I usually don't comment on current events (unless it's something like the newest sandwich at McDonald's), but this one really struck a nerve with me.
     I live in a typical suburban neighborhood (even though we're not really a suburb of anything), which means I live in a subdivision that has as many houses in it as the developer could cram on to the land. We're right up against our immediate neighbors, and even our unimmediate (is that a word?) ones aren't that far away. We have a punk kid who lives near us who has lots of punk friends and they like to hang out in their cars for hours on end, engines idling and bass pumping. This can take place at any hour of the day - 2AM, 6AM, 12PM...when does this kid sleep? It's incredibly annoying and disrupts our sleep quite regularly, because even the idling in their souped up "Fast and Furious" cars is pretty loud. Our next door neighbors have little yippy dogs and if we so much as go outside to take out the trash, we get barked at like we're trying to attack our neighbors with a chainsaw. If we're in our backyard, they'll pretty much stand by the fence and bark at us with their ear-piercing, tiny-dog barks the whole time unless one of our neighbors tells them to get in the house (which if the wife isn't home probably won't happen at all.) The neighbors behind us seem to think their yard is protected by an invisible sound-proof shield. When they go out there, they talk to each other in really loud voices (even though they're right next to each other.) A couple of weeks ago, we were trying to enjoy a peaceful afternoon in our pool. The dad came outside, saw that something he had told his daughter to do was not done, and launched into a loud, profanity-filled tirade that would have made Alec Baldwin blush. It's gotten to the point where I will not go out in the backyard if I see our neighbors are already out there (which, since they got their pool last year, is almost constantly this time of year.) The woman, who has no tolerance for our neighbors' barking dogs, will stand out in the yard and yell at the top of her lungs at her dog (equally annoying if you ask me), waiting for the dog to understand English and obey her every command. When they're in the pool, they're not just in the pool, they're in and out of the pool, each time entering with a big splash and yelling excitedly to each other. Earlier this week I wanted to enjoy the sunshine, so I took a book outside (actually, I was going to do my daily devotions), but had to abandon that whole plan when I opened my door and heard their music blaring at full volume from the backyard. I had to close myself up in a room in the middle of my house not to be distracted by it. We rarely get to enjoy our yard. When I tell people we want to move because of the noise, the new road across from the house is a big part, but our neighbors definitely contribute. That's why the people I read about this morning are my new heroes.
    This story involves another backyard neighbor and a pool. You can view the story here, but the gist is that there are two girls who spend every day of their summer vacation in their backyard pool, splashing and squealing the entire time. The neighbors behind them have built a wall and even installed a waterfall to mask the noise to no avail.  They complained to the neighbors whose defense is that children are children, they make noise when they play, and the neighbors are going to have to deal with it. So the neighbors sued them! I love it! I should also add that many of the other neighbors had complained too (getting the same response), and one even recorded the sounds from her backyard for proof (believe me, this wasn't just kids playing, this was excessive, obnoxious noise.) Unfortunately, the case was thrown out, with the completely unapologetic dad saying that, "We will try to keep them quieter." Yeah, I can tell you what he'll tell the kids, "Try to keep it down out there or the stupid neighbors will haul us in to court again." Every time I heard one of those parents say, "Kids are kids" I wanted to reach through the screen and choke them. Yes, kids are kids. They put things in their mouths without worrying about what it is or where it's been, they mimic everything they see without a thought of common sense, they feel invincible so they do stupid things with no regard for their own personal safety, they don't want to eat anything but sweets and junk food. Kids are kids, that's why there are parents!
     I hesitate to say anything regarding parenting, because the minute I do parents will get all defensive saying, "She doesn't have kids. What does she know?" Well, I may not be a parent, but I'm the child of two, and we were always taught to respect the fact that we have neighbors and they had as much right to quiet in their yards as we had the right to play in ours. If we had our music too loud or were making excessive noise, we heard about it (from our parents.) By the time we were old enough to stay home alone (as it sounds like the girls in the story might), we didn't need our parents there to keep us in line, we knew what to do. I might add that even though the couple that sued was childless, many of the other neighbors who complained were parents who said that they were all for the sound of happy children, but this was over the top. Clearly, the father of these girls expects the neighborhood to respect his children's' right to make noise, but it's not even going to cross his mind to teach his children to respect the rights of their neighbors. Even if he does do what he said and legitimately encourages his daughters to be quieter, his previous actions and the comments he's made show that he clearly doesn't see anything wrong with the behavior, which is most likely what his daughters will take from this experience. (His quote: "What, are you telling me that a kid can't make noise? It's not fair." Yeah, that's what this is about. Even though the neighborhood has other children, the fact that yours are the only ones who have been complained about and summoned to court means nothing. Don't think for a second that your precious angels might actually need to have their behavior corrected, clearly all your neighbors are unreasonable.)
     I have a neighbor that washes his car once a week or so with his Latin music blaring the whole time. You know what? He works hard to pay his mortgage and it isn't an everyday thing, so I don't let it bother me. We have kids that bike up and down the cul-de-sac often, calling to each other and playing audibly. I'm fine with that too. I'm not anti-noise by any means. Life makes noise! However, if the argument is that dealing with noise is part of living in a tight neighborhood, shouldn't the reverse be true? If I have to accept that living where I do means that I will be subjected to your activities, then shouldn't you have to accept that living where you do means that you may not be able to be as raucous as you might like or as loud as you could be if you were out in the country somewhere? Since when does your right to make noise trump my right to peace? Don't give up the fight.

