When I was a kid...

[Constance]

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning Uphill... barefoot... BOTH ways

Yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in Hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it! But now that I'm over the ripe old age of thirty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today.

You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia! And I hate to say it but you kids today you don't know how good you've got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have The Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and Iook it up ourselves, in the card catalogue!! There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter, with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!

There were no MP3' s or Napsters! You wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn record store and shoplift it yourself! Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ'd usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up!

We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal, that's it!

And we didn't have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your Bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, people!

We didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation video Games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'. Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen Forever!

And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel and there was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday morning. Do you hear what I'm saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-bastards!

And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove ... Imagine that! That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled. You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in 1980!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd

[Flan Princess]

Thanks for the reminder of the glory days of playing the degenatron for hours at end...

[Constance]

Actually, when I was a kid, we didn't even have an Atari 2600. I had to go to the bowling alley or pizza place with and use MONEY I mooched off my parents to play video games!

[Nicky]

There were some good things though in the early 80's.
I could say to mum "see you latter" in the morning and not turn up home until it got dark and mum would not have noticed I had gone out. I was able to walk to school on my own without thought or fear of a pervert abducting me. I could buy fireworks and matches from the local corner shop and nobody would care what a 7 year old was doing with such a big stash of explosives. My BMX was tall enough that I could sit on it comfortably without the danger of my knees hitting my chin and I did not have to wear a helmet. Phones had dials that went rudadadadadadadada, rudadadadadadadad. I could never figure out why they made that sound.

I was a commador 64 child. Games on tapes. How freakish was that? 

[Sephirah]

Oooh, I remember the C64. Spending hours and hours programming lines of BASIC only to watch a few pixels that were supposed to be a dude in a hot air balloon go round the blue background screen as though someone had just taken a potshot at it with an airgun.

Fun times.

And the ZX Spectrum. Lol, beeeeeeeeeeeeeep beep! That sound haunts my nightmares.

Oh, jeez, and I remember Saturday mornings. Timmy Mallett in the UK... like a deranged Willy Wonka let loose with a giant, oversized foam mallett... wearing clothes styled by someone who'd taken LSD.

And I had the hugest crush on She-Ra *blushes*

[tekla]

Pre video game here, had to play pool like old school juvenile delinquents did.  At least when we weren't hot wiring cars to joy ride them.  Ahh, hot wiring cars, can't even do that anymore.

Well, either you're closing your eyes
To a situation you do now wish to acknowledge
Or you are not aware of the caliber of disaster indicated
By the presence of a pool table in your community.
Ya got trouble, my friend, right here,
I say, trouble right here in River City.
Why sure I'm a billiard player,
Certainly mighty proud I say
I'm always mighty proud to say it.
I consider that the hours I spend
With a cue in my hand are golden.
Help you cultivate horse sense
And a cool head and a keen eye.
Never take and try to give
An iron-clad leave to yourself
From a three-rail billiard shot?
But just as I say,
It takes judgment, brains, and maturity to score
In a balkline game,
I say that any boob kin take
And shove a ball in a pocket.
And they call that sloth.
The first big step on the road
To the depths of deg-ra-Day--
I say, first, medicinal wine from a teaspoon,
Then beer from a bottle.
An' the next thing ya know,
Your son is playin' for money
In a pinch-back suit.
And list'nin to some big out-a-town Jasper
Hearin' him tell about horse-race gamblin'.
Not a wholesome trottin' race, no!
But a race where they set down right on the horse!
Like to see some stuck-up jockey'boy
Sittin' on Dan Patch? Make your blood boil?
Well, I should say.
Friends, lemme tell you what I mean.
Ya got one, two, three, four, five, six pockets in a table.
Pockets that mark the diff'rence
Between a gentlemen and a bum,
With a capital "B,"
And that rhymes with "P" and that stands for pool!
And all week long your River City
Youth'll be frittern away,
I say your young men'll be frittern!
Frittern away their noontime, suppertime, choretime too!
Get the ball in the pocket,
Never mind gittin' Dandelions pulled
Or the screen door patched or the beefsteak pounded.
Never mind pumpin' any water
'Til your parents are caught with the Cistern empty
On a Saturday night and that's trouble,
Oh, yes we got lots and lots a' trouble.
I'm thinkin' of the kids in the knickerbockers,
Shirt-tail young ones, peekin' in the pool
Hall window after school, look, folks!
Right here in River City.
Trouble with a capital "T"
And that rhymes with "P" and that stands for pool!
Now, I know all you folks are the right kinda parents.
I'm gonna be perfectly frank.
Would ya like to know what kinda conversation goes
On while they're loafin' around that Hall?
They're tryin' out Bevo, tryin' out cubebs,
Tryin' out Tailor Mades like Cigarette Feends!
And braggin' all about
How they're gonna cover up a tell-tale breath with Sen-Sen.
One fine night, they leave the pool hall,
Headin' for the dance at the Arm'ry!
Libertine men and Scarlet women!
And Rag-time, shameless music
That'll grab your son and your daughter
With the arms of a jungle animal instink!
Mass-staria!
Friends, the idle brain is the devil's playground!

