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LGBT Senior’s Weekly Humorscope: ‘L’ is for Leo
What does the universe have in store for LGBT seniors this week? We asked the cosmos. The cosmos, as usual, was vague but entertaining. Here’s what we got.
♈ Aries
You’re ready to charge ahead — but not everything needs a dramatic entrance. This week rewards strategy over speed. Pick your battles (and your emails) carefully.
Best Day: Tuesday
Avoid: Saying the quiet part out loud♉ Taurus
You want comfort, stability, and maybe a really good snack. Valid. Just don’t resist a necessary change out of habit. Something shifting now is actually in your favor.
Best Day: Friday
Avoid: “I’ll deal with it later”♊ Gemini
You’re juggling ideas, conversations, and maybe a little gossip. Stay grounded. One clear decision will feel better than ten open tabs in your brain.
Best Day: Wednesday
Avoid: Overexplaining -
Savvy Senior: Where to Get Help with Medicare Decisions
By Jim Miller
Dear Savvy Senior,
I’ll be 65 in a few months and could sure use some help sorting through all the confusing Medicare options that are available to me. Where can I get help with my Medicare decisions?
–Baffled Bob
Dear Bob,
With around 11,400 Baby Boomers turning 65 every day in 2026, you’re asking a very timely question.
Many people approaching Medicare are confused by all the choices available today. In addition to original Medicare (Part A and B) that has been around for more than 60 years, you also have the option of enrolling in a Part D prescription drug plan, and a supplemental (Medigap) policy – both of which are sold by private insurance companies.
Another option is a Medicare Advantage plan. These plans, also offered by private insurers, bundle hospital coverage, medical care, prescription drugs, and often extra benefits like vision, dental, and hearing into one policy. Most operate as HMOs or PPOs and require you to receive care within a defined network of providers in your area.
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LGBT Senior’s Weekly Writing Prompt: Happiness? Fulfillment? None of the Above?
This week’s writing prompt
Happiness is a word we use easily and define poorly. It can mean delight, relief, pleasure, laughter. Contentment feels quieter, perhaps as a sense that our life is enough and we’re pleased with it. Fulfillment might feel deeper still, as if we’re living the journey rather than being on it.
For this one-page flash writing, don’t overthink it. Write honestly. Let your pen move before your inner critic takes over. And don’t hesitate to be contrary. If none of these things seem applicable to you, say it. Maybe you think it’s nonsense. Maybe you think happiness is a marketing tool for the wellness industry. That’s perfectly okay.
However you define them, consider this: What might you want to feel them, or more of them: A change in routine? A conversation? More rest? A creative risk? Less noise? More calm in the chaos of the world around us? More connection?
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LGBT Senior’s Health Beat: Spring Into It
By the LGBTSr blog team
I just got a bicycle, something I’ve been intending to do for several years. Luckily a friend and neighbor had one to give away, saving me the considerable cost of a new bike. My plan is to start slowly, riding up the road every day and extending the distance a little each time. Eventually I’ll be doing a few miles, and who knows from there? I want the cardio, and I love bike riding. Stay tuned for an update. – Mark
It’s warming up. Your body is ready. Here’s how to meet it where it is.
Something happens this time of year that no gym membership or fitness app can replicate. The days get longer. The air changes. The front door starts to look like an invitation instead of just an exit. For those of us who spent the winter months moving a little less and sitting a little more, spring is one of the best natural motivators there is — and all we have to do is not waste it.
Here’s how to make the most of it, sensibly and enjoyably.
Start slower than you think you need to.
This is the one everyone skips, and the one that matters most. After months of limited activity, muscles can lose strength and flexibility, so it’s important to ease back in rather than jump straight to your pre-winter routine. That enthusiasm you feel on the first warm Saturday of the year is real and good — just don’t let it write a check your knees can’t cash. A twenty-minute walk is a complete success. Build from there.
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LGBT Senior Subscriber Freebie: The Vivid Press Edition of Vampire Classic ‘Carmilla’
Before There Was Dracula, There Was Carmilla
A Gothic masterpiece — and it’s yours free.
Most people know the name Dracula. Far fewer know the name Carmilla — and that’s a shame, because Carmilla came first.
Published in 1872, more than two decades before Bram Stoker’s famous count ever set foot on English soil, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla introduced the world to the vampire as a figure of seduction, obsession, and dread. It was groundbreaking then. It remains essential now. And it has a particular resonance for LGBTQ readers that no other vampire story quite matches.
We’re delighted to offer LGBTSr subscriber the Vivid Press Edition of Carmilla, both the ebook and audiobook editions. Beautifully produced with an original introduction written exclusively for this edition, this is complimentary for you, our readers. Current subscribers will receive in this week’s newsletter. Not signed up yet? HERE’S YOUR CHANCE.
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New Home, Same Great Content: LGBTSr and Mark McNease.com Move to Hostinger
In case you’re wondering, I’m leaving Bluehost after more than 15 years using them to host my websites. To make a long story brief, the sites became so slow I couldn’t take it anymore. No advice or suggestions needed: I tried everything. Coupled with the price tag, I said let’s move. Both LGBTSr.com and MarkMcNease.com will be hosted here. The change is almost invisible: same dotcoms, new home.
