Sign Up For Goods 🛍️ Product news, reviews, and must-have deals. Restaurants are surprisingly good age tests. When the menu lands, do you squint at the tiny fonts, tilt the page toward some inadequate candle, or blast it with your phone flashlight just to read it? Do you ask a friend to tell you the options because you refuse to wear the readers you know, in your heart, you probably need? And when did restaurants get so loud? Can you still follow the jokes from the far end of the table, or do you quietly converse with the person next to you because that’s all you can hear? These aren’t quirks. They’re brutal little reminders of your own mortality before the appetizers arrive—and I’m noticing them more when I go out with friends, some of whom have their phone fonts so big a single word takes up a line. Middle age doesn’t announce itself all at once—it’s sneakier than that. And that oh-so-helpful smartphone? It’s part of the reason eye strain is showing up earlier …