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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To want to know something you've experienced that current/future generations won't.

547 replies

BobcatDreams · 09/03/2023 19:10

I'm throwing in the disgusting smell of telephone boxes.
Smoking and/or drinking at work

OP posts:
Thread gallery
8
daisydoods · 09/03/2023 20:29

Playing out with friends on a night and knowing it was time to go home when the street lights came on!

...and winding my watch back an hour to stay out longer then telling dp's that it must need a new battery 😂

littleburn · 09/03/2023 20:28

A world without the internet and smart phones. Smoking upstairs on the bus.4 tv channels.

Nanny0gg · 09/03/2023 20:28

Guis23 · 09/03/2023 19:56

Just four channels on TV

Having no remote to change the channel.

Far less traffic on the roads

No NHS issues.

Metal bins carried by binmen on their back

Coalbunkers and coal being delivered.

Ironmongers who would sell you one nail if you wished.

Marks and Spencer Dairy and Deli Hall.

Ha! I remember only 2 channels and they were B&W!

And BHS had food counters too.

Bunty Comics with cut-out paper dolls on the back.

Original poster
BobcatDreams · 09/03/2023 20:25

Thelnebriati · 09/03/2023 20:06

Dangerous playground equipment, like slides that were as high as a house and had a switchback. There was one in Richmond Park that was so tall you could see over the wall.

Everything was huge and metal, I remember a massive rocking horse we would rock so it would stand up, also jumping on and off a big fast metal roundabout.
I don't think I had much skin from the thighs down.

OP posts:
Idratherbepaddleboarding · 09/03/2023 20:23

UthredofBattenberg · 09/03/2023 20:18

Needing to wait until after 6pm to phone someone

Yes and having to hang up and call back if you wanted to keep talking past 1 hour.

The whole family taking Grandma out “for a drive”.

Sitting down excitedly for a new series of Friends and then having to wait til next Friday for the next episode.

Queuing for the new Harry Potter book.

ratherbthedevil · 09/03/2023 20:22

BigMadAdrian · 09/03/2023 19:19

Plugs on a chain!

This has just made me realised I can't remember the last time I saw one

Teaandtoastedbiscuits · 09/03/2023 20:20

Pubs closing for holy hour on a Sunday (Ireland)

Nanny0gg · 09/03/2023 20:20

AnotherExpatKiwi · 09/03/2023 19:15

Having the only phone in the house in the hallway, on a little table with a doily underneath and it being a rotary dial one too!

Those were the days! And waiting for the party line to be free!

Nanny0gg · 09/03/2023 20:19

Sitting in the back of my uncle's van with no seats or belts!

Standing in the footwell of my dad's car as he drove us around the countryside.

UthredofBattenberg · 09/03/2023 20:18

Needing to wait until after 6pm to phone someone

Original poster
BobcatDreams · 09/03/2023 20:18

Mimilamore · 09/03/2023 19:27

Hitch hiking as a normal way of getting around

Yup and you never forget the places you were stuck for ages. I still remember one place that didn't bode well as I looked down to see tons of chalked "I've been here for five hours" type messages

OP posts:
Nanny0gg · 09/03/2023 20:17

BobcatDreams · 09/03/2023 19:10

I'm throwing in the disgusting smell of telephone boxes.
Smoking and/or drinking at work

Recording the Charts from my transistor radio onto my cassette player and hoping you press pause and start at the right times!

CloseYourMouthLynn · 09/03/2023 20:16

Having to get up to change the TV channel!

Teaandtoastedbiscuits · 09/03/2023 20:16

Cheques
Being uncontactable
Prams outside hairdressers on a Saturday
Buying cigarettes with a note from your mum
Having a tab in the corner shop
Telephone boxes that took call cards

Flavabobble · 09/03/2023 20:15

Just four channels on TV
Out first TV didn't get BBC2, channel 4 hadn't even been invented.
Watching a film at the cinema that had been out for years - you'd occasionally get a big film showing on the telly on a Saturday night, but until VCR you only had those 2 options.
Having to switch the immersion heater on if you wanted a bath.
My mum buying that life-changing technical marvel, a pocket calculator. We'd never seen anything like it.

CloseYourMouthLynn · 09/03/2023 20:15

Phoning up to find the train times and hoping they were right.
Saving up pocket money to buy a clothing item (from Tammy girl) you really wanted and it still being there 3 months later.
Going out to the SU with a tenner and it lasting the whole night.

Sevensilverrings · 09/03/2023 20:15

Interrailing with a timetable and guidebook, no mobile phone.
shrinking my jeans on in the bath.
sun melting the tarmac.
paper rounds.
gym pants.
those massive Christmas decorations that got pinned to the ceiling
cremola foam.

1980sfookup · 09/03/2023 20:07

The 1990s rave scene - I was slim, attractive and having the time of my life. Raves were safe from violence. Wouldn't want to go out now. Too many knives.

Thelnebriati · 09/03/2023 20:06

Dangerous playground equipment, like slides that were as high as a house and had a switchback. There was one in Richmond Park that was so tall you could see over the wall.

To want to know something you've experienced that current/future generations won't.
wendywoopywoo222 · 09/03/2023 20:05

Going on guide camp in the back of a lorry sat on our tents and sleeping rolls.

Getting the cane at school

Transferring phone calls in the company switchboard by putting plugs in the right holes. I was rubbish at it.

Uberbeeboo · 09/03/2023 20:04

Waiting patiently with my finger on the record button to tape my favourite song off the radio... I always missed the start of the song.

BucketHatCrew · 09/03/2023 20:03

Using the house phone to make arrangements to meet up with friends. You couldn’t cancel last minute like you can now.

Smoking indoors in a pub/club.
It’s actually weird (and gross) to think you used to be able to do that. I was in my first year of uni when the ban came into affect.

Being able to go to the cinema for £2.20 at the local picture house.

Woolworths pick & mix

Many ‘lost’ memories of a night out. We didn’t have social media like today, we didn’t take pictures, or if we did, it was a few dodgy drunk ones on a proper camera that you never got developed or the pictures are on a memory card somewhere!

Bobbi730 · 09/03/2023 20:03

Losing all my friends at a Festival and not finding them again until morning (I had some brilliant nights doing that). Meeting amazing people while travelling around the world and either putting their address somewhere so we could write or never seeing them again. Being given a mixtape knowing how much work went into it. The dial up noise. No social media growing up (thank God)

ClassicLib · 09/03/2023 20:03

Walking around your local town centre and seeing only people who look like you, dress like you, sound like you, share your culture and speak the same language as you.

I’m absolutely not suggesting that today’s diversity is a bad thing, just that it’s a completely different world from the one in which I grew up in Derbyshire in the 1980s.

NewNameForXmas · 09/03/2023 20:03

electricmoccasins · 09/03/2023 19:38

Piling into the back of one of your mate’s Dad’s vans at the end of the night with no seats/seatbelts and getting a lift home.

One of our local farmers used to run a taxi service back from The Dance on a Saturday night with his tractor and hay trailer! About 15 of us stacked together in the trailer. Halcyon days ...