A must read for Team Pampers!

[Bassn Blvd]

This is a HOOT !!

If you are 40, 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 d**n 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 d**n library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!! 

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!

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!

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!

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?

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!

There weren't any freakin' cell phones either. If you left the house, you just didn't make a d**n call or receive one. You actually had to be out of touch with your "friends". OH MY GOD !!!  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.

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!

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!

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?!?!

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-finks!

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

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 

[Fishing Rhino]

You're absolutely correct.  The kids of each generation in the past hundred years, maybe longer, have had it easier than their parents.

However, my heart and my head tell me that as adults, the kids of today will have it harder than their parents in the good ol' U.S. of A.

Without getting into politics, the fact is that good jobs have been lost, and are harder to find than in the past.  College graduates were eagerly recruited in the workplace.

There were more jobs available than graduates to fill them.  Today, economic conditions are such that college graduates remain at home simply because they cannot afford to strike out on their own, even with a college degree.

Looking back on my life, I do believe that I was fortunate to grow up in the best of times.  Today, the future looks to range from uncertain to ominous.  Where prior generations viewed the future with optimism, it seems pessimism reigns today.

Hopefully that pessimism will prove to be unfounded. 

[SirSnookalot]

Bassn, you had it too easy....lol!

For the members of the OFC, no tv until 1948, then it was 9" or a big 12" B & W,only 3 channels. 

Very true about the teachers, they were allowed to kick arse, parents always took the side of the teacher ( knew it was always the kids fault ) and never sued the school board.

Phones hahah, we had party lines.

Stamps .03 and post cards a penny.

My father told me I had it too easy.  He quit school in the 8 th grade during the depression to help support the family, there was no unemployment compensation, or food stamps. He walked the railroad tracks picking up coal that bounced off the coal car so they could heat the house.  Worked 3 jobs and took the bus from job to job, his nick name was 1 shirt Harry cause he only owned 1 shirt and washed it everyday.

As bad as the economy is today, it didn't come close to the depression, 25% unemployment then followed by WW2 when everything was rationed.

Under 40 crowd....weenies !

[Lund Explorer]

There were some things that were easier for us old codgers.....

Remember how you could pull into a service station, buy $1.00 (or less) in gas, and there was someone to pump it for you.  And they washed your windows, checked the oil, and everything else under the hood.  All the time, you got to sit inside your car no matter how cold or rainy it was!  That dollar also got you enough gas to drive around all day.

Growing up in a college town, a bunch of us kids found were the students partied in the days before either the bottle deposit laws, or the drinking age dropped to 18.  Long neck beer bottles were worth two cents apiece, and we were always happy those "old guys" drank a lot.  We could pick up a couple dollars worth of bottles every week.

For a brief time, I can remember getting a sliver of ice from the guy who drove the milk truck.  Always a nice way to cool off on a hot summer morning.

We also got to witness some of the most amazing things to ever happen.  A real live man was shot into space and lived to tell about it. Then a few years later, a couple of them walked on the moon.  We could even beg our mothers to buy Tang.... because the astronauts drank it.

Some things we witnessed weren't so good.  JFK got shot, so did MLK.  And Jack's brother Bobby got killed too.  We had race riots, and anti-war protests.

But we also had Motown, Muscle Cars, and Mini-Skirts!  Elvis was skinny, there wasn't any reason to write a song called American Pie, and Michael Jackson looked like, well never mind. 

We had The Duke, Jimmy Stewart, and we could look forward to seeing a new movie that Alfred Hitchcock not only directed, but made a cameo in.

To top all of that, a guy named Hefner had started a magazine that only your dad was supposed to "read". But somehow most of us figured out where he hid all the back issues. 

Yeah, I think we had it pretty good!

[Fishing Rhino]

There were some things that were easier for us old codgers.....

Remember how you could pull into a service station, buy $1.00 (or less) in gas, and there was someone to pump it for you. And they washed your windows, checked the oil, and everything else under the hood. All the time, you got to sit inside your car no matter how cold or rainy it was! That dollar also got you enough gas to drive around all day.

Growing up in a college town, a bunch of us kids found were the students partied in the days before either the bottle deposit laws, or the drinking age dropped to 18. Long neck beer bottles were worth two cents apiece, and we were always happy those "old guys" drank a lot. We could pick up a couple dollars worth of bottles every week.

For a brief time, I can remember getting a sliver of ice from the guy who drove the milk truck. Always a nice way to cool off on a hot summer morning.

