Baby Boomers, the demographic bubble whose progress over the years has been so closely charted by population statisticians, are about to begin swelling the ranks of those labelled "elderly". Neville Martin has a few words of warning for them.

OPINION: Listen. Can you hear it? The long-promised deluge of baby boomers, stampeding towards what they fondly imagine will be their Golden Years.

They can expect quite a welcoming committee.

The retirement home industry quivers in delighted expectation. Cruise lines drool at the prospect of ballooning business. Purveyors of quack medicines offering benefits safely beyond precise definition – let alone measurement – await with glee.

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The post-war generation can see the gilded uplands just ahead and have been led to expect a glittering reward for their life's labours.

But if I, now stumbling through my mid-70s with the assistance of several branches of the medical profession, may offer them a little advice - don't get too carried away.

"60 is the new 50, 70 is the new 60," you hear at every turn. Well, a grain or two of salt is strongly advised here. For some of us perhaps, the mantra applies – but certainly not for all. And dead, by the way, is still the same old dead.

Which raises the little matter of expiry. Those entering, or at least contemplating their upcoming dotage, can expect to be peppered with advertisements encouraging them to put something aside for a pre-paid funeral, lest when they finally join the dear departed, those not yet departed are too bloody tight to cough up enough for a decent send off.

We blokes are encouraged to keep our prostate glands under constant surveillance lest cancer comes to call. The prostate, an active participant in the pleasures of like at one end of life, frequently gives rise to developments at the other which could definitely not be described as pleasurable.

And boomers will be advised to keep a lookout for signs of other "health issues" which lurk at every turn. The price of (at least temporary) freedom from maladies which threaten to carry them off sooner rather than later will be eternal vigilance.

Then there are the dietary prohibitions. As blood pressures rise, waistlines expand, arteries clog and bones crumble, boomers can expect finger-wagging and dire warnings of imminent demise for those who stray from the path of abstemiousness. The real problem of course, is that nature had no idea we wanted to stay around as long as we do. Forty or 50 years perhaps, but not 60, 70, 80 and beyond. Ridiculous.

I've been told to cut my salt intake back to what seems like a few miserable grains a day. I now peruse the near-indecipherable panels on the back of food product packs - usually to learn the contents are off limits. Bacon for instance is salty, obviously, but look closely and you find it turns out to be half way between slices of deceased pig and Lot's wife. Those yummy nibbles you have with drinks – forget most of them. Tuck into a plate of tinned baked beans and the next thing you'll need is a defibrillator.

And, young boomers, there's more bad news. The packaging industry wants to starve you to death. It's true. You'll find that much of what you buy for consumption has been encased in some plastic material capable of resisting assault by ravenous piranhas. Use your teeth to effect entry and your dentist's next overseas holiday comes $300 closer.

And for those fondly imagining that old age bestows a certain venerability, disappointment lurks. It turns out generations X, Y and beyond think the reason our nation has, over the years, maxed out on its credit card, leaving them with the bill, is because the we ancients encouraged rampant profligacy in successive governments.

The excuse that most of us, in the words of the late, little lamented Rob Muldoon - that most people "wouldn't know a deficit if they fell over it in the street" and thus weren't aware of where the Ship of State was heading - doesn't seem to wash with the younger fry.

So that's it, newly minted crumblies. Best take a closer look at the golden glow you see ahead – it may just be that some idiot's left the cremator door open.