My Generation: Period Set, Style, Slang, etc.

[Whimsy]

Here’s a fun topic to talk about what the show has gotten right (and wrong) with in regards to set dressing, clothing, slang, etc within the show. 

[Whimsy]

I thought this would be a fun topic since so many of us remember this timeframe. I was just born in 1972, but I like seeing the call-backs to the old TV sets, the aluminum cans that you needed the special can opener to create the two holes, etc. 

[rhys]

I got married in 1972 in a Catholic church but I'm non practicing. But the Clearys are ahead of me by what 20 years? Should be easy enough to keep up. Someone in the first episode thread mentioned "take a chill pill" sounding wrong. I have to agree. My parents would never have bought High C (nor would my husband& I)  to accompany meals. It was always milk. While it was fun to see a can that needed a church key to open it, it seemed an odd drink choice.

thanks for starting this thread.

[Yeah No]

1 hour ago, rhys said:

I got married in 1972 in a Catholic church but I'm non practicing. But the Clearys are ahead of me by what 20 years? Should be easy enough to keep up. Someone in the first episode thread mentioned "take a chill pill" sounding wrong. I have to agree. My parents would never have bought High C (nor would my husband& I)  to accompany meals. It was always milk. While it was fun to see a can that needed a church key to open it, it seemed an odd drink choice.

thanks for starting this thread.

I was 13/14 in 1972 and pretty up on what was a "thing" and I agreed in the episode thread that "take a chill pill" came from the 80s, not the 70s.  When I looked it up online sources made it sound like it had been around longer, but who knows?  Back then a lot of expressions took a long time to spread because we had no internet.

My mom never bought Hi C, although I knew other families that had it.  We were solidly a "Hawaiian Punch" family.   I never drank that with dinner, though.  I was a Pepsi kid.  Sometimes I'd have one of my mother's diet Tab sodas, LOL.

Great thread idea, I love it!

[Snow Apple]

I remember metal lunch boxes and included a can of soda wrapped in aluminum foil to keep it "cold." 

Stamps you get at the grocery store to trade in for stuff (like that episode of the Brady Bunch)

[Yeah No]

1 hour ago, Snow Apple said:

I remember metal lunch boxes and included a can of soda wrapped in aluminum foil to keep it "cold." 

Stamps you get at the grocery store to trade in for stuff (like that episode of the Brady Bunch)

Or you got at the gas station, like S&H Green Stamps or "Plaid Stamps", and you went to a redemption center to get the stuff.

[Snow Apple]

I just remembered how magazines has a list of names of kids looking for pen pals.

Comics had all these cool things you can order by mail, like sea monkeys and X-Ray eyeglasses.

[peacheslatour]

On 10/18/2018 at 8:27 AM, Snow Apple said:

I just remembered how magazines has a list of names of kids looking for pen pals.

Comics had all these cool things you can order by mail, like sea monkeys and X-Ray eyeglasses.

 

Ah, yes X Ray Specs. And 100 dolls for a dollar! I always wanted to do that but my mom said it was BS. Did anybody do it?

[methodwriter85]

I'm going to upvote the names. Nothing seems glaringly off. "Meghan" on Mad Men still bothers the shit out of me, especially because otherwise they were also really accurate about names. The names feel right for Baby Boomers/early Gen Xers. I kind of wish they had named the youngest kid "Jason" instead of Andrew because this era seems to be when that name exploded in popularity, but whatever.

Another thing I like is that only the oldest rebellious son has long hair. It would have been a mistake to do that on everybody, especially if this is supposed to be a conservative Catholic family. It takes awhile for the Dazed and Confused look to totally take over. Also, most kids don't start picking their own style until about 8th grade or so.

Edited October 24, 2018 by methodwriter85

[SoMuchTV]

On 10/18/2018 at 8:57 AM, Snow Apple said:

I remember metal lunch boxes and included a can of soda wrapped in aluminum foil to keep it "cold." 

You got a SODA in your lunch?!?? I hope it was a special occasion!  

