Monday, May 1, 2023

Are You An "Old Fart"? Discuss......

 

Do you remember any or all of these?

 ( Sent in by JB )

 


  




































 

 

 

 

 

 

 

90 comments:

  1. I recall them all. I get the willies looking at the cursive writing sample. I was too impatient to write cursive well.

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    1. We learned cursive using the Palmer method, another of the "old fashioned" teaching methods that all knowing PhdEd's decided should be tossed on the scrap heap. It started with unending circles on a lined piece of yellow paper. That exercise was used for two reasons, to build up the dexterous muscles in young hands and forearms and subsequently to learn how to control the pencil/pen tip to follow along a predrawn line so that later the student could write words in a line on an unlined piece of paper.

      Such is the wisdom of the "modern day" PhdEd's that they tossed teaching methods that had been used successfully for a century or more, then wondered why their students couldn't write cursive, spell or do math.

      Nemo

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    2. @Nemo; I had the Palmer method, too. Still use my cursive.
      Your point about the Phd Ed's - - they scrapped phonics, too.

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    3. PHD = Pile it Higher and Deeper

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    4. Lots of good memories there Irish. We never got mustard in the glasses, but Grandma had a full set of glasses that came in the oatmeal boxes. Grandpa had oatmeal almost every day. I don't recall ever seeing a 16 rpm record, but Mom & Dad had some 78's

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    5. 16 rpm records were mostly language related. If you wanted to learn French or German or whatever, the slower speed records were used to get more content on them. Many early ones were actually made of glass, or something similar in composition. My momma worked in a radio and tv store. They had two booths where one could take a record into the booth and listen, then decide to buy or not. That went out around 1960.

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    6. 16 rpm records we're usually used for spoken word recordings, like speeches and sermons

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    7. Ah, yes; the musical Ethiopian coffin! "South Pacific" album and Dad's military band music playing in my head right now. Every picture depicts the things we did and items in our home at some point.

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  2. Oh boy, that's some good stuff right there. Thanks for the trip down memory lane :) BobT

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  3. All but # 25. Happy being this old. Every day I can get
    up is a good day!

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    1. My grandmother had a wringer washing machine. she would save the suds from one load to use in the next to be able to use less soap. I guess being a child during WW I and a young adult during the depression and going through the rationing during WW II taught you to be frugal.

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    2. Same! We later had a "Suds Saver" model of Kenmore washing machine that would do it automatically! All you needed was a dual-tub laundry tub. Ours was made of...concrete!

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  4. I remember and have used or seen or had ownership of everything there except the Mustarde glasses. Had plenty of grape jelly glasses used in my life though. I would buy the washing machine today if someone made one.

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    1. Amish country stores, the kind with kerosene lights, still have them.

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    2. Thanks for the heads up. Will look that up.

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    3. Wifey's family used to get drinking glasses at the Phillips 66 gas station; they were real glass, sorta translucent, and orangish/yellow. We still have half a dozen or so. They make really good iced tea glasses-you know, when you don't mind the condensate on the outside running down your wrist and onto your leg when you take a drink on a really hot day.

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  5. Oh yeah, remember 99% of them. The Mrs. still uses the hairdryer occasionally. Also remember the National Anthem played when television went of air and our house had a milk chute for the milkman (hope I can call the gentleman that), sez 1st ANGLICO.

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  6. #29 is a show about Indians...man... I still drive a stick shift. Best theft prevention money can buy, and more fun than an automatic (except in bumper to bumper traffic). And where's the 78 speed for the very old records?

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    1. "A show about Indians..." Broke my gut laffin'... never thought a test pattern would be thought of as such.

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  7. I have the last cardboard Nestle QUIK container that I bought many years ago, it's now a coin bank.
    Does the hair dryer have a place that dries finger nail polish? I still have a few of those window trays they make good parts trays. Guess I am an Old Fart.

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    1. Have a metal Hershey's Syrup can right next to the keyboard, serving as a pencil can. A full 16 ounces with the dark brown painted on "label" intended to get you drooling for the chocolate syrup inside.

