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Original poster

Do you ever wonder how people didn't die of boredom in the olden days

256 replies

AthenaisdeRochechouart · 13/08/2018 19:04

Before telly and iPads and Netflix and access to unlimited books/music via Amazon?

What did they do to stop going stark staring mad? Could you cope long term without the above?

OP posts:
MrsLettuce · 13/08/2018 19:06
Hmm
LeftRightCentre · 13/08/2018 19:06

They had no modern appliances so a great deal of time was taken up by chores. Access to food wasn't so easy so a lot of time was invested in that. Chores took a lot longer. People used to also work 6 days a week as routine.

Namechangeforhair · 13/08/2018 19:06

There's always been books.

SemperIdem · 13/08/2018 19:06

They spent more time reading (if able), outdoors (be it for work or pleasure) and cooking.

Meanderthal · 13/08/2018 19:07

They sewed etc didn't they, made their own clothes, walked everywhere so that would take time. They had big families too didn't they!

Methe · 13/08/2018 19:07

I expect the women spend most of their lives cleaning and cooking and hand washing their stalls. Must have been pretty miserable.

catlovingdoctor · 13/08/2018 19:07

A lot of reading, embroidery and that sort of thing if you were well off enough. Social occasions, and even meals, were often drawn out simply to fill the time. Most of the population however spent most of their waking lives working just to be able to afford to survive.

asphodelus · 13/08/2018 19:07

Music
Books
Art
Gardening
Knitting
Sewing
Crochet
Learning a foreign language
Chores
Cooking from scratch
Cleaning
Raising more children
Working on the weekends

asphodelus · 13/08/2018 19:08

Conversation

TheFaerieQueene · 13/08/2018 19:08

I’m hoping this isn’t a serious question.

asphodelus · 13/08/2018 19:08

Walking

Pinkvoid · 13/08/2018 19:08

I always think the same about ‘housewives’ in particular but I watched a documentary about life before all of the technology we have now and they didn’t have time to be bloody bored...

dinosaurkisses · 13/08/2018 19:08

Poor people not so much for reasons already mentioned, but the well to do women in the likes of Austen novels must have been bored off their tits.

HotblackDesiatoto · 13/08/2018 19:09

Most people were too bloody busy trying to stay fed clothed and housed to ever be bored.

TheThirdOfHerName · 13/08/2018 19:10

Which place and time do you mean?

Until relatively recently, most people had a lot less leisure time.

E.g. Monday to Saturday would have been spent working from dawn until dusk (or doing housework and childcare without the benefit of mod cons).

In this country, Sunday morning would have been spent at church. So only really Sunday afternoon off.

YaLoVeras · 13/08/2018 19:10

Well, I reckon the first 48-72 hours of no internet are the worst and then you get back in to all the things you say that your hobbies are. Going to the gym, painting, scultping, making jewellery, getting out the sewing machine, reading, writing letters, doing cross words, playing chess/drafts/bridge/bacarat....

Oh, and yes, I wasn't even THINKING of the olden olden olden days, I was just thinking of today but with no internet.

schooltripwoes · 13/08/2018 19:10

I don't think they had much free time. For the ladies, cooking, cleaning, childcare and laundry took up most of the day and evenings were probably spent sewing / knitting / mending clothes.
The men were at work all day then read in the evening / went to the pub.

Noooooooooo · 13/08/2018 19:11

I'd love it.

I don't watch much tv and I'm at my happiest on a cold, miserable night, lying on the sofa with a good book, the radio playing, curtains drawn and lamps lit.

Heaven.

HelpmeobiMN · 13/08/2018 19:11

Poor people didn’t have time to die of boredom since they had to cram working every hour of the day into their short lives before being carried off at the grand old age of 23 by a tooth abscess. Rich people had literature, music, theatre, parties, social propriety and political intrigue to keep them busy.

SavannahSky · 13/08/2018 19:11

They were more active

Less sloth like

Better times

Mercurial123 · 13/08/2018 19:12

You seriously think people had a chance to get bored they were busy trying to survive.

KurriKurri · 13/08/2018 19:13

Olden days ? - I didn;t have any of the things you mention as a child growing up in the sixties. I don't remember ever being bored as a child. we didn't even have a TV until I was about 14.

There are loads of enjoyable things to do in life if you have any kind of imagination whatsoever.

OverByYer · 13/08/2018 19:13

I remember what it was like to be bored.

PetraLost · 13/08/2018 19:14

They only rested on a Sunday.

Cornettoninja · 13/08/2018 19:14

It really wasn’t that long ago if you consider there were only four tv channels till the 90’s. Certainly in living memory of most mnetters.

People read, talked, had hobbies, phones each other for proper conversations, spent time on beauty treatments and appearance....A lot of time is wasted nowadays, especially on smartphones. I include myself in that and was a lot more well read and rounded pre 2010 and even more so before non-shit intenet access round about 2005.