# Flyin' the fogey flag



## ribonucleic

In the wake of Tuesday's announcement of Apple entering the wireless payment market someone opined that in 10 years paying for purchases with a plastic card will be a scarlet "F" of old fogeydom.

I'm ready for it. But it reminded me of visiting my father's law office as a boy and playing with a genuine mechanical pull-the-lever-towards-you adding machine.

Given that the community here is more, ah... _seasoned_ than the Internet average, what vanished bits of culture survive in your memories?


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## Manxfeeder

Tom Hanks has an app that turns your phone into a typewriter, complete with carriage return bells. Cool memory, but I'm glad those things are gone.

Speaking of fogeys, I still use DOS commands on the C prompt. I'm glad that bit of our past culture still survives.


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## JACE

People often remark when they see my Creative Zen MP3 player on my desk.










"What is that thing?!?!" they say, implying that I might as well be using an antique gramophone and a stack of 78 rpm shellacs.

Sheesh. It's not _that_ old. And it's not _that_ big. It works perfectly. So why give should I give it up? 

Hard to believe that it's _already_ odd to see a music-specific portable device.


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## Guest

ribonucleic said:


> [... ] Given that the community here is more, ah... _seasoned_ than the Internet average, what vanished bits of culture survive in your memories?


Reading the news on stone tablets with cursive hieroglyphs.


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## brotagonist

home-cooked meals and vegetables fresh out of the garden


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## ribonucleic

JACE said:


> Hard to believe that it's _already_ odd to see a music-specific portable device.


Well, not included among all the other Apple announcements yesterday was the removal from life support of the iPod Classic.

I suppose its time had come. But given its role in saving the company from bankruptcy, you'd think they could have buried it with at least a short eulogy of appreciation.


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## Figleaf

JACE said:


> People often remark when they see my Creative Zen MP3 player on my desk.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> "What is that thing?!?!" they say, implying that I might as well be using an antique gramophone and a stack of 78 rpm shellacs.
> 
> Sheesh. It's not _that_ old. And it's not _that_ big. It works perfectly. So why give should I give it up?
> 
> Hard to believe that it's _already_ odd to see a music-specific portable device.


That's way too modern and complex for me! I still have a Sony Walkman from 1990 and a portable gramophone- yes, it's a ridiculously cumbersome thing, but until everything I want to listen to is available in modern format, I'm keeping it!

'Flying the fogey flag'- if I were posh enough to have a coat of arms, that would be the motto on it!


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## SixFootScowl

My first computer class in college has us use punch cards to enter a program into the mainframe computer--just for the experience. I also remember doing word processing on a mainframe computer.

In the 1970s working retail I had to run credit cards with carbon copies through the device that rolled over the receipt and card to make the impression of the numbers. Ha, my dentist still uses that machine.


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## ribonucleic

Florestan said:


> In the 1970s working retail I had to run credit cards with carbon copies through the device that rolled over the receipt and card to make the impression of the numbers.


Ah, yes. Grip the plastic handle firmly, pull sideways, increase force to get over the resistance in the middle, and then the ka-chunk as it slams home at the far side.

I believe I've heard that sound for that last time.


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## JACE

Figleaf said:


> That's way too modern and complex for me! I still have a Sony Walkman from 1990 and *a portable gramophone*- yes, it's a ridiculously cumbersome thing, but until everything I want to listen to is available in modern format, I'm keeping it!


Mine's not portable, but there's NO WAY I'd give up my turntable. I still get TONS of enjoyment from vinyl.


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## JACE

I'm sort of amazed at how many people are giving away their CDs, transitioning fully to streaming services. Even friends who really love music. I can't imagine giving away my collection!

A sign of my own fogey-dom: If I love the music, I want a THING, a tangible object. Doesn't matter whether it's vinyl or CD. (And a download isn't sufficient! Not tangible enough! )

And streaming services? From my point of view, they're just for _previewing_ music. Like radio was in the past.


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## Jos

I play my music on vinyl, I read my newspaper on actual paper, repair my bicycle myself and I don't know how to operate the TVset with the controls of my sons Xbox, I don't even know how the TV got conected to this device. I prefer cash to plastic.
Espresso should be made with a proper Italian machine and not with these plastic disposables nonsense. I buy books at my friendly bookshop instead of online. I like my mechanical Omega watch. You may have seen my cellphone in another thread.
I'm very sceptical about the exposure of young children to "social media", for adults too for that matter. 
I don't say Oh My God every other sentence. I prefer good old lightbulbs to those energysavers with their horrible light.
Could go on for a bit......

And I'm not even fifty !!!

