What pisses you off or what's different about life in 2006?

[Ira]

The Wal-Mart/Buy American threads are great, and there were some great reminiscences (does this thing have spell-check?) about the old days.

It got me thinking about a character that a local NJ TV personality in the 70s, Uncle Floyd, did about an old guy complaining about everything nowadays. This character was basically later stolen by Dana Carvey of Saturday Night Live, but since Uncle Floyd was so small and local, no one noticed.

Anyway, I want to include a page in my magazine about these kinds of observations. They don't have to be funny, like, "When I was a kid, the dentist would touch your pee pee and you LOVED it. Nowadays, the kids all complain about molestation!"

It could be as simple as, "When I was a kid, we had to use this thing called a CAN OPENER. We also had this thing on the telephone that you had to TURN, at least seven times, to make a call--and you got blisters from doing it."

Any ideas?

[Sonetpro]

When I was a kid, When the national anthem played on the TV that was it. It was off for the night.

[Arne]

Sure, my mantra for the past several years had been: There are too many people and most of them annoy me.........

As the people crush intensifies in many areas of the USA, consideration for others has gone down the toilet....

Also, our materialistic cravings, right down to 3 year-olds, has helped accelerate the degredation of our society... Wants have become needs, and happiness depends more on the next purchase, than on family cohesiveness.

For a teenager to be happy they now need an x-box and a cell phone with 4,000 minutes per month along with an mp-3 player, plasma tv, new car at 16, etc...... and they still aren't happy. or satisfied.

[Scooter]

TV commercials. At one time their purpose was to support the programming. Now the purpose of programming is to support the commercials.

I won't fall for it. I surf the net, read, or build something instead. My TV watching usually consists of flipping through 6 channels and finding 6 commercials. No thanks.

[surveytech]

when I was a kid a parade was a parade. There was marching bands from all over the country and some cool floats. There was NOT some moron lip singing to something for TV. Jeez I hate that.

And all of the above applies to Super Bowl Half time shows as well.

And whatever happened to "Test Pattern" on TV? It sure is more fun to watch than those info-mercials. Better for sleeping in front of as well.

[Ira]

HAH! These are great!!! Thanks!

[Arne]

I watch TV with the vcr on (with a movie on tape), and a timer. My vcr can fast forward up to 2 minutes (it is an old vcr). Most stations now have 4-5 minutes of commericials.... So, when a tv commericial break comes on TV, I play the movie on the vcr. if the tape in the vcr comes to a commerical break, I fast forward 4 minutes. if still in commerical, I f/f another minute.

The timer sits on my stand and I wait till it gets to 4 minutes and check to see if commericals are still running.... yes, it is a bit tedious, but not as bad as watching 4-5 minutes of sales pitches on TV..

I figure the tonight show, with jay leno, has 16 minutes of commericals in one hour. so he gets paid millions to be on tv for the balance of one hour. Another annoying thing is he has some decent guests on and insists on talking about their new baby, marriage, breakup, etc... lots of garbage. I don't care about their guests children, grandchildren.... leno is always taped, so I can fast forward through that crapola..

[s4son]

When I was a kid we went outside and played (this was in the 60's not the 40's). When we had someplace we wanted to go we walked. Now that I have gotten old and fat it amazes me how far I used to walk as a kid. Don't even get me started on running.

Sports at all levels. What ever happened to playing for the love of the game. College scholarships have made high school sports more important than study. To compete in high school a kid has to start playing when he/she is 6 or 7 years old. And these parents, geez, you would think their kids are little Bret Favres and Venus Williams. Take a frigg'n pill will ya!

Plastic, the greatest and worst invention of all time.

Scott F.

[TRAIL-OF-TEARS]

Three TV stations rabbit ears and aluminum foil, no remotes.

Well some things don't change, I just described the TV in our house.

[Woodbutcher]

When I was a kid we spent the whole day outside. Played sports, cowboys and Indians, rode our bikes, with Willie Mays or Mickey Mantle baseball cards in the spokes, where ever we wanted to go. We knew when dinner was and better be there on time. Short of that Mom didn't worry where we were. She didn't have to.

BUT THE BEST WAS... We had a second stove in the basement for the twice a year big party where we needed that extra oven. As 12 year olds we would get our lead soldier molds out of an old toy box (without a safety latch) and begin melting hot lead on the old stove. Carefully pouring the molten metal into the molds. No need for Mom or Dad to help.
While the stove was on we would also take an old cast iron Griswold fry pan, that I still have today, and heat up a few hand fulls of marbles. When good and hot we would pour them into cold water to crack them. Nothing better then a bag of fried marbles to trade with your friends.

[TRAIL-OF-TEARS]

Oh and on that phone thing.
Back in the day we did not have caller ID or *69 or Caller ID blocker.

Now we have all that crap. You pay extra for caller ID then you can pay and extra charge for caller ID blocker now you are in the same place we were 25 years ago, and are paying 3 times as much

[doug hodder]

Best thing...building crappy forts in the back yard or out in the woods and sleeping in them, and actually being able to ride a bicycle without a helmet, and all padded up having to live/ride in a Nerf World...how did any of us survive without "Big Brother" mandating our safety? Playing on a team, beating the other team and not having to worry about their feelings cause they lost. Doug

[Scooter]

Oh and on that phone thing.

And in my area it's an extra charge to have an unlisted number. Why the heck is that!!!!!

[rainjer]

The thing I can't figure out is, since when did we start giving 10 year olds cell phone? That is the #1 thing on my daughters X-mas list.

The one thing that really annoys me is now days we have 150 channels on the TV & there is still njothing on worth watching most of the time.

And... What happened to Saturday morning cartoons? I miss Bugs Bunny while eating my Fruit Loops...

[Arne]

They have cell phones for kids that only have mom and dad buttons on them... that might be good to have these days, given the environment we live in.... but not to yak on for hours on end.

My cell phone calls rarely last more than 2 minutes. the phone is always off when I'm not using it.. and I don't know my own number. it is a tracfone that costs me 8 bucks a month and is essentially my own portable telephone booth... nothing more.

Each year, I renew for 94 dollars and get 150 minutes... right now, I have rolled up 650 unused minutes... guess I'm not a cell phone type of guy. I keep a list of phone numbers on a piece of paper, do not know how to use call waiting, or whatever it is... it is.. just my own portable phone.. boy, am I getting old..... oh, and it stays in my car, not on my hip.. I do not need to be in constant contact with the world... and yup, I'm not only old, I'm a cynic as well.