My nephew didn’t understand when I told him his prized possession was “nifty.” “It’s like snazzy.” Another blank stare. “It’s rad.” This time the blank stare was from his father, and Nephew explained “rad” to him.
My wife is the advisor for the undergraduate chapters of her sorority here in town. Apparently, they still use carbonless forms for membership applications and such (although she has been steadily re-creating such nonsense in digital form). She offered to lend out her typewriter to any applicants that might need it to fill out the forms nice and neatly. We had two of them over last night, and it was like we had presented them with an archaeological artifact. Before they left with it, we had to show them how to turn it on, put in paper, correct errors, etc. At 27, I felt positively ancient.
I guess Super 8 was just buggy whips, then.
What will be the replacement for rewinding? “Reboot the media server?”
As for popcorn, I made a batch on the stove just two days ago. It just tastes better without coconut grease!
I’ve got a mind-blower for today’s kids, and quite a few adults. Touch-Tone phones that do not have a * or #. That’s right, just ten buttons, back from the brief era before the * and # had been invented.
Pretty soon, kids will have no clue what a carburetor is. Pre-paid cards and passes for things like bus fare and bridge toll will lead to questions of “What is ‘exact change only’?”
“Turn on” a typewriter… whippersnapper!
ashtrays.
public phones.
Near Letter Quality printers.
Evening newspapers, perhaps newspapers.
Floating a check knowing it would not clear for a few days.
“Take the tubes out of the set, go down to the store and test them.”
My children have no concept of “tubes” (except for a CRT) and the idea that an owner could actually remove a part, test it and obtain and install a replacement is so completely foreign to them I may as well speak Latin.
Come to think of it, the idea that anyone would take Latin as a foreign language.
“A rough guess” Why would anyone take a rough guess when you can pull out a calculator the size of a credit card and get an exact figure to 6 decimal places? One of my sons is constantly amazed that I can figure a tip in my head, and even know how much to add or subtract for better or worse service.
Rushing out and buying a new 45 by your favorite group. Then getting home and realizing that you had lost the little yellow (sometimes red) adapter that you needed to play the 45.
Well, I don’t think anyone’s taken it as a foreign language for a few centuries 
I don’t see that the concept of studying Latin is all that different today than fifty years ago, and that it won’t be different in fifty year’s time either. And, FWIW, a couple of the (fairly ordinary) schools I teach in have Latin on their syllabus, albeit as an optional subject.
onionskin paper * carbon paper (for typewriters)
reel to reel tape recorders
paper Rolodex
card catalog (library)
daisy wheel printers
Polaroid instant cameras
Sure they will! It’s the hole in the side of a bong 
How about Mimeograph machines? I remember my teachers would eschew the copier in favor of the much more familiar mimeograph. They wouldn’t let any of the kids in the same room as the mimeograph, which was smart - the one pictured in the link is hand cranked, but by the 70’s they were driven by an electric engine, and that thing would rip your hand off if you got too close.
“Don’t touch that dial!”
We used to love that smell of freshly mimeographed handouts… It was such a thrill the one time I got to create one (can’t remember the project, but I do remember the backwards carbon paper going through the machine, and oh that smell…)
The first photocopier in our office had instructions for daily maintenance for the “Master Copier” i.e. the one in the office who was designated the master copier. One of the duties was to stir the toner with the special wand provided, to remove any clumps.
Couple more…
“Look it up in the log table”
“Pass me the slide rule.”
Most hand tools. Like a saw that goes back and forth in your hand and not powered.
Non digital measuring tools in the shop.
I loved the purply color of the mimeographs! And the smell–probably totally carcinogenic, but still! I would like to smell it one more time…
My son (who is very bright, really) needed to make a phone call. He was in the basement at the time, so I told him to use the phone down there. It is an old French phone that my sister used to have–complete with a separate bell thingy that is attached, but falls off regularly–anyhoo. All I heard was silence (I was in the kitchen at the top of the basement stairs). He came up the stairs and said he would rather use the kitchen one.
That was when I realized that he didn’t know HOW to dial a phone. I asked him and he copped to it. So, I gave him a lil inservice on rotary phone use.
How about dial TV’s? Rabbit ear antennae.
This is actually from MY mother, but adding the yellow color to the margarine?
And here in IL, there was something about the butcher’s union and not being able to buy meat on Sundays–and all the meat section at the A & P was covered in–butcher paper! It seems very odd now.
Cigarett lighters in new cars. And in the back seat.
Bench seats in cars–the front seat, I mean.
Balancing your turn table JUST right–that was an art, that was.
Oh! Oh! Who else has ever adjusted their 1541 alignment?
I wonder how long before they get redesignated as ‘power outlets’, which is surely what they see more use for nowadays.
Oooh, something I noticed at the weekend: Airline boarding passes with a box showing whether it’s a smoking or non-smoking seat.
The rookies here at work would raise an eyebrow at, “I’m drawing a flowchart - couldja pass me the template.”
Ya know, I’m starting feel really old and crotchety. But I’m only 36. I did grow up in remote Northern Ontario, though. Despite my age I attended a one-room schoolhouse and the trappings of modernity took a very long time to reach us. It’s odd to swap “I know what you mean” stories with folks twice my age.
Even still, reading this thread makes me fear breaking my hip next time I fall.
I was in Vegas in July spending an extraordinary amount on a pair of Mephisto sandals at a shoe shop in Caesar’s Palace. I handed them my card and they ran it through the machine with the keypad then through the chunka-chunka machine. I stood there with my mouth open for a bit as I hadn’t seen them in a while and asked why they were doing that. The clerk said that they’re making a comeback in Vegas as proof that the card was actually at the store, they had some problems with people claiming that their card (and they) were never in Vegas.