We also got to witness some of the most amazing things to ever happen. A real live man was shot into space and lived to tell about it. Then a few years later, a couple of them walked on the moon. We could even beg our mothers to buy Tang.... because the astronauts drank it.

Some things we witnessed weren't so good. JFK got shot, so did MLK. And Jack's brother Bobby got killed too. We had race riots, and anti-war protests.

But we also had Motown, Muscle Cars, and Mini-Skirts! Elvis was skinny, there wasn't any reason to write a song called American Pie, and Michael Jackson looked like, well never mind.

We had The Duke, Jimmy Stewart, and we could look forward to seeing a new movie that Alfred Hitchcock not only directed, but made a cameo in.

To top all of that, a guy named Hefner had started a magazine that only your dad was supposed to "read". But somehow most of us figured out where he hid all the back issues.

Yeah, I think we had it pretty good!

I agree.  I think we had it better.  Easier does not always equate to better.

We (those I knew) never had a lot of things, but, I was able to walk the half mile or so to school in first grade.  My parents did teach me not to talk to strangers.  But I could walk by myself to school or to friends houses down the street. 

I could ride my bike alone or with friends anywhere we wanted to go, sometimes two or three miles away.

We fished for perch and sunfish with cane poles, kite string, a cork for a bobber, a hook, and a can of worms.  It was always a great adventure, and when the cork started bobbing up and down and finally pulled under, it was a thrill equal to hooking a big fish today.

Cardboard boxes that appliances came in were among our favorite "toys" until the rain reduced them to a soggy heap.

We played with baseballs until the cover came off.  Then they got wrapped with friction tape, and we used them some more.

Our baseball field really was a diamond, not a square.  The first and third base lines formed an angle closer to sixty degrees than to ninety.

The "basepaths" were worn down to dirt paths while the grass was of varying heights, until the local farmer cut it for hay.

When winter brought cold and snow, it was ice skating on frozen puddles until the pond was safe for skating.  Snow forts and snowball fights, building igloos and snowmen was what we did when there was sufficient snow. 

But that was only after we shoveled off the path to the doors where we lived.

We made up games, called each other names, got into harmless scraps with each other and were playing outside until we were called to dinner.  After dinner, we'd go out and play until dark.

In the summer when it got dark we'd catch fireflies in bottles with nail holes punched in the caps.

Cowboys and Indians, cap guns and plastic knives with a blade that would slide into the handle when we stabbed each other.

We had our own IEDs.  Two bolts, a nut, and the old wood matches with the two tone tip that you could light with a quick swipe along your jeans were the components.

Catch one bolt by a thread.  Cut the white tips off the matches and place them in the nut.  Pack as many as you could while still leaving a thread or so for the second bolt to catch into the nut.

Throw it against concrete or a stone so it hit on the bolt head.  BANG!!!!!

Flying kites.  Taking the seed pods from sugar maples, splitting open the part that held the seed, then putting it on our noses to be a rhinocerous.  Making long "ropes" by plucking dandelion flowers, then removing the blossom and insertin the narrow end of one into the larger end of another, and repeating the process until we had a segmented tube several feet long.  Why?  Simply because it was something to do.

Staying indoors was anathema to "us kids" back then.  It was punishment, literally and figuratively.

Pushing the old reel type mowers was also great fun.  They didn't cut the dandelions, buttercups and other plants that sprung up to a height of four or five inches in a few days.

But we loved the whirring and clatter of the rotating reel, the grass shooting out the back covering our sneakers and our jeans almost to our knees.  But the best was the aroma of fresh cut grass.

Nope, it wasn't easier.  But it was definitely better.

Probably why my favorite Christmas movie is "A Christmas Story".  And yes, I did have a Red Ryder BB gun.

[Lund Explorer]

I loved fishing back in those days.  The first six years of my life was spend in Cadillac, MI where we lived a couple of blocks away from the lake.  Many evenings, our Dad would take us down to fish for bluegills from shore.  When work moved the family to Big Rapids, I became a river rat, and three to four miles of the Muskegon River was my escape.

Like you, a cane pole was #1.  A few hooks, real sinkers when we had them, a nut when we didn't.  There was an old bowl factory that made wooden bowls in town.  Fifteen minutes spent digging through an old sawdust pile got you all the fresh worms you ever needed.  The day after Mom cooked chicken, we would take the pilfered liver down to the creek where inside an old soup can, we could collect leeches for a day of walleye fishing. 

