular basis.
Aries28: I hear you about the need for more paragraphs in the OP. I write quite a bit, and writing overlong paragraphs is a bad habit of mine that I still have to break. 
Lynn Bodoni: You were still getting regularly carded until only a few years ago, and you’re 46? Lucky you! I must admit, though, that my situation is somewhat similar: blessed, as I have been, with a beautiful baby face. (I’m the oldest of three boys in my family yet people often think I’m the youngest! ) An Australian citizen, I did come over to the States for a holiday at the beginning of 2002 (I spent most of my time staying with a friend in San Antonio, Texas), and was carded myself whenever I went into any place that sold liquor. I remember one security guy looking rather stunned when I showed him my ID (a learner’s permit for a driver’s licence I still haven’t got), which was sort of amusing, not to mention flattering. Those friends of my friend that I met while I was over there also seemed taken aback by my disgustingly youthful looks; they said I looked about twelve! (His reply was to tell them that he could remember a time in the past when I seemed to look perpetually four!)
As for your comments on plastic surgery, I haven’t had any myself though I certainly wouldn’t rule it out if I thought it’d do some good. The closest thing I’ve had to it so far would be laser hair removal for my face.
MsRobyn: Your comments about what ailments of old age tend to run in your family were interesting. In my own family, the two main killers tend to be cancer (on my mother’s side) and heart disease (on my father’s), so I’m pretty much screwed (at least death from heart disease tends to be quick)!
Luckily, Alzheimer’s doesn’t seem to run in either side of my family although my maternal grandmother got dementia just before she died. In her case, though, the doctors thought that her affliction had simply been caused by an almost-complete lack of mental stimulation, for, ever since her husband had died (of a heart attack, nearly twelve years before she did), she had spent most of her time just sitting at her kitchen table, staring into space, and waiting for her own time to come. Thankfully(?), in keeping with the aforementioned fine tradition on my mother’s side of the family, she also had cancer, which killed her before the dementia really had a chance to take hold. I only saw her once when she was really bad from it; she couldn’t even recognize me or my mother which I found most unsettling (I’ve heard that that’s the worst stage of dementia as far as the family and friends of the afflicted are concerned). Less fortunate is my immediate supervisor at work who’s had both of her parents (as well as a few aunts and uncles IIRC) die of Alzheimer’s or something very much like it. I really feel sorry for her.
masonite: Your comments were thought-provoking: so much so that my reply to them really warrants a post of its own.
kiz: While I’m glad to hear that you understand where I’m coming from when I say just how much I detest the abomination that is Alzheimer’s disease, I’m sorry to hear why. I remember once reading a (very depressing) book on the subject years ago, in which a caregiver expressed sentiments very similar to your own. While she didn’t word it quite as strongly as this, she basically said that she was pissed off that, while her demented mother had had her life, she was wasting hers wiping up the other woman’s shit. This book also mentioned just how demanding caregiving was (certainly, I wouldn’t want to be looking after any of the dementia cases at my workplace 24/7), and mentioned that those sanctimonious fuckwits who railed against the “selfishness” of a caregiver who just wanted to stick the object of their care into a home were usually those family members, friends and whatever who didn’t bother to help out with the task, and therefore had no idea of what it actually entailed.
My mother experienced similar problems when her mother got dementia. Thankfully, she didn’t have to look after my grandmother, but she got lumbered with the job of finding accommodation for her. The trouble with my grandmother was that the severity of her condition fluctuated wildly - one day she’d be completely out of it, the next you’d swear there wasn’t anything wrong with her - and a lot of places would only take people who were either still largely independent or completely hopeless cases. Therefore, no sooner would my mother get my grandmother booked into one place (a difficult enough job given how scarce nursing home vacancies are in my part of the world) than her condition would change, rendering her completely unsuitable for the place in question! My mother is one of five children, and from what I heard, her brothers and sisters did NOTHING to help her.