Cheers,
Jos


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## Headphone Hermit

ribonucleic said:


> Given that the community here is more, ah... _seasoned_ than the Internet average, what vanished bits of culture survive in your memories?


in no particular order:
- slide rule for calculations
- a wrist watch that is wound up every day (yes, I have a 1960s Omega and my 30 year-old colleague thought I was pulling his leg when I said it needed winding up one day - ha had never heard of such a watch!)
- a rag-and-bone man with a horse-drawn cart
- bob-a-job week (For the Brits only, I guess!)
- greengrocers who used to use white paint to mark up the prices of their produce every day on the window of their shop
- scrags at the chippie (the bits and bobs of batter that fell ooff the fish in a fish and chip shop - given for nothing to the customers that the frier liked)
- chips in newspaper (and getting a free portion for taking a big pile of papers in)
- the guy who walked the streets sharpening knives etc
- being smacked at school
- 'penny for the guy' (another for the Brits)
- only two channels on the TV .... and it only broadcast for an hour at lunchtime (Watch with Mother) and then from early evening to before midnight (when the broadcasts ended with the nattional anthem) .... and there was no remote control!

will that do for starters?


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## PetrB

TalkingHead said:


> Reading the news on stone tablets with cursive hieroglyphs.


and cuneiform, and linear B. Even though I am apparently a bit younger than you, by gosh, those clay tablets were heavy!

ADD: there was an article not long ago about a father who stumbled upon his old Walkman and some casettes while going through a box of 'old stuff.' He got fresh batteries for it and, without further explanation, handed the apparatus to his son. The lad was astonished at how little time-play of music was on it, and it took him several days to figure out there were two sides on the cassette 

_Getting up to change the channel on the television (and that black and white only), the LP on the record player._

_Getting up and walking across one room, or through several rooms, to answer the telephone._

_Auditioning LP classical discs in the store's listening booths before deciding to purchase one._

_Having to purchase a concert ticket at the ticket booth in the hall, and nowhere else._

_Ordering music from Carl Fischer's, over the phone, that being enough to establish an account with them, their then sending it to you on good faith with the bill enclosed as being 'on account,' sans credit cards or needing to establish credit reliability!_


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## Ingélou

* Running off teaching worksheets on the 'Banda', a device which printed off paper copies using the carbon imprint of what you'd handwritten with a biro. I always ended up covered in ink and the carbon sheet sometimes 'cracked' or got too faint. *But* I liked them - you could draw or do fancy script and make a really distinctive worksheet. When I was doing teaching practice, I ran off some copies of The English Struwwelpeter (Shock-headed Peter; the Long Red-legged Scissor Man etc) with drawings and another student begged me for a copy of it. 

* Plasticine in primary school.

* Inkwells and fountain pens in secondary school. You used the old fashioned nib pen for mapping. At the end of term we all lined up to wash our inkwells. Mine was always very inky because I used to build up layer after layer so that the inkwell would turn gold.

* Shelling peas for lunch (and eating a goodly portion).

* The old British coinage, a history lesson in itself. I remember Victorian pennies and halfpennies circulating freely - usually the design with Vicky wearing widow's weepers, but occasionally a 'bun penny' would turn up. We all knew what Edward VII, George V, George VI and the younger Elizabeth II looked like, and were always looking to find the rare Edward VIII penny that would earn us a fortune.

* Post any letter or a card - no first or second class system then - and there was a 98% chance it would arrive the next day. And there was an early morning post, plus a mid-morning or noon post too. I once stayed at my sister's, posted a postcard which caught the 8pm post, then went home the next day by train in the morning & found my father waiting to pick me up.

PS - This is a fab thread, ribonucleic. :tiphat: I can't wait till Taggart sees it.


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## SixFootScowl

Jos said:


> I play my music on vinyl, I read my newspaper on actual paper, repair my bicycle myself and I don't know how to operate the TVset with the controls of my sons Xbox, I don't even know how the TV got conected to this device. I prefer cash to plastic.
> Espresso should be made with a proper Italian machine and not with these plastic disposables nonsense. I buy books at my friendly bookshop instead of online. I like my mechanical Omega watch. You may have seen my cellphone in another thread.
> I'm very sceptical about the exposure of young children to "social media", for adults too for that matter.
> I don't say Oh My God every other sentence. I prefer good old lightbulbs to those energysavers with their horrible light.
> Could go on for a bit......
> 
> And I'm not even fifty !!!
> 
> Cheers,
> Jos


What are you doing on this website? It is very high tech to talk on a web forum. You should be attending a community classical music club social gathering every month instead.


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## Vaneyes

I think ordering CDs online and then having them snail-mailed to your doorstep is kinda neat. A melding of past and present.

