Now I'm having flashbacks thanks to this thread. Anyone remember orange sunshine acid? Window pane? Some of the other items which contributed to my moral demise: Maximus Super beer, Weldwood Contact cement (before they added the mustard oil), black opiated hash. As for porn, why did the 8mm film ALWAYS have to stop and melt right at the critical scene, while we were watching on the garage wall, and then my friend yells out "Joey, your old man's home!".

Yes, I remember the windowpane. I did lots of that in high school. Also, "blotter". It was a little purple dot on a piece of paper.
As far as my porn experiences. My father was a teacher at a boys boarding school, (Im a girl, so that was a strange kind of lifestyle  to begrowing up in ) and we lived on campus. Our house basically was a dormitory. We lived downstairs, and the boys upstairs. We usually had about 30 boys. When they would go home on vacations, I would go in their rooms and look at all their playboy and porn mags they had stashed away.

Thing is, it was about the silliest porn ever created.  I don't know if it was just a '70's thing, or if whoever collected this stuff was just really strange.  It was all in black and white, and it was still shots "old silent picture show style" that told really bizarre and corny stories about sheiks, doctors and nurses, etc.  The "dialogue " was terrible.   It seemed pretty sophisticated to my 8-year-old mind, but looking back it was really childish and corny.

I'm a girl, btw, and detest porn and what it stands for nowadays, but when you're a kid, you're curious about this mysterious thing called sex.  Like I learned anything from that silly stash!

And, treehugger, I remember regular pot going for $10 per ounce (we called it a lid).  When it hit $25 I quit because I just couldn't afford it any more.  $25 would be a huge bargain today.  I also remember when possession of any amount here in Texas was a felony.

It is very standard to pay $400 for an ounce of "high grade" herb at a legal medicinal dispensary in a California city today (Oakland, SF, Clearlake, Arcata, probably statewide). Maybe more like $320 if you are lucky, for a slightly less-high-grade. For a long time I never had ENOUGH money to buy more than a little 1/8th oz bag for like $50 and try to make that streeeeetch for a few weeks.

Not to get too off-topic, but we could save this country in so many ways if they would decriminalize hemp. Food, biodiesel fuel, clothing fibres, paper/textile fibers, building supplies, cheap nutritious protein source, medicine.... legalizing hemp could completely revitalize California's currently-massively-in-debt economy. Unfortunately I live in an area where cattle ranchers rule the land, and vast hundreds and thousands of acres are fenced off and reserved for large herds of cattle who eat the grass down to the roots and make the land un-farmable. This has happened all over America and is one of the reasons why I am cynical as to ever seeing change in this country without *extremely* radical restructuring. There is nothing even remotely "sustainable" about a meat-eating society, it is entirely a myth which allows the elite (and in America, all the wish-I-was-elite's) to indulge in their addictive fatty fleshy treats. Only massive factory farms can feed the demand that has been created in this country, and it will NEVER be able to convert to an environmentally-responsible, sustainable system.

The spin has always been that cannabis is just another "deadly drug aimed at destroying our youth", but hopefully folks on NR are aware of the massive disinformation campaign that has been waged against this plant ally of humanity. If the focus could be placed on the *positive* constructive uses of the *entire* hemp plant, we could see HUGE, paradigm-shifting changes in our economy, agriculture, diet and culture, quickly and for the better!

Sorry I know thats off-topic, but it is just CRAZY to hear about your folks exposure to cheap marijuana in the past, because those days are OVER, at least in the cities. I don't agree with it being so expensive as a medicine in the first place, but the larger issue is that the entire plant, the industrial hemp plant, is completely out-of-bounds for Americans, and there are so many more uses than just the flowering tops for smoking!

Tim

ShineOn:

I fell in love with the show there called Top of the Pops , which every Thursday night featured the likes of the Troggs, the Hollies, the Who, Sandi Shaw, Dusty Springfield or the Tremeloes.

That show was my weekly highlight during the 80's. Sadly the show was aired for the final time last year, although 42 years isn't a bad innings!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/5099894.stm

MTV owes its entire early existence to TOtP and The Old Grey Whistle.  In those days, this was the only game in town.  So when MTV first started, this was how they got almost all of their material.  Gary Numan, The Police, The Pretenders, et. al. were heavily showcased because American bands weren't creating videos yet.

That show was my weekly highlight during the 80's. Sadly the show was aired for the final time last year, although 42 years isn't a bad innings!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/5099894.stm

The re-branding of the same old games, with more rule changes to boot, that's one thing that has changed in my time for sure. This game blows- I want a new one.

With NO rules.......

I like that analogy, and I feel the same.  Ready for the polar opposite of what we're living right now.  Let love and integrity rule!

treehugger, treehuggers seem to start out with an affection of smaller, pungent-smelling trees, odd.