[SoMuchTV]

I’m somewhere in age between the oldest brother and the middle/narrator brother, and most of the 60’s/70’s stuff seems spot on, but I can’t remember any moms with long hair. My mom/aunts/ friend’s moms all had hair that you do up in rollers or have a standing appointment at the beauty parlor. 

[CherryAmes]

Seems pretty spot on to me - biggest difference is I was raised in a big Catholic family of girls not boys but otherwise it's pretty close to my 1972 reality.  I guess since it's a house full of boys they won't be talking too much about crushing on David Cassidy or Donny Osmond :).  I also loved the comment from the pilot about how every family aspired to have a priest!  My parents didn't want any of us being nuns (god forbid as I'm sure they would have said) but I knew very few Catholic girls of the time who didn't at least think about going into the convent - usually after watching "Trouble With Angels" or "The Flying Nun"!  One thing I didn't notice was what did the kids use to take their stuff to and from school?  Was this in any of the episodes so far?  The reason I ask is because I have no memory at all of ever using a backpack or anything like that yet by the time my own kids were in school the backpack was common and the kids seemed to have to carry a crapload of stuff back and forth everyday!  That's not how I remember school in the '70s.

Edited October 25, 2018 by CherryAmes

[Snow Apple]

18 hours ago, SoMuchTV said:

You got a SODA in your lunch?!?? I hope it was a special occasion!  

No, we couldn't afford soda for every day, but some of my classmates got them with their lunch. It seemed normal back then.

Thankfully running around during recess must have helped!

[Former Nun]

2 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

The reason I ask is because I have no memory at all of ever using a backpack

My boys were born in '66 and '68.  When they were paperboys, they saved their money for backpacks.  I don't recall if other kids had them.  My older son was INTENT on getting an Eddie Bauer backpack.  He used that thing thru college.

[Former Nun]

20 hours ago, SoMuchTV said:

I’m somewhere in age between the oldest brother and the middle/narrator brother, and most of the 60’s/70’s stuff seems spot on, but I can’t remember any moms with long hair. My mom/aunts/ friend’s moms all had hair that you do up in rollers or have a standing appointment at the beauty parlor. 

I alternated between pixie-cut-short and long...but I did have a weekly "standing appointment" until my husband dumped the family (no support) in 1979.  Then it was a full-time job, short hair and Clairol for me!

The mom on the show DEFINITELY uses rollers.

[mojito]

Quote

The reason I ask is because I have no memory at all of ever using a backpack or anything like that yet by the time my own kids were in school the backpack was common and the kids seemed to have to carry a crapload of stuff back and forth everyday! 

We had school bags/book bags. Mostly like what you see those old time lawyers carry with the button you pushed down to unlatch the flap. In the Catholic schools I attended, we weren't allowed to carry books (which we had to cover) outside of the bag unless they didn't fit because of all the other books we had to go home with. I can remember kids slinging them around and hitting each other with them. That leather was stiff!

I mentioned on the other thread that the PO boxes were painted blue in 1971. I distinctly remember the poor high school grad whose job it was to paint our town's boxes that summer. I wonder if he wears blue to this day? I have a commemorative envelope postmarked July 1, 1971, the day  the Post Office Department became the US Postal Service. Oh, the trivia trapped in my brain....

I remember the soda wrapped in aluminum foil for our special pool days. Otherwise, it was milk at every meal.

The crushes girls had when I was a kid were on the Beatles, Illya Kuryakin (David Mc Callum of U.N.C.L.E. fame), Little Joe, Bobby Sherman, and....oh, the list goes on.

[CherryAmes]

3 minutes ago, mojito said:

The crushes girls had when I was a kid were on the Beatles, Illya Kuryakin (David Mc Callum of U.N.C.L.E. fame), Little Joe, Bobby Sherman, and....oh, the list goes on.

My first crush was Paul McCartney when I was 6.  By the time I was 12 I'd moved on to Bobby Sherman (still have a soft spot in my heart for Bobby) and then David Cassidy and Donny Osmond.  The show I guess inevitably will be centred on the experience of being a boy in the '70s, too bad in a way because back then in a lot of ways it was two different worlds that occasionally intersected.