   The 80's girl in me is screaming with absolute delight over my find at Target today. You know that section by the front door that has bins of stuff for a dollar? Well, there was a $2.50 section and in it were two shelves of...jelly shoes! I literally squealed. All they had were clear and pink, and I was going to buy a pair of both before Mike reminded me that I hate pink, owned nothing pink, and probably would never wear them. My argument, "But...jelly shoes!" wasn't very strong, so I left excitedly with my clear jellies.
   I practically lived in jellies during the summers of my youth. Since they were so cheap, it wasn't hard to convince my mom to indulge me with a pair when we went shopping. Plus, they were the only shoes I had in different colors (everything else had to be neutral to "go with everything".) I especially loved my blue jellies and would wear them until the woven plastic that comprised the upper would wear out and detach from the sole. They're also very light, which means wearing them feels like you're hardly wearing shoes at all (unless you've done extensive walking in them, which makes you feel like you're wearing shoes made of blisters.)
    In an effort to capitalize on the nostalgia craze of 80's kids, various trendy stores have come out with reproductions, usually running at least $12 a pair (I saw some at Nordstrom's for $38.) "I guess no one is interested," they mumble as people pass on this chance to relive their youth. They're missing the point! Part of the charm of the jelly shoe was it's cheap price tag. Besides, it's hard to justify paying $38 to relive the fun of running around in your $1 shoes (says a woman who actually bought a $12 pair of jellies and regrets it because they were flimsy and not as well made as the cheaper, vintage jellies.) I remember going to Dollar General and seeing a big bin of jelly shoes in a rainbow of colors and being told, "Go on, get whichever pair you like." That was part of the glory of jelly shoes.
    So, today I got the chance to reach into a bin and grab a fantastically cheap pair of adorable shoes again, go home with my bag, slip on my jellies, and dance around the house like I was six. And I did. Jellies so rock.

The house purge continues...

I've found a lot of old school papers as I've been going through things. I have to say how horrified I am at how easily I opened up about the personal parts of my life, and my family's, with various teachers. I just found this little gem. I feel I must preface it with the fact that my parents are really responsible people and I don't remember this really happening, so I'm hoping I just made this up. Still, I'm sorry that I gave Mrs. Taylor the impression that we were deadbeat white trash. It won't happen again.

