Golden Age turn-ons and offs

Unless you count the Homer and Jethro record that my mom bought for me when I was six (which featured such enduring classics as “Let Me Go, Blubber” and “She Made Toothpicks of the Timber of My Heart”), the first LP I ever owned was the Twist and Shout Beatles album released by Capitol Records of Canada in February 1964.

In that more innocent era, it was standard practice for the PR types who wrote the notes printed on the back of albums to include lighthearted data sheets intended to give fans titillating insights into what made the latest heartthrobs and pop idols tick.

Under the “Personally Speaking” section of the cardboard Twist and Shout cover, for example, kids like me were fascinated to learn that John Lennon “likes the colour black, steak and chips and jelly, admires the work of singers Carl Perkins, Chuck Berry, Ben E. King, The Shirelles, Larry Williams, Little Richard, The Miracles, Elvis Presley, Gene Vincent and Kay Starr.” He also “likes music, books, curries, painting, television and some modern jazz … and dislikes thick heads and traditional jazz.”

George Harrison “likes casual clothes, Alfred Hitchcock, and goes for the girl who is blonde and smallish.” He “dislikes having his hair cut and travelling on buses.” Ringo Starr, whose ambition (shooting for the moon) is “to own a string of hairdressing salons,” dislikes “onions, tomatoes, Chinese food, motor bikes and Donald Duck.”

I’ll spare you the Paul McCartney bumph, but will observe that it makes no mention, pro or con, of his feelings toward having “a prosthetic-limbed second wife who will make my life a living hell in about 40 years.”

Similar inventories were a staple of fan and girlie magazines in the 1960s and ’70s. No red-blooded North American male who grew up in those decades can ever quite forget that Playmates of the Month unfailingly listed some variation of “walking on the beach and sunsets” as major turn-ons and “guys who are insecure or who come on too strong” as major turnoffs. (That last one continues to befuddle the Manosphere, perpetually enraged over bowls of Captain Crunch in parental basements everywhere.)

This sort of tabulated popcorn trivia had pretty much run its course by the early 1980s. But now that we’re more than halfway through the Roaring Wildfire Twenties and everything old is new again, your faithful correspondents here at The Cataract Courier are of the opinion that today’s older seniors — from the Chinese food detractors to the sworn despisers of onions — deserve an opportunity to bare their souls, regardless of how they feel about the colour black, steak and chips, smallish blondes or Donald Duck.

We visited some tables next to the Market Mall lottery kiosk recently to canvass 20 random members of the over-80 set, asking them to reveal the turn-ons and turnoffs that either make their golden years sparkle or leave them muttering into their tapioca pudding. This is what they told us:

1. Sven Swiveller, 82, retired Swedish chef who spends his spare time rebuilding durable Volvo luxury sedans, wagons and SUVs.

Turn-ons: Greta Garbo choppers on an Anita Ekberg torsion-bar front suspension; a perfectly aligned set of dual exhausts; women who know the difference between a hemi and a hernia.

Turn-offs: Any music since ABBA packed it in; lutefisk plaque trapped under braces; radial tires on a 2012 Saab that deserves bias-ply.

2. Mabel Fudd, 87, former librarian and three-time runner-up in the Junior Miss Moose Jaw Beauty Pageant (1952-54).

Turn-ons: Bearded, bare-chested lumberjacks with more than a superficial understanding of how call numbers work in the Dewey Decimal Classification system; a clean ashtray; a gentleman who knows when to remove his fedora indoors.

Turn-offs: Tattoos above the collarbone; self-checkout machines; men who say “awesome” when they mean “quite satisfactory.”

3. Barry “The Blender” Blenkinsop, 81, retired radio disc jockey who refers to his hearing aids as “monitoring equipment.”

Turn-ons: The Ronettes at full volume; a girl who can do the Watusi without pulling a hamstring; a transistor radio with four fresh D-cell batteries.

Turn-offs: Rap; podcasts longer than the B-side of Their Satanic Majesties Request; anyone who says the Beatles were better after they stopped touring.

4. Dolores DeMille, 84, former burlesque dancer who now teaches chair yoga at the Legion.

Turn-ons: A man with a well-maintained hip flexor; a mink stole; the opening bars of Peggy Lee’s “Fever.”

Turn-offs: Velcro shoes; men who wear cargo shorts to a funeral; anyone who mistakes a standing ovation for a medical emergency.

5. Earl “Two-Stroke” McGillicuddy, 89, retired small-engine mechanic and lifelong bachelor.

Turn-ons: A woman who can prime a carburetor; the smell of two-cycle oil; a Saturday night without a check-engine light.

Turn-offs: Electric lawnmowers and leafblowers; pronoun preferences in a dating profile; anyone who puts ethanol in a vintage chainsaw and calls it progress.

6. Phyllis Prendergast, 83, retired high-school typing teacher who can still manage 85 words a minute, provided the keyboard has actual keys.

Turn-ons: Correct punctuation; a man who knows his way around a semicolon; a handwritten love letter with no spelling errors.

Turn-offs: Texts reading “U up?”; voice-to-text messages that turn “darling” into “darkling”; ignorami who think they’ll come off as more decisive if they use three exclamation marks when one would suffice.

7. Murray Goldfarb, 86, retired haberdasher and proud owner of 47 neckties, none of which he has worn since 2019.

Turn-ons: A double-breasted suit; a Windsor knot; women who understand that pocket squares are not handkerchiefs.

Turn-offs: Athleisure; bare ankles in January; the phrase “business casual,” which Murray regards as a contradiction in terms and an omen of irreversible moral collapse.

8. Beryl St. Clair, 91, former switchboard operator who once connected a call between a Manitoba premier and his mistress and has never quite recovered from the excitement.