[SoMuchTV]

2 hours ago, Former Nun said:

I alternated between pixie-cut-short and long...but I did have a weekly "standing appointment" until my husband dumped the family (no support) in 1979.  Then it was a full-time job, short hair and Clairol for me!

The mom on the show DEFINITELY uses rollers.

Ooh!  Maybe if she was a really cool mom she had those brand new electric rollers!  Otherwise it was probably the pink spongey things.  I don't think she would have put up with those bristly ones. (And are you an actual former nun?  Were you my 4th grade teacher?  That would be cool!)

2 hours ago, Former Nun said:

My boys were born in '66 and '68.  When they were paperboys, they saved their money for backpacks.  I don't recall if other kids had them.  My older son was INTENT on getting an Eddie Bauer backpack.  He used that thing thru college.

 

1 hour ago, mojito said:

We had school bags/book bags. Mostly like what you see those old time lawyers carry with the button you pushed down to unlatch the flap. In the Catholic schools I attended, we weren't allowed to carry books (which we had to cover) outside of the bag unless they didn't fit because of all the other books we had to go home with. I can remember kids slinging them around and hitting each other with them. That leather was stiff!

I was in 1-12 in the mid-60's through the mid-70s.  I don't remember ever seeing a backpack.  Early on we had these plaid cardboard-backed bookbags (leather?! you must have been one of those rich kids who took soda for lunch! :-) ) but we got too cool for those eventually and just carried a loose stack of books.  I remember seeing backpacks in college but it wasn't something everybody had.  Now my kids went to k-12 in the 90's-00's and EVERYBODY had backpacks.

[Snow Apple]

I had a homemade tote bag for carrying books in elementary school. Then carried books cradled in my arms during high school a la Marcia Brady.

Edited October 25, 2018 by Snow Apple

[festivus]

Never had a bookbag, carried my books all the way through school. I don't remember anyone having one. We all had metal lunchboxes though.

[CherryAmes]

1 hour ago, Snow Apple said:

I had a homemade tote bag for carrying books in elementary school. Then carried books cradled in my arms during high school a la Marcia Brady.

Yep, same here.  I wonder if one difference might be that in grade school we had our own desks with compartments to keep stuff in and in high school we all had lockers.  We just didn't seem to drag everything home every single day the way my own kids did.  We took home homework and that was about it.  I recall in high school there was always at least one guy carrying a briefcase (not usually one of the popular kids) and since I live in Canada in the winter sometimes we'd stuff our things in a plastic bag but a dedicated backpack for school?  Not in my neck of the woods that I can remember anyway.

We did have lunch boxes, until high school, then it was a brown paper bag or if we were lucky lunch money so we could buy terrible food at inflated prices in the cafeteria!!

Edited October 25, 2018 by CherryAmes

[Former Nun]

15 minutes ago, festivus said:

Never had a bookbag, carried my books all the way through school.

I went to Catholic school 1946-58 and never had a book bag.  We had LOTS of homework (more than the public school kids in my neighbhood) and we always carried our books--at least the girls did.  We had one girl, the smartest girl in the class, who had an actual leather briefcase.  We teased about her behind her back, but she had the best idea.

[festivus]

9 minutes ago, CherryAmes said:

We did have lunch boxes, until high school, then it was a brown paper bag of if we were lucky lunch money so we could buy terrible food at inflated prices in the cafeteria!!

Oh yes, you did not carry a lunchbox past 6th grade because that was totally uncool. Brown-bagged it in junior high and in high school you better not be caught bringing your lunch at all. I ate only mashed potatoes, rolls and chocolate milk for all of high school.

[CherryAmes]

For   most of grade 11 (last year of high school in Quebec) I had an apple and a chocolate  bar and fries for lunch.  The apple was my nod to healthy eating.  "Back in my day" we also had vending machines all over our cafeteria selling stuff like chips, chocolate bars and pop.  Didn't raise an eyebrow.  Of course my high school also had a smoking room for the students.   Students in a school where you graduate at 16.  The '70s were so different in so many ways!  I hope this show keeps reflecting that.