"No Power!" By: Lori King, Grade: 5

It was Sunday morning. No electricity. Dad forgot to pay the bill. We bundled up and went outside to grill steaks. When Monday came around there was no radio alarm. We woke up at 7:15. We roasted hot dogs for dinner. It was always dark. It was miserable. All this went on until the next Sunday. My dad got fed up. He payed (sp) the bill Monday morning. (He woke up with his watch alarm.)

Do you know what your kids are writing about you at school?

Those school girl days of camera clicks and snapping pics ago...

My 6th birthday is one that stands out in my memory as one of the best for gift hauls. I got some of my favorite stuff that year. I'm pretty sure that's the year I got my little red Panasonic tape recorder (which became my best friend and my mother's worst enemy.) I'm not positive about that one. I DO know it was the year I got my totally sweet Barbie Silver Vette (the only Barbie accessory I ever had, not counting clothes) and the subject of this blog entry.

Whenever I have to get a gift for a kid, I try to give them something that adults take for granted but a kid would be beyond psyched to have. That's harder and harder to do in this advanced age, but I got to experience that in my childhood when I got my Polaroid camera. It was my very own camera that I could take my very own pictures with and I didn't have to depend on Mom and Dad to get film developed (they had drawers full of undeveloped film. I knew the score.) Plus, it was no toy like that Fisher Price "I'm made of blue and yellow plastic so you know I'm for kids" camera. This was a REAL camera. I was given a pack of film with it and I snapped those first ten pictures away in record time. I have no regrets.

Today I came to grips with the fact that it was time to say goodbye to my trusted friend of over 20 years. I've been holding on to it for sentimental reasons, but it hasn't worked in years (I couldn't even use the excuse that it was still good.) The only way I could get rid of it with a clear head was to take pictures of it (oh the irony) and give it this proper sendoff. I get too attached to things, I know. But looking at that camera reminds me of a very happy time in my childhood and sometimes it's hard to throw away the last remaining items of an era. Thanks for the memories, little Polariod camera. I mean that literally.



Some of the first pictures ever taken with my Polaroid camera.



One last moment with my first camera

     I've been absent from the blog for a while, taking care of life, but I've really been missing it. I figured that the best way to end the slump would be with a subject close to my heart.
     Like most people, I can pinpoint a few defining moments in my life that helped make me who I am. Sometimes it's even amazing to think that huge parts of my character can, in fact, be mostly attributed to one particular thing.
     One such moment occurred when I was five years old. I'm pretty sure I was five because I remember spending my kindergarten year obsessed with it. I was sitting in the living room, most likely with Tracy, and my mom was doing...whatever mothers of two small children do. I couldn't have cared less. I was five. Anyway, my mom was messing around above the washer and dryer (which were in the hallway of our small townhouse) and I heard her exclaim that she had found something. All of a sudden, I was a little more curious about what my mother was doing. Rather than answer my questions, she simply put a tape in our behemoth VCR and pressed play. Immediately I was met with the vision of my father with a limp perm talking to me

"Today is Saturday, July the 14th, 1979. You may wonder why I'm sitting here like this with my hair wet. Well, the fact is, I have just taken a shower. Now you may ask yourself, 'Why has he taken a shower?' Well, aside from the fact that I was dirty, there's a very good chance I may be going somewhere today, and that's what this video tape is all about."