I like that turntable usage is still around. I don't miss the incessant intrusion of phonecalls. Phonecalls now are reserved for something fairly important. Spammers aside, of course, but thankfully I've managed to eliminate a lot of them.

Typewriters were sh__. I preferred handwriting.:tiphat:

PEE-ESS: With this thread, I think we've all morphed into Andy Rooney.


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## ribonucleic

Someday I'm going to blow my co-workers' minds by telling them how, when you used to pull into a gas station, a guy would come up and not only pump the gas for you, he'd squeegee your windshield.


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## Vaneyes

Ingélou said:


> ....
> ** Inkwells* and fountain pens in secondary school. You used the old fashioned nib pen for mapping. At the end of term we all lined up to wash our inkwells. Mine was always very inky because I used to build up layer after layer so that the inkwell would turn gold.
> 
> * The old *British coinage*, a history lesson in itself. I remember Victorian pennies and halfpennies circulating freely - usually the design with Vicky wearing widow's weepers, but occasionally a 'bun penny' would turn up. We all knew what Edward VII, George V, George VI and the younger Elizabeth II looked like, and were always looking to find the rare Edward VIII penny that would earn us a fortune. ...


You've struck memory paydirt, I. Inkwells were great for dipping girls hair into.

What was with all that concrete money? Mexico was also bad, though some of their money-junk was aluminum.


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## Vaneyes

ribonucleic said:


> Someday I'm going to blow my co-workers' minds by telling them how, when you used to pull into a gas station, a guy would come up and not only pump the gas for you, he'd squeegee your windshield.


Newsflash, for safety reasons, some North American municipalities require that gas be pumped by "service station" employees. And, I've found these sorts often ask to check your car's oil, and clean its windshield.


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## Jos

Florestan said:


> What are you doing on this website? It is very high tech to talk on a web forum. You should be attending a community classical music club social gathering every month instead.


After long and hard studying, with a very patient mentor, I can now write an "eMail" and operate the miraclemachine called "iPad".
One must keep up with the modern times. A bit.


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## Headphone Hermit

Ingélou said:


> * Running off teaching worksheets on the 'Banda', a device which printed off paper copies using the carbon imprint of what you'd handwritten with a biro. I always ended up covered in ink and the carbon sheet sometimes 'cracked' or got too faint. *But* I liked them - you could draw or do fancy script and make a really distinctive worksheet. When I was doing teaching practice, I ran off some copies of The English Struwwelpeter (Shock-headed Peter; the Long Red-legged Scissor Man etc) with drawings and another student begged me for a copy of it.


And the smell! The whole class tripping if the banda was too fresh!
You could get different colours on the printed sheet by using different backing sheets - I managed to get more than 10 colours on a fact-sheet for the 'Fire of London' (No ... it wasn't a 'Current Affairs' lesson - tut!)

More from teaching in the past:
Sending the kids to the corner shop to buy you a packet of cigarettes ..... if you couldn't steal any off the kids at playtime (well, you HAD to destroy the ciggies somehow!)

Throwing chalk at misbehaving pupils - I had to stop that when I laanded a stub of chalk right down a laughing childs throat and almost caused him to have a fit

And what about roller-maps - it was an essential skill for every geography teacher to be able to ink the roller, roll a map onto a clean page in an exercise book, and get round all of the class in a few minutes. By gum - it kept you fit and healthy!


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## PetrB

Jos said:


> I prefer good old lightbulbs to those energysavers with their horrible light.


*The ugliest* quality of light foisted on us yet, and totally democratic they are: everything and everyone seen in that light looks God-awful!

The other older generation fluorescent tube lights are almost but not quite as bad. And how about the eco-impact of these 'power savers,' eh? They're still fluorescent bulbs, with all the toxic 'do not dispose of in normal trash / special waste' provisos attached to all fluorescent lights.


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## Vaneyes

Come to think of it, I kinda miss the judo chops on the back of my neck, from drafting teacher Mr. Shupe. For unnecessary talking. Like now. He'd give me another one for this dribble.


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## SixFootScowl

ribonucleic said:


> Someday I'm going to blow my co-workers' minds by telling them how, when you used to pull into a gas station, a guy would come up and not only pump the gas for you, he'd squeegee your windshield.


Yes, I used to do that. We were called Pump Jockeys.


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## Figleaf

PetrB said:


> _Ordering music from Carl Fischer's, over the phone, and that enough to establish and account with them, their then sending it to you in good faith with the bill enclosed as 'on account,' without credit cards or needing to establish credit reliability!_


I just bought a CD on the internet and the billing system was as you described- an enclosed invoice to be paid on receipt of the goods. Not sure whether it's an old fashioned practice, or a German practice, or just this company's idiosyncratic way of doing things! It was this CD:







from the Hamburger Archiv für Gesangskunst.
http://www.hafg.de/framesets/sanger_recitals.html


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## PetrB

Headphone Hermit said:


> And the smell! The whole class tripping if the banda was too fresh!


