Back in the day

[Regs]

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 both ways through year 'round blizzards carrying their younger siblings on their backs to their one-room schoolhouse where they maintained a straight-A average; despite their full-time after-school job at the local textile mill where they worked for 35 cents an hour just to help keep their family from starving to death!

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've reached the ripe old age of 39, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today.You've got it so fcukin' easy!

I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a goddamned 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-we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves!

And there was no email! We had to actually write somebody a letter with a pen!-- and then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the fcukin' mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!

And there were no MP3s or Napsters! You wanted to steal music, you had to go to the record store and shoplift it yourself!

Or we had to wait around all day to tape it off theradio and the DJ'd usually talk over the beginning and fcuk it all up!

You want to hear about hardship?You couldn't just download porn! You had to bribe some homeless dude to buy you a copy of "Hustler" at the 7-11! It was either that or jackoff to the lingerie section of the Sears catalog! Those were your options!

We didn't have fancy shite like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal!

And we didn't have fancy Caller ID Boxes either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was it could be your boss, your mom, a collections agent, your drug dealer, you didn't know!!! You just had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

And we didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation videogames with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had Pong! With that little fcuking blob going back and forth, and the graphics sucked ass! Your guy was a little square! You 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 faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

When you went to the movie theater there no such thing as stadium seating! All the seats were the same height! A tall guy sat in front of you, you were fcuked!

And sure, we had cable television, but back then that was only like 20 channels and there was no onscreen menu! You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on!

And there was no Cartoon Network! You could only get cartoons on Saturday morning... ...D'ya hear what the fcuk I'm saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK, you spoiled little bastards!

That's exactly what I'm talking about!

You kids today have got it too easy You're spoiled, I swear to God! You guys wouldn't last five minutes back in 1977!

 

[Guinness]

Suitcase Slappy

Funny stuff for an old guy!!!

My parents always used that crap on me!!!
When I wanted a new bike their comeback was: "What's wrong with your own bike??? I didn't get a bicycle until my 19th birthday and it was 5th hand, but you would never hear me complain about it"!!! (They always had to use the word bicycle)

I also remember when I went to the cinema I hated tall bastards like you sitting in front of me when I was with my young love interest!!! Half the time I would switch seats and let her see the flick... Probably the reason why I thought Batman, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure and Twins were boring??? Back then, Mullets were in style, so you could imagine the scars left behind!?!?!?

 

[Fastshow]

in a similar vein.........

For Ballbaby, The Captain, and Peter specifically...............

If you lived as a child in the 50's, 60's or 70's, looking back,
it's hard to believe that we have lived as long as we have.......

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.
Our cots were covered with bright coloured lead-based paint. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors, or cupboards, and when we rode our bikes we had no helmets.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.
Horrors.

We would spend hours building go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times we learned to solve the problem.

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day.

No mobile phones. Unthinkable.
We got cut and broke bones and broke teeth, and there were no law suits from these accidents. They were accidents. No one was to blame but us. Remember accidents?

We had fights and punched each other and got black and blue and learned to get over it.

We ate patty cakes, bread and butter, and drank cordial, but we were never overweight...we were always outside playing. We shared one drink with four friends, from one bottle and no one died from this.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo 64, X-Boxes, video games, 65 channels on pay TV, video tape movies, surround sound, personal mobile phones, Thumbzilla, Personal Computers, or internet chat rooms; we had friends. We went outside and found them. We rode bikes or walked to a friend's home and knocked on the door, or rung the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.

Imagine such a thing. Without asking a parent! By ourselves! Out there in the cold cruel world! Without a guardian - how did we do it?

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and ate worms, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes, nor did the worms live inside us forever. With the notable exception of The Captain.

Footy and netball had tryouts and not everyone made the team.
Those who didn't, had to learn to deal with disappointment..... Some, like Ballbaby, even had to wait until they were well into their thirties.

Some students weren't as smart as others so they failed a grade and were held back to repeat the same grade. Tests were not adjusted for any reason.

Our actions were our own. Consequences were expected. No one to hide behind. The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke a law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law - imagine that!

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever. Apart from those who post on a Canadian website called TTP. The past 50 years has been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all. Apart from Regs who lost his hair instead.

And you're one of them. Congratulations!

 

[peter]

Ahh, the memories...

Fasty,

Those were the days. I don't think you can really lump those two youngsters in here though: they were of the "pong" generation and had it pretty soft.

irememberbeing10yearsoldoutalldayincommunicado(sp?)

 

[Fastshow]

must be something in thr air.......

In Communicado, eh, Peter? A bit like Kurgan on TTP.

Dunno why but these are flooding into my inbox these days.

Closest I've been to an inbox in weeks.


Are you displaying any of the following?
1. You leave gigs before the encore to "beat the rush".
2. You get more excited about having a roast on a Sunday than going clubbing.
3. You stop dreaming of becoming a professional footballer and start dreaming of having a son who might instead.
4. Before throwing the local paper away, you look through the property section.
5. You prefer Later with Jools Holland to Top of the Pops.
6. Before going out anywhere, you ask what the parking is like.
7. Rather than throw a knackered pair of trainers out, you keep them because they'll be all right for the garden.
8. You buy your first ever T-shirt without anything written on it.
9. Instead of laughing at the innovations catalogue that falls out of the newspaper, you suddenly see both the benefit and money saving properties of a plastic winter cover for your garden bench and an electronic mole repellent for the lawn. Not to mention the plastic man for the car to deter would-be thieves.
10. Sure, you have more disposable income, but everything you want to buy costs between 200 and 500 euro.
11. You don't get funny looks when you buy a Disney video or a Wallace and Gromit bubble bath, as the sales assistant assumes they are for your child.
12. Pop music all sounds crap.
13. You opt for Milano's over Pizza Hut because they don't have any pictures on the menus and anyway, they do a really nice half-bottle of house white.
14. You become powerless to resist the lure of self-assembly furniture.
15. You always have enough milk in.
16. To compensate for the fact that you have little desire to go
clubbing, you instead frequent really loud tapas restaurants and
franchise pubs with wacky names in the mistaken belief that you have not turned into your parents.
17. While flicking through the TV channels, you happen upon 'Changing Rooms' or 'Ground Force'. You get drawn in.
18. The benefits of a pension scheme become clear.
19. You go out of your way to pick up a colour chart from Atlantic
Homecare.
20. You wish you had a shed.
21. You have a shed.
22. You actually find yourself saying "They don't make 'em like that
anymore" and "I remember when there were only 3 TV channels" and "Of course, in my day...."
23. Lite FM plays more songs you know than FM104 - and Pat Kenny has some really interesting guests on.
24. Instead of tutting at old people who take ages to get off the bus, you tut at schoolchildren who have bad manners.
25. When sitting outside a pub you become envious of their hanging baskets.
26. You make an effort to be in and out of the chippies by 11.
27. You come face to face with your own mortality for the first time, and the indestructibility of the 20s gives way to a realisation that you are but passing through this life and if you don't settle down soon and have kids you'll have no-one to look after you when you're old and frail and incontinent and you can't go on pissing your life up against a wall forever and think of how many brain cells you're destroying every time a 'quick drink' turns into 10 pints and 4 whiskeys, and look at that, a full set of stainless steel saucepans for 99 quid, they cost as much as 35 each if you buy them separately, and you get a milk pan thrown in, ...
28. You find yourself saying "is it cold in here or is it just me?"