A few years ago, I arrested some kids involved in a string of burglaries. One of the things they stole was an old stereo with a turntable.
When I asked one kid (who was 12 years old) to describe the stereo, he said, “It’s the kind that plays those really big CDs”.
That stung a bit.
I felt old yesterday when I got a PM from my mom and she mentioned a quote her dad told her when she was a teenager which she repeated to me several times when I was growing up. I now passed that quote to my 18 year old daughter.
The sad part is that my mother forgot the exact quote. She had most if right though.
I can’t understand the analog clock thing. My kids are 20 and 18 and they can both tell time using an analog clock. Hell I remember learning to read an analog clock. The teacher had a big round cardboard clock with plastic hands. I remember the “Ohhh I get it” moment.
They also know what a rotary phone is because their dad has an old one that belonged to his aunt but if not for that then they might not know. I remember the way they plugged in with four prongs unlike the little plasitc doo dad of today.
I turn 40 in a month and I remember we had a rotary phone until I was a least ten or twelve. I also remember that we did not own the phone but rented it from the phone company.
I feel old when I go to store and the young man behind the counter refers to me as “young lady”. I know he is only doing it to make me feel better.
I taught myself COBOL programming out of a book. I had plenty of time to read, since the University Mainframe took **12 hours **to run a batch of computer programs.
After I gave up programming, “new” languages like C came in.
I don’t, either. My daughter is 11 and they spent significant time with the cardboard clock in first grade. Also, analog watches might be rare, but analog clocks are everywhere–especially in every classroom.
My daughter did talk about the “big black CD’s” when she was in preschool. She was also fascinated by the preschool’s movie projector and screen.
I am 32, and we had a rotary phone in our house until we moved in 1990 (when I was 14) and took it back to the phone company. We were told at some point in the 80’s that they couldn’t upgrade us to touch-tone service for some reason–my dad said that he didn’t really care. This was before automated menus, of course. I hope that for the people who live there now they figured something out!
Then, we moved and we needed a telephone. Dad picked one up at a garage sale–rotary, of course. We did eventually get some touch-tone/cordless phones, but that rotary phone stuck around the basement of our new house at least until I graduated from high school.
My dad was also too cheap for cable TV (still is) so I remember only getting two channels.
Several things like that, either from growing up in a small town in Montana or with a family which did not embrace technology quickly (though we did have an Apple //c, but my aunt bought that for us) that make me seem older than people my own age. I can certainly remember “the old way” for a lot of things.
I don’t think analog watches are rare. They’re all over the jewelry counters, and in the catalogs that come in the mail.
I’m so old, I remember when my Dad bought Texas Instruments SR-10 Version 1 (can’t seem to link to that specific page).
That calculator cost a fortune, $149! (which was about the same as their house payment) We all marveled. It could do square root.
My Dad actually was one of the pioneers in using calculators (and later computers) in the construction industry. Hard to believe they used to build skyscrapers using pencil and paper.
They’re electric ‘trolley-buses’. One wire is the electric supply; the other is the return. If the wires disconnect, the bus loses power and stops. They have great acceleration because the electric motor and power supply is lighter than a diesel engine and fuel tank. Toronto had them until the early 1990s.
Toronto now has hybrid diesel-electric buses, where a diesel engine drives an electric generator and batteries, which power an electric motor to drive the bus. I think we should combine the two technologies, so that we have an electric bus that runs off the wires, but if we need to leave the wires, there are batteries or a diesel engine to keep going.
I teach 7th Grade, as I previously mentioned in this thread. If you want to feel old, teach around that age. They are quite smart, but astonishingly young when you think about it.
Last year, I told the kids my age. For the first time, a kid told me, “That’s the same age as my mom!.”
I was 29 and she was 13(the kid, not the Mom). Anyway, that was the first “hint” that I am getting older.
My co-worker told me I’ll really feel older when the kids are born the year I graduated college(which will happen 2015). This year, they were all born around the time I graduated high school.
I love all of 'em, but none of them can remember Bill Clinton as President. They barely remember 9/11/01, and most have had the internet in their home “forever”.
I remember when a woman came to a conference I was attending saying how in a few years people would carry around little electronic “calculators” to handle every day math problems we all faced.
We laughed at her. (Yep, I missed that boat too).
These sound like what I’ve still seen in Beijing.
I’ve been in sooooo many classrooms, and almost all of them have analog clocks on the wall. I suspect it’s partly to force the kids to learn them.
They have them in San Francisco and Vancouver as well. I think Toronto’s getting rid of them was a mistake.
They’re much quieter than diesel buses too.
I remember those! It was quite the thing - ours was a big box that sat on the coffee table, with a row of push buttons. We also had pong - what a hoot, man!
I remember going down to Rolando’s Burger Factory with my friends, buying pitchers of beer and playing pong for 25¢ a game, years before highly advanced technology brought us the wonders of the home version.
I was that guy, for a while. I thought I had the coolest job in the world. My name was on my shirt, I had a red shop rag dangling from my pocket with which to check your oil, I did brake jobs, mufflers, water pumps, etc. L-o-o-o-v-e-d wiping the windows…sometimes ladies would flash you. For a high school boy, that just rocked!
God, thanks for this thread because my otherwise intelligent daughter did not get the concept of an analog clock until she was about 11.
To contribute, I have thrown my back out 3-4 times from sneezing in the last few years, what the hell is up with that?
I have always loved Mexican food but it no longer loves me. I will still eat it but I know there will be a serious price to pay in the morning… oh yes there will.
I was taught how to use both a slipstick and an abacus in junior high school. And found them both quite helpful for math problems. As were log tables!
Those calculators that came out in my senior year of HS were pretty nifty, though. I was an early adaptor!
I just remembered another one. I used to be so happy when I got carded for wanting to buy beer when I was 30. That never ever happens anymore.
Also as others have said, I get called sir way too much, even when getting a haircut and most of them even know me.
There’s actually a back-protecting position for sneezing - legs shoulder width apart, knees slightly bent, and leaning slightly forward. Another sign of being old - paying attention when you see something about a proper sneezing position. 
many years ago, my family moved to a different town-and the day we moved in, we were visited by a old lady driving a station wagon (remember those??). Anyway, she represented the local merchants-and gave us all listings and candy, plus crap with local business’s names and phone numbers on them. I really like those cool dehaydared sponges-you put them in water, and they swelled up to 10X the former size.
Anyway, does the Welcome Wagon thing still exist?
My parents had a phone that looked like one with a rotary dial but in place of the dial there was a lever you flipped to get the operator. I think they got a ‘modern’ rotary phone in '65.
My grandson was going on an outing with school some weeks ago where he needed a watch because mobile phones wasn’t allowed and he wanted a analog because he know that better than the digital. I feel proud, I drilled him in reading a analog clock when he was little