When SecondAct interviewed Jamie Moyer back in 2010, the then-47-year-old Philadelphia Phillies pitcher was striving to become the oldest pitcher ever to win a game in the majors. But what turned out to be a season-ending elbow injury compelled Moyer to undergo constructive surgery and miss the entire 2011 season. For an aging athlete, it's a tall order to come back after such a lengthy layoff, and it wouldn't have been a shock if Moyer had given up on trying to seize the spot in the record books held by the Brooklyn Dodgers' Jack Quinn, who threw five shutout innings to beat the St. Louis Cardinals back in 1932, at the age of 49 years and 74 days.

But as I noted in this April 2011 blog post, Moyer, like endurance swimmer Diana Nyad, is one of those athletes who simply refuses to quit. This spring, Moyer -- who is 49 and already older than Quinn was when he set his mark -- is fighting for a spot on the regular season roster of the Colorado Rockies. If he makes the team, Moyer's first decision in his 25th season in the majors would earn him a measure of baseball immortality. [Update: Moyer has earned a spot in the Rockies' rotation and is scheduled to start April 7 against the Houston Astros, ESN reports.]

We've all had those "Why did I buy this?" moments, where we're left scratching our head over a silly purchase that seemed like a good idea at the time.

Some of us just have more of these moments than others. My weakness, for instance, is online bargain shopping. When I see a pair of pumps that retailed for $200 on sale for $39, it's like a siren's song beckoning me to open my wallet -- even if it's something I don't really need or covet. I have to actively talk myself out of the purchase.

I am sitting inside a silk sling suspended three feet off the floor, feeling like a caterpillar in a giant orange cocoon.

If you're job hunting, career experts recommend staying active on social networks so hiring companies can find out more about you. But how much is too much?

Following a number of incidents of would-be employers demanding Facebook passwords during the job interview process, the social network on Friday blasted the practice as violating its terms of service.

Rushing outside to stare up at the moon, I couldn't believe that men were up there, walking around. It was the summer of 1969. The historic journey of Apollo 11 signified an extraordinary century of technological advancement, progress that has only accelerated with the arrival of personal computers, the internet and other wonders.

How did it all come about? Who made it happen?

Tony Johnson recalls that while he excelled at spelling when he was growing up in Mississippi, he never had the chance to enter a spelling bee and test his mastery against others.

That's why, as an adult, he was so thrilled when he won the 2011 AARP Spelling Bee. Johnson, 58, a La Grange, Ga.-based clinical psychologist by trade, plans to defend his title at this year's contest, which will again be held in August in Cheyenne, Wyo.

The recession's toll on jobs and retirement savings has kept a lid on the number of people transitioning to socially conscious careers in the second half of life, according to a new survey by Civic Ventures and MetLife released today.

Although slightly less than a third (31 percent) of Americans between 44 and 70 are interested in switching to an occupation that makes their community or the world a better place, only 9 percent of people in that age group actually work in such an encore career, according to Civic Ventures, a Bay Area think tank on boomers and work.

Some people know exactly what they're going to do in an encore career. But what if all you know is that you need out of your current occupation? How do you figure out your next act?

One answer: Take a career assessment test to determine what career you might be good at -- and also enjoy.

One of the things I like about Ashley Judd, star of films such as Kiss the Girls, De-Lovely and Dolphin Tale, and the lead in the new ABC action thriller series Missing, is that she's not one of those actresses who rely on their preternatural good looks as an excuse to mail it in.

Instead, the daughter of country singer Naomi Judd is a technician who labors diligently to convey every nuance that she can squeeze into her facial expressions and the modulation of her voice. She's not a queen but a worker bee like the rest of us, and maybe that's what makes her so convincing as an everywoman on the screen. As Roger Ebert noted in his review of Judd's 1993 breakthrough performance in the indie film Ruby in Paradise: "She is so good in this movie that her character stops being a performance and becomes someone you feel like you know." 

It's hard to feel good about spending when you feel like your bank account is being drained dry each time you leave the gas station.

With every fill-up of my Mitsubishi Outlander, I'm forking over $11 more than I did at the end of last year.