A month ago…

“How old are you, if you don’t mind me asking?”, I said rather nonchalantly.

She looked at me for a second with a bemused expression on her face, then laughed.

“Older than you, that’s for sure.”

“How old?”

“I’m forty.”

My jaw opened wide as I not-so-smoothly stalled, shifted to reverse, and backed up hastily.

“I thought you were younger”, was the only thing I could think of to mumble.

At this point, she started to laugh, then through teary-eyed mirth, gasped something about “Oil of Olay doing its job”.

Mortified, I sent a silent prayer up to God and begged Him to send a lightning bolt down and swiftly end my humiliation.