Feeling Old?

Headhuunter

Just got into a discussion about our childhoods at work. One of my colleagues is 23 years old today and someone else sent the email below.

I'm 36 years old and I think some of this is a bit of an exaggeration, we had a microwave in the early 1980s and a remote controlled video. But then I remembered computer games, loading up Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy from a tape deck to the Sinclair Spectrum. And I remember studying BBC BASIC at school.

Even in the 1990s when I was writing essays and doing my thesis/project for my degree, there was no internet and I thought I was amazing using CD ROMs and micro fiche. I also remember getting my 1st email address at uni, but the only other people I knew with email were my close friends and housemates, so that was pointless....

Anyone else feeling old? On the upside, someone asked me if I was under 26 a couple of weeks ago, so that's not bad...



THE SPOILED UNDER-30 CROWD!!!

If you are 30 or older you will 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 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
Thirty, 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!

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 catalogue!!

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!

There were no MP3's or IPODS! You wanted to
Steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn record store and
shoplift it yourself!

Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the
DJ'd usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up!


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!

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 mom, your boss, your Bookie, your drug dealer, a collections
agent, you
Just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances,
mister!

We didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation video
Games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With
games
Like 'Space Invaders' and 'asteroids'. Your 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!


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 and 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!

And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat
Something up we had to use the stove ... Imagine that!

That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids
Today have got it too easy.
You're spoiled. You guys wouldn't have lasted
Five minutes back in 1980!

Regards,
The over 30 Crowd

(Send this to someone you'd like to make smile,
Whether they are under 30 or not.)

Cafewanda

Headhunter, I'm 46 and have to make a great effort to stop describing the younger ones (late teens/early 20s) as boys and girls, especially when they look like they should be at school

What I love about conversations like these is assuring the younger ones that eventually they WILL say the same things we now say. I find that very comforting

PS: In my head I'm only 20-something. My creaking knees reminds me my mind is playing tricks on me :roll:

deffler

My partners 12 year old boy CANNOT believe in the 'olden days' music was on a cassette (wots a cassette mam?) & it had to be manually turned over halfway through (WTF mam)
Kids these days..........................

Headhuunter

deffler wrote:

My partners 12 year old boy CANNOT believe in the 'olden days' music was on a cassette (wots a cassette mam?) & it had to be manually turned over halfway through (WTF mam)
Kids these days..........................

I remember my 1st "auto reverse" cassette Walkman with Dolby B noise reduction. That was a milestone!

Jay dubbleU

I have a bus pass 8)

I can now be the grumpy old man i always wanted to be

lost_in_thought

OMFG, progress? No way! It's almost like time has elapsed since the 70's or something...

:P

Oh and I'm 26, and remember the days of cassettes, not having a microwave, Amiga 500s etc etc.

Hell, we didn't have a TV until I was 8, and even then I wasn't allowed to watch it.

R_T_A

Ah, nostalgia corner....

- Having dinner/doing my homework by candle light owing to no electricity. Something about miners I remember.
- My Raleigh Grifter, so heavy it had it's own gravity
- Breaking joysticks/keyboards playing Daley Thompson's Decathlon
- Getting home and waiting for the 2 hours of kids tv before the news

@Wanda: my Nan says the same, and she's 84. Apparently it doesn't ever change :shock:

Headhuunter

I vaguely remember the power cuts in the 1970s when all of Britain was unionised and mostly out on strike. I thought it was really exciting walking round the house with a candle!

Headhuunter

Oh and I remember going on a bike ride on the day of Prince Charles and Diana's wedding in July 81! My friend had a Chopper and my dad and I had primitive road bikes. My friend crashed his Chopper going downhill, those tiny front wheels were lethal at any speed. I remember the roads were completely clear though, literally everyone was indoors watching the Royal Wedding...

Eau Rouge

I'm sure we had a microwave, and we had "multichannel TV" where tv signals from Wales were rebroadcast. The joy of having 6 channels!, even if one was in Welsh.

We didn't have a telephone. Most other people did, but my family didn't get around to getting one until I was about 16 I guess. There was a telephone box just down thr road and if we really had to phone anyone, we used that. To this day, I avoid using telephones. Text messaging saved my life.

