Man I'm Old

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Man I'm Old

Postby Tug002 » Fri Dec 13, 2019 8:59 am

Someone asked the other day,,,,,,,,,,,,,

'What was your favorite fast food when you were growing up?'
'We didn't have fast food when I was growing up,

I informed him, 'All the food was slow.'


'C'mon, seriously. Where did you eat?'
'It was a place called 'at home,' I explained!

'Mom cooked every day and when Dad got home from work, we sat down together at the dining room table, & if I didn't like what she put on my plate, I was allowed to sit there until I did like it.'

By this time, the kid was laughing so hard I was afraid he was going to suffer serious internal damage, so I didn't tell him the part about how I had to have permission to leave the table.

Here are some other things I would have told him about my childhood, if I figured his system could have handled it:

Some parents NEVER owned their own house, wore Levis, set foot on a golf course, traveled out of the country or had a credit card.


My parents never drove me to school. I had a bicycle that weighed probably 50 pounds, and only had one speed, (slow).
We didn't have a television in our house until I was 10. It was, of course, black and white, and the station went off the air at 11, after playing the national anthem and a poem about God. It came back on the air at about 6 a.m. And there was usually a locally produced news and farm show on, featuring local people ...

I never had a telephone in my room. Our only phone was on a party line. Before you could dial, you had to listen and make sure some people you didn't know weren't already using the line.

Pizzas were not delivered to our home... But milk was & so was bread.


All newspapers were delivered by boys and all boys delivered newspapers --my brother delivered a newspaper, six days a week. He had to get up at 5 AM every morning .


Movie stars kissed with their mouths shut. At least, they did in the movies! There were no movie ratings because all movies were responsibly produced for everyone to enjoy viewing, without profanity or violence or most anything offensive.

If you grew up in a generation before there was fast food, you may want to share some of these memories with your children or grandchildren. Don't blame me if they bust their gut laughing.


Growing up isn't what it used to be, is it?


MEMORIES:
My Dad is cleaning out my grandmother's house (she died in December) and he brought me an old Royal Crown Cola bottle. In the bottle top was a stopper with a bunch of holes in it. I knew immediately what it was, but my daughter had no idea. She thought they had tried to make it a salt shaker or something. I knew it as the bottle that sat on the end of the ironing board to 'sprinkle' clothes with because we didn't have steam irons. Man, I am old.


How many do you remember?

Head lights dimmer switches on the floor.
Ignition switches on the dashboard.
Pant leg clips for bicycles without chain guards .
Soldering irons you heat on a gas burner.
Using hand signals for cars without turn signals.

Older Than Dirt Quiz :
Count all the ones that you remember , NOT the ones you were told about !
Ratings at the bottom.

1. Candy cigarettes
2. Coffee shops with tableside juke boxes

3. Home milk delivery in glass bottles
4. Party lines on the telephones
5. Newsreels before the movie
6. TV test patterns that came on at night after the last show and were there until TV shows started again in the morning. (Only 3 channels! If you had a TV!)

7. Pea-shooters
8. Howdy Doody

9. 45 RPM records

10. 78 rpm records
11. Hi-fi records 33 1/3 rpm
12. Metal ice trays with lever
13. Blue flashbulb
14. Cork popguns

15. Studebaker's

16. Wash tub wringers

If you remembered 0-3 = You're still young
If you remembered 3-6 = You are getting older
If you remembered 7-10 = Don't tell your age, &
If you remembered 11-16 = You're older than dirt! THAT'S ME!
I might be older than dirt but those memories are some of the best parts of my life.