[SoMuchTV]

11 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

 

We did have lunch boxes, until highhool, then it was a brown paper bag or if we were lucky lunch money so we could buy terrible food at inflated prices in the cafeteria!!

 

But then in high school, some of the girls had apparently saved those lunchboxes, and decoupaged (I'm sure that's spelled wrong) to make them into purses.

Edited October 26, 2018 by SoMuchTV

[festivus]

2 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

Of course my high school also had a smoking room for the students.   Students in a school where you graduate at 16.  The '70s were so different in so many ways!  I hope this show keeps reflecting that.

I started high school in 1980 and wouldn't you know that was the year they decided to outlaw the smoking porch. That's what it was called, really it was just the concrete at the side of the building.

 

We haven't seen them go to school in the show yet, I guess it's summer? Anyway, I can't wait to see what kind of lunchboxes they carry. Mine was Peanuts. Yes, I still have it. Broke the thermos long ago though.

[lb60]

5 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

My first crush was Paul McCartney when I was 6.  

Mine was Speed Racer, at around the same age. lol  Eventually, I moved on to actual humans in the form of Donny Osmond.

3 hours ago, festivus said:

We all had metal lunchboxes though.

 

15 minutes ago, festivus said:

Anyway, I can't wait to see what kind of lunchboxes they carry. Mine was Peanuts. 

Mine was Gentle Ben.

[mojito]

Quote

I don't remember ever seeing a backpack. 

Me, neither. At least, not at school. Otherwise, we called them knapsacks.

[Nessie]

On 10/24/2018 at 7:55 PM, SoMuchTV said:

I’m somewhere in age between the oldest brother and the middle/narrator brother, and most of the 60’s/70’s stuff seems spot on, but I can’t remember any moms with long hair. My mom/aunts/ friend’s moms all had hair that you do up in rollers or have a standing appointment at the beauty parlor. 

My mom had waist-length Cher hair in the early 70's.  She was a free spirit.  The one day she came home with a Dorothy Hamill (I guess it must have been after DH won the gold, so 1976).  It was quite a shock.  She's had it short ever since.

All you people with your fancy Hi C or Hawaiian Punch at meals...for us it was milk, always, every meal.

[Snow Apple]

Milk? We got water. Other beverages were for special occasions and guests. lol 

Actually, I got milk from school lunches. Four cents a carton.

[lucindabelle]

I got my hair cut 8’ a Dorothy Hamill too when I was 11. It was cute but hell to grow out. Your mom was smart. Changing my look at that age was a bad bad idea.

no backpacks in the 70s in Nj or in Palo Alto for sure. We carriednpurses in school and just carried our books by hand going to lockers to exchange in between classes. All those songs about boys carrying books for girls.

 

feeshman year of college 1982 I got a backpack to carry my books while on a bike. We called high school girls crashingnlarties girls with purses (that was in Palo Alto).

 

now the distinction wouldn’t make sense because everyone has backpacks but they didn’t then.

[LGraves65]

I was the class of '83, and only nerds carried backpacks to school where I lived.  You went to your locker between classes and changed books/notebooks. 

[Homily]

Microwaves - did many people have them back in the '70s?  I remember them getting hugely popular in the mid to late 80s - I have microwaves and VCR players completely entwined in my mind as we got both for Christmas (one from each set of parents)  I think in 1986-1988 timeframe.  Before that the VHS players were way too expensive and microwaves may have been as well.

Edited October 31, 2018 by Homily

[CherryAmes]

38 minutes ago, Homily said:

 I think in 1986-1988 timeframe. 

That sounds about right - I knew people who had both before that but IIRC microwaves were very expensive up to that point and while VCRs might have come down in price by then you couldn't buy tapes, or at least they weren't easily available so if you didn't live near a Blockbuster type place (and there were TONS of these kinds of places at one point) having a VCR wouldn't really have been worth it.  I had a cousin who was so into the VCR technology that she had a beta and a VHS - totally covered her bases there - but I don't remember now when that particular war was fought and when VHS emerged triumphant, I suspect maybe a lot of people waited to buy until they were sure which was worth the investment.