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  8. I remember them all, but not sure I knew about those glasses having mustard in them.

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  9. Forgot to mention; I'll be 65 in couple weeks

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  10. Yup, remember them all.

    Cursive writing. Not sure the current status in schools. Heard it was dropped, heard it was reinstated. If it ever is dropped, in a couple of generations, no one will be able to read our founding documents, only text "copies".

    Roll of caps. I was nine or so when I took a roll, set it on edge on the anvil out in the shed, and hit it with a sledge hammer. Good lesson on hearing protection.

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    1. Remember the immortal reply from a witness in the 'Trayvon Martin' case? 'I don’t read cursive.'.

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  11. Got them all, except the mustard company glasses. But then you could get glasses and plates from the gas station. In addition to free roadmaps. I think it was Kraft (Roka Blue) who sold blue cheese in juice glasses, I think we still have some at the camp.
    Bazooka bubblegum also had neat things you could send away for in addition to comics. A penny well spent. We had to cover our books and I liked the covers from the Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force. Having a book bag, much less a backpack would subject you to ridicule.

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    1. Was visiting one of the kids in Missouri for a month doing a bathroom remodel. Bought the groceries and did a fair bit of cooking. There was an IGA store nearby that carried about 3 flavors of jam made by a company in Oklahoma; really good stuff and very reasonably priced. Plus: the glass was just fancy enough to put in the cupboard for everyday use.

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    2. Garden Club jams and jellies -- just like they were 70 years ago, and just as good.
      Also, when we were kids, we would get Welch's Grape Jelly in glasses with the Flintstones on them, and a Flintstone character etched into the bottom. (We had to drink our milk all the way to the bottom to find out which character was at the bottom.)

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    3. Yes, Garden Club jams, jellies, & preserves by Clements Food Company:
      https://clementsfoodscompany.com/jams-jellies-preserves/
      With every jar of jelly you got a drinking glass - that was the only kind we used, and the same at my grandparents' houses!

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  12. Thanks. You made me feel really old!

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  13. I not only remember everything listed, I have used everything listed.

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    1. Anonymous Sr. -...Dagnabbit I still use most of the stuff. Phone is still there but no one calls anymore since it quit. The 8 track, hi-fi turntable is at my feet as I type (Yes I have an Underwood too).Am drinking my booze out of an "old" coke glass, gotta run my black iron skillet is about to burn my fried okra!

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  14. Loved the Life Savers book. Grew up in upstate NY and just west of us was the Beech-Nut factory in Canajoharie. They also did Fruit Stripe gum and sold the stuffed animal mascots of the mouse and elephant. Factory closed some time ago.

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    1. Ever notice that a lot of products made with sugar are imported from Canada into the US; a lot of sugary products made in the US use artificial sweeteners. I was once told that because of sugar tariffs the cost of making foods using real sugar in the US is a lot higher than importing the product from Canada. Case in point: Jello-if it has real sugar it comes from Canada and if it has artificial sweetener it is made in the US-or at least that is how it used to be.

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  15. mercurochrome? how about tincture of iodine? canvas skin-on-frame canoes?

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    1. I always used Merthiolate. When my bottle ran dry I discovered it is no longer available. When my mother passed away I "inherited" what was left of her bottle - and still use it.

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  16. I remember most of them 'cept the Canadian money, never had any. As far as old farts go, it depends on how long I had to hold one in. The longer, the older.

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    1. One's a "Looney", the two is a.... yep, "Toonie".

      Honest!

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  17. Remember all except the mustard. Used all except the hairdryer and the washer. That was my mom and grandma.

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  18. Ahhhh the good old days, this stuff needs to make a come back and then all us old bastards can laugh at this generation trying to figure these things out.

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  19. Should have included the original lawn darts, today that would be a way to clean out the gene pool.