Keep smiling
Tug :)
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby A Hobbit » Fri Dec 13, 2019 1:46 pm

WOW...Guess that puts a whole new light on my age, lol. Old old old OLD. Tell my kids and their kids about growing up with my mother cooking all our meals on an honest to God wood cook stove. It had an oven and warming boxes on one side and a firebox on the other. Think my brother still has it in his workshop. The memories that seem to be the best sorta crumbles while time flees down toward a future that, on one hand seems to be the stuff of science fiction movies and on the other a cold slap of total terror. I let my grandkids know once in a while that when I was growing up, we could walk to the store and home with no worries. Never locked our front door and gave hitchhikers a ride without a second thought...Gonna have to write these down for the kids and let them know that life 50 or so years ago, while being different is still the same. Computers have replaced cards and board games and don't get me started on the tech derived from the TV show Star Trek...Again, WOW!...and thanks for the trip down thru the years of my memory, just a hop skip and jump from the present.
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby yancovitch » Fri Dec 13, 2019 1:47 pm

-haha.....in central montreal, i remember.....a blacksmith in the block behind our house.....blocks of ice delivered by horse drawn wagon....
-and i did have a wagon.....
-and metal roller skates which were attached to our shoes....
-we used to take two skates, attach them on each end of 2x4, and add an upright orange box on one end with two handles...great scooter......
-oh how about bolobats or was it ball o bat?...don't remember.....
-singing o canada and god save the king at beginning of class...mouthed the words, no idea what i was singing.......
-remember maybe in grade 2, having a foot fettish....was enamored with the teachers feet
-burned wood in our cooking stove which also heated the apartment or suite whatever it was called....
-ld washing machines with a wringer.....even hung clothes out to dry in the winter
-remember orange julep ..great orange drink....although i'm vegetarian, i remember st. hubert's barbeque chicken and great smoked meat on st. lawrence blvd. in -the jewish sector...where you could get amazing brine pickles, that came in huge barrels.....and there was a delicious orange crush in the brown rippled bottle, before they changed and butchered it...oh...and buy
-remember going to the market where live chickens were slaughtered right there for you...
-used to buy may west cakes and maybe it was bingo cakes which were even better, but i probably got the name wrong...
-oh and how about wax lips....and little tubes in which you placed a parachute and blew it into the air....cool....
-and the devilish lacross ball....a very dense rubber ball which bounced higher than from where you dropped it....was kind of dangerous....
-and most of all.....how happy i was playing with a simple wooden truck model and later a wind up train set and mecano set, compared to all the stuff kids have today and who probably never satisfied :D
-sure i could go on, but best not to get too boring.....
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby AndyLavies » Fri Dec 13, 2019 3:11 pm

All these things I remember well. And going to sea at 15 years old in a ship with neither running water nor mechanical ventilation let alone air conditioning. I offer one correction to your list - the correct description for signalling your intentions when driving is "Arm signals." Hand signals are gestures that you give to other drivers who have just carved you up!
Regards,
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby napamule » Fri Dec 13, 2019 5:29 pm

Somebody's memory is fadeing. You left me in the dark. Nobody mentioned the high tech, adjustable, metal frame with a handle, kerosene lamp!!! Yeah I'm that old. Used to go get it at the store where I could watched (with delight) the lady turn the handle on the tank pump. So many turn would equal to 'x' amount. I am 79.
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby Flacke » Fri Dec 13, 2019 9:25 pm

One day my Sons had some friends over at our place. They were in the family room having a good time together. I overheard my youngest Son say..........." my Dad is so old, when he was a boy he had to brush his teeth MANUALLY".
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby 511Flyer » Sat Dec 14, 2019 10:05 am

Our water came from a pump in the kitchen. Woe betide anybody that forgot to fill the jug for priming the pump.

The toilet was at the bottom of the garden. If you took a newspaper to the toilet, it wasn't to read it!

The bath hung on a hook in the barn. The cleanest kid got first use. After 4 of us had finished, our dirty clothes went in. Sometimes when we were still in it.

Thankfully, my kids never had the dubious joy of hiding under the kitchen table while the Luftwaffe did their best to end our short lives.

The Good Old Days? Like hell they were!
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby yancovitch » Sat Dec 14, 2019 12:17 pm

well ....that takes the cake......sheesh!
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby ftldave » Sat Dec 14, 2019 12:52 pm

I remember during this time of year there was always a half-hour "Santa Show" on the local TV station, sponsored by commercials for toys, local merchants, and cooked-in-Indiana Chesty or Artie's potato chips. A simple program, Santa making a big entrance, then a half hour of kids coming to sit on his lap and tell what presents they wanted for Christmas. The same Santa was on duty during business hours at the local shopping center. Of course, the most entertaining moments of an otherwise mild show was the occasional kid freezing up in sheer terror or howling, screaming to get away. That made the show worth watching! I miss local TV.

