Henry Ford II?
It’s what Polish people get from sitting down too long.
Black and white TV sets
Motel 6
$6 per night.
Coin operated TV
Regal 8
$8 per night.
Free TV
kunilou:
What, no Magic Fingers?
You know, I’m only twenty and most of these things are familiar. My parents were never particularly interested in technology, and we only had terrestrial TV up until something ridiculous like 1998. Also, it was only this year that I got a 512k connection instead of a 56k one, but since they’re the ones who’re paying for it then I can’t really complain.
And I’m familiar with old tills, since we still use them where I work. They’re digital, but they’re pretty basic. Punch in total, hit ‘item’ button as necessary, repeat for all differently-priced items, hit ‘sub-total’, punch in amount given, give change. We’re getting new tills next year though, so memorising the prices at least will no longer be absolutely necessary.
After reading posts on this board about how annoying it is to get change coin-over-note, I experimented with doing it the other way round, but people tended to drop the notes and/or change all over the place. I stopped doing it. As for the ‘here’s your change, here’s your receipt, here’s your stuff, LEAVE!’ issue, I do all my bagging up after the customer gets their change. It does lead to the odd evil look and an annoyed ‘Where’s my stuff?!’ after they realise that I haven’t placed half a dozen hot pasties and a loaf of bread onto the loaded trays of squishable and/or chocolate items on the counter, but for the most part it works well.
closely followed by “Daddy, whats a guitar solo?”
Blotting paper…really!
I asked the girl in the local post office “where is the blotting paper please miss?”
“Hu?” “What’s blotting paper”
After trying to explain I left sans blotting paper
Now that this thread has been bumped – I was reminded of another during a Lost thread a while back:
Splicing blocks/Cement for film. A pretty regular thing to find around the house when I was growing up.
Even if they had the tools, not many of the up-and-coming generation would guess correctly about where to cut the film or bother to scrape the emulsion off. “What, you just tape the ends together, right?” 
Turning on the TV, and waiting for it to warm up. Actually, turning on the radio and waiting for it to warm up. The goodnight kiwi.
Milk in glass bottles. Milk in bottles with a thick layer of cream on top. Milkmen, who delivered the milk to your letterbox - forgetting to put the bottles out, and chasing the truck down the street waving a milk bottle holder full of warm, soapy bottles. Milk bottle holders.
Glass soft drink bottles {they still have them in Thailand: Coke comes in the old “naked lady” bottles, abraded opaque on the edges where they’ve been jostled together. It does taste better in glass - I brought a couple of full bottles home as souvenirs}.
Stealing glass soft drink bottles from the neighbours’ doorstep, and getting a refund for them at the dairy, which you then spent on lollies. Four-for-a-cent lollies. Cent coins. Two cent coins. Dollar bills.
A doctor making a house call. (Although you see that in “old” movies.)
More incomprehensible, a time when no one anywhere had health insurance. ‘Yeah that’s right sonny everybody just paid cash.’
From my dad, Three Musketeer’s bars that were actually three separate pieces.
A time before twist top beer/pop bottles when every hotel had a bottle opener mounted in or near the bathroom.
As a slight hijack. What would any of us or our parents thought 40 years ago, if in the middle of a city park they heard someone say, “Honey, stand over there I want to take your picture with my phone.”?
This might only be tangentially related to the thread, but what does “teach my grandmother to suck eggs” mean?
That and “butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth” (which I assume means the she in question is acting very cool).
They’re not technology related, but I am clueless!
I think I may have contributed to this already, but my son didn’t know how to dial a phone–we have an old rotary phone in the basement…
mimeographs, clip art, adding yellow color to margarine (that was before my time, actually)…
Flashcubes
Yeah. Dad paddled your butt for messing with his camera!
Don’t look now, but Magicube flashcubes and the Flip Flash are still available!
An E-ticket ride.
“Bueller?.. Bueller?” From “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”, from 1986. I’ve got 2 friends that teach at a community college, and their students don’t recognize that one any more.
Has anyone mentioned those big old juke boxes…Wurlitzers!?
Although this thread lost its original meaning long before the bump, I’d like to point out I still have both of these (although the milk is delivered to my doorstep)
Also, the strong 8" field of static electricity that surrounded the set, and how, when there were no more cartoons on, you could keep yourself entertained by pushing your head into it and making your hair stand up.
Or by turning it on and off and watching everything shrink down to a bright little dot that sloooowly faded away.
Or playing with some of the standard pot settings that are now inaccessable to the home user. I still think the newer Outer Limits series should have begun with “We control the… uh… brightness. We control the contrast! Ooooooh!”
Can you still get 115 cartridge film, for the cameras that used 'em?
Or do people just buy 'em to make detonators for small explosives, like I did with all the obsolete flash cubes that were lying around the house twenty years ago?
I have an opposite story about that. I visited my friend’s farm in Kansas. We wanted to look up something and I asked if they had an encyclopedia.
Grandpa (93 years old, born in that same house): A what?
Dad: Encyclopedia. (Tiny pause for thought) It’s a bunch of books with… stuff no one really needs to know.
Ahem…and…err…They aren’t powered that way anymore??