A-Ha! _The Mimeograph!_



Headphone Hermit said:


> Sending the kids to the corner shop to buy you a packet of cigarettes ..... if you couldn't steal any off the kids at playtime (well, you HAD to destroy the ciggies somehow!)


_Love it!_



Headphone Hermit said:


> Throwing chalk at misbehaving pupils - I had to stop that when I landed a stub of chalk right down a laughing child's throat and almost caused him to have a fit.


This is rather perfect... though in the States, you'd be suspended and charged with battery


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## Headphone Hermit

PetrB said:


> This is rather perfect... though in the States, you'd be suspended and charged with battery


And in the UK too, nowadays .... erm, and even for historical cases too - GULP!

I was merely exaggerating, your Honour, Really!


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## PetrB

Figleaf said:


> I just bought a CD on the internet and the billing system was as you described- an enclosed invoice to be paid on receipt of the goods. Not sure whether it's an old fashioned practice, or a German practice, or just this company's idiosyncratic way of doing things! It was this CD:
> View attachment 50844
> 
> from the Hamburger Archiv für Gesangskunst.
> http://www.hafg.de/framesets/sanger_recitals.html


It is very old school. Deals for a little or millions made on a handshake, with currency or contracts to follow the initial transaction, including walking out of a shop with the goods prior any payment, or the company sending you the goods prior payment. You simply gave them a name and an address (which could of course all be fake and part of a scam) and they sent it there -- period, and then awaited your follow through payment.

It goes back to that ethic of no matter who you are or how much you're worth, your true worth and integrity hang on the worth of your word alone.

Lovely, actually, and a pity it has nearly vanished.


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## PetrB

Christmas ought to bring a bit of a fogey recall flood:

Real pine trees.

Tinsel was made _of lead._ It weighted the boughs very nicely, and also shorted out the (big, fat) lights if you happen to brush it against a metal fitting 

Angel's Hair was actual spun glass, and putting it on the tree without gloves resulted in 'the thousand cuts.'

Elaborate hand-blown and hand-painted glass ornaments (almost exclusively from Czechoslovakia), some with concavities with dimensional scenes therein (I recall one with a mushroom in it.)

Garlands hand-strung by the family of cranberries and popcorn (still done, I think)


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## PetrB

Vaneyes said:


> Come to think of it, I kinda miss the judo chops on the back of my neck, from drafting teacher Mr. Shupe. For unnecessary talking. Like now. He'd give me another one for this dribble.


It was always the drafting / shop teacher, wasn't it?

Reminds me of SHOP, in early primary school (second or third grade), which included drafting, but also us tykes working gingerly with high-powered band saws -- our litigation happy and liability aware current times I'm sure don't allow for anything like a kid + a band saw!

Tools: Manual EVERYTHING. 
Pencil sharpener, hand cranked.
Squeezing an orange or a lemon: special tool, manual press and rotate.
Sanding. Block of wood, or other, sandpaper, and muscle power.
Hand-cranked drills (still have one, probably made before I was born, still works like a champ!) Yes, kiddies, screws were driven by hand, boards cut by hand, holes drilled by hand.

Paint: Interior or Exterior, all paints were oil-based, no latex (read "emulsion," British colleagues) and the only alternative was "Casein," (milk-based paint) which was chalky and rubbed off in a powdery dust if touched when dry.


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## Figleaf

Wonder if I should learn to use a slide rule in preparation for the upcoming zombie/ peak oil apocalypse, as John Michael Greer suggests.


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## Vaneyes

PetrB said:


> Christmas ought to bring a bit of a fogey recall flood:
> 
> Real pine trees.
> 
> Tinsel was made _of lead._ It weighted the boughs very nicely, and also shorted out the (big, fat) lights if you happen to brush it against a metal fitting
> 
> Angel's Hair was actual spun glass, and putting it on the tree without gloves resulted in 'the thousand cuts.'
> 
> Elaborate hand-blown and hand-painted glass ornaments (almost exclusively from Czechoslovakia), some with concavities with dimensional scenes therein (I recall one with a mushroom in it.)
> 
> Garlands hand-strung by the family of cranberries and popcorn (still done, I think)


Smaller footprint...


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## PetrB

Vaneyes said:


> Smaller footprint...


... and no smell but polyurethane!


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## Couchie

In Germany I was stunned that it is the norm for stores and restaurants to be cash-only. A country with 320 km/h trains still pays for everything with crumpled up bits of paper? 