People:
Trouble, oh we got trouble,
Right here in River City!
With a capital "T"
That rhymes with "P"
And that stands for Pool,
That stands for pool.
We've surely got trouble!
Right here in River City,
Right here!
Gotta figger out a way
To keep the young ones moral after school!
Trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble, trouble...

Harold:
Mothers of River City!
Heed the warning before it's too late!
Watch for the tell-tale sign of corruption!
The moment your son leaves the house,
Does he rebuckle his knickerbockers below the knee?
Is there a nicotine stain on his index finger?
A dime novel hidden in the corn crib?
Is he starting to memorize jokes from Capt.
Billy's Whiz Bang?
Are certain words creeping into his conversation?
Words like 'swell?"
And 'so's your old man?"
Well, if so my friends,
Ya got trouble,
Right here in River city!
With a capital "T"
And that rhymes with "P"
And that stands for Pool.
We've surely got trouble!
Right here in River City!
Remember the Maine, Plymouth Rock and the Golden Rule!
Oh, we've got trouble.
We're in terrible, terrible trouble.
That game with the fifteen numbered balls is a devil's tool!
Oh yes we got trouble, trouble, trouble!
With a "T"! Gotta rhyme it with "P"!
And that stands for Pool!!!

[Constance]

We had a pool table in the house when I was growing up. My grandfather was kicked out of home after 1 year of high school and never studied geometry or trig. Yet, he knew angles and trajectories. He could put the damned 8 ball in just about any pocket he wanted.

[tekla]

I grew up with a table in the house also.  When I was like 7 or 8 the time had come to recover it, and my dad put down a chalk line gird on it for about 1/2 a year, as long as I can see that grid in my mind, I can run 50+ balls on a good night. 

Putting the ball in the pocket is the easy part, its getting the cue ball where you want it that makes all the difference.

[trapthavok]

Thanks for this I especially like the irony of how you said you would never become that adult...haha

Who knows, give me another 10 to 15 years and I'll be that adult. Even at my present age (21) I've already started by prefacing things with (jokingly) "Kids These Days..."

XD

[Constance]

Putting the ball in the pocket is the easy part, its getting the cue ball where you want it that makes all the difference.

Hmm, the location of the cue ball never seemed to matter to my grandfather. Or me, for that matter. No matter where the cue ball was I'd screw up the shot. But, damn, I had fun though.

[Jay]

Im 21 and I say "kids these days" too because things are so diffrent from when I was in my teens to now. And the disrespect kids give adults is discusting in my view.. I would never speak to an adult even at my age..

[Constance]

Im 21 and I say "kids these days" too because things are so diffrent from when I was in my teens to now. And the disrespect kids give adults is discusting in my view.. I would never speak to an adult even at my age..

In the kids' defense, not all adults are worthy of respect.

That said, I overheard my son and his friends saying things like, "I remember when the first version of the Game Boy came out."

[nickie]

So true. Respect is earned, not expected because we are old. I work in 4 nursing homes, and I know a lot of stupid people. I am probably older than most of you (I remember using the outhouse, no TV until I was 5, and a phone without a dial, we called the operator, dad using horses to mow instead of a tractor) but I don't' expect respect just because I have been lucky to hang around this long. So called "adults" who raise nasty, spoiled rotten brats do not deserve respect.

[tekla]

Im 21 and I say "kids these days" too because things are so diffrent from when I was in my teens to now. And the disrespect kids give adults is discusting in my view.

Yeah, not like when I was young and people were walking around the White House chanting "Hey, Hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today."  Ahh, the Golden Age of respect.