# When I'm 64, and other reminders that you are old **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 27, 2018, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788 "2018-12-27T15:08:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/41 "2018-12-28T00:59:08Z")
im still a few from 60 but I remember as a math exercise back in the 4th grade of seeing how old wed be in the year 2000… we were shocked wed get that old … Sad thing is I think theres a few I knew that didn’t make it there …… ---
**Author:** ![sjankis630](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ea924/32.png) [@sjankis630](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sjankis630)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/42 "2018-12-28T05:38:44Z")
> [@](#): > > I remember calling into a radio station with a request so that I could then record the song on a cassette tape Oh yes I did this as well. I had a hand me down cassette recorder (the kind you used in school) and put on my closed door that I was “recording.” I guess I never figured out to make sure i went outside if I had to cough. It was easier to record off of radio back then because I mostly listened to album stations and the DJs didn’t talk over the beginning of the records much. That was when listening to music was an actual activity in and of itself. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/43 "2018-12-28T06:11:58Z")
JFK’s funeral is the first event I can remember and put a date to. I wondered what happened to the regular TV programming. I remember those funky-smelling mimeographed sheets that were handed out by the teacher in school. We had party lines, and I would listen quietly to the old ladies gossiping and try not to laugh when one started asking if anyone else was there. B&W TV, with our first color set a real event. I seem to recall our first car air conditioner as a major selling point. I remember card catalogs, but those are still used in the private library we subscribed to in Bangkok. Other school-related items are slide rules (but never used one myself.) and microfiche/microfilm, the latter in university in the 1980s, and it seemed like high technology. ---
**Author:** ![kambuckta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/53a042/32.png) [@kambuckta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kambuckta)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/44 "2018-12-28T06:53:09Z")
When you realise that your superannuation (retirement fund) is looming and you check it monthly for ups and downs. ---
**Author:** ![zoogirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b9bd4f/32.png) [@zoogirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoogirl)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/45 "2018-12-28T07:03:45Z")
I grew up with a four channel, b&w RCA tv, the kind that was basically a box on spindly wooden legs. I actually had that tv (dead) until 2012. It was a bit older than me. I remember wood on the kitchen window when Typhoon Frieda blew through. She was BC’s only named storm. I remember the first election of Pierre Trudeau. I remember the neighbour and my friends sister being hippies. I remember the Happy Face fad. My bike had V handle bars and a banana seat with an “Oh Fuddle Dude” bumper sticker across it. Our phone was Bakelite and stuck firmly to the hall wall, with a little table nailed to the wall under it, to hold the inches thick phone book. The new car my dad got when I was seven was a two year old ‘65 Pontiac Stratochief. (He owned that car until he passed away in ‘86 and it sat in the driveway until some jerk with a towtruck swiped it in ‘96.) I was forty when I joined the Dope and about two weeks in, 9/11 happened! ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/46 "2018-12-28T07:11:40Z")
> [@catflea12](#): > > Any body else remember MS-DOS and the blinking cursor of death? You had a cursor? I had to program the blinking block to make one. Heck, I remember when I had to write my own OS, before MSDOS or CP/M. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/47 "2018-12-28T07:14:17Z")
My local pizza place advertises on local TV, and tells me that I can download their app and order pizza from my phone. Great, but I have no idea how to “download an app,” much less use one. I remember when we got six channels on our TV, and three of them were snowy in bad weather. I remember being thrilled when our new family car had an AM radio–our old one did not. I remember writing school essays by hand, then using a manual typewriter. I remember my first computer, with a walloping 40 MB of hard disk space, so it didn’t have to boot from a floppy disk. Gosh, I feel old! ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim_r.mortiss/32/142_2.png) [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_R.Mortiss)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/48 "2018-12-28T07:33:54Z")
I remember when Bill Gates said that “64K of memory” should be enough for anyone! ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/49 "2018-12-28T07:58:17Z")
