From alcohol to zinc: The definitive A-Z of midlife men

Last week I turned 43. Unnervingly, this means that, according to the Office for National Statistics, I’m exactly halfway to the most common age at death for British men. I’m midlife – literally.

Which is why it felt like an apt time to compile this A-Z on the world of the modern midlife male...

Alcohol 

It used to pep you up. Now it sends you to sleep.

Barbecue 

The one type of cooking all men can do. Or at least insist on doing.

Clothes 

Increasingly a nightmare. Jeans make you look like Jeremy Clarkson. Chinos make you look like David Cameron. Hoodies make you look like a giant toddler. 

Doctor 

Someone you avoid. Partly out of macho conviction that you’re fine. And partly out of private fear that you aren’t.

Eyebrows 

Now weirdly tufty, making you resemble a displeased owl.

Films 

These days far too long, for either your patience or your bladder. A landslide awaits the political party which pledges that no cinema may screen any film over 90 minutes. 

Gym 

Place where men in their 40s go to sit and stare into the middle distance for an hour, while taking occasional sips from a bottle of water.

Hair 

Used to grow out of your scalp. Now grows out of your nostrils.

Instructions 

Things you don’t need to read.

Jack Reacher 

The ultimate midlife male fantasy. No boss. No mortgage. No one asking him why he still hasn’t cleared out the garage.

Keto 

Diet that makes you feel like a man because it’s lots of meat. But also like a teenage boy because it gives you spots.

Lights 

It’s like Blackpool Illuminations in here. Do they think you’re made of money?

Metabolism 

A distant memory from your youth, like Game Boys or Shed Seven.

Not going out 

Why go to some boring party when you could have a far nicer time at home watching a Channel 5 documentary about Britain’s 50 Favourite Motorway Services?

Old days 

Things that were better then: The Simpsons; music; Cadbury’s; The Onion; your attention span, before your phone ruined it. 

Politics 

No, of course you aren’t getting more Right-wing as you get older. Everyone else just seems to have got more Left-wing, that’s all.

QI 

You remember almost nothing you learnt at A-level. Yet you remember almost everything you’ve learnt from repeats of a BBC Two panel show.

Radio 2 

Station you’d always assumed was for people who are old and uncool, but has clearly undergone a dramatic change of direction as it now seems to be playing lots of songs from when you were a teenager.

Snoring 

The Richter-shattering din you emit each night is loud enough to wake everyone in the house. Except, somehow, you.

TV 

When watching any new drama, you and your partner now turn to each other roughly every five minutes to ask, “Hey, isn’t that Thingy? You know, the actor who played that bloke in that thing? Or was it that other thing?”

Uber 

Godsend that ensures middle-aged men are no longer woken at 1am by their teenage children phoning to plead for a lift home.

VAR 

Main topic of conversation with male friends. Narrowly ahead of mortgage rises and history podcasts.

Waiters 

Suddenly all appear to be around 15 years old. See also: policemen, teachers, prime ministers.

Xmas 

From now on you only want gifts that are of practical everyday use. For example: tools, gadgets, household appliances, and whisky.

Youth of today 

Spoiled, self-righteous, and hopelessly naive about the harsh realities of life. Unlike you when you were their age.

Zinc 

Plus omega-3, ‘live cultures’, and the many other expensive men’s health supplements that have no noticeable effect on anything except your bank balance.