Thread: Stories that will make you feel old

I posted a little bit about feeling old lately in another thread, but I figured we could all get some good laughs out some stories that really age us.

...When I was about 9(?) we got a VCR. We were the first house on the street to get a VCR, so it was a really big deal. My dad spent all night reading all the directions, and gave us strict instructions to not play with the VCR at all- as it cost a small fortune. The next night my brother, Dad and I all settled in to watch Airplane! which my dad had bought at the bargain rate of $125. The movie ran past our bedtime, and my mom kept coming into the living room to bug us to turn the TV off and get to bed. We kept buying more time by saying "next commercial mom, next commercial". Of course there are no commercials in a movie, so the big joke was on my mom, 'cause she didn't understand that!

Anyone else have stories that age them?

Originally Posted by Yankees

When I was a kid, Pluto was still considered a planet!

I thought Pluto was a dawg . . .

Lol- true! Crazy to think a planet has been downgraded in our lifetime. Kinda makes you wonder what other incorrect facts that we hold as truths are floating around out there.

I remember the first time I got an automated operator on a pay phone. I had deposited the correct amount of change, 2 nickels, and the phone did not register one of the nickels.

The "operator" came on and said please deposit 5 cents. I told her I had put in two nickels, to which she replied, "please deposit 5 cents". Again I told her I already had done that. She said again to deposit another nickel. I started getting a little ticked that she didn't even acknowledge what I was telling her. "Listen, I already deposited the nickel! Are you deaf?"

She never sounded like her feathers were ruffled and kept repeating the instruction. I, on the other hand, was getting more and more ticked at this B*tch! Finally I realized it was a recording.

When I was a kid (in the 60s) . . .

-Microwave ovens were in the Disney Carousel of Progress

-JFK had a crazy idea: Land on the moon before the decade was over

-Computers used cards for programs, took up entire city blocks, and cost millions of dollars.

(when I was a kid, millions of dollars was a LOT of money!)

OK, I'll stop.

-Russ H.

Someone once asked George Abbot (writer of Damn Yankees, the Pajama Game, All Quiet on the Western Front) what was the biggest change he'd seen in Broadway, during his time there.

After thinking about it for a few minutes, he said simply, "Electricity."

Abbot was the recipient of multiple Tony awards, a Kennedy Center honors, and a Pulitzer Prize.

He passed away in 1995 at the age of 108. He'd walked down the aisle on the opening night of a Damn Yankees revival just a year earlier, at the age of 106. When he heard cheers all around him and a standing ovation, he was overheard saying to his companion, "There must be someone important here."

Originally Posted by Allthingznew

I remember the first time I got an automated operator on a pay phone. I had deposited the correct amount of change, 2 nickels, and the phone did not register one of the nickels.

The "operator" came on and said please deposit 5 cents. I told her I had put in two nickels, to which she replied, "please deposit 5 cents". Again I told her I already had done that. She said again to deposit another nickel. I started getting a little ticked that she didn't even acknowledge what I was telling her. "Listen, I already deposited the nickel! Are you deaf?"

She never sounded like her feathers were ruffled and kept repeating the instruction. I, on the other hand, was getting more and more ticked at this B*tch! Finally I realized it was a recording.

lol- wow you are old! Remember when you had to pay for the internet according to usage?

Actually, when I was a teenager working in the hospital in the 1970s, one of my favorite things to do when I had extra time after work was talk to the 80+ year olds.

I'd ask them about their lives, and what it was like when they were kids.

No electricity.
No cars.
No airplanes.
Family members who fought in the Civil War.

I listened for hours, when I had the chance.

I was in awe.

-Russ H.

Originally Posted by Russ H

When I was a kid (in the 60s) . . .

-Microwave ovens were in the Disney Carousel of Progress

Oh my gosh, my mom learning how to cook with the mircowave!

How about when Star Trek, with Captain Kirk, was on prime time? It was so cool then, and so cheezy now...