[LBS]

Back in the early - mid 80s, our local video rental place had VCRs that you could rent.  My parents would rent one for our birthday sleepovers.  It was such a treat!   My parents bought my grandparents a microwave in the 90's and my grandma hated it.  I think she would of put a fork in it as well!

[CherryAmes]

1 minute ago, LBS said:

Back in the early - mid 80s, our local video rental place had VCRs that you could rent.  My parents would rent one for our birthday sleepovers.  It was such a treat! 

Omigosh I completely forgot you could do that! 

[rhys]

I rented a vcr a couple of times before we bought one. What a chore! But that was the only way to do it when you were deciding between betamax and VHS. 

[Snow Apple]

A few years ago, I stumbled upon a YA book from the 80's and the main character mentioned she was looking for a part time job because she wanted to save for a VCR which was almost $400. Depending on the year, that's from $800 to over $1000 in today's money. 

[Yeah No]

On 10/24/2018 at 7:55 PM, SoMuchTV said:

I’m somewhere in age between the oldest brother and the middle/narrator brother, and most of the 60’s/70’s stuff seems spot on, but I can’t remember any moms with long hair. My mom/aunts/ friend’s moms all had hair that you do up in rollers or have a standing appointment at the beauty parlor. 

My mom's hair was short in the early '70s and she used those electric rollers every morning before leaving for work.  I used to watch her do it and think it was such a chore.  I don't remember any moms with hair as long as the mom on this show.  I, however, had long hair parted in the middle like most teenage girls at that time.  Think "Brady Bunch".

On 10/25/2018 at 5:11 PM, CherryAmes said:

My first crush was Paul McCartney when I was 6.  By the time I was 12 I'd moved on to Bobby Sherman (still have a soft spot in my heart for Bobby) and then David Cassidy and Donny Osmond.  The show I guess inevitably will be centred on the experience of being a boy in the '70s, too bad in a way because back then in a lot of ways it was two different worlds that occasionally intersected.

Yeah, I was just thinking about this after this last episode.  Too bad they're all boys, because my life revolved around Donny Osmond in 1972 and I would love to see that featured on the show.  My bedroom was plastered with posters of him from Sixteen Magazine and Tiger Beat!  I actually still have a lot of them stored away in my basement.  They meant that much to me.  Too bad I didn't save all those Mickey Mantle gum cards I had!

On 10/25/2018 at 6:23 PM, SoMuchTV said:

Ooh!  Maybe if she was a really cool mom she had those brand new electric rollers!  

Haha, my mom was always cool and way ahead of her time!

On 10/25/2018 at 7:43 PM, Former Nun said:

I went to Catholic school 1946-58 and never had a book bag.  We had LOTS of homework (more than the public school kids in my neighbhood) and we always carried our books--at least the girls did.  We had one girl, the smartest girl in the class, who had an actual leather briefcase.  We teased about her behind her back, but she had the best idea.

In the '60s book bags or briefcases were big in New York, but as soon as we got into Jr. High in 1970 that became "out" and we just carried our books either loose or with those rubber band-style book holders that were big around that time.  We never heard of backpacks or knapsacks.  I remember when I started to see kids with them in the '80s I thought it was a great idea and wished we had them when I was their age!

18 hours ago, Homily said:

Microwaves - did many people have them back in the '70s?  I remember them getting hugely popular in the mid to late 80s - I have microwaves and VCR players completely entwined in my mind as we got both for Christmas (one from each set of parents)  I think in 1986-1988 timeframe.  Before that the VHS players were way too expensive and microwaves may have been as well.

My parents were always early with electronic stuff, so they got a Betamax when they first came out, then quickly got a VHS recorder in about 1980.  I vividly remember this because my mom recorded the Royal Wedding of Princess Diana and Charles on it.  Plus she used to record "General Hospital" for us to watch after work.  My whole family was addicted to GH.  We got hooked because I started watching it with my roommates in college.  We saw the whole "Luke and Laura" thing - Even my Dad and husband watched it with us, LOL!  Hubbie and I used to go over their house once a week for dinner and a marathon viewing of that week's GH.  Oh, those memories!  Sorry, tearing up now!

