We Are All So Adult Now - but Remember When We Weren't

[Palomine]

You knew how to fix things.

You dad could change the oil, belts, and hoses on his car. Probably even the spark plugs. He took it to a mechanic only when it was something serious that needed skilled labor to take care of (like the brakes). And fixing a leaky faucet or a wonky light socket was something he could handle before lunchtime, because every man worthy of the name had a toolbox with assorted washers, screws, and bolts. If the TV was on the fritz, the Radio Shack downtown had a Tube Tester....

I still maintain cars myself: the oil, belts, hoses, plugs, etc... though my dad never did and I don't know many other folks who do (excepting a couple of gearhead pals). But yes, cars are more complex than they were 20 years ago and a set of socket wrenches and a gap gauge only go so far.

These days, your car has more total computing power than an Air Force fighter jet. God help the amateur who tries to make repairs. Quickie service places are as common as fast food restaurants. TVs and other electronic devices are all "factory sealed", and it's easier and cheaper to just by a new one.

I know there are those who regard planned obsolescence as a necessary evil and a means to an end: keeping the engine of capitalism humming along in our consumerist society. And in some respects, I can sort of agree... but the oh-so-short lifespan and more-expensive(or impossible)to-fix-than-to-replace nature of so many things... it takes a serious toll. Not just on the environment... but also on people: when folks just replace things, they never develop problem-solving skills, let alone proficiency with tools or a sense of self-sufficiency.

Alright, that's enough curmudgeonly grumbling for now. Here's something I remember fondly from my chi1dhood:

 

[rtpoe]

Oh my god!

I actually had that issue! I was a subscriber for a couple of years!!!

[gOOber]

Things Your Offspring Will Never Know


NCSA Mosaic.
Finding out information from an encyclopedia.
Using a road atlas to get from A to B.
Doing bank business only when the bank is open.
Shopping only during the day, Monday to Saturday.
Phone books and Yellow Pages.
Newspapers and magazines made from dead trees.
Actually being able to get a domain name consisting of real words.
Filling out an order form by hand, putting it in an envelope and posting it.
Not knowing exactly what all of your friends are doing and thinking at every moment.
Carrying on a correspondence with real letters, especially the handwritten kind.
Archie searches.
Gopher searches.
Concatenating and UUDecoding binaries from Usenet.
Privacy.
The fact that words generally don’t have num8er5 in them.
Correct spelling of phrases, rather than TLAs.
Waiting several minutes (or even hours!) to download something.
The time before botnets/security vulnerabilities due to always-on and always-connected PCs
The time before PC networks.
When Spam was just a meat product — or even a Monty Python sketch

[rtpoe]

Things Your Offspring Will Never Know

Exactly what that little icon that means "Save File" is.....

[Palomine]

Exactly what that little icon that means "Save File" is.....

There's no comparable icon featuring a graphic of 5.25" or 8" floppies as those fell out of favor before GUIs for operatings systems came into use (there was maybe a small overlap around the time of the Apple //gs, but I'm not sure). 3.5" floppies (which were rigid of course) came into use widely around '84 with the first (128K RAM) Mac... before that, all widely-sold PCs and Apples were still generally using 5.25" floppies.

It's kind of sad... it'd be nice to see the same 'save to media' icon with the big/old floppies, or maybe even a cassette tape (which was the only way to save/load programs prior to the availability of 5.25" floppies on the Apple ][.

[gOOber]

More Things Your Offspring Will Never Know


Taking turns picking a radio station, or selecting a tape, for everyone to listen to during a long drive.
Remembering someone’s phone number.
Not knowing who was calling you on the phone.
Actually going down to a Blockbuster store to rent a movie.
Toys actually being suitable for the under-3s.
LEGO just being square blocks of various sizes, with the odd wheel, window or door.
Waiting for the television-network premiere to watch a movie after its run at the theater.
Relying on the 5-minute sport segment on the nightly news for baseball highlights.
Neat handwriting.
The days before the nanny state.
Starbuck being a man.
Han shoots first.
“Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father.” But they’ve already seen episode III, so it’s no big surprise.
Kentucky Fried Chicken, as opposed to KFC.
Trig tables and log tables.
“Don’t know what a slide rule is for …”
Finding books in a card catalog at the library.
Swimming pools with diving boards.
Hershey bars in silver wrappers.
Sliding the paper outer wrapper off a Kit-Kat, placing it on the palm of your hand and clapping to make it bang loudly. Then sliding your finger down the silver foil to break off the first finger
A Marathon bar (what a Snickers used to be called in Britain).
Having to manually unlock a car door.
Writing a check.
Looking out the window during a long drive.
Roller skates, as opposed to blades.
Cash.
Libraries as a place to get books rather than a place to use the internet.
Spending your entire allowance at the arcade in the mall.
Omni Magazine
A physical dictionary — either for spelling or definitions.