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And during the actual holidays, the local TV station would show old cartoons and sometimes even feature-length animated films, like the Fleischer Brothers' Gullivers Travels or, from Japan, Panda And the Magic Serpent. I remember my panic when I realized I wouldn't be able to watch the entire Christmas Eve showing of "The Fabulous World of Jules Verne" film on TV due to family travel. That was, of course, when a favorite movie on TV was a special event, looked forward to and enjoyed so much.

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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby Flacke » Sat Dec 14, 2019 7:07 pm

511Flyer wrote:
Thankfully, my kids never had the dubious joy of hiding under the kitchen table while the Luftwaffe did their best to end our short lives.

The Good Old Days? Like hell they were!


Hello 511, I am so glad that you survived that terrible war and went on to raise your own family in peace. I salute anyone who who endured war <S>.
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby Roypcox » Sun Dec 15, 2019 6:47 am

I go with Flacke on that one so glad you made it through that terrible war!!!
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby dbaker » Sun Dec 15, 2019 7:56 am

In another six months I will be 90. all of the things the other writers have told about I have experienced.I can even remember the time of the great depression from about 1934 on. I was a farm boy And had to walk everyday to a one room schoolhouse about a mile and a half each way. I remember Pearl Harbor and VJ day which before most of the other writers time. No bombers ever reached the US so I never hide under the table like one of the other writers but I recall world war 2 very well.
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby A Hobbit » Sun Dec 15, 2019 11:34 am

I remember hiding under a table at school because of atom bomb drills. The school wouldn't always let you know there was gonna be a drill, so the sound of the siren still wakes me in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. Never had to listen to the bombs exploding a few blocks away. Hats off to those that made it out alive. Better times to live in now I guess. And a happier note is does anyone else remember when Saturday mornings were a child's TV heaven?
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby Dilvish » Sun Dec 15, 2019 6:33 pm

And a happier note is does anyone else remember when Saturday mornings were a child's TV heaven?

OHHHH YES!

Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner show! Never missed it.
Now cartoons are computer generated, jerky, overcolored, often featuring nasty language, they just aren't cartoons any more. :naughty:

Best of all, we didn't have to be warned at the beginning not to strap a large rocket to our backs while wearing roller skates, or whatever. They were CARTOONS. It was brainless. We knew better. It was all for our enjoyment, not to go out and try. DUHHHHH! :doh:

Of course, we didn't have to have warning labels on every thing, or be warned on TV not to try stuff. I guess we were just smarter. If we weren't smart enough not to try stupid things, we got hurt, and didn't do it again. We didn't sue every one in sight, either. Just for being offended, even.
If you were offended, you told the person, and asked them to stop. If they didn't, we had 2 options, ignore them, or get into a tussle with them. Both get a black eye, and both go away and maybe even become friends afterward.

Anyway...
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Re: Man I'm Old

Postby A Hobbit » Mon Dec 16, 2019 12:35 pm

I remember watching Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner cartoons with my kids and they were the same as I remember, Wiley Coyote strapping himself to an Acme rocket and loosing the dogs of war on himself, funny stuff that and educational as I never even once had the urge to try it! When my grandbabies began to arrive, and were old enough to enjoy cartoons, I tried watching Bugs and the rest with them only to discover that they had taken out so much they were not the same. Redacted cartoons just plain suck. When I tried to gripe to their parents about it I was told that it was to keep the children from getting hurt?!? My reply was to ask when and where had any of my kids tried to do the Acme thing, all I got in reply was odd looks and some scratched heads...I guess times do change and not always for the better....*sigh*... Best to keep a good sense of humor and buy up all the old cartoons on DVD, like I'm doing so that in a few years when the great grandkids start to show up, I can let them decide for themselves if they want to be left hanging in mid air with nothing but a little sign with cornball saying on it to flash to others about the foolishness of giant rubber bands...lol
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