20 bucks a Z? Hows 1200-1500% inflation strike ya?
Don't ask me how I know this, must be intuition...

Soloflecks wrote: "What also becomes equally clear is that some form of fear has been used in each era in order to acheive aims that would be rejected by the people otherwise"

Whammo!

As I was reading yours and treehuggers posts, that is exactly what I was thinking (in somewhat different words), it gets no clearer than the way you put it, and looking at it thru a microscope like that makes it seem so trivial, in terms of being incredibly and disproportionately effective. 

That is the kind of illustration that makes one shake the head, and realize we are just being looked at in the fishbowl. Be it the drug laws, or fear of the thing in the closet, it never fails, and someone damn sure knows it.

Eternal Pavlov Syndrome. They ring that bell incessantly.
We are the ones constantly looking for an out of that wretched coil. Does no amount of will prove enough to accomplish that?  Argh.

The re-branding of the same old games, with more rule changes to boot, that's one thing that has changed in my time for sure. This game blows- I want a new one.

With NO rules.......                                                          J

The U.K's favourite pervert! That guy used to cause outrage with his antics, but looking back he pales in comparison with some of the stuff regular T.V gets away with these days. I loved the end sequences where they would play the daft music and Benny would run around in fast-forward while being chased by a posse of scantily clad beauties.

Ape-X

That's more like it, how I miss those winters. Summers here have never been consistent and the one thing we could rely on was a damn good winter...at least, we could.

Lono

And, treehugger, I remember regular pot going for $10 per ounce (we called it a lid).  When it hit $25 I quit because I just couldn't afford it any more.  $25 would be a huge bargain today.  I also remember when possession of any amount here in Texas was a felony.

What also becomes equally clear is that some form of fear has been used in each era in order to achieve aims that would be rejected by the people otherwise.  The fear of commies is what they used to gain support for the war in Viet Nam and used the "domino theory" the same way they use the fear of growing terror groups today.  The domino theory has long since been discredited even by the retired generals and whatnot from that war.  But enough time goes by that the next generation or two has forgotten how the prior generations were tricked into giving their lives for a lie, so they are always able to pull it off again and again.

I loved to play sports and games. These were the best activities for me. We would play tackle football in the backyard of a friend's house. Other games too. Nobody in my town had that much more money than anyone else. I was very conscious of the difference then that a few thousand dollars income made for a family. My mother was a nurse and didn't make so much. My dad tried many business ventures, but really didn't bring in that much income in the long run. The grandparents had money, but because my mother had always prefered her independence, they didn't subsidize us at all. I learned to make fun without needing material goods. I didn't have every toy that Hasbro made. Christmas was fun with the family, yet I always felt a bit deprived at that time of year, considering the toys my friends would get. I worked mowing lawns and shoveling sidewalks starting at age 10. Earned my own money.

The richest part of my life was spending time with my grandparents. My grandfather was one of the richest men in the county he lived in, although I never inherited any money. He taught me in those days that integrity and quality would take me far. I didn't know what that meant then. I didn't know that my mother lost a baby girl a year before I was born until I grew older. She raised me to appreciate life over money and possessions.  My grandfather was a funeral director and I would see him cry after he got a call that someone in town had died. He and my grandmother had both come from guilded victorian families that lost their greater monetary wealth during the depression. They knew that money itself was just a tool for a comfortable life--not a status symbol.  My family helped me to enjoy my childhood in ways that today's parents just don't remember. They didn't give me everything I wanted--partly because they couldn't-- but they gave me something much greater: self-responsibility and independence.

I was a free kid who could run all over town as long as I didn't get into trouble.  I never had the opportunity to think I was more important than anyone else. I grew up knowing that I would have to make it on my own. I enjoyed doing all the simple things then; simple things with friends that became an integral part of me and the way I saw the world. My parents and grandparents never uttered a hateful word around us. There were no divorces in my entire ancestry. I am lucky to come from such wise people. I was fortunate to grow up in those days. I don't think many kids today have the same kind of family luxury--to teach their kids these lessons.

Ps. The way we live now isn't much different than I lived then. We don't have cable, or watch TV at all.  We don't lock our doors. We didn't buy our kids everything we could afford. They are happy, independent kids who value friendships.  They have stable and long lasting relationships. They always had a bike though, and a parent home when they got home from school. I sacrificed higher income and status for my kids. We love having running water and a bathroom inside. We have a wood stove and I am self-employed. We are very, very rich--and we are aware that friends,  and the simple things,  are the most valuable part of our lives. I owe this to a value system developed by a family of self-employed farmers and business people who didn't put profit over people.  I was raised by America's greatest generation.