Some days collecting old beer bottles netted us enough cash to buy more hooks and sinkers, and sometimes live minnows to use in "The Pike Hole".  We didn't watch the bobber so much as we waited for the pole get jerked right into the river.  Then we would swim out to get our pole, swimming back to shore and fighting the fish at the same time.

The spring sucker run always meant that we had to load up a gunny sack full of white suckers for the Johnson family.  Canned sucker meat helped a family of 14 make ends meet.

We learned that part of our chores not only included mowing our lawn, or shoveling the snow out of our driveways, but it also included going down the street to do the same at the widow's home too.  And while Mom told us to never accept any money for it, she always had fresh cookies.

My first BB gun came as a Christmas present too.  The neighbors bought me it.  The next day I repaid their generosity by shooting the chickadee out of the large willow tree in their front yard.  One of the shots that missed put a really nice chip in their picture window!  Wow, was my Dad ever mad at me, but not the neighbor.  They only had girls, and it was almost like he was happy to see it!

They were simpler times!

[J Francho]

Yay for Team Atari.  ;D

[dave]

This thread is begging for Long Mike. Long Mike where are you? ;D

or muddy.

[northern basser]

I'll be 40 in July,  but can still appreciate this thread.  Like our parents beat into our heads,  I try to instill some old school values,  if you will,  with our kids.  I just end up being frustrated. 

Twenty years ago when I was a freshmen in college my buddy in the dorm got one of those HUGE cell phones.  At the time the concept was amasing.  He proceeded to tell all of us that he was told "in 5 years or so everyone will be carrying around one of these".  It seemed far fetched at the time.  Man,  how times have changed.

Recently,  the family and I were watching tv and people on the TV were playing pong.  The kids thought it was hilarious that that was one of our 1st experiences with home gaming.

[Triton21]

Seeing I was born in '43 I can relate to all of the above.  My biggest dilemma was walking to school 17 miles uphill both ways in knee deep snow in August.  Boy times have changed.

Kelley

[Tin]

We are the young ones who are supposed to be complaining, not Team Depends members.

[Bankbeater]

I remember when computers became popular back in the early 80's.  People would say what do I need one of those things for.

[Uncle Leo]

They are a bunch of Cupcakes!

[Fishing Rhino]

We are the young ones who are supposed to be complaining, not Team Depends members.

We who have reached honorable age aren't whining.  We are lamenting.  We aren't young.  We are not whining about having to live as a youth in this day and age.

We are lamenting that the youth of today long for possessions, not life experiences, and happy memories of a simpler time.

We heated with wood when I was a kid, and it was like Christmas when we recieved a couple of cord of stove length firewood.

I loved splitting wood.  At eleven years of age, I had the callouses of a ditch digger.  Can't tell you why, but I got great satisfaction from doing that chore.  It was like child's play.  It was almost as good as goin' fishing.

[.dsaavedra.]

tl;dr :

;D

[northern basser]

One of the things that is kind of disappointing these days is the constant stimulazation our kids are used to.

My kids love to go fishing(they're 8,9,and 12), but they are frustrated easily from lack of action. Ya, I know a slow bite sucks for all of us especially kids, but its different these days.

Maybe my memory is tainted, but I can remember going to the local river, dam or sometimes docks on the lake near were my friend lived and fishing all day. We never brought food or pop, maybe enough change to go to and share a soda. Sometimes the fishing was good and sometimes not. We always kept at it like an addiction(a life long one I guess)!!

Rhino talked about playing outside. We always played outside too. Still like to. My kids think its torture at times when we make them go out and play. No matter what time of year it is. Their sense of reality is skewed from technology. Kind of like those Japanese cartoons that gave kids seizures.

[slonezp]

No one has mentioned the family car. A station wagon (by todays standards that would be a "crossover" vehicle) If we were fortunate enough to go on a family vacation the 6 of us would pile into the beast with all the luggage and travel cross country. No dvd's to watch, we played the license plate game or bigger than a breadbasket.

Let's hear it for 8 track tapes. It gets better. We had the privilege of having a cassette adapter that plugged into the 8 track player. Talk about modern technology.

No one has mentioned using a wire coat hanger to get reception for the halfadozen tv channels. My mother had a radio in the kitchen that, to get the best reception when tuning, you would have to match up the green lines.

My father used to tell us kids when we were getting the belt that WE were lucky because his father used a razor strap on him and apparently that was much worse :-?.    

[bilgerat]

No one has mentioned the family car. A station wagon (by todays standards that would be a "crossover" vehicle) If we were fortunate enough to go on a family vacation the 6 of us would pile into the beast with all the luggage and travel cross country. No dvd's to watch, we played the license plate game or bigger than a breadbasket.