In Canada everything from taxis to vending machines to pizza delivery men not only accept cards but have chip and pin and contactless NFC terminals. One simply does not carry cash anymore.


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## KenOC

ribonucleic said:


> Someday I'm going to blow my co-workers' minds by telling them how, when you used to pull into a gas station, a guy would come up and not only pump the gas for you, he'd squeegee your windshield.


And check your oil and belts, and your tire pressures. 'S true! There's a beautiful scene in the movie Back to the Future showing this in a somewhat idealized way. But I remember it, yessiree Bob I do.


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## senza sordino

I carry cash. I do not own a mobile phone, I manage quite well without it. I still write postcards and use the post.

I remember walking to school by myself, this doesn't seem to happen much these days.
I can remember a time when flying was quite exciting and people used to be well dressed for such an occasion.
I can remember when university tuition was less than $800 per year.
I completed my university degree without using the internet.
I remember having to get up from the couch to change the channels. 
I remember when you had wait for music to be released officially and pay full price for it.
I remember cold winters and the Fraser River freezing over. This doesn't happen anymore.
I remember visiting my Grandmother's neighbour who was a WWI vet.
I remember having milk given to us in schools (Before Thatcher the milk snatcher)


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## mirepoix

^^^^ I remember the free milk in school.

I still prefer to use cash whenever possible (and as an aside, a German woman I dated told me that the reason so many Germans use cash has more to do with privacy concerns than with being behind the technological times).

I recall when borrowing a book from the library a small card would be taken from the book and placed inside my ticket, which would then be placed on file. And while we're in the library, being stopped on entry and hearing_ "Are your hands clean? Let me see!_" - cheeky auld swine...I didn't have much as a child, but I was always clean.

Going round the doors of nearby houses and asking "Got any empty ginger bottles (glass bottles for soft drinks) you don't want?" which we'd take to a shop and be given 2 pence for.

Over the last few years two of my friends have upped and moved away. While we keep in touch via email, I occasionally write letters to them - and when I do so I enjoy the simple pleasure of using one of these:









Waiting for the early/sports newspaper containing the fitba (soccer) results to see if I'd won the 'pools'.

Next to the main entry doorway to some buildings there used to be a small hole in the wall, located at ground level. It had a bar across it so you could scrape the mud off your shoes before entering.

Some winters we couldn't afford gloves, so we'd wear a pair of socks on our hands instead. Come to think of it, that was quite commonplace where I lived.

Phoning a girl from a phone box and trying to sound all mature and posh and innocent when her father picked up to answer: "_Good evening Mister McTavish, I hope you and your lady wife are both well this fine evening. If it's not too much of an imposition, may I speak to Jeannie and her legs, please?_"

Most of the technology used in my job now mostly resides within the digital domain, but one thing I really miss is the huge range of camera film that once existed. "I'll have a brick of Ektachrome and one, no, make that two of Kodachrome, thanks".


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## KenOC

senza sordino said:


> I remember having to get up from the couch to change the channels.


Hah! I remember when there was just one channel (channel 27). All the shows were locally produced, live, and boy were they bad!

In fact, I remember before we or our neighbors had television at all. A wonder that we survived.


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## Piwikiwi

PetrB said:


> *The ugliest* quality of light foisted on us yet, and totally democratic they are: everything and everyone seen in that light looks God-awful!
> 
> The other older generation fluorescent tube lights are almost but not quite as bad. And how about the eco-impact of these 'power savers,' eh? They're still fluorescent bulbs, with all the toxic 'do not dispose of in normal trash / special waste' provisos attached to all fluorescent lights.


LED's are alright though.


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## Piwikiwi

Couchie said:


> In Germany I was stunned that it is the norm for stores and restaurants to be cash-only. A country with 320 km/h trains still pays for everything with crumpled up bits of paper?


Germans are quite conservative in regards to technical stuff, in the Netherlands you can pay with your pin card everywhere, even in bars.


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## PetrB

Piwikiwi said:


> LED's are alright though.


... if you don't mind feeling like you're under a U.V. light at the dermatologist's office, and _brrrr!_ they even look cold.


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## Piwikiwi

PetrB said:


> ... if you don't mind feeling like you're under a U.V. light at the dermatologist's office, and _brrrr!_ they even look cold.


Haha but still everything is better than tl light.


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## GGluek

Carbon paper. (The joke about the first ballpoint pens (made by Reynolds) was that they were the first pens that would allow you to make four carbon copies -- and no original.)

Taking exposed film (Kodacolor, Verichrome Pan), to the drugstore, where it would be sent out to Rochester for processing -- and you'd get the prints back in three or four days!

