I used to think the comment "do you remember when" and "back in the day" was exclusively the province of the elderly. Thinking back, "I can remember when" as relatively young men we used to reminisce about days gone by. I find when talking to friends, we will often dredge up events and people from the past. **I can actually remember when crisps actually had a blue paper twist in them containing salt**, not a sachet, but a bit of twisted blue paper. I even remember my very first packet and coming across this contrivance, having to be shown what to do. Untwist, shake the bag, of course with the level of motor control of a very small child, this usually ended badly. Within a very short period they changed to "ready salted"…and innovation, then came flavours, starting with salt and Vinegar…which I swear tasted better than todays artificial version. Or perhaps you remember the time when gas cookers had a pilot flame (permanently on) in the centre and a little gas wand on a tube (clipped to the side of the cooker) with a button. You lit the wand from the pilot and then used it to light the oven or overhead grill. Incredibly dangerous, especially as it was coal gas, but no one thought anything of it. As a small child I wasn't allowed to touch the gas wand…My mum had a Parkinson Cowan like this, right up to about 1975, [upl-image-preview url=//i.imgur.com/GeL7IuH.png]

God, this thread is made up for old timers! I can remember when a Mars Bar was 2d and you needed two hands to hold it. The chocolate was soooooooo thick! My neighbour (I was around 4 or 5) used an Isetta Bubble Car for her everyday drive. In winter, you woke up (pre central heating) to chipping ice from the inside of thesingle glazed windows and you wore jumpers indoors. You ran downstairs when it snowed to find the bloody Blue Tits had pecked through the silver top milk bottles and had stolen the inch or so of cream that used to settle on the top. I remember watching the first episode of a new cutting edge drama, Z Cars.......I could go one and on! Tell you one thing though, life was simpler but were they really the good old days?

@"dfk41"#p2934 Definitely remember the ice on the inside of the windows and as a kid dragging my cloths into the bed to warm them up. Big old cottage with no central heating brrrrrrrrr.

Do you remember Spangles? When Curly Wurlys were massive, you could use them for a ladder. Bri Nylon shirts. Nylon bed sheets! Some shops still had Lamson pneumatic tube systems that would shuttle away your payment and bring back your change.

> @"Gagaryn"#p2938 Do you remember Spangles? > > 1. Bri Nylon shirts. > 2. Nylon bed sheets! > > 3\.Some shops still had Lamson pneumatic tube systems that would shuttle away your payment and bring back your change. Spangles, yes..my favourite sweet, I like the old english ones too, but only certain flavours…the red one was to die for.. 1. Mum thought it was a brilliant idea for school, I hated them. I think it was the stain resistance and one shake they were dry. Remember the little blue sparks that came off them in a dark room in the morning. 2. Nope, I refused to sleep in those…absolutely refused…used to make me itch like mad all night 3. Bentalls used to have those back in the day, always fascinated me as a kid. Shluwooop, pshhhhh. I always wondered where they went and they used to come back with the recpt as well I think. We had another shop near us, Digbys general store, like something out of 1920…used a system of wires, The stuff was put in a tube on the wires, then a sharp pull on a handle, and it went flying across the roof of the store. Those cheap bastards kept the store the same and the system going until the mid 60s..open sacks of flour, beans, tea in large cases, butter pats etc.. Can you imagine how well that would have all gone down now. [upl-image-preview url=//i.imgur.com/bY3zuoy.png ] [upl-image-preview url=//i.imgur.com/HbHmfM2.png ]

@"Gagaryn"#p2938 If ever you go to Beamish Museum, my friend provided the tube system they use in the shop. To carry on, card with starter handles although by my time they were more of a standby than actually needed on the modern car. Telephone kiosks with the old A & B system for putting your money in (ask your parents!), bus conductors!

Sharing your phone line with the neighbors "party line" I think it was called. Picked the phone up and you caught half their conversation - nuts!

> @"Lake_M"#p2943 Sharing your phone line with the neighbors “party line” I think it was called. Picked the phone up and you caught half their conversation - nuts! As a kid my parents had one…It always puzzled me how both phones didn't ring when an inbound call came in, and it was only years later I found out how they did it.

