[al baby]

Thought this was a good light read. Especialy in light of recent events

[VRWC_minion]

Remember playgrounds with hard tar or cement ? Remember monkey bars and seesaws ?

[just me]

Those were the days!
I hadn't realized how many children were in our neighborhood until the "black out" last year.

[the Deejay]

That's a GREAT one! Very accurate. I got one just like that in email about 5 months ago. I put it in my drafts
folder. It's'a keeper!

[NRA2BFree]

Oh no, I am the walking dead. All this time I just thought I was alive. :-)

[katnip]

My sisters and I should have died long ago from breaking thermometers and playing with the mercury....

[MontanaBeth]

My sister and I would sit in the backseat of the family station wagon, Indian style but with our backs facing front and try not to fall off the seat when mom or dad used the breaks. It sounds silly now but I know we absolutely loved doing that. We both must have suffered brain damage and died.

[fortunecookie]

And if you got in trouble in school or got a bad grade, you also got in trouble at home. Even if it wasn't your fault.

[Busywhiskers]

Whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

[EllaMinnow]

We used to jump on our bikes and chase off in the cloud of pesticide fog being sprayed by the city. Yup, I'm dead.

My sister swallowed 10 nickels while practicing her first communion. She's dead, too.

[Ditter]

There are so many things they left out.
I road my horse all over what is now west Houston.
I rode my bicycle miles from home & I did it alone.
I didn't wear shoes from the time school was out till it started again & I didn't die of tetnus when I cut my feet.
I swam in sand pits & didn't drown.
I played outside long after dark & wasn't abducted.
I walked a mile to the bus stop & took the city bus into downtown Houston by myself at age 12.

The scarest thing I did was probably eat food from street vendors.
I can still remember the tamales & how good they were. Those were the days.

[birbear]

Before I knew them, my current crop of friends tell of a day when they made bows and arrows and poison and would shoot at the "nerds" in the neighborhood.

I guess a couple of my friends were watching some nature documentary on TV (this would have been in the early 80s) and it was about how the Native Americans used this particular plant as a poison. One friend said to another, "Hey, that looks like the plant you have in your backyard." So they investigated, and sure enough it was...so the made a concoction of the sap from the plant, and then one said to the other, "I wonder if it really works." So, of course they had to test it. One spread the mixture on one of his home made arrows and then stabbed himself in the leg with it. Immediately his leg began twitching and convulsing...and then he said it felt like it just went to sleep, and he couldn't move it for about 15 minutes.

They decided it was pretty cool and wouldn't get them into too much trouble, so they loaded up their bows, arrows, and poison and went nerd hunting.


Today these guys are actually some of the most repsonible and nicest people i know.

[Rooivalk]

Had television heroes like Sheriff John and Engineer Bill. I still remember songs like..."look both ways before you cross the street, use your eyes and then your feet....."

And Davy Crockett told us: " Be sure you're right and then go ahead"

[R. Scott]

Yep!
Oh for the Bad Old Days!
How did we survive?

[XBob]

1 - "This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and problem solvers and inventors, ever. "

"Thought this was a good light read. Especialy in light of recent events"

Excellent post - I think there is a lot more wisdom in this than your comment suggests.

[G Larry]

Played w matches & set a canyon on fire. Local FD put it out, with no loss & I never got blamed. Later, found a field on fire, called it in, & got blamed even though I hadn't been in that field.
Survived major bike wrecks, BBgun wounds, firecracker explosions, fist fights, falling down rock cliffs, near drowning in irrigation ditch. (the friend who pulled me out 40 years ago, died this year from liver failure).
Haven't noticed any posts citing the fact that back then, Mom was home!

[valkyrieanne]

My husband used to make these little rockets out of his mom's old discarded lipstick tubes...

[nutmeg]

ping!

Please FReepmail me if you want on or off my infrequent ‘miscellaneous’ ping list.

[Revelation 911]

we used to make these tennis ball cannons with soda cans and lighter fuel

then the neighbor kid found his brothers bird shot shells and we proceeded to whack it with a sledgehammer....it never did go off (we were about 10 or 11)

and of course we'd also douse the rear wheel of our stingray with lighter fuel and ride around at nite

but probably my favorite thing was jumping our bikes off ramps like evel knievel

[beaureguard]

We used to have chickens when I was growing up.

I would get my Daisy BB gun, get about 150' or so from the chickens, and pop them in the tail or body. Wouldn't hurt them too bad, but they would run. They finally got to where they would scatter for the four ends of the earth when they saw me, and I would have to quit for a while till they "forgot."

Made one mistake one time - hit a rooster in the neck - he flopped around for a while, and I thought my butt was dead (as well as his!). Didn't kill him though. He recovered, and my parents never found out. I quit after that.