<p>Right, Pizzagirl -- and remember when people used to get dressed up to travel by air?</p>
<p>Do kids wonder why digital cameras make that strange clicking noise when you take a picture? I do.</p>
<p>
[quote]
remember when people used to get dressed up to travel by air?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>:)I do so miss that!!</p>
<p>Once I tried to impress upon my Ss what an event it was when I was growing up to watch the yearly airings of Peanut specials or the Wizard of OZ. If you missed them, you had to wait another year. "Why couldn't you just rent them?" S wanted to know.</p>
<p>
[quote]
They also don't remember not having air conditioning.
[/quote]
I think that's only if you're in a warm climate. Up here in the northeast, many folks don't have air conditioning. And there are few, if any, public schools in New England with air conditioning!</p>
<p>"Time and charges" requested by my dad after the rare cheapest hours long distance phone calls. I guess he didn't trust their billing to be accurate.</p>
<p>Girls in my day, even at progressive schools, had to wear skirts/dresses to HS. Of course they were a lot less modest in the miniskirt era than any tight jeans were or culotte skirts. Certain belts- pantyhose was a godsend, as were certain "feminine product" innovations. Better life through chemistry!</p>
<p>Girls' sports came after my college days. </p>
<p>How about a black and white TV set- I even had one in the early '80's, color was much more expensive. No cable, either.</p>
<p>Got our first camcorder when son was one year old, its case was bigger than today's laptops.</p>
<p>We registered for classes in person- going from one end of campus to the other and in between to visit all of the departments enrolling in to get signatures - no fun in January. </p>
<p>Slide rules anyone? Everyone had to learn how to use one as a freshman in HS science. Log and Trig tables... Doing math calculations by hand- even in college calculus.</p>
<p>Going to a campus area bookstore to find out the books required for a course and paying by check, all mere hours/days before classes started.</p>
<p>TV dinners that took a half hour to cook in the oven- the treat moms made when dads weren't home for supper (most moms didn't work then, nor did they have a second car to use).</p>
<p>Banks that closed at 3 pm and no grocery stores open late evenings, much less nights- hard when you had to deposit your paycheck and pay the rent while working.</p>
<p>Mailing those college apps with an enclosed check, after receiving those requested catalogs and application forms in the mail.</p>
<p>Speaking of air travel, remember when suitcases weren't rollerboards -- they were just, well, big suitcases that you checked as a matter of course? I received hard-sided Hartmann luggage and garment bags for college graduation. They're sitting in the basement with a layer of dust over them -- all we use today are rollerboards for carry-on and soft-sided duffels for when the kids have gone to camp.</p>
<p>And if you were picking someone up from the airport and the flight was delayed, you just sat outside until they came out? You had no way of knowing if the flight was late, how to get in touch with them, etc.</p>
<p>
[quote]
We registered for classes in person- going from one end of campus to the other and in between to visit all of the departments enrolling in to get signatures - no fun in January.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>We had a different system -- each class had computer cards and you literally stood in the line for Art History, for Math, whatever and hoped that there was still a card remaining for you to take. If you got up to the front and Art History 301 didn't have any cards left -- well, you were out of luck, go stand in the next line. </p>
<p>
[quote]
Slide rules anyone? Everyone had to learn how to use one as a freshman in HS science. Log and Trig tables... Doing math calculations by hand- even in college calculus.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Eigenvalues by hand. If you made one mistake, you were out of luck. And you couldn't reconstruct your mistakes.</p>
<p>Going to the bank every 2 weeks to deposit a paycheck and withdraw whatever money that you needed. No driving up to ATM's. </p>
<p>Handwriting college apps, and finishing the process in an evening or two :-)</p>
<p>When I went to college, fall of '72, I got an account at a small local bank in Cambridge (MA). That small local bank was the first bank, in the fall of '74, to introduce ATM machines. That was wonderful! I had my CoolCash card--and I could go to the bank to get cash when I needed it. </p>
<p>I remember handwriting my MIT app the night before it was due. One of the questions was "what books have you read lately?" and I remember writing up the margins of the application in order to get in my comments, because it was the end of Christmas break and I'd been reading a lot of books.</p>
<p>I tried to explain to D, how when I went to college, I had to wait in the line at the Student Union to get a PHONE for my dorm room, that I had to do it through the Phone Company, and get a phone number for my room. And that I was lucky to have my own phone in my dorm room to avoid the whole pay phone scene. <blank stare=""></blank></p>
<p>I also remember taking mini tape recorders to class and at the large lecture classes, there would be a bunch of them lined up on the stage to record the professor. </p>
<p>And getting a copy of a piece of paper made was a pretty huge deal. Copy machines were rare and expensive. I can't imagine I made more than a couple dozen copies of anything during my four years in college. </p>
<p>Even going into the work force in the mid eighties -- a fax (anyone ever call it a "dex"?) was pretty high-tech!</p>