Being able to tune your own car. (Taught this to my younger son, who got a 1972 Mercedes cheap for the "cool" factor when driving it around.)

Being able to pretend to fix you TV by opening the back and wiggling the vacuum tubes with the tip of your finger, usually burning your hand in the process.

Anyone still have a breadbox?

In the U.S., paper money used to be "silver certificates" -- exchangeable for the equivalent amount of silver, rather than "Federal Reserve Notes," which aren't.

Having to rely on National Geographic Magazine photos, or the occasional Time Magazine photo of a European girl in a really skimpy bikini to learn about sex.

Turning on the television before the station began broadcasting normal programming and watching the test pattern.


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## Couac Addict

...when Spam came in a tin and not your inbox.


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## ribonucleic




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## Badinerie

> he'd squeegee your windshield.


That's probably a euphemism these days!

I remember taking old clothes to the rag and bone man' s horse and cart and getting sweets and a balloon. 
Telephone receivers you could stun a cow with. 
My dad used to give my sisters and I an old penny when we went out in case we got lost, we were supposed to phone home and he would pick us up. We would never pool them together and buy a cigarette, no siree! 
Mobile shops used to come round the streets selling anything you could desire. 
I really miss Junk shops!! Yeah...now the ex-contents are labelled "Collectables" and are sold for outrageous prices on Fleabay. 
Mobile phones? dont get me started! I hate not being incommunicado when Im in the pub with the lads, the endless comparing of phones and ceaseless text alarms.


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## Vaneyes

PetrB said:


> ... if you don't mind feeling like you're under a U.V. light at the dermatologist's office, and _brrrr!_ they even look cold.


We wouldn't go back. A complete LED changeover. Side by side comparison with the old dingy yellow light that needs changing regularly? No contest.


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## Vaneyes

ribonucleic said:


>


"Is this the party to whom I'm speaking?"


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## Vaneyes

Couac Addict said:


> ...when Spam came in a tin and not your inbox.


Yummy. The former was one of my university days staple foods, avec pork 'n beans ou mac 'n cheese.


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## Headphone Hermit

It wasn't all good - does anyone remember *Izal toilet paper*?


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## hpowders

^^^How bad can it be? It's medicated.


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## mirepoix

^^^^ toilet paper connoisseur checking in.


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## Headphone Hermit

hpowders said:


> ^^^How bad can it be? It's medicated.


Clearly, you have never used it


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## Ingélou

Headphone Hermit said:


> It wasn't all good - does anyone remember *Izal toilet paper*?
> 
> View attachment 50898


It made brilliant tracing paper, though!


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## Ingélou

Couac Addict said:


> ...when Spam came in a tin and not your inbox.


Foreign or exotic food in the UK in the early 1960s - spaghetti in tins & Chinese food in dry packets - Vesta Chow Mein et al! Olive oil just stuff you bought at the chemist to clean up your ears or your insides.


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## Headphone Hermit

Ingélou said:


> Foreign or exotic food in the UK in the early 1960s - spaghetti in tins & Chinese food in dry packets - Vesta Chow Mein et al! Olive oil just stuff you bought at the chemist to clean up your ears or your insides.


I thought I was being so exotic eating a Vesta (packet) meal when I was a teenager ... I tried one again about 10 years ago - absolutely foul!

I'd never seen spaghetti until I was 15 - I thought my friend was pulling my leg when he said you ate these long dry sticks and was very embarassed when I tried to eat one that wasn't cooked (hangs head in shame!)


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## Wood




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## Wood

Sundays::::::@@@@@


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## KenOC

Ingélou said:


> ...spaghetti in tins & Chinese food in dry packets - Vesta Chow Mein et al!


My mother used to make canned chow mien -- heat it and pour it on crispy noodles that came in a smaller attached can. It was truly horrible, even then.

But I've never lost my taste for the take-out sweet 'n sour pork and the batter-fried prawns (with hot mustard) that came in those little cardboard boxes with the wire bails. Does anybody still use those? There's a scene in the Godfather with everybody sitting around eating that stuff...

Chef Boyardee canned spaghetti and raviolis weren't too bad either, and still available. BTW big news: He was a real chef, born Hector Boiardi.


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## hpowders

Headphone Hermit said:


> Clearly, you have never used it
> 
> View attachment 50899


Looks like something right out of a S/M bathroom...not that I've ever been in one.


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## hpowders

However, wouldn't the fact that it's medicated, neutralize some of the colon perforating effects?


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## ribonucleic

KenOC said:


> He was a real chef, born Hector Boiardi.


For helping feed Allied troops, he was awarded both a Gold Star from the US Army and the Order of Lenin by the Soviets.


