[Travelinglady]

Apparently If You Did Any Of These 40 Things Growing Up You Are Officially Old


I'm older than dirt. Many of these things didn't exist when I was growing up. Home computers? The computers I used took up several rooms, and I had to use a key punch machine, for example. Gee...

[SprinkL3]

Is this a new game? If so, I wanna play!

You are old if you…

…know what the relationship is between a pencil and a cassette

…or recall the “where’s the beef” commercial

[Nammu]

Ha ha I’m ancient too. In my Midwestern dorm we were considered the best dorm because we had access to the campus computer. It was a huge green thing with a perforated paper feed and no monitor. If you played Star Trek on it it was an all night party as you drank with friends while waiting 15-20 minutes for the computer’s response. The computer itself was housed in a separate building.

Transistor radio anyone? Huge boom boxes.

Party line telephone? ☎️

[IrisBloom]

Nickel and dime candy, Walt Disney on Sunday night, go-go boots....

[Broken Old Man]

Grew up with a party line for the telephone,
can remember paying 25 cents a pack for cigs
bought gas for the car for 25 cents a gallon
was not allowed to use a calculator in H.S. and had to use a slide rule instead.
Never worried about locking the doors on the house--crime wasn't a problem
Got your *** whipped in school if you didn't follow the rules.

Yes, I'm old, I could go on and one.

BOM

[pachyderm]

Grandparents had a crank telephone (on a party line). To call someone you had to call Central.

Also a wringer washing machine.

But they also had electricity, central heating, and "city water".

[Nammu]

My grandparents both sides had no running water or phone. They had a pump and had to heat the water on a wood stove. Used outhouses. They both lived in the boonies. Mum had a ringer washing machine for a long time, well into the 60’s. She liked her ringer. Wasn’t until mum was 14 that they moved to a city and they got both hot and cold running water, a indoor bathroom and a phone. But it wasn’t the numbers we have today you had to go though a switchboard and people had letters combined with a few numbers.

[Travelinglady]

Great game. Thanks, SprinkL3.

Oh, yeah. Party lines on phones where people had different rings to know the call was for them, such as one long and two shorts. Pay phones, requiring going through an operator and being able to "reverse the charges" to the person you were calling.

Dial phones, with a great deal of satisfaction when you got mad at somebody and could slam the receiver down, thus ending the call.

Princess dial phones even in different colors or the standard black dial telephone. Dialing was more fun than punching on numbers.

[Nammu]

I miss the sounds of a computer dialing different phones, was such a futuristic type of electronic noise. But don’t miss how long it took.

Miss phone books too. If you wanted to call someone you met at school you looked up their last name in the phone book.

[nonightowl]

Originally Posted by Travelinglady

Apparently If You Did Any Of These 40 Things Growing Up You Are Officially Old

I'm older than dirt. Many of these things didn't exist when I was growing up. Home computers? The computers I used took up several rooms, and I had to use a key punch machine, for example. Gee...

Me too but I knew that. Some of those things didn't exist when I was growing up either but I recognize some of them. But not eating ice cream out of a toilet paper holder, that brown paper thing..whatever you call that.

No downloading of songs! I still have my Walkman. It still works.

I remember using computers in the 80's that were bigger than my frig. Remember old fashioned adding machines where you punch the keys and it prints out. "While you were out" pink message pads. Cash registers that went "ding", hence the expression "ring up" (I'm guessing). Gas pumps that "dinged" after each gallon, 50 cents a gallon then.

One time one of my cassette's tape unraveled in the machine and got so tangled up I had to CUT the tape to get the cassette out. So I couldn't save it and it was ruined. I think it's sort of funny now but at that time I was so pissed! I didn't know it wasn't playing right until it suddenly stopped. And OPENING the cassette door was hard. That was the first step.....

Originally Posted by Nammu

I miss the sounds of a computer dialing different phones, was such a futuristic type of electronic noise. But don’t miss how long it took.

Miss phone books too. If you wanted to call someone you met at school you looked up their last name in the phone book.

I miss the sound of those old modems, that made that dialing sound. Phone booths, as cell phones don't always work right---so dependent on signal, battery strength and other stuff. But landlines WORK, even during a power outage or storm!

I also miss phone books. Also in those days people couldn't call you if you were unlisted! Now it seems anyone can find you. The printed phone books are so skinny now, and I have to ask for it. They are ONLINE now, but paper always works. I mean it's always there, you don't have to worry about a slow connection or slow page.

[nonightowl]

Originally Posted by Broken Old Man

Grew up with a party line for the telephone,
can remember paying 25 cents a pack for cigs
bought gas for the car for 25 cents a gallon
was not allowed to use a calculator in H.S. and had to use a slide rule instead.
Never worried about locking the doors on the house--crime wasn't a problem
Got your *** whipped in school if you didn't follow the rules.

Yes, I'm old, I could go on and one.

BOM

I remember slide rules. Crime wasn't too much of a problem when I was little but it increased when I got into my teens.

I could go on and on too. Connecting or talking meant TALKING, with our voices either on the phone or in person. Now it's email or texting or Facebook.

Handwritten letters and cards. Thank you notes. Good manners. Milk in glass bottles delivered to us. Knowing our neighbors and looking after each other. Getting up to change the channel on the TV, no remote! Still have my boom boxes! Remember those printers with green and white striped perforated paper, ha ha. So SLOW!