Turn-ons: A man who can keep a secret; the click of a rotary dial; a telephone conversation that begins with: “Are you sitting down? I have something to tell you.”

Turn-offs: Caller ID; group chats; being told that the affair she overheard in 1967 is now “ancient history.”

9. Stanislav “Stan the Man” Kowalski, 85, retired hockey referee who still owns a whistle and isn’t afraid to use it at the breakfast table.

Turn-ons: A clean, rock-’em, sock-’em body check; a woman who understands how delayed offsides work; the national anthem as sung by tenor Roger Doucet.

Turn-offs: Shootouts; self-important stripes who linger over faceoff circles like they’re defusing a bomb while the crowd fidgets to high-energy clips of AC/DC and jostling centres wait for the bloody puck to drop; players who earn more in one shift than Stan made in his career.

10. Marjorie Tuttle, 88, former travel agent who has visited 32 countries but now considers the pharmacy across the street an exotic destination.

Turn-ons: A man with a valid passport; a window seat; hotel stationery and those tiny bars of soap that the big chains don’t stock anymore.

Turn-offs: Airport security; $19 airport sandwiches; travel influencers who describe a six-hour layover in Doha as “my journey of self-discovery.”

11. Vernon Pickles, 82, retired dairy farmer whose romantic life peaked during the 1964 World’s Fair in New York.

Turn-ons: A woman who knows the difference between Jersey and Holstein; a full moon over the pasture; a 6 a.m. grilled cheese at Tim’s.

Turn-offs: Oat milk; people who refer to cows as “livestock partners”; anyone who says farming is easy because modern tractors practically drive themselves.

12. Eunice Bumpstead, 90, former church organist and self-appointed arbiter of acceptable behaviour in the neighbourhood.

Turn-ons: A baritone who can sustain a high F; men who kneel without requiring a chair to get back up; a tasteful bit of scandal.

Turn-offs: The crinkling of candy wrappers being opened during the service; yoga pants at the supermarket; young people who say “literally” when they mean “figuratively,” especially during the sermon. (Yes, Pastor Phil, she’s stink-eyeing you. And for the love of all that’s holy, please leave your guitar in its case.)

13. Leonard “Lenny” Lube, 84, retired service-station owner whose first wife left him after he proposed naming their son Pennzoil.

Turn-ons: A woman in coveralls; a freshly greased universal joint; the sound of a V8 turning over on a frosty morning.

Turn-offs: Touchscreens in automobiles; cars that beep when you back up; a mechanic who says the problem is “somewhere in the computer.”

14. Shirley Templeton, 86, retired dance-hall hostess who claims she once turned down Liberace because he was “too darn flashy.”

Turn-ons: A man who can foxtrot without counting aloud; Brylcreem and Dippity-Do; anyone in a dinner jacket with satin lapels who agrees with her that Liberace was straight as an arrow, despite what “that old biddy” Gwendolyn Throckmorton says.

Turn-offs: Line dancing; men who dance with their hands in their pockets; the phrase “I don’t really dance” from a man who has spent 40 minutes explaining his pickleball strategy.

15. Harold “Hal”itosis, 81, retired dentist whose breath-freshening regimen has become a source of concern among his bridge partners.

Turn-ons: Peppermint; a woman who flosses daily; the gentle hum of a properly functioning ultrasonic scaler.

Turn-offs: Garlic; open-mouth chewing; people who describe dental implants as “the new dentures.”

16. Gwendolyn Throckmorton, 89, former antiques dealer who can identify a Chippendale chair at 50 paces but can’t remember why she just walked into the kitchen.

Turn-ons: Mahogany; a gentleman with a good patina; a little French polishing after dinner.

Turn-offs: Flat-pack furniture; distressed wood that has never seen a distressing day in its life; men who refer to a valuable antique as “oh, that old thing.”

17. Bernie Borscht, 83, retired short-order cook who once fed the entire cast of a touring production of Godspell and has followed the career of Victor Garber ever since.

Turn-ons: A woman who orders steak medium-rare; a well-seasoned cast-iron skillet; a diner waitress who calls everyone “hon.”

Turn-offs: Foam on soup; genetically engineered human meat; a $28 hamburger served on a plank of wood with no ketchup in sight.

18. Patricia “Patsy” Pincushion, 85, retired seamstress who maintains that a woman’s wardrobe should conceal her flaws and advertise her assets, preferably in that order.

Turn-ons: A man who can sew on a button; a sharply tailored pencil skirt; a discreet zipper.

Turn-offs: Elastic waistbands masquerading as fashion; men who wear socks with sandals; anyone who says “one size fits all” without first consulting a tape measure.

19. Clarence Dingleberry, 92, retired municipal accountant who has kept every receipt since the Diefenbaker administration.

Turn-ons: Compound interest; a woman who files her tax returns early; a two-for-one coupon with no expiration date.

Turn-offs: Cryptocurrency; restaurant tip prompts on digital payment terminals with a baseline starting at 18%; young couples who spend $7 on coffee and then complain that they can’t afford a house.

20. Norma Niblick, 87, former golf-club champion who has outlived three husbands and two sets of golf clubs, but still maintains a single-digit handicap on her good days.

Turn-ons: A man with a low handicap and a high tolerance for criticism; a crisp nine-iron; a clubhouse martini served in a proper V-shaped glass.

Turn-offs: Slow play; men who offer unsolicited swing advice; being told that her handicap has mysteriously increased since she started playing off the women’s tees.

Asked whether this exercise had revealed anything profound about the psychology of aging, the respondents were unanimous in their agreement that it had not. They did, however, have one final observation in common.

They all dislike being asked to turn down the television by thick heads.