Posted April 24, 200817 yr CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL US KIDS WHO WERE BORN IN THE 1920s, 30s 40s, 50s, 60s and 70s !! Why???? First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us and lived in houses made of asbestos. They took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer. Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with bright coloured lead-based paints. We slept on our stomachs and there were no baby alarms in our rooms because they were shared with our brothers and sisters. We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets or shoes, not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking. As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts, booster seats or air bags. When our parents went to the pub for a drink we were left outside with a bag of crisps and no-one abducted us. We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle. Take away food was fish and chips or pie and chips. No Pizza Hut, McDonalds, KFC, Wimpy, or Subway. We ate meals all together as a family. We all ate the same thing and no-one starved because they couldn't eat the meal. Even though all the shops closed at 5.30pm and didn't open on Sundays, somehow we didn't starve to death! We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this. We could collect old drink bottles and cash them in at the corner store and buy fruit Spangles, Love Hearts, Fruit Polos, Palm Toffee, Gob Stoppers and Black Jacks and Flying Saucers. We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank soft drinks with sugar in them, but we weren't overweight because...... WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!! We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. No one was able to reach us all day. And we were OK. We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. We built tree houses and cubby holes and played in river beds with matchbox cars. We explored streams and ponds, woods and abandoned places, and never drowned or got lost. We did not have Playstations, Nintendos, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 99 channels on cable, no video tape movies, no surround sound. We either had no TV at all or else it was strictly limited to 2 channels and one hour of children's TV a night. We had no TVs or Computers in our bedrooms. We read comics and books and learnt to make them last. There were no mobile phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms.....BUT.....WE HAD REAL FRIENDS and we went outside and found them! We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no Lawsuits from these accidents. Only girls had pierced ears! We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt and the worms did not live in us forever. You could only buy Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns at Easter time.......no really! And in December, there was only one festive holiday....... CHRISTMAS ...... and everyone wished each other MERRY CHRISTMAS! and NOT.... HAPPY HOLIDAYS..... take it or leave it! We were given air rifles and Catapults for our 10th birthdays, We drank milk laced with Strontium 90 from cows that had eaten grass covered in nuclear fallout from the atomic testing at Maralinga in 1956. We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them! Mum didn't have to go to work to help dad make ends meet! RUGBY and CRICKET had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! Getting into the team was based on MERIT AND NOT DUE TO BLACKMAIL, THREATS AND GUILT FROM THE PAST..... strange but true! Our teachers used to belt us with big sticks and leather straps and bullies always ruled the playground at school. The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law! Our parents got married before they had children and didn't invent stupid names for their kids like 'Kylie' and 'Brooklyn' and 'Paris' and 'FiFi Trixibelle' This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors ever! The past 70 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL! And YOU are one of them! CONGRATULATIONS! You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives 'for our own good.'
April 24, 200817 yr that is SPOT ON! that is how life was... mind you, its our generation that also is responsable for political correctness, its our generation who has created this techno world, its OUR fault things are the way they are now in the world.
April 24, 200817 yr Author that is SPOT ON! that is how life was... mind you, its our generation that also is responsable for political correctness, its our generation who has created this techno world, its OUR fault things are the way they are now in the world. I agree with you there Rob. But looking back on all that, life was soooo different. I don't think the kids of today would be able to cope if all that came back. :unsure:
April 24, 200817 yr i know.... looking back we were in reletive poverty! coal fires, single glazed windows in uninsulated houses where the fire went out overnight. we put coats over the beds in winter to keep warm, ice formed in the kitchen sink!!! we ate what we got and were grateful for it... by todays standards we were deprived, but we didnt know any better! its just how things were, we accepted our lot.
April 24, 200817 yr Author i know.... looking back we were in reletive poverty! coal fires, single glazed windows in uninsulated houses where the fire went out overnight. we put coats over the beds in winter to keep warm, ice formed in the kitchen sink!!! we ate what we got and were grateful for it... by todays standards we were deprived, but we didnt know any better! its just how things were, we accepted our lot. Exactly. I remember icicles forming on the inside of the windows and you had to scrap the ice off if you wanted to see outside. :cry: Socks on in bed, like you said, coats on the bed for extra coverage. Hot water bottles for your freezing cold feet. :unsure: Crisps sandwiches for lunch with instant whip for pudding. :blink:
April 24, 200817 yr instant whip...angel delight! pretty awful muck really! :lol: i still have dinner at me mums often, so i can have 'dinners of yesteryear'.... theres nowt like yer mums cooking!
April 24, 200817 yr Author instant whip...angel delight! pretty awful muck really! :lol: i still have dinner at me mums often, so i can have 'dinners of yesteryear'.... theres nowt like yer mums cooking! The instant whip, we used to crumble digestive biscuits in it to make it crunchy :yahoo: Angel Delight, you were posh then. :lol: Yeah, mums always make great dinners, it's funny how we try and cook like our mum's used to do it.
April 24, 200817 yr Yeah, mums always make great dinners, it's funny how we try and cook like our mum's used to do it. and fail! lol my mum did us 2 hot meals a day plus breakfast. her dinners were always traditional ones... meat n tatty pie, fry up! , steak n kidney pie, cornish pasties, braised steak, etc.. she cooked the lot herself too.