[solvegas]

This list reminds me about when my Grandma died and, as we go through her stuff, we find she still had in her house a good old fashioned Western Electric manufactured by AT&T rotary dial phone which was still wired, not plugged, into the wall. The k1ds were fascinated by its size, weight and toughness but they couldn't initially figure out how to make it work. So I started to spin the rotary dial and their eyes betrayed their initial fascination. Then they commented how slow it was and how it had no screen to tell you who was calling you and etc, etc. She had gotten that phone in 1959, according to manufacturer's serial number plate, and she died in 1997 at 96 years of age. So she had that phone for close to 40 years and she saw no reason to change. It was black colored by the way. Those phones could actually kill people. I remember when I was a 10 year ol pup when it was in the news how a man had killed his wife by using the phone handle to eventually cave her head in. Try doing that with your cellphone. 

[Palomine]

This list reminds me about when my Grandma died and, as we go through her stuff, we find she still had in her house a good old fashioned Western Electric manufactured by AT&T rotary dial phone which was still wired, not plugged, into the wall. The k1ds were fascinated by its size, weight and toughness but they couldn't initially figure out how to make it work. So I started to spin the rotary dial and their eyes betrayed their initial fascination. Then they commented how slow it was and how it had no screen to tell you who was calling you and etc, etc. She had gotten that phone in 1959, according to manufacturer's serial number plate, and she died in 1997 at 96 years of age. So she had that phone for close to 40 years and she saw no reason to change. It was black colored by the way. Those phones could actually kill people. I remember when I was a 10 year ol pup when it was in the news how a man had killed his wife by using the phone handle to eventually cave her head in. Try doing that with your cellphone. 

...boy that brings back memories. I had one of those: a heavy black phone with metal rotary dial that was kind of hard to turn and made it feel like you were slicing off the tip of your finger! The phone weighed a ton and dialing a number took some not-insignificant fraction of a full minute... that was the phone I had as a kid when I finally got one in my room.

It was SO sturdy and solid that you could (I imagine) club someone to death with the receiver and the phone would continue to work fine. As it happens I JUST got one exactly like it from a neighbor cleaning out her shed not even two weeks ago. Like my chi1dhood model, it's got one of those plugs on the cord with the 4 large metal prongs (I'll get an adapter rather than deface the phone by cutting it off to wire on a contemporary RJ-11 plug).

I doubt any 'new' (present-day) corded phone (if you can even find one... like 90% of those I see in stores are cordless, which are even more disposable) will even last one decade, let alone several.

It looked similar to this:

[solvegas]

Yup, that's grandma's phone ! My younger brother kept it and it's in his attic. If I remember correctly they were not made of plastic but of another material whose name escapes me now ...kryolite or something like that. You could actually drive nails with it on thin wood  . Try THAT with your I-Phone !  Now I remember, the material was Bakelite. Super tough stuff. Ma Bell in those days didn't want her phones to fail no matter what.

[DruulEmpire]

My parents STILL HAVE that kind of phone.  I bless their Luddite souls.

[Hiram]

I still maintain cars myself: the oil, belts, hoses, plugs, etc...

Yep, me too.  Last job I did was some new glow plugs.  Before that it was some new front brake pads.  I had to buy a couple concrete blocks to rest the car on, as I only have the scissor jack that comes with the car (I wasn't going to use that) and not a garage jack.

[Hiram]

...boy that brings back memories. I had one of those: a heavy black phone with metal rotary dial that was kind of hard to turn and made it feel like you were slicing off the tip of your finger!

Which always makes me wonder why, in the US, the emergency number is 911.  Here it is 999, but surely it should have been 111.

[pedonbio]

Which always makes me wonder why, in the US, the emergency number is 911.  Here it is 999, but surely it should have been 111.

When the conversion was made (1966? 67?) that was explained. Using a rotary dial the switching equipment couldn't differentiate between dialing 1-1-1 and breaking the circuit three (or more) times. You can still do it using a push-button phone. Next time you dial a number with a "1" in it, don't dial "1", but hit one of the hang-up buttons. It will still complete the number.

When I was young, there were many funny tricks you could play with an analog phone. My favorite was dialing the three-number sequence that would make the phone ring.

[Hiram]

When the conversion was made (1966? 67?) that was explained.