Originally Posted by Nammu

Mum had a ringer washing machine for a long time, well into the 60’s. She liked her ringer.

What's a ringer washer? Or it wringer? Yes I could look it up but asking is more fun. I get the personal touch.

[Nammu]

Washers didn’t spin the water out. You put the clothes one piece at a time between two rollers and cranked a handle to squeeze the water out then put them on a clothes line to dry. Thus the expression put him though the wringer. If you’ve seen old I love Lucy shows you might catch a glimpse of the wringers. Her washer was either in the kitchen or out on the porch.

[nonightowl]

Originally Posted by Nammu

Washers didn’t spin the water out. You put the clothes one piece at a time between two rollers and cranked a handle to squeeze the water out then put them on a clothes line to dry. Thus the expression put him though the wringer. If you’ve seen old I love Lucy shows you might catch a glimpse of the wringers. Her washer was either in the kitchen or out on the porch.

Oh I didn't know about that. I've heard of or seen washing boards in the movies. Then you had to wring the clothes out by hand. What a pain. We didn't have a dryer so hung clothes outside on the clothesline.

I Love Lucy was hilarious. I'm listening to a podcast about her life, and I'm enjoying it so far.

Speaking of rollers, I remember in kindergarten the teacher made copies of something by cranking handle and the copies came off this roller. I could smell the ink, and we had to wait for it to dry or it would smear, LOL. I think it was called a mimeograph machine. Now we have scanners----you don't need a physical copy of stuff now.

And maybe remember carbon paper? Ha Ha

[RoxanneToto]

Playing Star Trek on a computer with no monitor? That sounds very intriguing to me, I’d love to know more about how that worked!
Hehe, I remember my parent’s old rotary phone - I actually bought a proper landline phone to go in my new flat. It looks like a rotary phone, but the numbers are all separate buttons.

[Nammu]

Originally Posted by RoxanneToto

Playing Star Trek on a computer with no monitor? That sounds very intriguing to me, I’d love to know more about how that worked!
Hehe, I remember my parent’s old rotary phone - I actually bought a proper landline phone to go in my new flat. It looks like a rotary phone, but the numbers are all separate buttons.

The computers were housed in a building separate from any other building on campus there was a thick cable that connected to a army green paper feeder with the box of attached with holes on the side that fed into the modem. There was a typewriter attached. The whole game was played by numbers. You were in a hostile territory doing enemy fire on Klingons. You typed your moved into the modem then waited 15-20 minutes for the computer to reply. Then typed your next moves. I always ended up destroying the enterprise. It was kinda like the kobayashi Maru , I didn’t know anyone who won. We always had alcohol to pass the time so that could be a factor,….so could the fact that none of us were computer science or math majors. We were all in the arts field, but loved Star Trek. The games took place after 7 at night when the computer opened up to general use. This was in 1977.

[pachyderm]

My grandmother got her arm caught in the wringer on her washing machine.

There were no such things as computers when I grew up.

Fountain pens.

We got milk in glass bottles from the cows across the street... (Streets existed, though.)

However, we had electricity, central (oil) heating, airplanes existed, radio, automobiles as well, a refrigerator, though we had to go downtown to the post office to get our mail (box 105).

[poshgirl]

What memories!

My maternal grandfather had a squashed index finger from getting it stuck in wringer whilst helping his mother with washing (got him out of being called up!). No fridge so things like meat, butter, cheese stored in a "press". A metal cupboard with wire netting sides. Very little plastic packaging; potatoes and other veg tipped straight into shopping bag. Meat wrapped in paper, as was cheese, butter. Cheese/butter cut from block. Proper butchers and fishmongers.

Hard toilet paper (Izal was "popular brand"), like greaseproof paper. Pop (soda) delivery lorries, returning bottles and getting money off. Same in shops.

Outside toilet, often next to coalhouse. No bathroom so once weekly bath in front of fire. Carpet usually in one room only, often called front room, because that's where your visitors could be seen by anyone walking past. Only used on Sundays.

Strips across road that were supposed to activate when traffic lights would change. Rear entry/exit buses (like old London ones) with conductor to take money, issue ticket, ring bell for stops etc. Zebra crossings with belisha beacons. Cars without seatbelts. Steam trains with separate compartments.

Think I better stop there as beginning to feel very old!!

[nonightowl]

I remember when the Polaroid cameras came out, and that was a big deal. Before waiting for your pictures to develop was time consuming yet the anticipation was kind of fun.

Now it's a real mystery to me how phones "take pictures" when there's no film in them.

Invention of the VCR was so state of the art at the time....

[*Beth*]

Originally Posted by Travelinglady

Apparently If You Did Any Of These 40 Things Growing Up You Are Officially Old


I'm older than dirt. Many of these things didn't exist when I was growing up. Home computers? The computers I used took up several rooms, and I had to use a key punch machine, for example. Gee...

Terrific article! Made me laugh.

[poshgirl]

Completely forgot in previous post to mention party line telephones.

My mother got fed up with the "other side" listening in to our calls. There was an audible click when they picked up the receiver. Conscious of them listening in, she used to say "there's a cow on the line". Very quickly there was another click as receiver was replaced. It happened quite a few times before other side got the message.

Another gem was my grandmother, who had resisted having a home phone until living on her own. One day whilst talking to my mother she said "can you see that big plane that's just gone over?" She died before computers came to the fore so wasn't any link there. My mother was about ten miles away...