Does anyone remember these…. Once a month a man would come round and empty it and if there was more than what the monthly payment was, my mum would get back what was over. It was the only way we could afford to have a telly. Mind you, it was a bit frustrating when you'd be watching a really good programme and the chuffin thing would click off because the timer ran out, and mum and my older brothers would be scrambling around to quickly find a two shilling piece (two bob bit) to put in it. [URL=https://i.imgur.com/ot7CJ0u.jpg][IMG]https://i.imgur.com/ot7CJ0u.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

We had a telly like that but mercifully without the prototype pay per view box! Old English flavour Spangles were the best boiled sweets ever. Nobody ever knew what actual flavours they were but they were the best variation of Spangles for sure. I liked the light brown opaque one and the deep red translucent one best but they were all nice. I had a 'piggy bank' from Lloyds that was a black plastic horse head. Anyone remember those 'chocolate vending machine' piggy banks where you loaded them with Neapolitan sized chocolates and had to put a coin in to get one out?

Down Memory Lane

CafeCalando

DavecUK I can remember winning a Thunderbird 2 with detachable pod from a comic competition ( I think it was The Eagle). I was so excited when I opened the package and found what was inside. It was like Christmas and birthday rolled into one.

Drewster

I was a Thunderbirds fan - all the main TBird pilots were originally based on famous actors of the day (although Lady P was based on Sylvia Anderson).

John was based on Charlton Heston, who apparently was somewhat fancied by the aforementioned Sylvia Anderson.
Gerry Andersons “revenge” (on Charlton Heston) was that poor old John spent most of his time stuck in isolation in space. (Although theoretically, in the back story, John and Alan have a monthly rotation - Throughout the series John was basically stranded).

DavecUK

Drewster John and Alan have a monthly rotation - Throughout the series John was basically stranded).

John had a pretty miserable existence….

there were so many good shows I remember watching as a Kid and a lot of them were really quite well done. The Time Tunnel (Irwin Allen) was really good.

Rob666

“Space Patrol”. That series gave me a minor triumph at school. Science lesson - teacher asking for types of radiation. I stuck my arm up and said “Gamma Rays” - much laughter. “Quite right” said the teacher, “Any others?” Someone else put their hand up and said, “Yobba Rays.” My turn to laugh…

DavecUK

Rob666 I don’t remember that one at all, I looked it up hoping it would ignite a neurone or two.. All I found was the 50s TV series from USA and a puppet one from 1962.

One of my huge favourites wasn’t a kids program but the more Adult Twilight Zone

“There is a fifth dimension, beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, between science and superstition, and it lies between the pit of man’s fears and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area which we call The Twilight Zone.”

Loved it!

Rob666

DavecUK It was indeed the puppet one from ’62.
This should play from just before the “Gamma Rays on, Yobba Rays on” launch sequence,
I particularly liked the sets and scratch built a few of the buildings.

I didn’t see many of the “Twiglet Zone” episodes. (as we called it…)

Pompeyexile

Fun fact…. Before he became really famous playing Captain James T Kirk, Wiiliam Shatner appeared in the Twilight Zone twice, the first in 1960 in an episode called ‘Nick of Time’ then in 1963…ish called ‘Nightmare at 20,000 feet’ He was a passenger on a plane and it was a stormy night and he suddenly saw this creature on the wing ripping the plane apart that nobody else could see… or did he? Of all the episodes , it seems that episode also became one of the most famous too.

Hotmetal

There is a dimension between teatime and the cheese fondue… between the first pint of Double Diamond and the Bell’s or Irish Coffee at the end of the night. In the pit of man’s stomach… we call it the Twiglet Zone.

DavecUK

Hotmetal There is a dimension between teatime and the cheese fondue… between the first pint of Double Diamond and the Bell’s or Irish Coffee at the end of the night. In the pit of man’s stomach… we call it the Twiglet Zone.

All massive blasts from the past…in our house, mainly around Christmas time…not the Fondue of course, far too posh for my parents. My dad loved making Irish coffee and floating the cream on it with the spoon….I liked drinking it to…there you go, I admitted it. I would still have a go today, except you have to use so much sugar to make the cream float, and I don’t use sugar.

One of the things I do remember were the family holidays to Butlins…don’t laugh, but I was only little, and I thought the place was magical….we used to go to the one in Bognor Regis. Disneyworld for the Brits.