Now, I may have only been five, but I knew the significance of that date. It was the day before I was born. The shot on the TV screen immediately changed to that of my vastly pregnant mother. This was amazing to me. This tape had only been lost for about two years, but at my age, that was a really long time - nearly half of my life! I never even knew this tape existed. You see, my parents didn't have a video camera. They had borrowed one that belonged to a friend to capture my first milestones, which I'd never heard about. To say I was enchanted was an understatement. Events I had only witnessed in pictures were now coming to life before my eyes. As I watched, I witnessed my coming home. I got to see my self as a wiggly little newborn, I got to see my cousins as toddlers, and eventually got to witness my first two birthday parties.  It's the sort of thing that seems so blasé these days, but being able to witness yourself in your first few days of life, or being able to hear your tiny voice as you were first learning how to speak, was an unreal experience. Even though home movies had been around for a little while, they were the old 8mm film with no sound. In fact, it's pretty safe to say that I was part of the first generation of videoed babies.
     We didn't have access to a video camera again until 1989. My grandmother saw one on clearance at Best Products and thought it would be nice to have around for family functions. Of course, she didn't know how to use it, so she made my dad the camcorder steward. The deal was, we could use it as much as we wanted as long as we had it at her house when she wanted it. I was thrilled to have the opportunity to create more home videos that we could enjoy later. I even buried some in the backyard so we could experience the excitement of rediscovering them. (Just kidding about that last part.)
     After I got married and moved out, my first birthday present from my husband was a camcorder. He jokes that he spent more on that camera than he did on my engagement ring because he knew which one was more important to me. I won't go so far as to say that I consider having a camcorder essential, but I wanted one as soon as possible. I've learned how much having them has meant.
     You buy the camcorder for the important moments in life: Jimmy's band concert, Kimberly's first dance recital... but you'll realize later on that the video moments you cherish the most are the ones that were meaningless at the time. You'll spend 45 minutes taping that concert to find that the most treasured moment is two seconds before you stop it, when you whip the camera around and catch a glimpse of the family sitting there next to you. You'll see Grandma and Grandpa who traveled an hour to get there, maybe a little brother wearing that green t-shirt he insisted on wearing everywhere. It was a moment captured on accident, one too mundane to ever be intentionally recorded, but the one you'll be most thankful to experience again.
      You take the camcorder on your family's vacation, hoping to capture the sights to show your friends back home. In the future, you'll find yourself commenting less on the scenery you taped from inside your car as you will the car itself...remembering the things you loved and hated about it, how long you had it, adventures you had from that very seat. The family vacation you took for granted then will become precious when you look back on it, when you can relive, even briefly, the time before your kids moved out and you saw them every day as opposed to a handful of times a year. You'll find yourself delighting in watching the quirks of your kids that at the time you couldn't wait for them to grow out of.
      You think you're taping your baby's first birthday so you can remember the way your baby was, and I certainly won't dispute that, but in twenty years you'll find yourself much more appreciative to hear the voices and see the faces of those who are no longer with you, brought back to life for just a moment. I speak from experience on this one. When I left home, my mother entrusted me with that tape, and as tradition I watch it every year on my birthday. What used to just be fun has become almost poignant as more and more people who shared my first birthday in 1980 pass on. When I pop in that tape, it's like getting a chance to celebrate my birthday with all those people again, if only in spirit. It's powerful for me to think that I may have children of my own someday who will be able to watch that with me and see in action relatives that died long before they were ever born.
     Now, here I am. My favorite hobby is video editing. I've garnered a sort of reputation in my family as the archivist. I'm getting really good at putting together people's wedding videos, mostly because I balk when I hear people say they aren't having a videographer and say, "Don't worry, I'll bring my camera." I'm sure I owe most, if not all of that, to that day in 1984 when I realized what a powerful medium video could be. Some people see video cameras as an extravagance. Certainly it doesn't rate high when compared to the necessities of life: food, clothing, shelter, etc. And if you're a rather unsentimental person, reliving your past in video isn't going to have as significant an impact on you. I have albums full of two-dimensional photographs, which I also love and cherish,
but it's just not the same as having a moment of time completely captured - the sound, the movement, the voices, the actions that would be otherwise forgotten - like a little time machine in a cassette case or tiny disc.
     See, I told Best Buy I should have sold camcorders, but they wouldn't listen.

I was perusing my Entertainment Weekly a few days ago, when a candy-coated Burt Reynolds peered at me from one of its glossy pages and urged me to go to becomeanmm.com and make myself in M&M form. I literally got up at that very moment, went to the computer and tried it. It was so much fun that I had to make someone else. The first person I thought of was my mom, the only person I know for a fact likes that weird stuff as much as I do. I thought I'd make her and send it to her. So, I made her. But then, Mom looked incomplete without Dad, so I made him. Now we were just an incomplete family, so I rounded it off with Tracy and Mike and have now created our family in M&M form:


I like to imagine that this picture was taken somewhere near Mom & Dad's mountain home.