> [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](#): > > I remember when Bill Gates said that “64K of memory” should be enough for anyone! I think you are referring to the supposed BG quote that “640K” would be enough. But this quote may [be only an urban legend,](https://www.computerworld.com/article/2534312/operating-systems/the--640k--quote-won-t-go-away----but-did-gates-really-say-it-.html) and Gates has denied saying it. ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/50 "2018-12-28T08:02:03Z")
Getting older is remembering when policemen were figures of authority, and not, seemingly, teenagers doing it for Bob-A-Job week, and realising not only that you aren’t surprised when they call you “Sir”, but that you take it for granted that they damn well should. I remember actually getting our first TV. We’d seen it before in other people’s houses, and my older brother had made his own (sort of), with an old oscilloscope for a screen, but, whether because of the cost or becuase she thought it might be too much of a distraction for a young child, my mother had put her foot down for a few years. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/51 "2018-12-28T08:11:01Z")
At age 31, I don’t belong in this thread anymore than kids belong on the lawns of some cranky people, but I’d always grown up watching pro sports with athletes being older than me, and it suddenly occurred to me of late that Super Bowl MVP Nick Foles is two years younger than me, and not just that, but many of the college football athletes I watch on NCAAF are a full 10-12 years younger than me. That’s just unnerving. ---
**Author:** ![as\_u\_wish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6f9a4e/32.png) [@as\_u\_wish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/as_u_wish)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/52 "2018-12-28T09:26:49Z")
I remember house calls from the doctor being a regular thing. The milk man delivering all kinds of dairy products to the door. We had an insulated box and a fan-like paper device that we could set to show what we wanted. We also had a bread delivery truck that had all sorts of bakery items - he came daily as well. Perhaps my most poignant memory is from around 6 years old (1957). All the mothers were sitting on the steps of our apartment building, chatting in the cool of the evening after dinner dishes were done. We kids were playing up and down the block. We lived near the county hospital and heard sirens and then learned an 18-year-old had been killed in a motorcycle accident. The mothers got all serious and talked about how sad it was–he was so young. And I clearly remember thinking “18!! He was 18! That’s old. He could drive! That’s really old.” ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Nova](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f07891/32.png) [@Just\_Nova](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Nova)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/53 "2018-12-28T09:36:57Z")
Maybe I’m considered young (almost 40), but I remembered having this conversation with my nephew; me; “when I was in school, having a Sony Walkman is very cool…” nephew ; “what’s Sony Walkman… ??” me;"…" note; not a native English speaker, so sorry for the grammar mistake(s). ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/54 "2018-12-28T09:58:34Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > … my mother had put her foot down for a few years. My mother and father refused to get a colour television because “colour TV hasn’t been perfected yet. Colour TV will destroy you kids’ eyesight.” Then, suddenly, because my sister was on a TV show, we got a colour TV. Apparently, the perfection of colour TV coincided with my sister’s appearance on a TV show. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/55 "2018-12-28T10:01:26Z")
> [@Just\_Nova](#): > > Maybe I’m considered young (almost 40), but I remembered having this conversation with my nephew; > me; “when I was in school, having a Sony Walkman is very cool…” > nephew ; “what’s Sony Walkman… ??” > me;“…” Reminds me of a conversation at work about a year and a half ago. Some Dope conversation had caused me to look up Wernher von Braun’s Wikipedia page, which mentioned that he was buried in Ivy Hill Cemetery in Alexandria. Which is where my father is buried. So I’m talking with my co-workers (one was 22 then, the other late 30s) and I tell them I’ve just found out that Wernher von Braun is buried in the same cemetery my father is buried in. “Who’s Wernher von Braun?” I give a brief synopsis, and mention that von Braun was the subject of a song by Tom Lehrer. “Who’s Tom Lehrer?” :smack: I’m 64, closing in on 65. It’s just a number, but I’m going to miss being able to sing, “will you still need me, will you still feed me?” when I’m asked my age. ---