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  20. Every. Single. One.
    The Lifesavers book inparticular. I used to get these from my paper route customers every Christmas.
    Mom had a washer with the mangle on the back porch.
    I still have a basic black rotary phone just like the picture. Still worked last time I had a land line... craftsmanship.
    -lg

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  21. Every one! I still have the bookcase that my father built specifically to house the 1968 Encyclopedia Britanica set that he bought new, though I Goodwilled the books years ago. He'd had a very good year in '68. We got a new car (a Plymouth Custom Suburban Wagon that I drove until I shipped off to the USN in "76) a new TV (an RCA Color Console), a component stereo system, that actually replaced one like you have shown, and a new Electrolux vacuum that I use to this day! Thanks for the memories.

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  22. TerrytheterribleMay 1, 2023 at 1:38 PM

    I remember/used most of these. I remember my parents having 78s. Older sisters and bothers were buying some 33s but mostly 45s but don't recall ever seeing 16 rev. Grandma had a washing machine just like that.

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  23. How about aluminum can pull tabs, phone party lines, candy or bubble gum cigarettes and 5 and 10 cent stores just to name a few...

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    1. Shades of the Ben Franklin store.

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  24. don't remember glasses with mustard in them. nobody mentioned all the crap (glasses, towels, etc.) that came in laundry soap.

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    1. Or your mom's lifetime supply of 1/8 cup coffee scoops, one free in every can of Chock Full o Nuts coffee. Which came in 1lb or 3lb cans made of steel. Laundry detergent used to be powdered, and there was a free scoop in every big box of that too. Heck, remember when laundry detergent had phosphates and actually got your clothes clean?

      A parallel post could be made of pics of so many things that have been downsized ... us old farts remember when a Ring Ding was the size of a hockey puck. The one sold today is a Ring Ding Jr, relabeled.

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  25. All except the milk bottles and mustard in glasses. Although, I do remember Bama jelly coming in reusable glasses.

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  26. Still have crank windows in both vehicles. I remember losing the skate key several times. And some of my best memories are listening to records on our Zenith console. The picture tube had sliding covers that moved in front of the speakers. AM FM TV controls on the right, turn table on the left. I can still smell it warming up.... I used to be able to hear the flyback buzz across the house. I can't now....

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    1. I'll bet not one in ten thousand kids today have the foggiest idea what a flyback is. Or maybe one in ten million.

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    2. I imagine you are spot on.

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    3. Having VERY good hearing I could tell wen somebody had their TV set on. Zenith and Philco had the worst squeal, it had to do with the manufacture of the windings of the secondary coils in the flyback transformer. Learned that when I started working on them. Never could figure out WHY the folks couldn't hear 'em. Now I know.

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  27. TerrytheterribleMay 1, 2023 at 3:53 PM

    I would like to thank you JB and you FI for this post. Between the pictures and all the comments it brings back memories of a better time. Again thanks.

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  28. Plane forced into emergency landing... after 2,000 FARTING SHEEP set off a smoke alarm
    A PLANE has been forced to make an emergency landing after more than 2,000 farting sheep set off a smoke alarm.
    By TOM PARFITT
    PUBLISHED: 04:33, Thu, Nov 5, 2015 | UPDATED: 04:49, Thu, Nov 5, 2015
    GETTY
    Thousands of smelly sheep reportedly grounded a flight
    The Singapore Airlines flight made a sudden diversion after worried crew members noticed a smoke warning in the cargo bay.
    But it soon clear a flatulent flock of animals were to blame, according to reports.
    The aircraft was carrying 2,186 sheep from Sydney, Australia, to the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur.
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    Terror fears as officials ban BATTERIES from planes that could...
    Officials apparently determined the smoke warning was due to "exhaust gases and manure produced by the sheep".
    Sheep can become bloated with gas in stressful situations, according to animal experts.
    GETTY
    The Singapore Airlines jet was flying from Sydney to Kuala Lumpur
    The plane continued its journey after spending two and a half hours on the ground in Bali, Indonesia, and safely delivered the cargo in Kuala Lumpur.
    A spokesman for Singapore Airlines said: "Inspections were carried out on the ground and the aircraft was certified serviceable."
    But he refused to confirm that stinky sheep were responsible for triggering the smoke warning.
    AFP
    The plane safely delivered the cargo in Kuala Lumpur

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  29. Used all of those things at one time or another, except the hair dryer. Mom had one that she and my sisters used.