<p>I can not recall ever having a syllabus for any class in college.</p>
<p>I find it interesting that some of these examples are sort of local. The car she shares with her brother leas a key, and she grew riding in a car with no AC, and windows that had to be rolled down by handle Freshman at Duke know all about not having air conditioners! My D loves to tease me about "what she remembers". She'll look at me wide eyed, and ask "what's a record?"</p>
<p>College applications with no essays required :eek: Whatever did we do with our time senior year?</p>
<p>Anyone here the designated child who had to get out of the car and manually open the garage door for your parents, since automatic garage door openers hadn't yet been invented?</p>
<p>For that matter, changing channels on the TV by getting up and walking across the room ... and when tuning in UHF channels, doing so on a continuous dial as opposed to a dial that clicked in on a certain number?</p>
<p>We recently came across H's old Sony Watchman. My parents gave it to him when it was the "hot" gift (mid / late eighties) so he could watch TV when he was at the hospital during med school / residency. We had to laugh at how big and bulky it actually was for such a small amount of screen space.</p>
<p>D2 (16 yr old) bought some cool records in thrift store and needed a record player. so without parental guidance and with her own money, she bought a used "record player." she plugged it in, turned it on, put on the record, placed the needle correctly and waited for the music. Which never came because she didn't buy a record player... she bought a turntable. She'd never heard the concept of "stereo components"!</p>
<p>I was a member of the "Look it Up" club in school - you got a list of various questions and had to go to a dictionary, encyclopedia, thesaurus, atlas, book of quotations, etc. to get the answers. Now I believe all the answers are out there on the internet and if I can't find the answer it's my fault!</p>
<p>I was one of those girl AV geeks - I'm sure I still have my club pin somewhere.</p>
<p>And we always had to carry a checkbook to pay for groceries - or have enough cash, which you got from the bank teller.</p>
<p>When I started working, we had telecopy machines that would sloooooooowly print out one long curly sheet - very high tech! And when we first got personal computers in the workplace you would turn on the computer, go down for coffee in the cafeteria, read the paper, come back upstairs, and it was still booting.</p>
<p>Daughter's friends ask how to dial the ancient, harvest gold rotary wall phone which still hangs in the kitchen. One girl also was tickled to use a hand-crank can opener- she'd never seen one. Nice to know we can offer a museum experience.</p>
<p>I clearly remember my first encounter with an ATM (late 70s in midwest). It was SO weird not dealing with real live teller. I felt like I'd entered some kind of sci-fi "future world" where I was communicating with a robot. It was exciting, in a way, but also sad and dehumanizing. Life would never be the same. </p>
<p>Around the same time, (79?)I remember all the gas stations changing to "pump your own." As a high school girl, I hated that.</p>
<p>Another random thought--anyone feel there is a connection between the obesity epidemic and--not just fast food drive-thrus, but 24/hr drive-thrus that take CREDIT CARDS! (Remember when not having "cash" stopped you from going to the drive-thru?)</p>
<p>How hard it was to do research! So amazing all the info you can get with the touch of a button now. I never even DREAMED of such a thing back in the old days--when we had to go to the library. Recently one of my kids asked what "cc" and "bcc" mean. I had to explain carbon paper. Haven't thought of that in 25 years.</p>
<p>What about going away from home/overseas? Long distance calls were super expensive. Had to wait 5-10 days for a letter from home. No email, no skype,--you really went away.</p>
<p>Another moment I remember--it was 1999, I believe. I had to fly to a funeral after not flying for many years. At the airport everyone was walking/sitting around talking on cell-phones (I lived in a rural area, and cell phones hadn't quite made it there yet.) I'm hearing scraps of all their private (mundane, yes, but private) conversations!
I was appalled, but baffled. I felt like I was invading their privacy, but they didn't seem to mind. (Should I pretend not to hear? Act like I'm not listening?) They were intruding on my space/peace/quiet with their company/family business and there was no escape. (I don't care where you're taking the clients to lunch, if little Susie is over her diarrhea, how the new sales team is performing, or what time you'll arrive home on Wednesday. . .) It seemed SO WRONG to me. "Welcome to Future World". I felt like MORK landing on Earth! (I guess wireless and texting have cut down on the chatter lately.)</p>
<p>I remember the housing lottery at my big state u.in early 80s--thousands of numbers were handwritten on little squares of paper. You went to the housing office and pulled one out of a cardboard box.
I checked ID's in the dining hall. There was a sticker with number on each student's card. I found the number on the list and put a check mark next to it.
How quaint.</p>
<p>I still changed the volume/channels on the side of the TV--can't figure out the remote.
Only use hand can openers-- I feel more in control.<br>
My parents still have their 47 yo rotary/corded house phone. All the grandchildren are in awe of it.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Recently one of my kids asked what "cc" and "bcc" mean. I had to explain carbon paper. Haven't thought of that in 25 years.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I had to explain bcc to my husband yesterday!</p>