So, I'm thinking back to the blog entry I posted here last summer -- the "Ma'am" entry back on July 25 -- after seeing the smirk slapped off Simon Cowell's face when never-been-kissed 47-year-old Susan Boyle opened her mouth to sing on "Britain's Got Talent." And how maybe we older, plainer, dowdier gals are becoming a little less invisible.

Frump FTW!!!!

It got me connecting some dots, including the one that has me, at 51, finally cautiously approaching the dream of trying standup comedy (not to mention singing solos!in front of audiences!). And my 47-year-old Top5TV and FB friend, who sings in bands and, like me, wrestles with self-esteem issues. And my new open-mike guy pal's middle-aged female friend, a veteran singer in bands, who is having a crisis of confidence as she struggles to maintain her career in middle age and finds the reception cold.

I'm sensing a pattern, which leads me to this conclusion: This is the dawning of the Age of the Frump.

(DISCLAIMER: I don't know first-hand what the other two women look like, so I cannot speak personally to their frumpiness. But for purposes of this exercise, I'm including them. And maybe even Paul Potts, the cell-phone salesman-slash-Unexpected Voice-from-a-plain-face whose amazing voice slapped the smirk off Cowell's face a couple of years ago on the same show).

We are embarking on an era when middle-aged women who didn't get the memo about yoga and jogging and crunches and Botox and waxing and stuff like that, or who were just too plain tired or beaten down or unentitled or whatever to incorporate them into their schedules -- the women they don't write MILF (or GILF!) songs about -- take our place and find our voice. We're old enough to have learned how wonderful it feels to NOT give a rat's ass what someone thinks when we do something unconventional, no matter how many eyes roll when we get up there to do it. We're mad as heck and we're not gonna ... well, we're not gonna yell very loud, we're just gonna stand over here and be pleasant in hopes someone will notice us. And maybe sing a nice little song, tell a few jokes. Expect a groundswell of ... ummm, people-pleasing. It's what we do.

We're here, we're ... here ... Get used to it. If you want to.

Wait, what was I saying? Boy, I need sleep. Expect this to be edited later.