    The wringer washer brings back memories of helping my mother do laundry using one of those. She'd feed the clothes into the wringer and I was responsible for guiding the garment or sheets into the laundry basket. Then it was a trip to the second story window mounted clothes line across the kitchen to hang the clean clothes out to dry. Mom was ecstatic when, after we moved into our house, she got an automatic washing machine. She still hung the clothes out to dry for a few years until she got a gas fired dryer. Even then she would still hang sheets on the line in good weather. She liked the smell of them, as did we.

    We had a bunch of glasses that originally contained jelly. Welch's grape, if I recall correctly. Never saw any with mustard in them that could be used as drinking glasses. We did have some glasses that originally contained dried, salted, chipped beef that my mother used to make creamed chipped beef on toast on occasion. I still have one those and there's a bunch more at camp.

    Milk bottles. We lived about 1/4 mile from the local dairy. In the winter on really cold days when the milk man would come early, the milk would start to freeze and pop the paper caps off the bottle and there'd be a couple inches of frozen cream sticking out of the bottle.

    We had some adventures with caps and rocks and caps and hammers. We got the caps at the local penny candy store.

    Nemo

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  30. Next time try something a little more difficult.
    😝
    Phil

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  31. Can't quite read the brand name on that cash register. When I worked at McDonalds in 1976 we used Sweda Powerpenny Cash registers, got sales tax off a little card, keystroked it in, and counted change by hand. People these days wouldn't make it. Also - McDonalds didn't take credit cards. It was a cash only operation. The idea of buying fast food on a credit card would have seemed bizzare. As a teenager I had this theory that if fast food places started taking credit cards then everyone would be fat and in debt. Called it.

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    1. Remember when it felt okay to buy groceries with cash or write a check? Then along came paying with a credit card; took quite a while before that seemed acceptable. Groceries on credit??? Kind of like the early days of state sanctioned gambling, aka The Lottery. That one still doesn't seem right.

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    2. paying for your groceries with a credit card only happened after ATMs came on the scene. Before that all credit card purchases anywhere used the punch card sized paper with the carbons attached and the roller machine for taking your card's imprint. So that ate the cashier's time, and the credit card fee was considered by the stores to eat too much of the profit margins. And every couple months the store manager spent an evening at county court, trying to recoup losses from the deadbeats who wrote rubber checks. Hell, I'm so old that I know what a rubber check is.

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    3. Hey, I used a credit card about a month ago for a $300+ charge and they still used one of those old "roller machines" and gave me the carbon copy! It shocked me -- the person taking my card said the owner was approaching 90 and was resisting changing to digital-only transactions -- he wanted a paper trail.

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  32. I remember all but the Mustard glasses--we drank out of jelly glasses, because us 4 kids quite often broke them
    how about "Green Stamps" ?, Lincoln Logs ?, Erector sets ?
    That 4-speed on the floor lived along longer than the 3-speed on the column shifter -- that might also have had a pull cable under the dash for "Overdrive"
    And who remembers that Maytag also having an option where it was powered by its own gas engine with a kick type started -- my aunt had one

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    1. Ever own a Gilbert Chemistry set?

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    2. Neighbor had one that I got running with my dad's help!

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    3. Yes, we had a Gilbert Chemistry set, and my little sister became a chemical engineer.

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  33. Everything except the mustard glasses. My wife and I just had a blast from the past talking about places and things we did growing up. Advantage for us is we grew up together in the same town. Thankyou!

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    1. Dairy Queen on a hot summer's night-hard to beat. Or a Root Beer float.

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  34. No mustard glasses, we got our glasses out of "Lux" soap. I got many of those Life Saver books for christmas from classmates. Everything else was well known and used by our family. Still drive a 5 speed.

