I keep trying to hold the aging process at bay, but it’s a losing battle.

I try to run regularly, but typically end up just hurting my knees or ankles. I try to eat right, but end up eating too much of whatever it is that’s before me.

Last night, something happened that made me realize I was just old and there’s no turning back.

After arriving at my hotel in Andalusia, Ala. Early Tuesday evening, I skipped dinner with my traveling companions so that I could get in a run. After getting back and cleaning up I went out for a dinner, to Andalusia’s only Mexican restaurant. I enjoyed a Dos Equis with my dinner. I saw a Winn-Dixie supermarket on my way back to the hotel and remembered seeing a refrigerator in my room.

I thought, &uot;That beer was pretty good, I think I’ll stop and get a six pack and sip on a couple this evening while I watch a ballgame.&uot;

Inside the supermarket I was looking over the beer selection and noticed it was directly across from the ice cream cooler. And there it was. Blue Bell Ice Cream.

I was in heaven. Blue Bell is regional brand that’s made in Texas. I hadn’t had any since I lived in Alabama in the mid-1980s.

So instead of beer, I took a pint of Blue Bell Cookies & Cream back to my room and feasted on that. That’s just not something a young person does, alone, away from home, living off the company dime, within driving distance of Mississippi casinos and I’m here having ice cream.

Laxatives and Depends undergarments can’t be far away.