I like Hostinger, where you’re reading this, and I’m ready to make a move. All my sites will be on here, as dedicated pages (Your Write Path, MadeMark Publishing, and Vivid Press.)
This may take a little while, but not too long – I’m among the more tech-savvy people I know, and moving everything over here shouldn’t take more than a couple weeks, if that. There’s a lot of work to do “behind the curtain,” so to speak, with redirects, emails and all that, but it will get done seamlessly and quickly. So welcome to where “all things are of the substance of dreams.”
Mark
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On the Map: Fonthill Castle, Doylestown, PA
On the Map: Fonthill Castle, Doylestown, PA
Our friend Kathi Hill was here for her annual two-nighter. On Sunday we went to Fonthill Castle in Doylestown, a large imposing castle you can see from the road that we’ve passed a zillion times and never gone to. It’s a must! It’s the kind of place that makes you want to book two nights in an upstairs bedroom, light a candle, and write something a horror story by the light of the moon. Built in the early twentieth century by Henry Mercer — archaeologist, Arts and Crafts visionary, and the obsessive genius behind the Moravian Pottery and Tile Works next door — it’s a concrete labyrinth of rooms, hidden staircases, and ceilings encrusted with thousands of his own handmade tiles pulled from the kilns just steps away. The gothic atmosphere is not manufactured. It grew here, out of one man’s magnificent strangeness. He was also a lifelong bachelor, which adds a little fill-in-the-blanks to it all.
We walked through it on a guided tour and I and immediately started thinking about the horror stories I could write there. The ceilings are all low, the rooms are small, and everything is concrete. If you’re anywhere near Bucks County, put it on your list.
Tours run regularly and can be booked through the Mercer Museum website at mercermuseum.org. Fonthill Castle and the Tile Works are both on site.
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LGBT Senior Fun Facts: Haunted and Hidden Doylestown, PA
Henry Mercer’s Dark Side
Everyone knows Fonthill Castle (see our recent On the Map), but fewer know that Henry Mercer filled it with tools of execution, instruments of punishment, and objects associated with death and suffering. He also slept there alone — in a building he designed to be nearly impossible to navigate without knowing its secrets.
The Museum With a Jail Cell
Inside, there’s an actual historic jail cell, preserved exactly as it was.
Paranormal Ground Zero
Bucks County has been a hotspot for paranormal researchers for decades. The region’s age, its Revolutionary War history, and its dense concentration of old stone buildings have made it a recurring subject of ghost hunting documentation.
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LGBT Senior’s Tech Talk: You New Best Friend Might Be AI
By LGBTSr
Let’s be honest. Most of us didn’t grow up with computers, and some of us came to smartphones late and under protest. So when people started talking about artificial intelligence like it was the next big thing we all needed to understand, a lot of us did what made perfect sense: we ignored it and hoped it would sort itself out.
Here’s the thing, though. AI assistants — the kind you can talk to or type questions to — might actually be one of the most useful technologies to come along for older adults in a very long time. Not because they’re flashy, but because they’re patient. They don’t sigh. They don’t check their phone while you’re talking. They don’t make you feel foolish for asking the same question twice. They just answer.
So what exactly is an AI assistant?
Think of it as a very knowledgeable friend you can ask anything. Not a search engine that gives you a list of links to sort through — an actual conversational tool that reads your question, understands what you’re asking, and gives you a real answer in plain language.
You may have already encountered some of them without realizing it. Siri on your iPhone is an AI assistant. So is Google Assistant on Android phones. Amazon’s Alexa, the voice that lives in those small speakers people keep in their kitchens, is one too. And then there are newer, more conversational ones like ChatGPT and Claude that you can access through a web browser or app and have a genuine back-and-forth conversation with.
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The Twist Podcast Android News Sunday Edition: Four Features, Two Clones, One Love
If you’ve been listening to The Twist Podcast for any length of time, you know that Mark and Rick have opinions about things. Culture, politics, food, entertainment, the general state of the world as it lurches forward into whatever this era is going to be called when historians get around to naming it.
So we did what any reasonable pair of podcasters would do: we cloned ourselves.
Yes, really. Meet the android versions of Mark and Rick — same voices, same sensibilities, significantly less coffee dependency — and they’re here every Sunday with The Twist Podcast: Android News Sunday Edition, your weekly roundup of everything worth knowing and a few things worth arguing about. Will we go weekly? If the interest is there and we can hire more robots.
Each week we’re covering four beats: culture, politics, food trends, and entertainment. Politics, because ignoring it hasn’t been working out great for anyone. Culture, because it tells you more about where we’re headed than the news does. Food trends, because you deserve to know that beef tallow is making a comeback and tiramisu is officially everywhere. And entertainment, because even in complicated times the shows we watch and the stories we tell matter.
New episodes drop every Sunday. Find us wherever you’ve always found The Twist, same feed, no new subscriptions required.
— Mark & Rick
(The originals. Probably.)