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  35. #15 My third vehicle had a shifter like that. The first had a 3-on-the-tree shifter, a 72 F100 with a 302 and a 4:10 rear that was almost impossible to stall on first gear. The second vehicle was a 62 VW Bug with a 4 speed. The third was a 76 Fiat 124 Spider with a 5 speed.

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  36. Which gave us the fun lines in school, see Dick run, run Dick run. It should be on the 2nd or 3rd page

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  37. Those were the peak of empire days. 1945-1975. We were the luckiest generation in American history - or maybe our parents were. It overlaps for us. (Our parents mostly won't/didn't have to live through - or even know of - what's coming).

    Not today's kids, not most anyone under 50 (Born in 73, 10yo in 83? Baby-on-board generation. Early stages of downhill by then)

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    1. The downward slide began with LBJ and his Great Society. The Nanny State ruined the Great American Experiment.

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    2. Too bad Goldwater didn't win in '64 ... but the fix was already in by then.

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  38. My mother had the hair dryer. I took a dry cleaning bag and taped it around my neck with the hose going in the bag. set it to cool to inflate the bag and I was a space explorer or a deep sea diver. I used to pull the fuses from M-80s and tape a thin strand of wire in the hole. Cut the end off an extension cord and clipped it to the M-80 wires. Plug it in at a distance and it would blow up. Rode in cars without seat belts for years. It's a wonder I survived childhood,

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  39. I’m still fortunate enough to have a couple of A&W drive-in within driving distance

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  40. ProudboomerI’m63dissme andI’llbeat your ass punkMay 1, 2023 at 11:48 PM

    Dang that was a good time to grow up in, riding bikes till dark, drinking out of a water hose, fried chicken dinner after Church, playing baseball in hot afternoon then heading to the swimming hole, grabbing an ice cold grape ne-hi or orange crush out of the cooler at the gas station on a 100 degree day, riding an old car hood down park hill on the first good snow.. endless list of blessings and good times I grew up with.....

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    1. "fried chicken dinner after church" --
      At age 7 I asked my mother why the calendars had a fish on Fridays - she said to remind the Catholics to eat fish on Friday - so I asked "Why don't they put a chicken on Sundays to remind the Methodists and Baptists to eat chicken after church on Sunday?"

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  41. Every one of ‘em. Used to get my ass beat with one of those wooden paddle things when I was a kid and acted up. The Lifesaver book was a standard Christmas thing from my Dad’s dad. Remember the milk deliveries & the Charles Chip delivery van too, from spending time in Upstate NY at grandparent’s while Dad was in Vietnam in 65. Still had milk delivered in bottles every morning into the late 80’s, but it in the UK; was stationed there from 82 till 93. Lotta good memories in this bunch. Thanks!!

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  42. A cap gun reel, Viewmaster film for Tomorrowland Beyond Thunderdome, DIY book cover and I always thought damn these books are heavy as a youngster.
    You can still get Bazooka but the comics are so micro you need a magnifying lens.
    Cursive is going to come in handy for messages that burn it all down comrades won't be able to read.

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    1. "the comics are so micro you need a magnifying lens" - same for the preparation instructions on most food these days. My little sister taught me to take a picture of it with my phone, and then expand it until I can read it.

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  43. #13 - contrast knob... and the old joke about turning up the brightness on the TV but it doesn't help.

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  44. Use to be....
    Fun with Dick and Jane

    Today......
    Fun with Jane's Dick

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  45. I was in school back when the universe was just a swirling hot dust cloud and stars had not yet coalesced so I never got those things...

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  46. Yea, all of them, except the mustard glasses. Still got glasses from my
    favorite oatmeal, wedding oats, until they lost their space on the grocery
    shelf a couple of years ago. By the way, that photo of the "stereo" system"
    with the green phone has to have come from my mothers den in 1963.
    How did you get it,? I didn't know you could hack a Polaroid!
    Bubbarust

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