This is a really interesting post if you don’t read the post it’s answering.
High school friends had a player piano (well, their parents did), and it was a huge hit a parties.
My grandmother had a baby grand, but she had a stroke when I was five …she was probably about 60? 65? And she couldn’t play anymore after that. None of her children or the grandchildren that lived with her played it either.
I was surprised to see many of the items listed up-thread. I am nearly an octogenarian and for the most part, I find modern conveniences, well, convenient. Back last century, I was a truck driver and I remember when I went to work one morning and was presented with a mobile phone.
Some of my colleagues were horrified: "They’ll be on at us all the time. We can’t get away from the bosses. Etc. I, and others, saw the benefit. A common problem is when you are expected at a specific time and you know you are going to be late. Now, all I had to do was call the office and it was no longer my problem. All kind of stuff happens and I could simply pass it back to those who could do something about it. I remember looking desperately for a working call box, or begging customers for the use of their phones.
I do everything online: Banking, shopping, booking holidays… When I go out, anything I buy for less than £100, I can just tap my card on a reader. I don’t carry cash anymore.
One point I really do agree about is medical staff with long hair over their faces. I am amazed it is allowed. As for scrubs vs uniforms - my wife was a nurse and those uniforms were a PITA. It gets pretty hot in some wards so thin scrubs are much more suitable, If someone throws up over you, you it’s easy to change. I’ll tell you a secret too - My wife worked with premature babies and the nursery was kept pretty warm. They all wore scrubs, but no one wore tights (pantyhose).
I agree. I liked many of the things we had in the past, but I wouldn’t want to give up what we have now to get them back.
In a more perfect world, we would have the best things from the past (e.g. fedora hats, less traffic, common decency, ubiquitous pianos, no Kardashian sisters on TV, etc.), and the best from the present (e.g. Internet, cellphones, more social enlightenment and safety nets, Buffalo wings, etc.).
In a most perfect world we’d have the best from the past, present, and future. I want those flying cars, AI indentured slave robots, instant food fabricators, and affordable intra-solar system transportation.
Yeah, I mean, at least one person has said, upthread, that they’d like to see children hanging out/playing out of doors normalized again. So would I, but first we gotta re-normalize neighborhoods full of families that each have a minimum of two kids, plus normalizing an economy that makes it possible for one parent to stay home while the other is the sole breadwinner.
IIRC, the nib experience isn’t as great for a left handed writer where the nib is pushed more. Is that a false memory?
I would like to be able to purchase a heating pad that actually got hot. Woke up with a stiff neck, went to the pharmacy and came home with one that barely got lukewarm. Went back and exchanged it for one that’s marginally better.
I remember heating pads actually getting hot when I was younger. I suppose somewhere along the way someone carelessly got burned (a la McDonalds coffee) and from then on they have toned it down. But what good is a heating pad that doesn’t get hot?
When my mother was in a skilled nursing facility. They would not allow heating pads. I understand. Some may get too hot, and the patient can’t move. Others may short out and burn down the building.
This one is fantastic. Ignore all the baloney about jade, tourmaline, and negative ions. I believe it will meet your expectations.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N9GG1LB/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
We have a player piano. Unfortunately, there is no one around who can repair the roll drive.
Thanks. But unless I’m in a lot more pain than I currently am, that’s a bit beyond my heating pad budget.
Serifs. This new AI thing always makes me think Al Bundy!
Somebodies mind is in the gutter. 
Nice catch!
There are other ways to attain this – co-housing with green commons/play areas, with retired folks designated to watch the kids; a ban on social media for much of the time, are things that would contribute favorably. We wouldn’t have to go backward, but we would have to decide to live sanely and sustainably.
I think you meant, “Your plastic pal who’s fun to be with!” there. 
Well, hot-lan, that does sound like a good idea!
Yes, you don’t need to go back to having one parent at home , you don’t need to have a minimum of two kids per family and unless screentime on a cell phone is very different from cable TV and the internet, you don’t need to get rid of that either. I still see kids playing outdoors and at the neighborhood park. There were kids playing outside when my kids were young and the only difference from when I was young ( and almost all the mothers were at home) is that there aren’t quite as many kids playing outside between the end of school and dinnertime as there were when I was young. I’m not sure how much of that is because I live in a city - I’m sure some of it is, but I can’t imagine that’s the only reason.
I totally agree with your post.
In addition to the arguments you listed, a piano add a nice touch of class and sophistication to a home. They’re beautiful objects from a purely aesthetical point of view.
As a matter of fact, when pianos were ubiquitous, piano reductions were often the only way people in small towns could hear the most modern orchestral pieces. Local orchestras usually didn’t have access to the newest scores, and couldn’t play some of them because they didn’t have enough instruments. In some cases they actually didn’t have the skills. So, if you lived in some backwater town, couldn’t afford to travel and still wanted to keep abreast of new musical works, you’d get a piano reduction and play it at home. In an amusing reversal of the situation, some current piano duos have made it a speciality of unearthing those scores. Listening to a symphony stripped down to a 4-hand piano version can be very enlightning musically, and it’s an amazing experience for piano lovers.
Oh, yes, I thoroughly enjoy symphonies (and concertos) transcribed for and played on piano (providing the pianist has talent, and the transcription is done by someone of Franz Liszt’s caliber). The article below explains how the piano is capable of this.
I don’t do many Crossword puzzles, but I do not consider this “Cheating”. The goal of the puzzle is to fill in all the little boxes with letters. Using your head to figure out what letters go where is the puzzle to me. If you need the internet or a dictionary or whatever, you are still solving the puzzle. Not cheating!
If you just knew every word in existence, not much point in doing it at all, really.
So, Carry On With Your Bad Self!