It’s probably just me,but I’m afraid this country will never be right again. Everything is faster,cheaper,shinier. A hundred million people living off a government check with millions more pouring across our borders to take what others have worked and sacrificed for. Two more years to agonize under Obama’s abuse then at least four years under Hillary. I will not live to see another republican president. The sight in my left eye is gone and this morning I had a severe emphysema attack in the shower. It gets harder to breathe every day. I take nebulizer treatments,but it’s just temporary. Any physical exertion leaves me gasping for air. It’s been two years since I quit smoking but the damage was done long ago. At least I can look back at my life and think: damn,I had me a time.
HOW MANY HOURS DID YOU SPEND LOOKING THROUGH ONE OF THESE?
I STILL HAVE ONE IN THE CLOSET THAT MISS ISABEL AND OLIVIA PLAYED WITH
WHO WILL ADMIT THEY HAD A MOOD RING?
OUR JUG HAD A METAL HANDLE
GRANNY USED TO POUR KOOL AID INTO THE TRAYS,COVER THE TOP WITH SARAN WRAP THEN PUT TOOTHPICKS THROUGH IT.WE HAD HOMEMADE POPSICLES WHEN WE DIDN’T HAVE A NICKEL FOR A STORE-BOUGHT ONE
I CAN PROMISE YOU THERE’S NOT A PERSON UNDER 40 WHO EVER USED ONE OF THESE OR EVEN KNOWS WHAT THEY’RE FOR
THE GRANDFATHER OF FACEBOOK
GRANNY PUT THESE IN THE TUB SO WHEN I TRIED TO SLIDE FORWARD AND BACK TO MAKE WAVES,IT HURT LIKE HELL
DID ANYBODY EVER GET ONE OF THESE THINGS TO POP WITHOUT BURNING IT?
C’MON,DON’T EVEN TRY TO TELL ME NONE OF YOU LADIES DIDN’T HAVE A CRUSH ON BOBBY SHERMAN
YOU COULD PUT A LOG HOME TOGETHER WITH THIS STUFF
REMEMBER WHEN THE BANK ACTUALLY PAID YOU INTEREST ON YOUR ‘PASSBOOK SAVINGS ACCOUNT?’
I WORE ONE OF THESE WHEN I WORKED IN A SERVICE STATION IN HIGH SCHOOL. CARS PULLED IN,WE PUMPED THEIR GAS,CLEANED THEIR WINDOWS,CHECKED THEIR OIL AND THE AIR IN THEIR TIRES AND MADE CHANGE. TRY TO GET A HIGH SCHOOL KID TO DO THAT NOWADAYS.
I WENT WAY OVERBOARD ON THIS POST,AND I HAVE SO MUCH MORE. I BEG YOUR FORGIVENESS,BUT MEMORIES ARE WHAT I HAVE LEFT OF WHAT ONCE WAS.
polination.blog 
I remember thinking the height of technological advancement was being able to actually cut a working record off the back of a cereal box! And the world keeps on turning … last week I bought a 2004 Toyota Highlander, with a CASSETTE DECK. I guess I should be glad it wasn’t an 8-track.
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I had a 1979 Porsche 924 one time with a Blaupunkt 8-track player. It was a conversation piece, and the highlight of the car, which was kind of a piece o’ junk.
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i had an 8 track a buddy of mine installed in my 1965 Ford galaxy.The only problem was when you hit a bump and the tape would skip.
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We need a post for “Embarrassing 8-Track Tapes We Have Owned.” I think my wife had a bunch of Bay City Rollers. I remember the Mamas and the Papas and Puff the Magic Dragon.
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My sister and her husband had an 8-track player! They had stuff like Bobbie Gentry singing “Ode to Billy Joe.”
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Pete, this is a great post. Your news links & comments are meat and potatoes, but your fun and nostalgia posts are apple pie dessert. I look forward to the more you say you’ve got! Meanwhlie…
Kaleidoscopes. Growing up, our house never had them, but thank goodness my pal Tom’s had them. Kaleidoscoping is one of my favorite tools in the digital art
program, too. I had a whole series of these.
