I'm only 33 years old, and I feel like an old man! (1 Viewer)

[Dave Mack]

I too used to be way into the Jerry Lewis telethon. My dad and I would see how much of it we could stay up for and then first thing in the morning it was back on. Good memories...

 

[Francois Caron]

That would make you a dirty old man!

 

[Mort Corey]

Yeh, when you look at the girls in the mall and think to yourself.."boy, I'll bet her mother looks good"...it's all downhill. (until it changes to grandmother...then it's probably all over)

I miss the channel changer knobs on TV's too. I'm stuck with one channel until my granddaughter comes over to show me how to change to another.

Mort

 

[MarkHastings]

Giddy-up!

 

[Carlo_M]

That will never happen to me

 

[Zen Butler]

Dave, all the way feelin' that. I'm 39 in a college town but a town full of older eccentrics, aging punk rockers and starving artists which helps a little. What is the most revealing of my age are occassional moments with my 22 y/o girlfriend. She saw my Atari box turned it on and started playing Asteroids. About 3 minutes in she's yawning and saying "it's basically just the same thing over and over huh?" "it's kinda boring." I remember getting high and playing that shit for hours along with Missle Command, Centipede etc.

And then Mark(Hastings) kills it. I'm closer in age with her mother than I am with her.

 

[MarkHastings]

...been there! With my ex, I was closer in age to her step mom than to my ex. Ugh! (shudder) Definitely Creepy!!!!

 

[Bryan X]

Not if they're both hot! Think of the possibilities!

 

[MarkHastings]

Damn it, what happened to that pukey smiley!!!

 

[BrianW]

I remember the Kennedy assassination.

The day is fast approaching when there will be only three things I care about:

1. Whether I've had a bowel movement that day.

2. Whether I'll be getting pumpkin pie for dessert.

3. Dang! I forgot the third thing! Maybe if I take a short nap, it will come to me...

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

Probably something about keeping those damned kids off your lawn. (Who also remembers the JFK shooting - and who lives in a condo so he doesn't have to worry about the damned lawn.)

Regards,

Joe

 

[andrew markworthy]

It's all a matter of perspective. I recently was bemoaning that whilst for a younger colleague, the Beatles were something she learnt about in modern history, I could remember them breaking up. An older colleague, overhearing this, said that in his case, he could remember them forming ...

My kids have occasionally asked me, at my grand old age of 46, what life was like when I was young and dinosaurs still roamed the Earth. The things which most surprise them (NB this is from a Brit perspective):

(1) lack of remote controls
(2) computers being the preserve of rich geeks
(3) stores being closed on Sundays and for half a day during the week
(4) no videos - so you either watched a TV programme live or you didn't see it
(5) kids being made to play outdoors all day in all weathers because it was 'good for them'
(6) two television channels (and getting excited when a third channel arrived)

Mentioning the historical events of the past - moon landings, the Yom Kippur war, the Falklands crisis, either of the Kennedy assassinations, has no meaning for them. The only 'big' thing that has ever impressed them was that my aunt was amongst the last group of people to dine with Anne Frank's father before he died (and that was only because one of my kids had just 'done' Anne Frank in a history lesson).

I remember it clearly (though I was only three at the time). My parents were going out for the evening (NB the UK-USA time difference) and the TV evening news was full of the event. My mother, resplendent in posh evening clothes, was disparaging about the Kennedys and I remember even at that age being surprised by her attitude. As I later learnt, along with a lot of Brits not amongst the London media set, the sins of Kennedy Snr when he was Brit ambassador still remained fresh in the mind. Another reason was that we knew someone who had taught the Kennedy kids when they were in the UK and let's put it this way, the stories she told did not shed a good light on that family.

Actually, a colleague of mine (the same one who made the comment about remembering the Beatles forming) was in Dallas on the day of the shooting. He didn't see Kennedy (he was in fact trying to avoid the crowds) but he said that post-shooting he'd never been anywhere that was so overwhelmed by one sentiment and mindset. People often suppose that in any historically-remarkable event everything else stopped. That usually isn't true (e.g. a high percentage of the Brit population were completely unmoved by Princess Di's death, and were plain embarrassed by the hysterical scenes shown on the TV).