**Author:** ![bowlweevils](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e5b9ba/32.png) [@bowlweevils](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bowlweevils)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/56 "2018-12-28T10:27:45Z")
I remember when dinosaurs were extinct. Now I eat them often. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/57 "2018-12-28T14:11:31Z")
This year I was talking to a young man wearing an Oklahoma City hat. I mentioned it was really bad what happened in Oklahoma City. His response? "What happened there? People don’t know about the greatest act of terrorism by an American against his country? Damn, I’m old. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/58 "2018-12-28T15:06:23Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > This year I was talking to a young man wearing an Oklahoma City hat. I mentioned it was really bad what happened in Oklahoma City. > > His response? "What happened there? > > People don’t know about the greatest act of terrorism by an American against his country? > > Damn, I’m old. See, l don’t understand this. I am familiar with events that happened before I was born, not just major events, but movies, celebrities, popular songs, objects (like candlestick phones, though I’ve never used one), and other cultural items from my parents’ generation. I know who Artie Shaw and Glenn Miller are, and a couple of the songs they were known for. I know about sleeve garters and painting a line down the back of a woman’s leg to simulate a stocking seam during the wartime nylon shortage. Maybe it’s because my parents sat around and talked about stuff. I dunno. ---
**Author:** ![whitetho](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whitetho/32/1059_2.png) [@whitetho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whitetho)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/59 "2018-12-28T15:28:29Z")
> [@Misnomer](#): > > At 47, I’m in that weird “not quite old, but no longer young” area. Middle-aged is a good term. 😉 Sounds like you’re a prime candidate to appreciate [Suzi Quatro’s _48 Crash_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lk6kvVGPURA). ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2018, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788/60 "2018-12-28T16:19:11Z")
> [@Tim\_R.Mortiss](#): > > I remember when Bill Gates said that “64K of memory” should be enough for anyone! I remember _having_ 64K of memory; I spent my teen years fiddling with a Commodore 64. This was preceded by my elementary-school years, during which I played games in the classroom on a [Commodore PET,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_PET) after having loaded said games very slowly from [a cassette tape-based storage system.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_Datasette) The games were either text-based or used ASCII-symbol graphics to create coarse images. [Oregon Trail](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Oregon_Trail_(1971_video_game)) was a mainframe computer game that had been ported to microcomputers like the PET; that was a favorite. The quality of today’s video game graphics (and the fact that you can enjoy them on a device that fits in the palm of your hand) was inconceivable back then. You couldn’t even get graphics that good using the best supercomputers of the day (although to be fair, part of this was that displays were just 480-line CRTS, not 4K flatscreens). As a kid I remember thinking that in 2000 (kind of a cultural milepost year), I would be 30. That was strange to contemplate. [Prince’s hit song became seriously outdated at that point](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_(song)) (although still fun to listen to). I’ve mentioned before in other “things that remind you you’re old” threads that one of the reminders that gets to me is the fact that all of the people who were healthy, young, productive adults during my youth are now elderly or dead. People speak of The Beatles, Jagger, Dylan, but there are so many more. Example, Arnold Schwarzenegger - I once knew him as Conan the Barbarian and the Terminator, characters that embodied superhuman vigor and strength - is now 71, and recently underwent emergency open-heart surgery. Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush41 - all gone now. Carter likely will be gone soon too. When I was a kid, people who had fought in World War 2 were still a vital part of the labor force; now most of them are dead, and the few who remain are revered as national treasures. While we’re all discussing turning 64, I’ll mention this line from a Simon and Garfunkel song (“Bookends”): > [@S&G](#): > > Can you imagine us years from today, > Sharing a parkbench quietly > How terribly strange to be seventy. [In this interview,](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jimclash/2014/12/01/art-garfunkel-explains-song-lyrics-how-terribly-strange-to-be-in-his-70s/#3b5049d21f50) Art Garfunkel discusses his thoughts when he wrote that line, and how he feels about being in his 70s now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-im-64-and-other-reminders-that-you-are-old/826788.md?page=4)