I was just thinking the other day I could use a good thick phone book to sit on like I did as a child. Not as short as I was then but still too short. Love your posts. You are a gift to the world!
This AMAZING! I'm your age and one of the girls in my grade was on Zoom. We all thought she was the coolest. I remember "penny candy " specifically the wax vampire teeth, also gas stations used to give out decorated glass cups with the Flintstones on them ? Also A&W root beer, dinosaur shaped soaps as a give away at the gas station (BP maybe?). Jacques Cousteau tv specials, Sunday night Disney. Speed Racer. So many things lost to the past. Bell bottoms with wild decorations, so great!
Saturday night at the movies, the Ed Sullivan show, Wonderama, Bozo, the little rascals, Our gang. There were service announcements. One was to tell you how to cross the street and it was a song and I still remember it. Don't cross the street in the middle in the middle in the middle of the block, keep your eyes to look up keep your ears to hear, walk up to the corner, where the coast is clear. And wait... and wait until you see the light turn green.
There were coloring contests at the local grocery store. We wore pedal pushers. There was a yellow polka dot bikini. We went to the drive in. Charlotte russe was a famous dessert. The Automat. The hula hoop. The Duncan yoyo. Playing jump rope and hop scotch. Advertisements for camp fire girls. Drinking Tab. Using Coppertone or baby oil with no SPF. Using a sun reflector. Going to sleep in curlers.
Australian here; Saturday afternoon tv was black and white Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers and Elvis movies. Reading books under the doona covers with a torch after strict lights out ( do kids have a bed time these days? Riding bikes around the neighbourhood hood till dark with no adult supervision. Space invader machines. Wow hasn’t the world changed ….
Trapper Keepers! I actually just bought one of these to create a fun, analog drawing space that connects the adult me to the 12 year old me that loved drawing comics. I take it everywhere. It’s amazing.
I never seemed to need to be available to answer my phone - when I was out I never needed to be contacted. Being able to just call friends without checking in with text messages, and long, long phone conversations. Going to the Video library to have a big night in with the latest blockbusters. Owning films, owning music, games - and being able to share these with friends and family.
Wow what a trip down memory lane! Born in the 1960’s in NZ and I can relate to almost all of these - had totally forgotten I used to use a slide rule when I first started work!!
I was just thinking the other day I could use a good thick phone book to sit on like I did as a child. Not as short as I was then but still too short. Love your posts. You are a gift to the world!
This AMAZING! I'm your age and one of the girls in my grade was on Zoom. We all thought she was the coolest. I remember "penny candy " specifically the wax vampire teeth, also gas stations used to give out decorated glass cups with the Flintstones on them ? Also A&W root beer, dinosaur shaped soaps as a give away at the gas station (BP maybe?). Jacques Cousteau tv specials, Sunday night Disney. Speed Racer. So many things lost to the past. Bell bottoms with wild decorations, so great!
Rock'em Sock'em robots,
Matchbox cars with the tracks we set up with loop-de-loops,
jungle gyms with asphalt underneath (how many of us were injured on those things?),
swings made with metal or wooden seats (ditto),
station wagons with wood on the side,
riding in the very back of a station wagon and sliding around on every curve,
making Pinocchio noses with those seeds with wings
breaking open a milkweed and chasing after the fluffy down
collecting fireflies in glass jars
August meteor showers
OH the memories!
I’m only 24, these are all of the ones of your entire list that I relate to:
“Making textbook covers out of brown grocery bags”
“No kid had a camera” (changed drastically when I was about 12–suddenly, we were all overexposing ourselves to what we looked like constantly)
“Mandatory showers in gym class”
“Reading cereal boxes while eating them”
My list would be:
•Landline/making funny voicemail intros
•Really wanting the pink flip phone
•Getting a phone that’s keyboard slid (!!!) open because my parents forgot me and I got lost getting home
•Wired headphones (getting caught on every drawer handle and ripping out of your ear, often losing the gummy part forever)
• Redbox
•Arguing about what Redbox movie to rent
•always returning the movie late
•bookmark that kept track of pages read (like a stitch counter)
•iPod touches
• Switching radio stations to skip the commercials for 10 minutes straight
• CD books on tape in the car
• the family computer
• downloading viruses onto the family computer
• blowing air on the game disk scratched to bits hoping it’ll work again, you try every time, it’s your favorite game
• unplugging the family computer and watching it slowly blink off
• overhead projectors in class my teachers could never wipe away the markers well enough
• thinking the first kid in school to get a touch phone was totally obsessed with it
• one rich girl who had a landline and little TV in her room
• box tvs with no clicker (or we lost it…)
• getting sent outside when being too crazy
Dang this was longer than I expected!
One more note— I *love* getting to hear your Sony Walkman experience. I have always wondered what that transition was like for folks.
http://I.love your list!
I remember most of those things.
You made me feel so old....😅😉
It's nice to remember.
The Marlborough Man…. Whose cigs were 50 cents a pack when I was in Jr High….(I am older than you) 😂
Fun! Thanks for a wonderful post.
During summer vacation, my elementary school would show Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan movies in the gym on Saturday afternoons.
Saturday night at the movies, the Ed Sullivan show, Wonderama, Bozo, the little rascals, Our gang. There were service announcements. One was to tell you how to cross the street and it was a song and I still remember it. Don't cross the street in the middle in the middle in the middle of the block, keep your eyes to look up keep your ears to hear, walk up to the corner, where the coast is clear. And wait... and wait until you see the light turn green.
There were coloring contests at the local grocery store. We wore pedal pushers. There was a yellow polka dot bikini. We went to the drive in. Charlotte russe was a famous dessert. The Automat. The hula hoop. The Duncan yoyo. Playing jump rope and hop scotch. Advertisements for camp fire girls. Drinking Tab. Using Coppertone or baby oil with no SPF. Using a sun reflector. Going to sleep in curlers.
Australian here; Saturday afternoon tv was black and white Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers and Elvis movies. Reading books under the doona covers with a torch after strict lights out ( do kids have a bed time these days? Riding bikes around the neighbourhood hood till dark with no adult supervision. Space invader machines. Wow hasn’t the world changed ….
Trapper Keepers! I actually just bought one of these to create a fun, analog drawing space that connects the adult me to the 12 year old me that loved drawing comics. I take it everywhere. It’s amazing.
I never seemed to need to be available to answer my phone - when I was out I never needed to be contacted. Being able to just call friends without checking in with text messages, and long, long phone conversations. Going to the Video library to have a big night in with the latest blockbusters. Owning films, owning music, games - and being able to share these with friends and family.
Best post ever! I’m going to print it out and keep it forever.
Shrinky Dinks! Traveler’s checks!
Thank you for that list! I grew up in the same era as you, it was great fun to be reminded of everything on your list!!
Wow what a trip down memory lane! Born in the 1960’s in NZ and I can relate to almost all of these - had totally forgotten I used to use a slide rule when I first started work!!