Things that disappeared, without you realising?

[jennymanara]

What things have disappeared in society, and you did not notice until much later?
So when I was young in every shopping street you would see old women wearing coloured polyester macs and headscarves. And then one day I suddenly realised that I had not seen a woman wearing this kind of clothing for a long time.
The same with plastic rainhoods. You used to see these for sale in newsagents, and elderly women would wear them when caught unaware by the rain. Again disappeared.

People who fought in WWI (and WW11) but never spoke about it
Other elderly people who talked about it a lot - rationing!
British cars, bikes watches...
'Buying British'
Showing off/conspicuous consumption being frowned upon and 'unBritish'
Small old cars with rusty chrome bumpers that broke down a lot (and as lots of people have said, covered in squashed flies)!
Kids packed into the back of cars - no seat belts
Life centred on adults not so much the kids as now: invitations to afternoon tea with older people with tea in china cups and saucers, sandwiches and only afterwards homemade cakes - children sitting still and quiet while adults talked...
Adults going to parties and kids sent upstairs to sleep then taken home asleep late at night
Pretty villages which are now too expensive lived in by people who came from there, extended families, farm workers and working age families
Knitted ties (my dad was a teacher)
Tattoos only on older men
Itchty wool jumpers either hand me downs, knitted by a well meaning relative or from a jumble sale
Buckle shoes and white holey knee socks
Nylon nighties and a nightie case to put it in on your pillow (why)?!
Nylon sheets that sparked
Blue tits pecking the foil off the top of full fat milk bottles on the doorstep
No heating, freezing bathrooms - chillblains
Flypapers
Quiet Sundays - unpopular bracing walks before roast lunch and always a homemade pudding - crumbles, Eve's pudding, queen of pudding, jam/syrup sponge
No advice on healthy / unhealthy food - it was just food
School dinners - proper dining rooms and food cooked in the kitchen even in small schools
Free eye tests and dental checkups for all, free prescriptions
Cheap cuts of meat - neck of lamb stews, liver ..
Ski yoghurt
Pizzas and pasta were barely heard of...
Formica everywhere
Asbestos was fine then! (we had an asbestos water tank 😐
Original wooden windows that were repaired
Dentists that shouted at you - dentists are so nice now
Bronco shiny loo roll
Vim cleaner
Vosene shampoo
Mornay soap
Sun In hair bleach for your Lady Diana flick
Blue rinse hair
Chelsea Girl
Andy's Records for those in the East of England
Pubs in the country that didn't do food

The "Charlie Says" ads on the telly. Gave me the creeps - but sort of in a good way

Fox's glacier mints.
Roll on Lip gloss.

Loads of vertical blinds round here btw. Always hated them. Boring and officy as pps have said. I have pretty voiles (NOT nets) and don't care who judges me.

Jokes printed on ice lolly sticks.

I'd totally forgotten about tutti frutti ice cream flavour.

Party songs from the 1980's seemed to be around for years,must have been a much slower turnover or output of songs for kids...
"Hands up,put your hands up,give me your heart" etc
Superman song
Agadoo.

All staple songs from kids parties of the day. All of sudden I grew up they disappeared

I think vertical blinds are more popular in Scotland I think? Or offices down south.
I'm in SE London and most people in my street have horizontal blinds/shutters and a few with net curtains.

Jokes on lolly sticks

I cannot find the lady who mentioned me in a post (it's hard on my phone)..but thank you ...

I don't remember us using the encyclopaedias but I found stories at the back of the 10th book. Tales of Uncle Remus, Brer Rabbit etc, and Greek myths, tale of Narcissus I remember. I wouldn't have heard of these otherwise.

I was thinking about what we used before there was plastic - toothpaste in a tin, like a germolene tin, and you wiped your toothbrush over it to pick up the toothpaste, might have been made by Gibbs.Shampoo came on soap leaves, you put your middle finger in a hole in the middle and rubbed it over your wet hair (or my DM did), strawberry punnets, small baskets of shaved wood, I think it was, worked well but I don't suppose you could stack them.

I was ginkgo about what we did before all this plastic too. When I was a child (1970s and 80s) toothpaste came in metal tubes.

