We didn’t have ‘green’ back then

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• Wow, I am that old guy! I don't know when it happened, but watching some old TV program on Netflix, my wife (a bit younger than myself) remarked on my story of arguing with my brothers and sisters over which show to watch back in the "olden" days. She exclaimed, "you guys only had one tv?" I recalled for her how that really wasn't that big of a problem since after homework and chores were done we were usually up in the hills or in the street playing ball, during the summer we were gone usually ten hours a day entertaining ourselves until we were old enough to get a job. Didn't get into to much trouble and I know we didn't use up resources our enlightened youth do today, perpetually transfixed to a computer screen, tv or xbox, etc..

  • Remember when there were TVs without remotes? You actually had to hate what was on enough to get up and go over and change the channel. However did we survive?

    • I had a discussion like this with my 11-year-old niece, not too long ago. I told her that when I was her age (I'm 42), we didn't have Internet, or even a home computer. We didn't have cable TV, or satellite, or cell phones, or iPads, or Play Stations, and until I was about 16, we had one TV in the house.

      She said, "You must have been bored!" I told her that because I'd always loved to read, boredom wasn't something that was an issue for me. Then I really blew her mind by telling her about rotary dial phones. :)

    • Yea and when your the kid it becomes your job to change the channel..:)

      • You beat me to it! And my parents (mostly my Dad) decided what we would watch. I grew up watching "shoot 'em ups" and boxing with my Dad!

      • ...and get dad another beer

        • LOL!....yup....and if you were lucky you got a sip..(just so mom didn't see it).

        • I didn't even like beer when I was a kid, except for Birch Beer and Rootbeer

        • I still don't like beer.

        • That's OK Flash, when I go to someone's house that doesn't stock beer, I will drink vodka, bourbon, rum, spiced rum, Canadian Whiskey, Seagrams 7 or VO, Southern Comfort, Midori, Appel, and any of a number of other adult beverages. I'm not too picky. :-D

  • One Tv three channels.....It was better to be outside doing something....unless of course Gunsmoke was on...

  • We seldom got home until way after dark during summer vacation. During school that was verboten except on Friday and Saturday.

• I loved the part where the Eco-terrorist wrote how we used to burn our trash and bury it in a hole. So what's the difference today? Why we pay somebody else to burn it and bury it in a larger hole.

• On top of all this, I notice that today's little Maoists sure love the autos, gadgetry and entertainment flowing from capitalism. They wear Che t-shirts and talk like greenies but live like the rest of us. Perhaps they'll wake up and see the threat that leftist thinking is to their way of life.

  • I doubt it - they're programmed that way...

    • Back in the day, us kids used to collect bottles for the refund. Regular bottles were two cents, big ones were a nickel. But that was in the days when a nickle would buy you something. Yeah. I'm old.

      • Our roadsides were spotless as far as bottles. If we could each find a few bottles, we could get a popsickle for 7 cents from the ice cream man. Nutty Buddy s were a dime, so much more precisous, ans were dreamsicles!

        • Nutty Buddy has a whole new connotation these days.

      • Cokes tasted better back then, too. Real sugar, and glass bottles. And my local grocery store (mom and pop) had a Coke machine where the drinks cost 15 cents (this was in the late 70s-early 80s) and you brought the bottle back, and put it in a wooden box next to the machine. Memories...

      • I remember cashing in bottles as a kid, also. In Alaska we got a nickle for small bottles and a dime for the large ones. Then we'd turn around and buy penny candy--bags of it! Back then you could fill up a small paper sandwich bag w/candy for about 2 bucks.

        • Yea I use to save bottles all year, just before the fourth of July I would load them up in a wagon for a trip to the store, that was my fireworks money for the 4th. I had an advantage, My Dad worked for a Coca Cola bottling plant, we always had plenty of soda bottles. Best summer of my life was when they banned cyclamates...I bet I emptied about 10,000 bottles of Tab and Fresca and got paid a buck an hour...Big money in those days.

        • I had a pack of gum from a private product test of cyclamate sweetener. It was odd. Those three sticks I chewed will be blamed for any maladies unattributed to the huge doses of asbestos to which I was exposed.

          One of my older brothers, in contributing to my delinquency, would take me with to get a case of PBR just about weekly. A case was around $3.00, but with last week's empties and the heavy duty reusable flop top case you saved 50 cents! That was enough for a pack of Winstons AND a pack of Juicy Fruit!

          There was another, often overlooked benefit to the cheaper, thinner glass bottles; Molotov cocktails didn't require nearly as much force to use effectively as the old refillable bottles did.

        • I remember getting in trouble for spending one dollar on candy. That was when the $.05 candy bar was still around. My parents had a fit.

        • For a few years as a kid I'd get $1.00/week allowance for helping with chores around the house. I'd ride my bicycle down to the local hardware store and buy $.50 worth of candy and one Matchbox car to go with my collection.
          Life was good then.

        • Ironic, isn't it? Today, riding around in a Chevy Volt, one's life is worth 50 cents.

        • We used to take the soda bottles back to the grocery store and get the deposit, then go to the produce department, where they had the Brachs candy display. We would fill the little "Honor Box" with the change, and stock up on the "2 cent samples". The store manager came by one time and didn't believe we put money in the box, he jiggled it to make sure there was money in it.

      • I remember those days.

        A nickle did buy stuff. In my opinion, they were better days. We actually had our freedom back then!