30 Years Difference

Poststructural Pub
1

30 Years Difference:

1975: Long hair
2005: Longing for hair

1975: KEG
2005: EKG


1975: Acid rock
2005: Acid reflux

1975: Moving to California because it’s cool
2005: Moving to California because it’s warm

1975: Trying to look like Liz Taylor
2005: Trying NOT to look like Liz Taylor

1975: Seeds and stems
2005: Roughage

1975: Hoping for a BMW
2005: Hoping for a BM

1975: The Grateful Dead
2005: Dr. Kevorkian

1975: Going to a new, hip joint
2005: Receiving a new hip joint

1975: Rolling Stones
2005: Kidney Stones

1975: Passing the drivers’ test
2005: Passing the vision test

Just in case you weren’t feeling too old today, this will certainly
change things.

The people who are starting college this fall across the nation were
born in 1987.

They are too young to remember the space shuttle blowing up.

Their lifetime has always included AIDS.

Bottle caps have always been screw off and plastic.

The CD was introduced the 2 years before they were born.

They have always had an answering machine.

They have always had cable.

They cannot fathom not having a remote control.

Jay Leno has always been on the Tonight Show.

Popcorn has always been cooked in the microwave.

They never took a swim and thought about Jaws.

They can’t imagine what hard contact lenses are.

They don’t know who Mork was or where he was from.

They never heard: “Where’s the Beef?”, “I’d walk a mile for a
Camel”, or “de plane, de plane”.

They do not care who shot J. R. and have no idea who J. R. even is.

McDonald’s never came in Styrofoam containers.

They don’t have a clue how to use a typewriter.

Do you feel old yet? (Sorry) Pass this on to the other old fogies on
your list. Notice the larger type, that’s for those of you who have
trouble
reading.

2

I was not born in 1987, though one of my younger brothers was.

3

For what it’s worth, some of us older guys could care less who shot J.R. too :wink:

4

Ever since I moved to Louth about 18 years ago I’ve travelled to work in Lincoln on the bus. There are always some youngsters going to college on that bus and it struck me the other week that it won’t be long until the children of those original students are riding with me.

Ah feel old. Do ah look old?
(Don’t answer that)

5

You don’t have to look old if you don’t want to. You can always take Joan Rivers’ lead and choose to look like an alien instead…

6

Wow, Doug. That is a good list. Somehow CD’s still seem new to me. I still have old tapes and albums I never play because of those new-fangled CD’s we get now :laughing:.

Boy, I’m really kinda shocked at some of these things. They’ve always made microwave popcorn and always worried about AIDS?
Yep, I do feel kind of old.:laughing:

7

Tapes!! I’ve still got Edison cylinders. Well..no, I really don’t but my first records were 78s.

8

Not true. Johnny Carson retired from hosting the Tonight show in May 1992. Leno took over shortly thereafter, and immediately initiated his rapid progression into terminal lameness.

9

But wasn’t there a lot of fooling around for years with who was going to take over? Like there was that Joan Rivers fiasco, etc. Maybe it just seemed like he retired when they started trying out those guest hosts for the job. I think I had probably stopped watching by then anyway. I liked Johnny though. He could really be funny.

10

A child born in 1987 would have been 5 years old in 1992, far too
young to be up late enough to watch the Tonight Show, and too young
to remember who hosted if they had watched. So to them, it seems like
Jay has always hosted, which was the point of the statement.

11

I love these lists, I’ve been reading them since my first year of college. At the time everything applied to me. Since then less and less applies. I won’t feel old till none of it does. :laughing:

On one of the earliest lists was the line “The show Cats has always been on Broadway” and I actually had to stop and realise that it wasn’t a permanent and timeless installation! It really had “always been there” :stuck_out_tongue:

12

My mom said she started feeling old when the kids in her science classes had problems asking them to compare the speed a record needle travels at the start and end of a record (because the RPM stay constant while the diameter changes), and they thought you started a record with the needle in the middle.

13

A friend was (with some trepidation) allowing her daughter (15 yrs) to play her old Led Zep albums. The daughter came back a while later and asked her mom to come check the record player, as something was wrong. It would only play one side. :astonished:

djm

14

Now I feel young actually.

15

When I was a kid, we played with an old cylinder player my grandaddy had. Our favorite tune was “Barney Google, with the goo-goo-googly eyes”.

I’ve got an old crank Victrola in my living room that still works just fine. I like how I can adjust the speed to where it suits me, but it is really loud. I guess they hadn’t figured out a voulme control at that point.

16

Things like these were said in 1987, too. There was the classic, “The Beatles? Were they the group Paul McCartney was in before Wings?” Or my favorite, at a Steve Winwood concert, when he started singing “Soul Man.” “What’s Steve Winwood doing singing a Blues Brothers song?”

17

:laughing:

Good one Chas,
Some years ago a friend of mine was going out with a girl about fifteen years younger than him.We were sitting in a pub one night chatting away when she asked if we had heard the new song by the boy band of the moment. The song was a cover of Father and Son and when I mentioned that I had heard it on the radio in work and it was a cover of a Cat Stevens classic, she asked…“Who’s Cat Stevens?”

I did not know if I should laugh or cry…


Slan,
D.

18

Well, of all the things in the list, the only one that refers to remembering something is the one about the space shuttle. All the rest speak of the existence of something in 1987. So I stand by my comment. I guess inattention to detail is one of the hallmarks of aging, isn’t it? Or is it constant nitpicking about minor insignificant details that characterizes the elderly mindset? I forget. Guess I’m getting old…

19

When Steely Dan won a grammy a few years ago my daughter was in college. None of her friends had ever heard of Steely Dan! I guess the best my daughter could do was “some band my Dad listens too”.

20

I thought Jack Paar was the host of the Tonight Show?!!!