Silver Planet™ Help Your Parents Age in Place.

As expected, this year’s 2011 Consumer Electronic Show was complete replete with pounding stereos and flashing TV screens.

 Attendees were treated to a particularly awe-inspiring multi-screen, stop-you-in-your-tracks LG display; the white light room with nothing but Audis in it; and that deep-plush Microsoft area -- hard to call it a booth -- with so many Kinect game-playing glassed compartments.

Perhaps you saw the recent article on The New York Times’ “New Old Age” blog about one family's encounter with the ballooning costs of assisted living.

The article pointed out that nationwide year-over-year costs for assisted living have risen 5.2 percent. It profiled one 72-year-old gentleman who needed a higher level of care than he had previously received, increasing his annual housing costs by 18 percent (an additional $12,000).

Warning: rant on!

The first boomers are about to turn senior: I thought that the excitement of the first boomers turning 65 in January would have waited a few weeks closer to January, but silly me. So one boomer will turn 65 every eight seconds starting in January.

Market indifference—the mobility gap: You've seen the driver—too short to see over the wheel, too timid to change lanes safely, maybe taking multiple chronic disease medications—and still driving. In 15 years, one of five drivers will be 65 or older. "The result is a 'mobility gap,'" according to Joseph Coughlin, head of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's AgeLab, which develops technologies aimed at keeping older people active.

Kinect-ion mania: This was an interesting week, aside from the mid-term elections, which were as riveting a score-keeping experience as I've watched since the days before the 2004 World Series. But immediately after the election came the arrival and quick store departure of Microsoft's Kinect sensor units: the Target near my home sold out in a single day.

MetLife today reminds us why aging in place, like long-term care rates, will trend upward: With MetLife's new study just out that updated nursing home, assisted living, and home care rates, it is no wonder that seniors will, whether or not it is appropriate for them, increasingly age outside the nu

When aging in place is out of place: Aging in place may not be for everyone, as the University of Florida's Stephen Golant noted: 48% of seniors spend more than half their income on housing, and 14% of those age 75+ still have mortgages. Separated by distance from adult children, perhaps they suffer from isolation, poor health, and other downsides that Dr. Golant spells out in some detail.

Lots of "health" invention: Next week I am going to Connected Health in Boston, where I will no doubt walk up and down aisles filled with medication management systems, chronic disease devices, and every type of tech to help doctors do a better job of caring for their patients—and presumably to help patients take better care of themselves.

Boomers everywhere: So there were 22,000+ attendees (average age, 62.8, according to AARP). They slogged around the mammoth Orange County Convention Center, stopping by exhibits only when they weren't a mile away (same building) and listening to the likes of Whoopi Goldberg, Larry King, Rob Reiner, Cesar Milan, Dave Barry, and Newt Gingrich. No question, AARP puts on a great party.