[Former Nun]

2 hours ago, Yeah No said:

My mom's hair was short in the early '70s and she used those electric rollers every morning before leaving for work.

My hair was long, short, shorter, longer...everything...because I had my hair "done" every week.  I also worked and one time on my lunch hour I was in Walgreen's (early 70s) and I saw this odd contraption.  It was on a clearance table:  HOT ROLLERS.   I took the box to show my hairdresser the next time I was in.  She said, "If they have any left, get me one!"  I had that same one and it worked well for over 30 years...until some demonstration on QVC of something "better" (not really) caught my eye.

[Former Nun]

21 hours ago, Homily said:

Microwaves - did many people have them back in the '70s? 

I had one in the mid-70s (in my mid-30s).   My husband was a podiatrist who had gone to school in California.  There he got a best friend, Tom...and Tom's wife, Pam.   Pam and Tom came to visit us and Pam was SHOCKED that I didn't have a microwave.  While the guys were playing golf, she took me shopping for one. She said, "Our husbands want us to spend their money."  Mine DID NOT (but he was in love with Pam).  We went to a large appliance store, she decided which one I wanted...but we had to stay and sit through an actual class on how to use it--and the cookbook (which I still have).  When the men came home, Pam explained that SHE made me get it.  He pretended that he had wanted one all along. 

I remember the timeframe because (later) Pam and Tom got divorced; my husband had an affair with her, and eventually dumped the microwave, the kids and me...but for his secretary.  That was 1979. 

[sigmaforce86]

On 10/24/2018 at 7:35 PM, SoMuchTV said:

On 10/18/2018 at 8:57 AM, Snow Apple said:

I remember metal lunch boxes and included a can of soda wrapped in aluminum foil to keep it "cold." 

You got a SODA in your lunch?!?? I hope it was a special occasion!  

Grape Juice - mine was a can of grape juice every day (not Welch's, the cheaper store brand) and yes it was wrapped in tin foil to keep it cold.  Also it was a full pop tab not the pull back ones you have today and we dropped the tab into the can and let it sit in there while we drank.  Nobody I knew swallowed one but I suppose some kids did (hence the current pull back type)

 

3 hours ago, Yeah No said:

In the '60s book bags or briefcases were big in New York, but as soon as we got into Jr. High in 1970 that became "out" and we just carried our books either loose or with those rubber band-style book holders that were big around that time.  We never heard of backpacks or knapsacks.  I remember when I started to see kids with them in the '80s I thought it was a great idea and wished we had them when I was their age!

No book bags for us either just carried them in our arms but we did wrap the books in paper grocery bags.  In fact the school required covers, the teacher would check at the end of the first week and send a note home with you if your books weren't done.  I never did figure out how my Mother did it exactly but just about every kid had that - except the "rich" kids they had store bought covers.  I liked the paper bag better though, always had to remind Mom to make sure the store logo faced in and she had to write the subject along the spine.  But when done you had multiple school books that each had the entire blank paper cover front and back to color and doodle on throughout the year.  Only thing I had to do was occasionally re-tape the edges.  Or worse ask for a completely new cover if I dropped the book in a snow  pile on the way home,   

 

On 10/25/2018 at 1:43 PM, CherryAmes said:

Seems pretty spot on to me - biggest difference is I was raised in a big Catholic family of girls not boys but otherwise it's pretty close to my 1972 reality.  I guess since it's a house full of boys they won't be talking too much about crushing on David Cassidy or Donny Osmond :).  I also loved the comment from the pilot about how every family aspired to have a priest! 

Me too!  Luckily I went to public school because my Mother & all her siblings went to Catholic School and she hated it.  So I got out of that but still had CCD once a week and all the "milestone" ceremonies.  I loved the comment in the first episode that they were ahead of so & so's family who could only come up with a Nun.  If they had a sister on this show I could definitely also imagine the posters & relate - I still remember our group of neighborhood girls running to the corner store to see the next issue of Teen Beat or 16 magazine but THE one to have was Tiger Beat not that we bought many we just pawed through them in the store and generally drove the owner crazy.