    When my mother-in-law turned 50 last year, I went searching for the perfect gift. In my search, I encountered a t-shirt that nearly made the cut. It said on it, "Am I getting older, or is the supermarket starting to play really good music?" I appreciate shirts that genuinely make me laugh, and that one did. While in the end I opted for a more meaningful gift, I haven't forgotten that shirt. Last week, I was doing some shopping of my own, and about the second time I had to stop audibly singing "Stormy" by The Classics IV because someone else walked into the aisle, I had to come to terms with the fact that the joke t-shirt aimed at the over-the-hill crowd applied to me perfectly. (What's that scripture about removing the speck from your neighbor's eye when you have a plank in your own?) In my newly-realized shame, I grabbed the rest of the items on my list and left, though not without first treating the store to an encore of "Love Grows (Where My Rosemary Goes)" by Edison Lighthouse.
     When I was a kid, I always assumed that my parents had been wild, carefree youths at some point. I'm not saying I thought that they always acted like 50-year-olds - my dad was an Top 40 AM DJ after all - but I always figured that the stories of their adolescence were much crazier than they let on. I couldn't imagine it, but I figured that all adults, no matter how conservative they turned out, always started out that way. When I think that my children may think that about me some day, I almost have to laugh. My life has proved that while there are the people that spend their teenage years staying up late to party and engage in underage activities, there are some that just stay up late to call local talk radio stations and weigh in on the topic du jour (to be fair, I only did that ONCE.) When they imagine me in my 20's, I hope they picture me as a social butterfly, spending every weekend with our young married friends playing Cranium and enjoying frappuccinos. I can only pray that it never crosses their mind to picture me comparing labels on spaghetti sauce jars while singing the repertoire of Burt Bacharach.
     My friends tend to know me as an 80's girl, which I truly am. It's hard not be nostalgic for the era of your childhood, when you had your whole life ahead of you and had yet to encounter anything in life that would jade you or break your spirit. The ignorance of childhood truly is bliss. The irony is, in the late 80's and early 90's, I was kind of a 60's girl. It was around this time that oldies stations (as they are now) first started popping up (at least as far as I know, I don't have any hard evidence to back this up.) For the first time, people like my parents could listen to stations completely devoted to the pop music of their childhood and teenage years. There had been plenty of stations that played a mix of music (at the risk of aging myself to my Richmond-area readers, I remember when Q94 played the best of "the 50s, 60s, 70s and today". Can you imagine Q94 playing 50s music?), so I wasn't completely uninitiated to the "oldies", but I soon found myself immersed in it. The songs were short, catchy, and incredibly singable, so I became pretty hooked. I looked forward to Saturday nights when our favorite station played "American Gold" and I'd dance around the house. When I got a little older, I even got to the point where I'd call the oldies station and make requests. Things got a hundred times worse when "The Wonder Years" premiered and completely played into my fascination with all things 60's and 70's. I remember laying in bed, listening to the radio while I tried to sleep, and imaging myself in a Kevin/Winnie type montage with Fred Savage, letting whatever poignant song happened to be playing set the mood. I wasn't trying to be one of those "ironic" teenagers who listened to classic music in an effort to be nonconformist, I legitimately liked it. I liked riding around in the car with my parents, singing in three part harmony to songs on the radio (concrete proof that being ironically cool never entered my consciousness.)
     I can almost tell you the exact moment when I was snapped back into the 90's. I was in 6th grade and one of the girls in my class was talking to me about Mariah Carey. I had nothing to offer the conversation. I'd heard the name, but I didn't know anything about her singing or any of her songs. I realized that the reason my parents liked the music of the 60s and 70s was because it was the music of their youth. The oldies station played the songs they first kissed to, their first breakup songs, their class songs, their prom songs, songs from the first records they ever bought...these songs were meaningful to them beyond the fact that it was just good music. In the meantime, I was missing out on the music of my own era. I needed to expand my horizons. In actuality, it was a slow transition. I quit listening to the oldies station exclusively and moved to the "mix" station, weaning myself like a junkie, and by 8th grade I was back to Q94, which by that time was strictly Top 40. My dad hated it - he didn't understand why I couldn't at least listen to the adult contemprary station that they liked. There was no way to explain it without sounding like I was giving some cheesy sitcom monologue (which I was guilty of oh-so-often), so I just let it go. It's just as well. It's much better that awkward, uncomfortable memories of my teenage years ruined the mediocre music of the 90's for me than truly good music.
     As time went on, more and more oldies stations were either changed to completely different formats or transformed into classic rock stations, resulting in moments where I flip out in a store now because it's been 15 years since I last heard a song that came out 15 years before I was born.
     I used to think I was genetically uncool, and maybe I am. I've always had kind of an old soul and, while that makes it hard to fit in during the pubescent years, I have no regrets. I've come to peace with the fact that I'm destined to be that square parent who embarrasses her children by singing with the songs in the department store and dressing like a soccer mom. And kids, if you're reading this in the future, you can stop wondering - I was that way long before you were born.