Is it just me, or are there two very different sets of 30-somethings. Some seem to have moved straight into their late 40's, and look it. Others still seem to be in their mid-20's, and look it. Is that just me being 30-something? My parents are in their 60's I'm sure my grandparents were a lot 'older' then they were in their 60's, if you know what I mean.

Cafewanda

R_T_A wrote:

@Wanda: my Nan says the same, and she's 84. Apparently it doesn't ever change :shock:

Your Nan is so right. The cycle of life is a constant

PS: I hope your Nan is ageing disgracefully. I've already warned my siblings and their kids to watch out as I'm in training

Cafewanda

Headhuunter wrote:

Oh and I remember going on a bike ride on the day of Prince Charles and Diana's wedding in July 81! My friend had a Chopper and my dad and I had primitive road bikes. My friend crashed his Chopper going downhill, those tiny front wheels were lethal at any speed. I remember the roads were completely clear though, literally everyone was indoors watching the Royal Wedding...

:shock: I was at work that day. Watched it on tv :shock:

Whippersnapper :roll:

Jay dubbleU

My dad was a TV engineer so we had a TV for the Coronation - B&W of course and slightly disappointing - we went to the cinema and saw it in colour afterwards.

The microwave I bought from Currys in 1975 has only just died - my first computer was a Commodor 64 and is still in the loft somewhere

stevep3156

I think i've done things in reverse - I remember having a Dawes Galaxy as a teenager & watching the marriage of Di & Charles with a slight tear in my eye...

Now i'm 40 I have a Kona SS commuting weapon with a gold chain & those spangly Kona grips...& like nothing better than to diss all those young whippersnappers as I take them out on my daily commute...

Oh my gosh I think i'm regressing...or is it mid-life crisis?

Headhuunter

Cafewanda wrote:

Headhuunter wrote:

Oh and I remember going on a bike ride on the day of Prince Charles and Diana's wedding in July 81! My friend had a Chopper and my dad and I had primitive road bikes. My friend crashed his Chopper going downhill, those tiny front wheels were lethal at any speed. I remember the roads were completely clear though, literally everyone was indoors watching the Royal Wedding...

:shock: I was at work that day. Watched it on tv :shock:

Whippersnapper :roll:

I was on school hols. At least someone's older than me then!

Headhuunter

Jay dubbleU wrote:

My dad was a TV engineer so we had a TV for the Coronation - B&W of course and slightly disappointing - we went to the cinema and saw it in colour afterwards.

The microwave I bought from Currys in 1975 has only just died - my first computer was a Commodor 64 and is still in the loft somewhere

A microwave in 1975? Wow, they must have been so expensive back then! And was it the size of a small house? I was talking to my dad last weekend about our first video which was a big old JVC the size of a large concrete slab. He was telling me that video cassettes in those days cost a tenner each!

benno68

The first bike I remember having was a Tomahawk, a smaller version of the Chopper.

@RTA - a mate of mine had a Grifter - the 3 speed grip shift gears were a revelation. They were heavy but were great for pulling wheelies. In fact I remember pulling a wheelie along the full length of Sandringham Road in Cardiff, it crossed a main road which could have been hairy - just checked on bikehike and it works out as a third of a mile.

I had been feeling old, grumpy and unfit for a couple of years but then at the end of October I got the best 40th birthday present, a road bike

I'm still grumpy, but feel younger and a bit fitter

Headhuunter

Yeah I'm 36 and fitter, stronger and healthier than I've ever been in my life. I'm sure that if I'd stopped smoking and drinking so much when I was in my 20s I would have been fitter and stronger then than now, but hey, fitness is not just about physical ability but the mental strength to push yourself....

Wallace1492

Headhuunter wrote:

Oh and I remember going on a bike ride on the day of Prince Charles and Diana's wedding in July 81! My friend had a Chopper and my dad and I had primitive road bikes. My friend crashed his Chopper going downhill, those tiny front wheels were lethal at any speed. I remember the roads were completely clear though, literally everyone was indoors watching the Royal Wedding...