Thanks for explaining that.  It's been something I've wondered about for a while. 

[gOOber]

Magicano, you might want to delete that link. It has pics of juveniles. Sorry.

[Magiciano]

Magicano, you might want to delete that link. It has pics of juveniles. Sorry.

Thanks

[gOOber]

Damn hippies. GET A JOB!!!

[gOOber]

In 1953, this pic was as hot as any pic of Chloe Vevrier is today.

[WadeWilsonEsquire]

I thought about this one recently.

Do you guys remember when television actually WENT OFF.

You couldn't just flip on the tube after the late show concluded because the majority of channels were off air. Amazing thought for me.

[solvegas]

I thought about this one recently.

Do you guys remember when television actually WENT OFF.

You couldn't just flip on the tube after the late show concluded because the majority of channels were off air. Amazing thought for me.

Oh yeah. I remember when we got our first UHF channel and had to get that round antenna to make it work. Or the pride my pappy had when he got a newfangled, motor driven, multi-directional, long range, all purpose antenna ( wind resistant too  ) for our brand new Admiral color TV with Hi-Fi AM AND FM radio tuner with a turntable rcord player able to do FOUR LP vinyl records in a row which set him back $600 back in 1966. My mother was pissed 'cause the old black and white Zenith worked just fine. And we had FIVE whole channels ( three networks and two independent UHF ) but like today, there is still nuthin' worthwhile to watch  .

[WadeWilsonEsquire]

Those old sets with the record player on top sure as heck look classy.

Sure they aren't 52'' inch flat screens but they combined furniture with functionality .

[solvegas]

Those old sets with the record player on top sure as heck look classy.

Sure they aren't 52'' inch flat screens but they combined furniture with functionality .

Yes, and they were made with real wood, no particle board shit.

[gOOber]

 I wasn`t all that young.

[solvegas]

I wasn`t all that young.

Brings back memories. My first VCR I bought in Sears, on sale, for $850 in 1981. It was a Panasonic, all metal, top loaded VHS tape player with a wire remote. For a poor ass sailor it sure was a huge chunk of moolah to spend. I bought it because even though the Sony Beta machines were of better sound and image quality, they cost about $200 more  . Mind you, this was a lot of money for me then. Back in 1974 I bought my first car, a 68 Impala, for $900 and just a few years later I was buying electronic doodahs for about the same. So that photo makes me smile. 

[SwitcherX]

I wasn`t all that young.

I spent years trading videotapes and building up a collection that made people on other continents send me a SASE(when was the last time anyone sent one of those?) for my trade list.

Today everything is on DVD, or available for streaming.

It's now nothing more than a single box in a crawl space.

*Sigh*...




P.S.   I must commend you on your hand-drawn labels. 

[pedonbio]

An advantage of staying up late is the number of "retro" channels that broadcast old tv shows, especially for those of of us who are retro enough to remember when they were cutting-edge tv. For example, "Sea Hunt" with Lloyd Bridges (father of a generation of male leads) was high-end tv at the time and now serves as a reminder of how far marine science has progressed. I was especially charmed by an episode of "Sea Hunt" which detailed the horrors of that most aggressive of man-eaters, the killer whale. It's really funny now to remember back before the IGY (International Geophysical Year) when nobody believed in tectonic plates except a few crazy Germans.

[Robin_K]

I highly recommend MeTV, for those who can recieve this side channel. I just finished watching "The Rockford Files." Right now I'm viewing "The Rifleman." Next up is "M*A*S*H," followed by "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," "The Dick Van Dyke Show" -- then Bob Newhart, "The Odd Couple" -- television heaven! Laurel and Hardy on Sunday mornings, "The Wild, Wild West" tomorrow. "Lost in Space," the original "Star Trek" . . . all on MeTV.

Oh! And "The Honeymooners" every night and every morning, along with "I Love Lucy."

It's not that all of these shows were so fantastically great (though some are, indeed!), but that modern TV is such #*&# by comparison. And let me finally add that they had far fewer commercials than any programs today. Almost all MeTV programming is uncut.

[DruulEmpire]

"The Rockford Files," yes!  Just the other morning ThisTV here in Pittsburgh showed the original Outer Limits episode "The Sixth Finger."  I always sit still for that, if only because Jill Haworth is so fine.  But MeTV is good for "Sea Hunt."  Mike Nelson, the one-man Coast Guard -- and what theme music it had.  (bio, I can forgive the bad science if only because they were obviously desperate for plots.  I recall one insane episode featuring a mysterious "satellite" -- it was "orbiting" Earth, just underwater, so the description went. )