Hotmetal

Ha, Bognor Butlins! Me and the lads went there not sooooo long ago for a Ska weekender, which wasn’t 100% Ska, they had Dr and the Medics, Bad Manners (Buster Bloodvessel is now rather slim), a Madness tribute band, Pauline Black out of the Selecter and even Toyah Wilcox banging out Thunder in the Mountains. Memory Lane indeed.

I used to love Irish coffee, not exactly diet friendly though was it? Very 70s/80s. Used to have one at the end of a meal at the Berni Inn…

Pompeyexile

OMG Butlins! We used to go to to Minehead ( Bournmouth was too close to home to Portsmouth and wouldn’t have seemed like going away) and as a kid I absolutely loved it. I remember having our meals in these big halls on long tables with all the other holiday makers. The free funfair, the penny arcades, chasing the guy dressed as a pirate and throwing him in the pool. When you arrived you were put in a different house (a bit like Harry Potter) and we used to have friendly but very competative competitions against each other. Glamorous Granny and knobbly knees competions and not forgetting the free entertainment, comedians, singers, magicians, dancers and of course the Red Coates. Kids today would just roll their eyes and carry on heads down engrossed in their phones.

The swimming pool with the large glass viewing panel so that you could see under the water like you can do in seaworld to look at the sharks. You went to one of the areas/bars where you got a drink to see it, all the people’s bottom halfs and ocassionally whole if the swam underwater, which I’m not sure is still there or would be allowed today.

We did go to Pontins (book early as Fred used to say) Southport one year, but it wasn’t a patch on Butlins so went back there the following year.

DavecUK

Pompeyexile The swimming pool, I remember, especially the roof with the Parrots. Floating on my back looking up at it all.

The Cafe below, where people could look through the glass sides…you’re right, wouldn’t be allowed today.

Happy days……The best thing of all about a Butlins holiday, even when I was 8….I could bugger off all day long and my Parents would only see me at breakfast and when I was asleep in the Chalet.

Pompeyexile

Yep, you felt as safe as houses at Butlins…my old mum never had a worry when like you I went out after breakfast and she didn’t see me for hours. Plus, because of the amount of Red Coates wandering around there was always someone you could go to if you needed.

DavecUK

Pompeyexile A little more of that today wouldn’t go amiss…I wonder when it all went wrong. As kids, were were about 10-11 and we used to go out all day long trekking miles into the woods at Wisley common. Or go Night fishing…..just as a group of kids.

You can’t do that today.

Pompeyexile

I don’t know if there is more danger out there for kids today or if because of social media and wider reporting it is just ‘seen’ more. There were still monsters out there targeting kids (Brady & Hindley) so why weren’t our parents so worried and like you, allowed me go out all day to the woods or on my bike for miles? Blimey I remember going on a really long bike ride and didn’t think twice about knocking on a stranger’s house door and asking for a drink.

As for making dens in woods or going on adventures on bikes with their mates today, phones have ruined that. If I wanted to talk to my mates I used to go round their house…today? they don’t even need to get out of bed and they would rather play a video game than actually go out and use their imagination and skills in playing.

Meldrew

We used to be out all day on our bikes or in the woods making camps or in the farmers fields piling the hay up and jumping out of the tree into the hay till it got dark. No one bothered you and you came home when you were hungry. As far as Butlins that was the bees knees the fun you could have. I remember eating in the large dining rooms on the long tables and when someone dropped any cutlery the roar in the room was mad. Talk about feeling embarrassed if it was you luckily I never dropped anything.

DavecUK

Just now I was reminded of this…remember watching it on TV. The SAS certainly didn’t take any shit.

Rob666

DavecUK I remember watching this live on TV while at work, Kate Adie lost it in a big way…

DavecUK

Rob666 I remember watching this live on TV while at work, Kate Adie lost it in a big way…

I seem to remember terrorism took a slight downward turn after that…the SAS considered the best in the world and probably still are today.

Pompeyexile

DavecUK I seem to remember terrorism took a slight downward turn after that…the SAS considered the best in the world and probably still are today.

He Who Dares Wins Rodney!

DavecUK

Pompeyexile

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