@Carpediem1 funnily enough was getting a different cd out the other day for the car and came across one with an Andy's Records sticker on it!! Very local to me

Really, @BikeRunSki ? I will check that out.

Chocolate vending machines at tube stations with chocolate in foil wrappers.

I use reins on my two year old, but am in a minority amongst my mum friends. Agree with the pp who said reins actually give them the feeling of more freedom!

I haven't seen a milkman in nearly 30 years

I've started using 'milk and more', I'm lactose intolerant so it's more an orange juice man. I ave not actually seen him, I think he may have Ninja training.

BumbleBeeWineGlass

Try Wolverhampton.

If the pic loads the person in the wheelchair is outside the green grocer, next door is the butcher, then the off licence, the green shutters are the baker / cafe, if you go further round there is an independent computer repair shop and a pharmacy, the opposite side has a general shop/off licence/post office.

No fishmonger on the road but there is a mobile one.

This is not some middle class paradise, this is on a council estate.

Comb overs.

I used to work with a chap in the 1980s that has a comb over starting at the back of his head that went right over the top to the front and was plastered down with brill cream.

I see them everywhere

@CasanovaFrankenstein I had a toilet mat for a while until I had little boys, am not sure why cos my parents didn't use them, much easier to clean the floor. I guess it was that matching bathmats and toilet mats were sold and others had them, but never saw the point of the matching seat covers. Maybe if you had s bathroom carpet. May was sensible, thànkfully I never lived in a blue with one
Vinod sir

Parking spaces. We used to play on our roller boots and skateboards and play kerby on the dead end road in between our houses, which is now crammed full of cars. It used to be empty in the day when I was little and 2-4 cars parked there in the evening.

@Iamthewombat the CoOp is currently selling a morello cherry and amaretti ice cream that is pretty lovely and if you are ever in Northumberland Morwick Dairy near Warkworth has the best black cherry ice cream ever.

Thank you, next stop the Co-op!

I may have gently mocked the vertical blinds earlier but reading further I have:

An outside toilet (working but a Mecca for spindly spiders so I don’t go in there)
A proper dial phone (a retired BT engineer restores and sells them at a local vintage market)
Until recently used my reins on my 2 year old (she was a bolter and reins are better than being hit by a car)

#Sashh I think you are right! - MilkandMore are definitely Ninjas, I have never seen them either! They deliver organic milk in glass bottles (so middle class) gives me a flashback from the clinking sound of putting out the empty bottles....

Toys in little plastic bags in cereal boxes!

Has anyone mentioned Blakey’s yet?

They are still sold but I don’t know anyone who has used them in years!

They used to be so popular.

Jokes on lollies yes i was just thinking that the other day when i had a mgnum

My dgf sitting out the front of his flat with his foldup stripy chair-I do miss him

Just 3 tv channels-Wasnt life simpler then

I'm so sad...since this thread started all I've done is remember back to things no longer available that were in my childhood!!
The baskets someone mentioned in pp, I used one in secondary school it had a n domesticated cover that fit over the handle and you could open either side.
Tootie Frooties
Sunday school
Brownies/Girl guides
Toast toppers..mentioned earlier, loved the chicken & bacon one.
Blue Jeans and Photo Love Magazines
Banana or sugar sandwiches
Sterilized milk in the bottle...my hand tea was the best made with that.
Milky coffee in cafes served in see through cups.
Grandad on the beach with their knotted hankies on head, vests and rolled up trousers.
Proper school dinners where you got seconds, best fish fingers ever and lovely thick custard with the skin on. 😋
Hot water bottles in winter, blankets and eiderdowns on beds.
Cartoons, Tom & Jerry, Ivor the Engine. Bagpuss, Magic Roundabout, Stingray, Rupert the Bear. The Wombles.
Beanie babies...oh my we had hundreds of pounds worth...sold on eBay for £40 😢
Transistor Radios. Absolutely loved mine, took it everywhere until they brought out the Walkman.
Potatoes with the mud and dirt still on them.
This could go on forever, I await some more from everyone else now😁