Someone gave me a mood ring once. I might still have it buried in a drawer, somewhere. Now they have clothing that changes color according to your “mood.” Or something.
Those old metal ice cube trays could be a real hassle.
No matter how many times I’d buy them, I’d never have gummed reinforcers where & when I needed them.
And the trick to Jiffy Pop was, if you keep it on the stove until the last pop is heard, you’ve burnt the bottom of the batch, if not the whole thing. And boy, what a smoke when you opened up one of those that was burnt! The modern version of this, of course, is microwave popcorn, with added chemical so the smoke is extra toxic.
“GRANNY PUT THESE IN THE TUB SO WHEN I TRIED TO SLIDE FORWARD AND BACK TO MAKE WAVES,IT HURT LIKE HELL”
Hahahahaha! They started as shower-tub safety things. Then they migrated to Volkswagen buses. Eventually, they ended up all over the scenery and gals on Laugh-In. Gritty plastic flower power, baby!
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Laugh In was one of the few truly funny shows I can remember.The characters were a riot,with JoAnne Worley,Artie Johnson,Ruth Buzzi and the rest.How many classic lines came from that show like:’here come da judge’ and ‘sock it to me.’ Nobody writes like that anymore.
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People today have an attention span of less than 30 seconds.We would be fascinated by a kaleidascope for hours.
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I remember making Jiffy Pop over a bunsen burner in chemistry class. We even brewed coffee over bunsen burners. I hated the dang things (the bunsen burners — not the popcorn or coffee). One time I was doing some stupid experiment, and I leaned in kind of close so I could see what was happening, and I sizzled my bangs in the flame from the bunsen burner. If you’ve never smelled burning hair, you’re lucky — it’s horrible.
We didn’t have the bathtub appliqués in our house, but I remember them from hotel rooms (I hated them). I certainly remember setting my hair with Dippity-Do, and listening to Bobby Sherman (whom I did NOT have a crush on, since my heart belonged to Justin Hayward of The Moody Blues), and using gummed reinforcements (which tasted disgusting), and trying to wrestle ice cubes out of those horrible aluminum ice cube trays (we were so relieved when our parents finally got a modern refrigerator with a built-in automatic ice cube maker). I remember with no fondness whatsoever having to make change for customers at my first job, at Dunkin Donuts. We didn’t have a cash register that added numbers, let alone told you how much change to give, so we had to do all the arithmetic in our heads, figure out the total, subtract it from the amount the customer handed to us, in a huge hurry (because we were chronically understaffed and there were almost always lots of customers waiting impatiently in line, but the boss was too cheap to hire enough workers), and then make change accurately. Anytime we made a mistake (which was inevitable, given the pressure we were under) the boss had a cow and chewed us out. He was such a dickhead.
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LOL
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There’s an idea for another thread — “My worst job” or “My worst boss.” That could be pretty funny. The longer ago it is, the funnier it seems.
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FUN post, Pete. I’d comment, but everybody else already said everything I would say. 🙂
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Blog Heap o’Links — just random links galore, clumped under various headings.
PoliNation pals, pardon a personal pronouncement please. 😛
Because I always have ‘way more links than I could rightly post on here, after some pondering and experiment, I decided to revive my ol’ linkin’ blog (SWIDT?), which I started many years ago to web-bookmark links of interest, for Milady, for the kids if they were interested, for myself especially, and of course for anyone who accidentally stumbled by. I was pretty diligent at it until a couple of technical gremlins and other gnomes clobbered my ability to keep up. The Heap has been an off-and-on thing for years since then; lots of off.
Now, anyway, I’ve kept it going again since Valentine’s Day (must’ve been the candy ♥ buzz), but I waited to mention it, since I didn’t know if I’d be able to keep it going; and I still don’t know, but for now, for now. I do like having the links handy this way; it’s what I created it for in the first place. Anyway, anyone’s invited.
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Wow, that is a LOT of links — and so organized! and orderly! I’m in awe! I’m so impressed that I can’t stop using exclamation marks!
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