Do kids today really have it easy compared to decades ago?

[PChefPEI]

I just had to share this with you guys, 'cause when I read it, I nearly peed my pants! ROFLOL!!!

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If you are 30 or older you will think this is hilarious!!!!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears
with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with walking
twenty-five miles to school every morning ... uphill; BOTH ways

yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up,
there was no way in hell I was going to lay
a bunch of crap like that on kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!
But now that I'm over the ripe old age of thirty,
I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today.

You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my
childhood, you live in a damn Utopia!
And I hate to say it but you kids today you
don't know how good you've got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have The
Internet. If we wanted to know something,
we had to go to the damn library and
look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!
There was no email!! We had to actually write
somebody a letter ...with a pen!
Then you had to walk all the way across the street and
put it in the mailbox and it would take like a week to get there!

There were no MP3's or Napsters! You wanted to
steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn record store and shoplift it yourself!
Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ
usually talked over the beginning and @#*% it all up!

We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting!
If you were on the phone and somebody else called
they got a busy signal, that's it!

And we didn't have fancy Caller ID Boxes either!
When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was!
It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your
bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you
just didn't know!!! You had
to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation video
games with high-resolution 3-D graphics!
We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and
'asteroids'. Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your
imagination!! And there were no multiple levels or
screens, it was just one screen forever!

And you could never win. The game just kept getting
harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

When you went to the movie theater there no such
thing as stadium seating!
All the seats were the same height! If a tall guy
or some old broad with a hat
sat in front of you and you couldn't see, you were just screwed!

Sure, we had cable television, but back then that was only like 15 channels
and there was no on screen menu and no remote
control! You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on!
You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off
your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel
and there was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons
on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying!?!
We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-bastards!

And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat
something up we had to use the stove or go build a frigging fire .
imagine that! If we wanted popcorn, we had to use that stupid Jiffy Pop thing
and shake it over the stove forever like an idiot.

That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids
today have got it too easy.
You're spoiled. You guys wouldn't have lasted
five minutes back in 1980!

Regards,
The over 30 Crowd

 

[pamperedpals]

I got this email last week and sent to the office and we were all laughing.

 

[chefann]

That's funny. Although I do have to point out that there WERE microwave ovens before 1980. They were invented DECADES ago, but weren't popular (or inexpensive enough for regular people) until the late 1970s. The microwave I currently use at home is from 1977. It's got knobs instead of buttons, no turntable, and a drawbridge style door. nd even without a microwave, there were electric oil-pop popcorn poppers (my mom had one - it was covered in yellow stalagmites of cooked on vegetable oil).

 

[buckeyefan08]

I'm only 24 and I thought this was hilarious!!

 

[Jules711]

Thank you for this!! We must not have had a microwave when I was little, b/c I remember my sister catching a wall on fire making popcorn. Oops! Good thing it was brick!

 

[tlag1986]

This is great!!!! I enjoyed totally.

 

[allisonserna]

even I got a laugh from this!

 

[susanr613]

too funny!

DS is still amazed when i tell him i didn't touch a computer till after college

he's now ripping apart my busted laptop keyboard for fun

 

[The_Kitchen_Guy]

Video games had little squares?We had black and white television.Automatic transmission? Mom had to double-clutch.Video games had little squares?We had black and white television.Busy signal?My phone number was two longs and a short.Okay, I made that one up. But we didn't have pushbuttons, when you "dialed" a number, you actually dialed a number.You *&^%$#@! Kids!(And a "choo choo" actually chugged and choo-chooed.)

 

[KellyTheChef]

 

[susanr613]

yes, and the phone had a cord....did you want yours in beige or black? the spoiled kids got the "princess phone"...still on a cord

 

[chefann]

Okay, I made that one up. But we didn't have pushbuttons, when you "dialed" a number, you actually dialed a number.

We had a rotary phone until after I graduated High School. One of my friends was over one afternoon and wanted to call home to check in with his parents. He didn't know how to use the phone, since he had never seen a rotary dial.

 

[susanr613]

the funny thing is now it is recommended that a house have at least one corded phone so that if the electricity goes out, you can still make a call.

what goes around comes around....

 

[gingertannery]

Hey.. what about the typewriters.. You had to start over if you messed up even one letter unless you had a corrector ribbon to re-type over the "wrong letter" LOL The spell check was the dictionary. The font.. just one. And if you got the paper in wrong it would feed wrong and mess everything up. Geeze..kids do have it too easy.

 

[ChefBeckyD]

We had a rotary phone until after I graduated High School. One of my friends was over one afternoon and wanted to call home to check in with his parents. He didn't know how to use the phone, since he had never seen a rotary dial.

We were on a party line until I was in the 5th grade!

 

[abaker1]

My parents still have a rotary phone!!! They have upgraded to a touchtone too, but it's still fun to use the "old" one when we visit!! Thanks for sharing this!

 

[amy07]

I always tell my kids when we leave for a trip that they have more electronic devices in the car, than most people have in their house! But that the best thing they have that I would've LOVED as a child in a car: AIR CONDITIONING!!! We had 4-60. 4 windows down going 60mph - actually it was more like 4-75 since the speed limit was higher.

 

[TammyStar]

I remember not having a hair dryer. I would not go out in public today without a hairdryer. Last winter I had to go to work without drying my hair I felt so crappy all day I nearly died of embarassment.

 

[amy07]

ooooh, remember when it took what seemed like all day to defrost the freezer.

but to be honest, the first video game I played (not mine, we couldn't afford one) was Pong.

 

[Grandmarita]

This thread was so much fun to read. It obviously would apply to my kids talking with
my grandkids. In my childhood, my grandma did not have a telephone. We could walk
less than a mile to see her, and help her bring her groceries home because no one at
her house drove a car! My aunts who worked took the bus to work. We picked them up to drive them to Church on Sundays. My Dad drove, Grandma sat in the front seat,
and three aunts sat in the back with each of us three kids on their laps. We all fit into a 1929 Model T Ford. Daddy continued to drive that car until 1952, and embarrased me half to death when he would pick me up at a Saturday night dance at the local YMCA.

We had live five or six piece bands play for our high school dances. There was only one out of nine high schools in our City with lights for night games. It was at least five miles from my home, and we took the bus to the game, and walked home the night the busses were too full to take one more body. It was safe to do that, back then. Now,
I don't even venture into those neighborhoods with my car locked. Times have changed!
My grandchildren who live in that same City are bussed from door to door and have safety guards to herd them into school, safely, most of the time, and to usher them onto the busses to ride home less than two miles from home. I do not envy them all that
they have compared to what I had. I was blessed with a SAHM and hopefully, many of you can appreciate the gift that is to any child.

 

[pcchefjane]

Hey.. what about the typewriters.. You had to start over if you messed up even one letter unless you had a corrector ribbon to re-type over the "wrong letter" LOL The spell check was the dictionary. The font.. just one. And if you got the paper in wrong it would feed wrong and mess everything up. Geeze..kids do have it too easy.

I had a boss that loved to change one word in letters on the old manual typewriters! he nearly drove me crazy because of course it was in the middle of a sentence and so the whole letter had to be redone each time! Then we got electronic typewriters with a memory...and I got another boss who changed whole sentences because it was in the memory of the typewriter!:cry:

 

[PChefPEI]

We were on a party line until I was in the 5th grade!

LOL! We had one when I was in high school and our neighbour would always pick up no matter who's ring it was....and would listen in on our conversations. I'm sure it drove 'em nuts when we spoke in French on the phone...LOL!