Girls' Tops - JCPenney Christmas Catalog - 1991

 

      

     Well, here we are. It's Christmas Eve. Man, this countdown, not to mention entire Christmas season, really flew by. Hopefully, this last entry won't disappoint.
     I was 12 years old for the Christmas of 1991, so the tops you see above you were aimed right at my demographic. Oh boy, is looking at them ever a time warp! That's not necessarily a good thing, because I've yet to meet anyone who's said that middle school was one of the highlights of their life. Still, even with some not-so-good recollections from that era , I can't help but chuckle at some of the memories, and this catalog page is ripe for that.
     This page is a self-contained rap rivalry, with nearly all of the shirts devoted to M.C. Hammer and Vanilla Ice. Clearly, M.C. Hammer was winning. There is a lone appearance by Nelson on the Shannon Miller doppelganger. Ah, Nelson. I am nothing if not honest on this blog, and I will admit that I still get excited in the car when "Love and Affection" comes on. Yes, even 15 years later, I'll crank up some Nelson. There is something about this page, however, that I find particularly perplexing.
     I looked through many Christmas catalogs to make this countdown, and I saw a lot of trends represented in clothing. I've seen everything from Muppet Movie jackets to New Kids On The Block t-shirts to Spongebob Squarepants pajamas. The 1991 catalog offered me something I didn't see in any other. Now, I had to reduce the above picture quite a bit, so I don't know how much you can tell, but aside from the modeled sweatshirts, everything else is an honest-to-goodness sweater with names and catchphrases knitted right into them. It was like a compromise for parents and daughters,
"You can't wear your M.C. Hammer sweatshirt! It's the church Christmas Eve service, for crying out loud! You have to wear something nice!"
"Well, I'm not putting on a dress, and you can't make me."
"We're going to be late! Look, just wear a sweater with a nice pair of Dockers."
"Can it be my M.C. Hammer sweater?"
"Whatever! Just get ready!"
A couple of the sweaters even had photo patches, so when you said "Ice Ice Baby to the EXTREME", everyone knew exactly what you were talking about. I don't recall ever seeing one of these in real life (though that doesn't mean I didn't), nor do I recall seeing anything like this in any other catalog. It is a lone example of early 90's marketing, submitted today for your approval along with ankle-loop jeans, continued proof that, for whatever reason, we can't be satisfied just wearing plain old jeans.

     There it is - the 2006 Christmas catalog countdown. It was a blast for me, and I hope I can do it again (or something like it) next year. Tomorrow's the big day, so I wish everyone reading this (um...I guess that would be Mom) a wonderful holiday. The blog will be back in its regular format very soon, but until then, God bless us, everyone. Merry Christmas!