[rhys]

I had hot rollers in college 1968. So maybe that's what Peg is using. Surely California was more progressive than Colorado.

[lucindabelle]

For some reason we had to do that with the books from Hebrew school but not the books from public school. Which in retrospect is even stranger because I think we owned the books from Hebrew school. I have got to be remembering this wrong. I had a big plastic briefcase for Hebrew school hilariously enough, but for regular school elementary school etc. I just carried my books. But you’re right, The Paper Bag book covers were the absolute best you could doodle on them and write on them and it was just awesome.

I hope we get to see the 6 ounce Coke bottles.

[geauxaway]

My mom is visiting for the weekend and she jokingly ask me if she needed to rinse out a used zip loc bag and turn it inside out to dry, like her mom (my grandma) used to do.  Then we laughed about re-using cereal bags, bread bags, tin foil over and over.  That the way it was!  

[CherryAmes]

My SIL always uses the little sticky tape from the tinfoil.  I admit it does make a useful label but it still something I'd have expected my grandmother to do - she definitely reused her zip loc bags and her paper towels for that matter!  

[rhys]

4 hours ago, CherryAmes said:

My SIL always uses the little sticky tape from the tinfoil.  

I don't even know what that is. But I do re-use my foil as long as it's clean& dry. I also keep my butter wrappers & stash them in the freezer in order to use them as my cake pan greasers. I realize I sound like a child of the depression! My kids are going to wonder WTF when they clean out the freezer after I die.

[Homily]

On the aluminum we can buy here there is always a long piece of white/beigeish sticky tape holding the roll closed that you have to strip off before you can use the foil.  I guess you could save it and write on it if you wanted to.  Never occurred to me!

[biakbiak]

On 10/31/2018 at 12:09 PM, Homily said:

Microwaves - did many people have them back in the '70s? 

I didn’t have an issue with it because it was supposed to be a new thing that his work was developing.

We had a microwave in the late 70s because my older sister tried to put me in it when I was 2 or 3.

Edited November 3, 2018 by biakbiak

[Nessie]

On 10/31/2018 at 3:09 PM, Homily said:

Microwaves - did many people have them back in the '70s?  I remember them getting hugely popular in the mid to late 80s - I have microwaves and VCR players completely entwined in my mind as we got both for Christmas (one from each set of parents)  I think in 1986-1988 timeframe.  Before that the VHS players were way too expensive and microwaves may have been as well.

That seems late to me.  My dad was in the Navy and we were stationed in Spain in the early 80's.  That's when we first got both, and it felt like we were the last ones on base to get them (my parents were far from early adopters...it drove me crazy that we always seemed like the last people to get anything).  I realize I kind of lived in a bubble over there but when we returned to the US in 1985, pretty much everyone I met had both.  @CherryAmes is right about the lack of tapes, though, at least in the early 80's, and especially in our particular Navy Exchange in Spain.  I still remember the first two movies we bought for our first VCR...East of Eden for my mom, and The Outsiders for me and my sisters.  And they had those horrible big, soft plastic "clamshell" boxes that would pop out of shape easily and you could never get the tape back in afterwards.

On 11/1/2018 at 10:44 PM, lucindabelle said:

For some reason we had to do that with the books from Hebrew school but not the books from public school. Which in retrospect is even stranger because I think we owned the books from Hebrew school. I have got to be remembering this wrong. I had a big plastic briefcase for Hebrew school hilariously enough, but for regular school elementary school etc. I just carried my books. But you’re right, The Paper Bag book covers were the absolute best you could doodle on them and write on them and it was just awesome.

I hope we get to see the 6 ounce Coke bottles.

We never had to cover our books in elementary school, but by the time I went to middle school, we had moved from California to Scotland (again...Navy brat...we moved a lot).  We were required to cover our books but we used wrapping paper, so we girls would use the prettiest we could find.  Over there at the time (I don't know about now), you could buy wrapping paper by the sheet in stationary shops.