A message from the over 40 crowd

[Guest EXPAT]

Hilarious! Growing up without a cell phone

If you are 36, or older, you might think this is hilarious!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... Barefoot... BOTH ways...yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But now that I'm over the ripe old age of forty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia! And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don't know how good you've got it!

1) I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!

2) There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox, and it would take like a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!

3) Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere was safe!

4) There were no MP3's or Napsters or iTunes! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself!

5) Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio, and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when finished, and then the tape would come undone rendering it useless. Cause, hey, that's how we rolled, Baby! Dig?

6) We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that's it!

7) There weren't any freakin' cell phones either. If you left the house, you just didn't make a damn call or receive one. You actually had to be out of touch with your "friends". OH MY GOSH !!! Think of the horror... not being in touch with someone 24/7!!! And then there's TEXTING. Yeah, right. Please! You kids have no idea how annoying you are.

8) And we didn't have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your parents, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, the collection agent... you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

9) We didn't have any fancy PlayStation or Xbox video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'. Your screen guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen.. Forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

10) You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel!!! NO REMOTES!!! Oh, no, what's the world coming to?!?!

11) There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying? We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-bastards!

12) And we didn't have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

13) And our parents told us to stay outside and play... all day long. Oh, no, no electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside... you were doing chores!

And car seats - oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the last moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first place!

See! That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in 1970 or any time before!

Regards,
The Over 40 Crowd

[AdamSmith]

LOL We all now qualify as geezers.

[KYTOP]

12) And we didn't have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

I once asked my Grandmother, who died a few years ago well into her 90's, what was the greatest change or invention she saw in her life. She remembered a time without electricity (used kerosene lamps), wood burning stoves to heat and to cook, rode to town and church in horse and wagon, outside toilets, no telephone or television, plus numerous other lack of what she called "luxeries" and she raised 12 kids.

Her response was the "Microwave oven". She thought it was the greatest thing ever and even heated her coffee in it during the day. It amazed me that was her answer, but if I had once cooked on a wood stove I might have said the same thing.

[AdamSmith]

Women were the pragmatic ones. When my grandmother got her first electric range, my grandfather continued to cook his breakfast eggs & bacon on top of the wood stove that heated the kitchen.

Likewise, when the wife in a couple we knew pestered her husband into finally having an indoor bathroom installed (ca. 1963), he continued to use the outhouse, even in winter. Pooping inside the house just seemed unnatural and faintly nasty to him.

[BiBottomBoy]

I wish child protective services had given a shit when I was beaten up by my family.

[RA1]

To remember "before" some of those things you have to be a good deal older than 40. Of course, I am younger than 40 (at heart).

The thermos bottle is being neglected as the greatest invention. How so? Well, it keeps things hot that are put into it hot and it keeps things cold that are put into it cold. How do it know?

Best regards,

RA1

[BiBottomBoy]

I'm 44 and remember many of those things.

[Guest CharliePS]

I have a photo of my mother, taken in front of her home when she was in her teens. She lived in a suburb of New York City, only a few miles from Manhattan, to which her father commuted by train and ferry, as she would herself for twenty years (she could have seen the Empire State Building from the house, except that it hadn't been built yet). In the background of the photo one can see her street, unpaved, with a horse and buggy. There are no electric lines or phone lines in the photo. There are no planes in the air, of course, because the Wright brothers' first flight was only a few weeks before she was born. Naturally, she possessed no electronic devices, since none had been invented yet, though people were talking about something new called a radio. Movies were still black and white, and silent.

Years later, she felt that none of the changes was as significant for her life as the electric refrigerator.

[AdamSmith]

Years later, she felt that none of the changes was as significant for her life as the electric refrigerator.

Ah, the Kelvinator!

[RA1]

Ah, the Frigidaire. Funny how different products became generic names for same in different parts of the country. FEDEX spend a lot of money to avoid having overnight package delivery called FEDEXing it. Hoover is generic for vacuum cleaner for many and I am sure with little to no prodding various posters can remember or cite others.

Frigidaire was a GM name. I also remember my grandmother's sister and husband having an ice box although refrigerators were certainly in existence then. My great aunt also bought margarine which was white in color and came with a packet of orange powder which she mixed to make it yellow. A fair trade law at work.

BBB-

You may be 44 and remember many of these things but do you actually (for instance) remember BEFORE microwave ovens? I know I bought my first one in the late 1960's (Amana by brand) so you were not born then.

Best regards,

RA1

[AdamSmith]

BBB-

You may be 44 and remember many of these things but do you actually (for instance) remember BEFORE microwave ovens? I know I bought my first one in the late 1960's (Amana by brand) so you were not born then.

Coloring the white margarine. Yuck. At least I came along after that.

Amana = Radarange! The poetry of Cold War brand names.

[Guest CharliePS]

My partner remembers microwave ovens in his college cafeteria in the 1950s, but we didn't own our first until 1983, when we bought a new house that came already equipped with one. It certainly changed our life (we do much more cooking in the microwave than our oven).

[Guest CharliePS]

Ah, the Frigidaire. Funny how different products became generic names for same in different parts of the country. FEDEX spend a lot of money to avoid having overnight package delivery called FEDEXing it. Hoover is generic for vacuum cleaner for many and I am sure with little to no prodding various posters can remember or cite others.

Let's not forget Kleenex and Xerox.

[RA1]

Wow. I didn't think the Radar Range came along until the late 60's. The college industrial version must have cost a fortune. The Amana home version was expensive enough.

The margarine was a white solid block the size of one pound of butter but not in sticks. I remember seeing my great aunt mixing the powder in a large bowl. I have to suppose she let it warm up a bit beforehand. After all, I was just a wee lad, so I have memories but not necessarily details. I could easily imagine today that margarine provided in white solid block form might slow down the average consumption of it; a good thing.

Of course, Kleenex and Xerox are prime examples of generic names for products. Tissue paper and elctrostatic copies would have been very passe.

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest lurkerspeaks]

I remember when my father bought a new fangled thing called the amana radar range. It was somewhere around the late 60's.

And back when I was growing up in Houston, I remember that all sodas were called "Cokes".. What Cokes do you have?

[Guest justme1369]

Whoa you guys are old...beats the alternative i guess