How to live like its the 1990s?

[Coffeeandcake12]

Inspired by a thread about how people were happier in the 90s, how can I live more like we did in the 90s?
Obviously no Internet, I already don't use social media apart from mumsnet.
But what made the 90s so good that I could recreate for me and my children a bit more?

We did a charity event where (as much as possible) DS lived as I did at his age for a week. 80s rather than 90s but a lot of the same may apply. Key things were no internet, no mobile devices/phones, 5 tv channels and limited choice of what to watch and no pausing to go to the loo or forwarding ads, rudimentary video games only, no ordering takeaway - it was a rare treat and you had to fetch it, more general amusing yourself and less pre made entertainment- he got used to playing a board game or doing some drawing, Lego etc. There was a lot less anxst about things generally too as I recall. You got a plastic ham sandwich and a penguin bar for pack up and this was acceptable. No stress about sugar or eating habits. No one I knew worried about getting their 5 year old's profile built up ready for Oxbridge. People didn't endlessly worry about offending others, inclusion etc. I'm not actually saying the latter was necessarily good but it was a product of the mindset of the time that you just got on with what you were doing and used far less headspace as a result. I think that's the thing that no experiment or recreation can do - recreate the mindset of a past time.

Wear heather shimmer lipstick
drown yourself in Dewberry perfume from the body shop
play games on teletext
read Sugar, Bliss, Mizz and J17 magazines then graduate to More magazine with it’s random position of the fortnight

Make your kids go through the phone bill and identify every number they've called. Then have an argument if there are mystery numbers that no-one claims to have called.

Ban GPS. Use a map if you need to get around.

Book a holiday on Teletext. You won't have any photos of the resort, or any reviews, but that's half the fun.

Get rid of your mobile phone

I was there. It wasn't great. But maps were good. The images didn't move around while you were looking at them.

Instead of going to hairdressers, save yourself some money by buying a bottle of sun in. Then walk around enjoying your new orange hair.

If you do decide to go to the hairdresser, make sure that you ask for thick stripy highlights and a Rachel haircut.

Yes, many people lost their properties in the early 90s. Richer people snapped up
Lots of repossessions. The Tory Poll tax was unworkable (sahm with no income got a separate bill, as did anyone over 16!)
Things did definitely get better after we got the Tories out. Why oh why have we made the same mistakes again??!

The early 90s were Black Wednesday, sky high interest rates and many house repossessions. Major's Cash for Questions Ministers who personified the sleaze culture of Westminster at the time. The NHS was failing badly and Labour had a great party political broadcast about a wee boy who needed an operation for his ears.

The internet existed but not social media. People had email through dial up internet. There were mobile phones - txt spk came from the 90s.

Ladette culture was popular. Raves in fields with Ecstasy were the weekend. EasyJet and Ryanair showed a new way to travel abroad to Europe. Freedom of movement across the EU came in, I think. Inter-railing had been big before then though.

The biggest change has been social media and ordering 'stuff' via the internet. People did phone each other - you had to put down the phone and redial if the call lasted more than an hour. People shopped in High Streets and Shopping Centres as a leisure pursuit. There were more independent retailers which meant travelling to a different town offered different shopping to your home town.

The coffee chains were not ubiquitous outside of the main cities. No drive-through coffee at all.

Really?

Of course there were people with poor mental health; there just wasn't the Internet telling us.

@WomanFromTheNorth I don't think that the mining communities would agree.

Or those made homeless through interest rates and repossessions

@WomanFromTheNorth I would agree about John Major having integrity though- he was the the best Tory. He dislikes the current breed.

But the conservatives were in government for 75% of the 90s…..

Take down the security fence at your kids primary school. Send the nursery teacher out to pick up.the needles before the kids can go out to play. Send the Y6 teacher out to pick up the dog shit from the field before PE. Let any tom dick or Harry enter the school whenever they want to nick the teachers' bags from the staffroom or worse.

God the 90s were miserable. Playgrounds all vandalised. Terrible public transport. Heroin epidemic. Awful homophobia and misogyny. Bullying endemic. No minimum wage. Cold and rainy all the time. That’s my memory of it anyway!

I think it must depend on how old you were at the time. I was mid 20s in the early 90s and it seemed to me that all anyone talked about was house prices and how much they earned, interest rates, MIRAS, income multiples etc.

I also disagree that there was no impending sense of doom, there absolutely was, global warming, the hole in the ozone layer, protests against road building, nuclear fallout from Chernobyl, the end of the Cold War, the BNP, the poll tax riots.

Then it turned to all anyone talked about being negative equity, repossessions, the interest only mortgage with endowment policy scandal.

I think the big one would be not using social media and calling up friends. I didnt realise how fun that was. Weirdly I hate phone calls now.

Obviously get off mumsnet now!

To be honest, in the 1990s and 1980s, think there was a lot of nostalgia for the 1960s. People used to go on how much fun it was then.

We didn't even have a phone you could dial out on until dh and I moved in together in 1999! Obviously not a lot of mobiles until around 1998.

Love this thread. So nostalgic and it’s reminded me of so many memories growing up!

Kinda wish we could go back in time for a day and show our children how it was! Tho not sure I’d like to see what the future will look like given the option

What a great thread! Wish i could go back to the 90s (in my teens) . Ringing my pals from the phone box - 10p then i think. The only thing i had to worry about was which rimmel lipstick matched my Naf Naf t Shirt 🤣. (Usually Heather shimmer). Oh and the body shop white musk perfume. No wonder the lads kept away ha ha.

Pretend Vienetta is really posh.

Buy a velvet hat with a rose on it.

Carry a discman.

Agree that it depends on your age. I was a kid in the 90s so carefree and largely unaware of all the bad stuff.

Kids of today will probably look back on this period with nostalgia, while we will simply remember rising interest rates, generation rent, covid, CoL crisis etc.