Not really 25 years in the past, but that exact example sprang to my mind.
Actually, he picked up the mouse, and tried to use it as a microphone (“hello, computer…”).
A keyboard. How quaint.
Have you seen the baby trying to understand a magazine
That sort of role-playing is quite common in certain situations, such as when you’re going through training for certain jobs. It lets people spot problems, and try to work out the bugs, before dealing with live customers.
Actually, that is still true-to-life, although most people go years at a time without experiencing it. Even though cars are much more mechanically reliable than they used to be, battery technology has regressed in one very important aspect.
It used to be that an old battery would generally give obvious warning signs before it failed completely. These days, not so much. A modern battery can start the car just fine one day, and be dead the next. For real-life examples, see here.
I remember in The Time Tunnel, set in 1968 (“two years in the future”), the only way they had of entering data into the computer was to punch it in on a keyboard (or flip some switches on the old DoD consoles they had).
There was one episode where the complex was under attack by some outside force (Nero’s ghost?). The wind was blowing, lightning was flashing, and thunder was booming … and Dr MacGregor (Lee Meriwether) is frantically entering data on a keyboard. Damn, she must have been a really good typist! 
Or in therapy.
Or forced to participate in an “encounter group” form of work training; or even quasi-work. I really don’t want to talk about it. Let’s just say, it happens.
I’m guessing people in Europe don’t quite have the same insane brand loyalty that they do in the US for effectively identical beers?
I mean, I know some people that drink Bud Light, and will opt for a Coke over any other beer. And others will only drink Miller Lite, etc…
Yeah, and they did some other stupid rude things such as putting a ad in the paper- “No phone calls” so you arrive after getting all dressed up and a 15 minute drive and they tell you the jobs been taken.
You answered ads in the paper, hopefully they listed qualifications, but ad lines cost $, so sometimes they didnt list them all.
But rarely did they say “you are completely unqualified.” More like, “dont call us, we’ll call you” or"The Position has been filled, sorry".
Two years ago, I worked with a 19-year old woman who did not know what a fax machine was. I don’t mean she didn’t know how to use one; she had no idea what the actual device was. (There were three in the store where we both worked.)
This was used to great dramatic effect in the Doctor Who episode “Silence in the Library”. The Doctor and his party, some wearing spacesuits and helmets, are fleeing a race of sentient, flesh-eating microbes. To protect the pilot, who’s been infected, the Doctor seals him into his suit and turns off the helmet light, leaving a black visor. When the light comes back on, the pilot’s head has been replaced with a grinning skull.
Regular phones don’t, and never did. You don’t get a dial tone until you hang up. And if the other person called you, you wouldn’t get a dial tone until they hung up, too.
I just saw it last night. Cracked me up to hear a dial tone on a cell phone, especially like that. Can’t remember if it was FBI/Most Wanted or a L&O rerun, but it was definitly 21st century.
Got to admit, I do miss slamming down a heavy bakelite handset onto a dial phone if you want to make a Grand Exit from a conversation.
Someone want to become rich making an app that sounds like that? For when you hang up on a jerk, and they’ll be left wondering "Wait, did I call their landline? And they just hung up on me by slamming the receiver of a vintage twenty pound phone?
IIRC, they never showed the faces of the invading aliens in UFO. If there was one in an episode, he’d be in a space suit, and the helmet would have a black visor. It made them look even more creepy.
I mean, I do this all the time to scammers at work. Oh…you’re from Anydesk? Slam!!! Landlines are still a thing at a lot of businesses.
Whoa! I must have missed that episode!
An alien with blue instead of green or silver skin. Who’d’a thunk it?!?
I knew someone who drank only Miller Lite, in a can. Had it in a bottle? forget it.
No, not necessarily. That was true with party lines and operator-assisted calls, or phones in small towns that didn’t have dials, but were operator-assisted even for local calls up through the 1960s (you picked up the receiver, and lifting it from the cradle sounded a tone; the operator answered; you asked her to please get you whatever the exchange was-- or gave the person’s name, if it were REALLY small, and she did, by physically plugging in a connector), but once calls were automated, as soon as one person hung up, the call was disconnected-- which was pretty much my whole life, being a kid from Manhattan, born in the late 60s. Sometimes my mother would put down the phone, think of one more thing she had to day, and pick it up quickly, and say “Hello?” as thought the other person might still be there. I didn’t understand why until she explained it to me.
Wow. I wish I’d paid more attention in my programming classes. That’s a million dollar idea.
There’s a shot of an alien autopsy in the credits of each episode.
And we also got a good look at the alien defector in A Matter of Priorities
Around 2010 the only car I could afford was POS 1988 Chevy Celebrity. I drove my then 20 year old nephew in it once and he had no idea how to put the windows down. (It was one of the crank handles you grab and turn around in a circle.)
Oh, now that’s just privilege, because I bought a no-frills Chevy Spark (that was nonetheless an automatic-- I could NOT find a new manual, and I looked) in 2016, with roll-down windows. It has all kinds of stuff for safety, and AC as well, but manual controls on the seats, and soforth. It’s so small that even 5’5 me can reach across and roll down the passenger window. I also have a 2002 Audi, with pings and dents, and a few things that don’t work, but automatic windows, and seats, interior trunk release, stay-up hood (no prop rod), but it’s a manual. Takes 93 octane. I use it around town, because my son is 5’9, and doesn’t fit in the Spark well. But I use the Spark for out-of-town trips. It gets 40mpg. Actually, the Audi gets pretty good mileage for as old as it is, but it’s still that expensive gas.