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## TresPicos

Piwikiwi said:


> Germans are quite conservative in regards to technical stuff, in the Netherlands you can pay with your pin card everywhere, even in bars.


As long as you can use both cash and cards (or mobile phones), I'm fine with whatever, but when stores stop accepting cash, I stop shopping there. After theatrically storming out, leaving everything at the counter, of course. 

I feel sick to my stomach when people speak of the "cashless society". I would hate to live in it. 

Go, Germany! :tiphat:


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## TresPicos

JACE said:


> People often remark when they see my Creative Zen MP3 player on my desk.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> "What is that thing?!?!" they say, implying that I might as well be using an antique gramophone and a stack of 78 rpm shellacs.
> 
> Sheesh. It's not _that_ old. And it's not _that_ big. It works perfectly. So why give should I give it up?
> 
> Hard to believe that it's _already_ odd to see a music-specific portable device.


Ah, I used to have one of those. I loved it like a puppy, and I was heartbroken for weeks after I lost it. Even with my 160 GB iPod Classic stuffed with classical music, and the whole Spotify universe available in my computer, I still miss my Zen...


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## Vaneyes

KenOC said:


> ....*Chef Boyardee canned spaghetti and raviolis weren't too bad either, and still available. BTW big news: He was a real chef, born Hector Boiardi*.


Oh, it is bad...and I think it was once served to me in a London restaurant.

Another raunchy "entree" is Michelina's frozen food.


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## hpowders

I love Chef Boyardee Ravioli. I eat it cold right out of the can, straight up. Inside the macaroni patties appears to be a meat-like material. I just mind my own business and don't ask any questions.


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## KenOC

Vaneyes said:


> Oh, it is bad...and I think it was once served to me in a London restaurant.
> 
> Another raunchy "entree" is Michelina's frozen food.


The spaghetti's not bad (so long as you don't expect spaghetti anyway). I used to make sandwiches out of it. The raviolis are maybe a bit more chancy...

BTW last night we made spaghetti Caruso. Wow was that good!


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## PetrB

Headphone Hermit said:


> It wasn't all good - does anyone remember *Izal toilet paper*?
> 
> View attachment 50898


Apologies in advance, but a few of these, ^^^ that especially ^^^, 
remind me of the quip, "When it is 4 a.m. in Manhattan, it is 1936 in London."
(and yes, I know that has _all_ changed now..._well, nearly all_


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## Headphone Hermit

PetrB said:


> "When it is 4 a.m. in Manhattan, it is 1936 in London."
> (and yes, I know that has _all_ changed now..._well, nearly all_


Hang on, pal! The OP did say: "what *vanished* bits of culture survive in your *memories*?"

I'm older than Methuselah .... well, in my 50's :lol:


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## PetrB

TresPicos said:


> As long as you can use both cash and cards (or mobile phones), I'm fine with whatever, but when stores stop accepting cash, I stop shopping there. After theatrically storming out, leaving everything at the counter, of course.
> 
> I feel sick to my stomach when people speak of the "cashless society". I would hate to live in it.
> 
> Go, Germany! :tiphat:


In the United States of good ole North America, _all_ paper currency has this text on it:

"THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE"

I'm awaiting the supreme court case where an individual or group sues one business or another for refusing to accept cash... should be interesting!


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## PetrB

Headphone Hermit said:


> Hang on, pal! The OP did say: "what *vanished* bits of culture survive in your *memories*?"
> 
> I'm older than Methuselah .... well, in my 50's :lol:


Lol, older than you, enough that some memories of my past have also vanished!


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## Taggart

Gorgeous thread! I've had a blast reading it.

I certainly remember punched cards - I saw them in my first job at a technical college. Years later in Durham, down by the riverside, there used to be a carpet weaving factory and if they had the doors open you could see their Jacquard loom in full flow:










The carpet factory is, als, no more.

Even later when I got into computing myself, the Open University used to use teletypewriters as input devices. The typical transmission speed was about 6 baud and they were terribly slow. I was lucky as I had a BBC B of my own and a modem capable of 300 baud which made things a *lot* easier.










@mirepoix remembers going out for the papers to find out the football results but many in the UK will remember the sight of the teleprinter thundering away as the results were transmitted from the scattered parts of the kingdom:






I remember a time when there was *no* TV at all and we relied on (steam) radio. When I wanted to hear Dan Dare on Radio Luxembourg my dad had to run aerial wire round the room to get a better signal. Many years later I tried the same thing and gave myself a major shock. I'd been living in a student camp in Sussex, totally out of touch with the news, and got an old steam radio. I was reading _On the Beach_ about the effects of a nuclear war after an Arab Israeli conflict. Up into the attic I goes with lots of aerial wire, comes downstairs, switches on, and gets the news of the Yom Kippur war. 