How about when Star Trek, with Captain Kirk, was on prime time? It was so cool then, and so cheezy now...

No, it was cheesy then, too. But in a 60's camp kinda way.

I also remember watching the original Batman TV shows (Ka-POW!), when they first aired.

Also campy, but lots of fun.

-Russ H.

[ame=http://youtube.com/watch?v=r94AJzJZZaU]YouTube - 1960s Batman - Fight scene[/ame]

Originally Posted by Russ H

No, it was cheesy then, too. But in a 60's camp kinda way.

I also remember watching the original Batman TV shows (Ka-POW!), when they first aired.

Also campy, but lots of fun.

-Russ H.

YouTube - 1960s Batman - Fight scene

Yes, Batman!

Lost in Space was cheezy...Danger Will Robinson!

And Atari was cutting edge...

Personally, I always liked the riddles on the old Batman shows. They were always so ridiculous- Batman would somehow find this nonsensical riddle, something like "What's red and green at 2pm?" He would somehow deduce that red meant love and that love meant marriage and that marriage meant the mayor's daughter's wedding. And verde was green in Spanish, and that verde was also a type of chili, as in chili verde, and that the Joker was going to poison the chilis at the mayor's daughter's wedding at 2pm. ...Of course it all makes perfect sense when you're a kid!

I remember when we got a microwave and my mom would cook EVERYTHING in it....it was gross...having rubbery "meatloaf" or "eggs"....she even cooked a birthday cake of mine in the microwave....I had a slumber party at my house and I wanted an angle food cake. Since she cooked it in the microwave, we couldn't cut it! My Dad had to pull out the electric knife to try to get it going! Talk about a memory!

Any of you girls remember "Holly Hobby"...I loved her...

I also had a Mrs. Beasley doll when I was real little...

Am I dating myself? You all can see my age, so it's no big secret....I do have to tell you though 40 is FABULOUS! I've never been in happier, hotter, healthier and hungrier for biz than now! I always knew I'd like my 40's...

So you "younger set" enjoy everything now, it only get's better!!!!

On the topic of VCRs, my parents bought the first one for our house. It was the size of a small picnic table. It was also not the cutting edge frontload models. This one was top load with a remote that you plugged into the front of the unit. If I recall it only had rewind and fast forward on it.

Before that we would just rent the VCR and movies and make it a weekend thing.

Oh, and our first cable box was the type that you slid the litte lever to each number or letter to change the channel.

Originally Posted by yveskleinsky

Lol- true! Crazy to think a planet has been downgraded in our lifetime. Kinda makes you wonder what other incorrect facts that we hold as truths are floating around out there.

Here's another one that I wrote about on my old blog several years ago (the same day as the Pluto downgrading)...still think this is tremendously interesting, and wonder if the high school textbooks have been changed yet...

Directly from my old blog post:

------

As you might recall from high school biology, the basic unit of inheritance is a gene, which is piece of DNA — the master copy of the genetic code. In classical genetics, it was believed (and most of us have been taught) that every offspring is endowed with two sets of genes (two copies of DNA), one from the mother and the other from the father. And all of our inherited traits come from just these two sets of genes. In other words, the two sets of DNA that we inherit from our parents are the sole determiner of our genetic fate. Further, we’ve been taught that DNA follows a two-step approach to passing on its genes. First, it creates sub-copies of itself in the form of RNA. This RNA then creates the proteins that build life.

The theory holds that all hereditary information is stored in the DNA, and only that information may be replicated and therefore inherited. But the experiments above indicate that this basic tenet of biology may not hold — that RNA may have “memory” and replicate traits that were held by previous generations of genes, but not by the specific set of genes most recently inherited.

This means that we may inherit traits of our parents (and perhaps even grandparents?) that weren’t necessarily passed on to us through our genes!

I wonder how many other basic tenets of scientific fact have changed since I first learned them?