My family was poor back then, but we didn't really know it, in the fifties and sixties.

"We are infinitely richer than all the deceased Royalty of history"
~~carefulcarpenter

We had a jeep when I was little and it was always an adventure to go out riding.  A lot of back roads still didn't have bridges, the creek just ran across the road.  If there had been a lot of rain you couldn't get across until the water went back down again.  Now most of those roads are paved and have been recut so they don't have so many twists and turns, so it's not nearly as much fun to ride.

Sometimes my dad took us out on the service roads that go to the electricity pylons.  I was both scared and fascinated by the pylons.  They are on steep hills and the roads were very rough so it was always exciting to see if we would be able to make it up the hill to the top.  Coming back down the other side was terrifying and wonderful.

I didn't have any brothers or sisters, or neighbors close to my age, so I rarely got to play with other kids outside of school.  When I did it was usually with the children of my dad's friends, rather than my own friends from school.  When any of my cousins came to visit it was a really big deal.  We never had anything in particular to do, so we mostly just ran around inside the house or outside acting silly.

Hardly anyone was into video games or computers yet.  It was cool to have a trampoline, or a 4-wheeler or go-cart.  We climbed trees and went exploring in the woods.  Sometimes we would pick blackberries, or shuck corn, or gather up pecans in the yard.  We played in rivers and creeks, and went swimming at the lake.  It was a rare treat to use a swimming pool. 

We never stayed in motels when we went on vacation, we stayed in campgrounds.  I walked mountain trails by myself and no one ever bothered me.  I collected bucketfuls of river rocks and never had a thought that some crazy environmentalist might try to stop me.  I loved going to Six Flags, Rock City, and Ghost Town.

Sometimes we had a frozen pizza and french fries and ate dinner watching TV.  Back then you were lucky to get than 2 or 3 channels clearly with your TV antenna.  My dad eventually got tired of that and mounted an antenna on a pole so high it scandalized everyone in the community, with a rotary mechanism so we could turn it to get stations from any direction.  So after that we were able to get TBS from Atlanta, and Fox from Greenville. 

But I remember watching PBS more than anything else.  My all-time favorite show was Benny Hill.   I also remember seeing a lot of Reading Rainbow, Sesame Street, Doctor Who, and Mr. Rogers.  As I got older I loved Masterpiece Theater, Days of Our Lives, and miniseries like The Thornbirds.  And I always looked forward to seeing things like the Charlie Brown holiday specials, and The Grinch That Stole Christmas.

My mom's parents had cable and I soaked up every minute of it I could get.  I watched MTV in the early days when it was good, and I was always trying to catch dirty movies on HBO or Cinemax.  My granny would pretend to fuss at me about it and then leave me alone so I could watch what I wanted.  No one bothered much about ratings in those days.  If a show got too "ugly" an adult might change the channel for a few minutes, and then turn it back when the bad part was over.

VCRs weren't common yet, and they still showed films in school or at the library on a projector.  My favorites were Peter and the Wolf, Alice in Wonderland, and Fantasia.

I came home from my first day at kindergarten covered from head to toe in red dirt.  I never slept during naptime, and one time my kindergarten teacher spanked me by hand in front of the entire class just because I was still awake.  At the end of the year we each got a Mr. Goodbar if we had learned to say our ABCs, count to a hundred, and tie our own shoes.  I looked forward to getting that candy bar like it was made of gold.

Riding the school bus was horrible.  The older kids were always groping each others butts and heckling everyone.  There was always someone spitting tobacco juice on the floor, and every time we went rode past a chickenhouse the stench nearly choked us to death.  I would read on the way home and it gave me headaches.

I read almost every book I could get my hands on, except for the Bible.  I read the encyclopedia for fun.  I read Good Housekeeping, Redbook, Better Homes and Gardens, Ladies' Home Journal, and Woman's Day when I was still a long way from being a woman.  I collected every issue of Mad Magazine for five years straight.

I listened to records and eight tracks, and when I was 6 I got my first cassette player.  My first tape was the Journey album Frontiers and I loved the song Separate Ways (Worlds Apart).  I sang along with Madonna, blasted Guns N Roses, took showers with Bon Jovi, and rode my Big Wheel listening to Aerosmith with headphones in my ears.

When a thunderstorm came we unplugged everything in the house and sat still until it was over.  You weren't allowed to go in the bathroom or kitchen during a storm.  But sometimes I would sit outside with my dad to watch the lightning.

Our county government hasn't allowed much development, so the community doesn't look much different than it did 20-30 years ago.  But it feels like living in a different world.  Growing up I felt that the energy here was very dark and ugly.  Attitudes have changed and it is a lot more pleasant to live here now.