I went on a biking Youth Hostel trip during the wedding, my first ever trip away on a bike overnight. Was only 14 at the time, but was great fun.

Gavin Gilbert

Does anyone else think that back when we only had 3 TV Channels to chose from, there was actually more on worth watching?

posh_pedaller

I'm 19, I remember playing Free Willy 3: The Final Frontier or something on my ZX Spectrum loaded from tape (I was very young, I think I had that thing since birth). I remember albums on tape and games on floppy disks and Sega Mega Drives. We only had 4 1/2 channels until about 5 years ago.
Did that make anyone feel young?

sufferingpete

My daughter asked me if I took IT when I was at school.
I am now 48 they were not available then.

jrduquemin

lost_in_thought wrote:

OMFG, progress? No way! It's almost like time has elapsed since the 70's or something...

:P

Oh and I'm 26, and remember the days of cassettes, not having a microwave, Amiga 500s etc etc.

Hell, we didn't have a TV until I was 8, and even then I wasn't allowed to watch it.

When I was a kid, we didn't even have TV as there was no British TV broadcast in Germany at that time. Mind you I was only about 2 or thereabouts Coming up on the big 40 the end of this year

R_T_A

Cafewanda wrote:

PS: I hope your Nan is ageing disgracefully. I've already warned my siblings and their kids to watch out as I'm in training

Hell yeah - she doesn't do "change". I mean, she still washes her laundry with a wash board :shock:

@Benno: The 3 speed shift on mine had an "optional extra" which occasionally made it change randomly (especially when standing up). It still amazes me that I have a kid

cjcp

posh_pedaller wrote:

I'm 19, I remember playing Free Willy 3: The Final Frontier or something on my ZX Spectrum loaded from tape (I was very young, I think I had that thing since birth). I remember albums on tape and games on floppy disks and Sega Mega Drives. We only had 4 1/2 channels until about 5 years ago.
Did that make anyone feel young?

I had a BBC B. "Revs" and "Elite" was about as good as it got (although they were brilliant. Back then.) "Chuckie Egg" was another of my favourities.

There was a brief discussion about this last year. A number of our flock on here hadn't ever heard of "Cannonball Run". As in, the Best Film Ever Made. :shock:

benno68

R_T_A wrote:

Cafewanda wrote:

PS: I hope your Nan is ageing disgracefully. I've already warned my siblings and their kids to watch out as I'm in training

Hell yeah - she doesn't do "change". I mean, she still washes her laundry with a wash board :shock:

@Benno: The 3 speed shift on mine had an "optional extra" which occasionally made it change randomly (especially when standing up). It still amazes me that I have a kid

Yup - Raleigh Choppers were the same (I nearly lost my family jewels when the gears slipped), were they Sturmey Archer???

Jay dubbleU

No - the best film ever made was and always will be 'Casablanca'

cjcp

Jay dubbleU wrote:

No - the best film ever made was and always will be 'Casablanca'

Not likely. Even suggesting a film like that suggests that you're waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay out of your depth. Even Happy Gilmore was better.

Jay dubbleU

I beg to differ - Casablanca is a classic - Cannonball Run is a redneck comedy

Headhuunter

cjcp wrote:

posh_pedaller wrote:

I'm 19, I remember playing Free Willy 3: The Final Frontier or something on my ZX Spectrum loaded from tape (I was very young, I think I had that thing since birth). I remember albums on tape and games on floppy disks and Sega Mega Drives. We only had 4 1/2 channels until about 5 years ago.
Did that make anyone feel young?

I had a BBC B. "Revs" and "Elite" was about as good as it got (although they were brilliant. Back then.) "Chuckie Egg" was another of my favourities.

There was a brief discussion about this last year. A number of our flock on here hadn't ever heard of "Cannonball Run". As in, the Best Film Ever Made. :shock:

Chucky Egg! Wow, I'd forgotten about that!

cjcp

Jay dubbleU wrote:

I beg to differ - Casablanca is a classic - Cannonball Run is a redneck comedy

"Classic" in that "this is going to send me to sleep very shortly" kind of way. CR rocks. :P