April 24, 200817 yr i still have dinner at me mums often, so i can have 'dinners of yesteryear' .... theres nowt like yer mums cooking! You'll have to speak for yourself there I'm afraid. I love my mum to bits but she's a bloody awful cook! Except for her Sunday Roasts - which were fabulous! We'd always have the whole bag of potatoes peeled and roasted (with the meat & veg & gravy of course) for Sunday Dinner and for supper - if there were any roasties left - we'd fry them up and have them with brown sauce and bread! Norma Edited April 24, 200817 yr by Sheila_Blige
April 24, 200817 yr and fail! lol my mum did us 2 hot meals a day plus breakfast. Our mum used to send us to the corner shop for Milky Ways for breakfast! Norma
April 24, 200817 yr Author You'll have to speak for yourself there I'm afraid. I love my mum to bits but she's a bloody awful cook! Except for her Sunday Roasts - which were fabulous! We'd always have the whole bag of potatoes peeled and roasted (with the meat & veg & gravy of course) for Sunday Dinner and for supper - if there were any roasties left - we'd fry them up and have them with brown sauce and bread! Norma Hehehe, oh yes, bring out the brown sauce. Corned beef hash with brown sauce on it. When our mums got us those plain crisps with the little blue bag of salt in it, what a treat that was. :yahoo:
April 24, 200817 yr Author You'll have to speak for yourself there I'm afraid. I love my mum to bits but she's a bloody awful cook! Except for her Sunday Roasts - which were fabulous! We'd always have the whole bag of potatoes peeled and roasted (with the meat & veg & gravy of course) for Sunday Dinner and for supper - if there were any roasties left - we'd fry them up and have them with brown sauce and bread! Norma Always looked forward to my sunday dinner, best meal of the week. Everyday we had potatoes, none of this chilli or curry most people eat today.
April 24, 200817 yr Hehehe, oh yes, bring out the brown sauce. Corned beef hash with brown sauce on it. When our mums got us those plain crisps with the little blue bag of salt in it, what a treat that was. :yahoo: Smiths Crisps - I remember those little bags of salt too! I remember when they first introduced exciting new flavours - like Cheese & Onion and Salt & Vinegar! Do you remember when Smiths and Golden Wonder were the only makes of crisps readily available - now it seems like Walkers have taken over everything. We must have had very extravagant dad - because when he went to the pub and left us outside - we'd have a bag of crisps AND a bottle of lemonade - I think it was Corona - in those funny bottles with the 'bubbled' glass! Norma
April 24, 200817 yr i remember crisps with blue bags of salt very well... and the introduction of 'flavoured' crisps, salt n vinegar being the first. potato puffs anyone?... we used to have them at school along with the free school milk.
April 24, 200817 yr Author Smiths Crisps - I remember those little bags of salt too! I remember when they first introduced exciting new flavours - like Cheese & Onion and Salt & Vinegar! Do you remember when Smiths and Golden Wonder were the only makes of crisps readily available - now it seems like Walkers have taken over everything. We must have had very extravagant dad - because when he went to the pub and left us outside - we'd have a bag of crisps AND a bottle of lemonade - I think it was Corona - in those funny bottles with the 'bubbled' glass! Norma Oh yes !! :yahoo: We used to take back our empty bottle to the off licence and money back on them. :cheer:
April 24, 200817 yr free school milk. We were probably the last to get this - until Thatcher the Milk Snatcher (AKA b**ch Troll From Hell) came along! Norma
April 24, 200817 yr Author i remember crisps with blue bags of salt very well... and the introduction of 'flavoured' crisps, salt n vinegar being the first. potato puffs anyone?... we used to have them at school along with the free school milk. Potato puffs, mmmmmmmmmmm, wow it's all coming back to me now. What about lucky bags, i couldn't wait to open them to see what toy i had got in it. And those Jubblys.http://www.escape-to-the-seventies.com/sweets/sweetpics/jubbly.gif and screwballs.http://www.escape-to-the-seventies.com/sweets/sweetpics/screwball.gif
April 24, 200817 yr Author yeah lucky bags sherbet fountains too rainbow crystals http://www.sweetstall.com/acatalog/sherbet-fountains.jpg http://www.sweetstall.com/acatalog/rainbow-Crystal-Sherbet.jpg Dibdabs http://www.sweetstall.com/acatalog/dip-dabs.jpg My faves :wub: Not enough lolly pops in them though :(
April 24, 200817 yr yeah lucky bags sherbet fountains too rainbow crystals Bull's Eyes That liquorice that was shredded like tobacco (see how they tried and succeeded even then to get us to smoke) Lemon Bon-Bons Black Cat Chewing Gum, Black Jack sweets Penny 'Arrers (arrows) and one of my favourites (which I know are still around today) flying saucers. I remember going to Church on a Sunday night (we were a late rising weekend family and never made the early masses) thinking 'These communion wafers wouldn't be half bad if there were two stuck together with some sherbert in between'. Norma
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