I certainly remember my dad playing with the valves in both the radio and the TV not to mention the joys of the horizontal and vertical hold which needed regular tweeking.

Somebody mentioned DOS commands, I go back beyond that into CPM which was the first OS I used in earnest.

Hope this thread keeps going.


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## Taggart

Headphone Hermit said:


> It wasn't all good - does anyone remember *Izal toilet paper*?
> 
> View attachment 50898


Newspaper, lad. Not just for fish and chips!


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## KenOC

Taggart said:


> I certainly remember punched cards - I saw them in my first job at a technical college...
> 
> Somebody mentioned DOS commands, I go back beyond that into CPM which was the first OS I used in earnest.


I prepared decks of punch cards (aka Hollerith cards) for years, mostly with IBM 360s and 370s. A bigger pain there never was. My first personal OS was the one in my TI-59, and after that TRSDOS and LDOS.


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## KenOC

Headphone Hermit said:


> Clearly, you have never used it
> 
> View attachment 50899


Clears up hemorrhoids quickly, I'd bet.


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## Vaneyes

Taggart said:


> Newspaper, lad. Not just for fish and chips!


Reminds me...late one night buying takeaway fish 'n chips in Sandwich, Kent. The fish still had part of its tail. Quite genuine, I thought.


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## Vaneyes

hpowders said:


> View attachment 50987
> 
> 
> I love Chef Boyardee Ravioli. I eat it cold right out of the can, straight up. Inside the macaroni patties *appears to be a meat-like material*. I just mind my own business and don't ask any questions.


....................


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## Vaneyes

KenOC said:


> Clears up hemorrhoids quickly, I'd bet.


Try, and report back.


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## Ingélou

'Creamola Foam' - a powdered sweet soda drink in little blue tins with a moon (with face) on the front of it; flavours were lemon, orange & raspberry that I recall. I was addicted to the stuff and when I got home from school, I didn't feel human until I'd had a glass of it. I used ever more heaped teaspoons. Watching & listening to the fizzy frothing as water met powder and a huge white head formed at the top of the glass was a vital part of the experience. 
No longer produced, alas...


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## mirepoix

^^^^ http://www.allmarksweets.co.uk/creamola-foam-100g-tin/ - note the price.


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## mirepoix

Taggart said:


> <snip>
> 
> @mirepoix remembers going out for the papers to find out the football results but many in the UK will remember the sight of the teleprinter thundering away as the results were transmitted from the scattered parts of the kingdom:


How could I forget that?


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## Headphone Hermit

Vaneyes said:


> Reminds me...late one night buying takeaway fish 'n chips in Sandwich, Kent. The fish still had part of its tail. Quite genuine, I thought.


shows you that it was a real fish :lol:


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## Headphone Hermit

Not sure if "*Flyin' the Fogey Flag*" is entirely the most appropriate place for this observation ..... but isn't it great to see Taggart back on TC? :tiphat:


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## Taggart

Headphone Hermit said:


> Not sure if "*Flyin' the Fogey Flag*" is entirely the most appropriate place for this observation ..... but isn't it great to see Taggart back on TC? :tiphat:


Why ever not? I'm a card carrying fogey (if I can remember where I put it) and proud of it. Glad to be back.


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## elgar's ghost

My life hasn't been quite as happy since Aztec bars and Spangles were phased out.

(with arms outstretched) WHY???

http://ts1.mm.bing.net/th?id=HN.608044202628547372&pid=15.1

http://ts1.mm.bing.net/th?id=HN.608027761492561304&pid=15.1&w=139&h=126&p=0


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## Ingélou

Ooh, spangles - I loved 'Acid Drops' flavour. And in the fruit spangles, do you remember the 'mystery fruit'? Something like mango, I'd guess.


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## elgar's ghost

Ingélou said:


> Ooh, spangles - I loved 'Acid Drops' flavour. And in the fruit spangles, do you remember the 'mystery fruit'? Something like mango, I'd guess.


I don't recall that, to be honest - on that old pic I posted there's also a pineapple shown but I can't ever remember a pineapple flavoured one being included either.


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## Taggart

Wiki says yes to pineapple. It also thinks the mystery flavour was ... grapefruit


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## Headphone Hermit

^^^^ on a similar theme, my life (as a teenage boy) was much improved by the long and ever changing sequence of TV adverts for Fry's Turkish Delight ... probably all available on you-tube


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## Badinerie

As Are the Hai karate adverts....


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## SixFootScowl

I remember the "Ya Hooo Mountain Dew" commercials with the hillbilly. Like this:


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