Let's hear it for 8 track tapes. It gets better. We had the privilege of having a cassette adapter that plugged into the 8 track player. Talk about modern technology.

No one has mentioned using a wire coat hanger to get reception for the halfadozen tv channels. My mother had a radio in the kitchen that, to get the best reception when tuning, you would have to match up the green lines.

My father used to tell us kids when we were getting the belt that WE were lucky because his father used a razor strap on him and apparently that was much worse :-?.

Seat belts ? they were jammed under the seats for the life of the car. The kids would jump back and forth over the seats until dad slapped the bejeezes out of everyone while barreling down the interstate at 75mph. Ahhhhh the good old days

And how was it if we did something wrong 5 blocks away our parents knew all about it by the time we got home :-?

[Lund Explorer]

While I really liked thinking back on the "good old days", it has proven that my memory is faulty.

I can remember when gas caps on cars were always behind the rear license plate, but what year did that change?  Must be I've been driving a pickup for too  many years!

And does anybody remember the old blond joke when they moved the dimmer switch off the floor? 

[Fishing Rhino]

While I really liked thinking back on the "good old days", it has proven that my memory is faulty.

I can remember when gas caps on cars were always behind the rear license plate, but what year did that change? Must be I've been driving a pickup for too many years!

And does anybody remember the old blond joke when they moved the dimmer switch off the floor?

The filler behind the license plate started about the same time "panaramic"/wraparound windshields were introduced, in the mid 50s.

As I recall, one of the "features" of the filler behind the license plate was that you could pull up to the gas pump on either side.

I'm not sure when the American vehicles moved the dimmer switch to the signal stalk.

I believe my '90 Chevy pickup truck still had it on the floor.  I know my '01 GMC had it on the signal stalk along with the cruise control.

When the US car makers moved it to the stalk, it worked like the floor switch.  You pulled it toward you to change from high to low beam and vice versa. 

It took 'em a few years to decide to copy the foreign autos with the push away for high beams, pull toward you for low beam, and the ability to flash your high beams by pulling it further back.  No need to have the lights on in order to flash your lights at oncoming traffic.

Heck, I can remember when cars did not have turn signals.  When they were first introduced as an option, they clamped onto the steering column.  They may have been an aftermarket addition.

I go back a ways, but that far back I was young enough that I noticed those things but didn't really pay that much attention to them.

Heck, I didn't even pay attention to girls during the advent of the turn signal on cars.

[slonezp]

I think they moved the gas fillers about the same time the onslaught of downsized front wheel drive cars started. Last car I owned with the filler behind the license plate was an '85 Cutlass.

Remember the Cadillac Cimmaron. A Chevy Cavalier with bling ;D

[jdw174]

I remember when computers became popular back in the early 80's. People would say what do I need one of those things for.

I said exactly that to a friend who bought a new Apple.  That was in the pre-internet days. 

Nowadays, every kid is allowed to use a calculator in his/her match class.  Look at the ones working as a cashier.  Most of them couldn't count out correct change if the register didn't tell them how much.

[Fishing Rhino]

I remember when computers became popular back in the early 80's. People would say what do I need one of those things for.

I said exactly that to a friend who bought a new Apple. That was in the pre-internet days.

Nowadays, every kid is allowed to use a calculator in his/her match class. Look at the ones working as a cashier. Most of them couldn't count out correct change if the register didn't tell them how much.

What's just as bad is that those registers need pictures of each item on the keys or touch screen so they can ring them up.

[slonezp]

I remember when computers became popular back in the early 80's. People would say what do I need one of those things for.

I said exactly that to a friend who bought a new Apple. That was in the pre-internet days.

Nowadays, every kid is allowed to use a calculator in his/her match class. Look at the ones working as a cashier. Most of them couldn't count out correct change if the register didn't tell them how much.

What's just as bad is that those registers need pictures of each item on the keys or touch screen so they can ring them up.

I think that's more of a no speeky de english problem.

[bilgerat]

I remember when computers became popular back in the early 80's. People would say what do I need one of those things for.

I said exactly that to a friend who bought a new Apple. That was in the pre-internet days.

Nowadays, every kid is allowed to use a calculator in his/her match class. Look at the ones working as a cashier. Most of them couldn't count out correct change if the register didn't tell them how much.

Wanna see a cashier have a mental meltdown ? If your total is $8.22, hand them $10.25 and watch the fun begin