Star Wars Merchandise - Sears Wish Book - 1982

 

      

     Star Wars, Nothin' But Star Wars... George Lucas may have his faults, but he knows a cash cow when he sees it. Unlike most kids my age (if I had a dollar for every time I've said that...), I didn't grow up with the magic of Star Wars. I think I was 14 before I ever saw it (I totally didn't get it), and I didn't really appreciate it until I watched it again last year during my post-Revenge of the Sith marathon of the original trilogy. As with a lot of the major cultural events of my childhood, I arrived late to the party. In fact, most of my Star Wars knowledge came from catalog pages like the one you see above. I watched the original movies saying things like, "That thing! It was a toy in the Best Catalog!" I could have been sitting next to a guy who was wearing thick glasses, holding a light saber, and wearing a shirt that said "Han Shot First", and I still would have been the biggest loser in the room.
     I think my favorite items on the page are the clocks at the top. The fact that they got a third of the page to themselves says to me that I'm not alone. They're less like clocks and more like Star Wars dioramas. I love them. My favorite part is that C-3P0 and R2-D2 can wake you up...with a conversation. This was only a good gift for kids who were light sleepers. Even I have a hard time imagining that I could be awakened from a dreaming coma by Threepio saying in his British drawl, "Hello, there. You might want to open your eyes and get up now." Yes, quite.
     I'm also amused by the shampoo bottles. No disrespect to the man in black, but Vader really loses some villainous points by being turned into a bottle containing fresh-smelling, hair-cleaning goodness. I feel bad for the fighter pilot, because you know he knows he's the least desirable of the bunch. Wait, maybe that's supposed to be Luke. Considering there were at least a dozen people in the movie dressed like that and it has an incredibly non-descript face, it could go either way. I don't have the catalog in front of me anymore to double check and I'll be darned if I dig it back out for THAT. Maybe eBay knows. Yeah, according to eBay, this was Luke Skywalker. Well, the bottle may say "Luke Skywalker", but a kid on Christmas morning was only going to see "Random X-Wing Pilot", followed closely by, "By the way, kid, this is shampoo".
     As for the watches, I won't spend time on them because we dealt with watches a few days ago. Watches are played out.

Laptop Computer - Sears Wish Book - 1989

 

      

     As I mentioned in the video camera entry, I like showcasing old technology to appreciate it, not to laugh at its inadequacies. Here's another great example. By 1989, I had only seen one computer that could be close to being considered a laptop. It had a tiny little screen next to a disk drive, and it was all attached to a keyboard. It was still a pretty substantial machine, so in reality it was more like a portable PC than a laptop. I'll admit to being late to the whole home computer game, but I don't think laptops were commonplace yet by this time. This was still cutting edge. Looking at this notebook computer's specifications, it's a wonder we were able to get anything done. First of all, you can see that it had a whopping 640k of RAM (I know, if you know nothing about computers, that means nothing to you.)  The picture you see above you? Admittedly, it's a pretty big picture (reduced dramatically for use on this page), but it's 603k by itself. In the description of the computer, it goes on to say that it has an 8 MHz processor. The lowest-end laptop on Best Buy's site right now has a processor speed of 1.6 GHz. You can also see that this laptop came with Prodigy. If you're like me, it's hard to imagine people going online 17 years ago, but they could. For those who don't know, Prodigy was one of the first (if not the first) online services. Consider it the forerunner to (and eventually, casualty of) AOL. The screen says that Prodigy was created by IBM and Sears, which I did not realize. According to Wikipedia (believe at your own risk), the software wasn't officially launched nationally until September of 1990, which means that we're witnessing the birth of a revolution here. As Pigpen would say, "Kind of makes you want to treat me with...a little more respect...doesn't it?" Actually, that quote really doesn't apply very well. It just popped in my head and I wanted to use it. You can move on now...