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

I happened to be in Chicago on business the day Walter Payton, an American Football player, died. It is really hard to convey to someone who is neither a fan of the sport of a native of Chicago what Walter's passing meant the the football world in general and Chicago in particular. Imagine if David Beckham and Princess Diana had been the same person, and had died young after a heroic battle with cancer. Payton was one of the best and also classiest players in the history of the NFL. He held numerous records, but was also modest, shunning the limelight and refusing to celebrate in the end zone after scoring a touchdown. He was a driving force on the legendary 1985 Chicago Bears team which lost only one game in the regular seaon and the ran up a combined score of 45-0 against play-off opponents on the way to their 46 to 10 drubbing of the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XX, still the most lopsided score in the game's history. Ironically Paytong didn't have a good day in his only Super Bowl appearance. The Patriots held him well below his normal rushing average and he never scored a touchdown. But he had been a big part of what got the team into that game in the first place.

He had done a lot of charity work, esepcially in Chicago, and this only increased after his diagnosis. As long as he could he work a gruelling schedule of fund-raisers for his cancer research foundation. The week after he passed away not only did his former team, the Bears, wear memorial "34" patches on their uniforms, but every single NFL game in every city around the league held some kind of ceremony honoring his memory.

Chicago all-but shut down. Businesses gave workers time off to attend memorial services, grown men openly wept on the street and Walter Payton was the only topic of conversation. I remember thinking, "This is what Dallas must have been like after Kennedy was killed." But maybe it was more like Boston, where Kennedy was more universally loved, would have been that day. Almost everyone I talked to had a Walter story - getting an autograph, a chance encounter in the street, seeing him at a charity event. If all the stories were true he must have spent every minute he wasn't playing or practicing walking the streets of Chicago being nice to people. But that tells you something, too, that everybody wanted to feel personally connected to the man.

Anyway, that's as close as I've ever come to that kind of situation.

Regards,

Joe

 

[BrianW]

Joe, that's a great story. I'm not a football fan, but it still touched my heart. Thanks for sharing.

I'm a little older than you, I think, so I'd like to share a story, too, if I may:

The Beatles were on Ed Sullivan, and the decade of the 60s was fast establishing itself as the decade of Flower Power, civil rights advancement, and, more insidiously, big business. Art reigned supreme in pop culture, and the notions of global community and regard for the environment began to enter public consciousness. When I was in school, they served us beans and ketchup for lunch. The first of the Baby Boomers were just reaching an age sufficient to begin developing the presence of mind to evaluate and judge the tumultuous events around them. We saved nylon for the paratroopers. Did you know that pigeons can fly upside down? Government policy fell under increasing scrutinity by the public. I once found a turtle in my back yard. Have you ever been in a cave? OW! My KNEE! That Kevin is such a nice boy... If only he'd get a haircut. When I was a boy, we didn't call people "fatty." Hey, Baby! Wanna take a peek under my shawl? I like peanut butter, but it sticks to my teeth. Can you swim?

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

Dude, relax. That's just the rush hitting you. Just plop down in that beanbag chair, put on the headphones and listen to the "White Album" for awhile. Oh, here, eat this banana, you need the potassium, and take this B1 tablet.

Regards,

Joe

 

[Mort Corey]

I found myself humming an old 60's tune by Hermans Hermits just the other day while out on a stroll....Mrs Brown You Have a Lovely Walker...

Mort (who's creeping up to needing one year by year)

 

[andrew markworthy]

I think that counts as gay gerontophilia.

 

[todd s]

I am 37. Last year I took my family skiing. It was near my nephews college. So I went to see his dorm room. It was a Friday night and when I get there my nephew and I walked off the elevator. All of the sudden a kid with a beer see's me and gets all nervous looking. He then asks my nephew is that your Dad? I was like "Are you f'in nuts?!?". He then apologized and asked if I wanted to do beer pong with them.

 

[MarkHastings]

LOL - kinda reminds me of when my female friend sings the Shania Twain song "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!" and I'll say "...me too!!!"

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

Hell, you young whippersnapper, when I was born my famous cousin Winston L. S. Churchill was Prime Mininster in the UK.