You know you're ancient when...

[Stephen]

You find the movie JAWS listed among the classic movie listings and you recall going to see it opening weekend.

[Stephen]

You are in the music store and a young girl tells her friend... "Yeah the Beatles... That was Paul McCartney's band before Wings"

[Nancy]

You remember Maureen McGovern's The Morning After from The Poseidon Adventure rather than from the South Park episode, The Succubus .

Fun topic, Stephen.

[Bill, Moderator]

Your walking down the street and someone exclaims, "Hey Gramps"

You realize you're going to have to start saving up for your next traditional wedding anniversary gift which will be "Emerald"

[Bill, Moderator]

You just watched the movie "Elvis" with Kurt Russell and remember seeing him on the Ed Sullivan Show (above the waist only).

[B.L.]

You can remember your Grandma picking up the phone and telling her sister-in-law, who lives across the road, to get off the party-line because SHE needs to make a call.

[Steven]

You need every aspect of using your cell phone to be "voice activated" because you can't see anything on the phone itself, and you wouldn't know an app from crap

[Bill, Moderator]

You start using the word 'newfangled' a lot.

[David]

You find yourself saying, "Fashion these days? It's just a rerun of the [40/50/60/70]s."

[Doug]

Everything you are watching is a remake of something that you loved in the 80's!

[Bill, Moderator]

Doug wrote: "Everything you are watching is a remake of something that you loved in the 80's!"

One gets tired of reboots!

[Stephen]

Someone else mailed me a couple of replies to this post stolen directly from Phyllis Diller

You know you're ancient when your birth certificate is on a scroll...

...and they've discontinued your blood type

And you not ancient enough if you've never heard of Phyllis Diller.

[Bill, Moderator]

I liked Phyllis Diller. Your last line reminded me of a conversation I had with my office manager, who is 38. We talk movies a lot and somehow got on Jesus/Religious movies. I had suggested The Ten Commandments as a great one. She'd never heard of it. So, I said it starred Charlton Heston. "Who's that," she said.

Sigh... That made me feel ancient.

[Steven]

Don't feel bad. I was talking to a young woman in a club who probably got in with a fake i.d. and when I mentioned the Village People for some reason, she said " Who? What village are they from?".. I felt old as the Rosetta Stone.

[B.L.]

Kernos, I understand how you feel. Even though I'm the same age as your co-worker, I do know who Charlton Heston is and I've seen the Ten Commandments more times than I can count. My great-uncle was a camera man for that movie, so it was required watching every year when it came on t.v. LOL! But still, I feel my age when I'm talking to the youngin's I work with as well. I'll mention something and see that blank look on their face and have to add: Before you were born...... LOL!

[Stephen]

Steven wrote: ".....I felt old as the Rosetta Stone. " Now THAT would make a great drag Name!

I've always thought Mine would be Alexa De Bois or Heidi LaPinga or even Penny Dreadful but now...

And as to Charlton Heston... I've often wondered if the mortician DID get to pry that rifle out of his cold dead hands. I'm sure that at least some of you recall his being in Ben-Hur too and that awful (but true) story about his co-star pretending while filming that he and Ben had been lovers.

[Tom]

Kernos wrote: "I liked Phyllis Diller. Your last line reminded me of a conversation I had with my office manager, who is 38. We talk movies a lot and somehow got on Jesus/Religious movies. I had suggested The Ten Ten Commandments as a great one. She'd never heard of it. So, I said it starred Charlton Heston. "Who's that," she said.

Sigh... That made me feel ancient...."

There's a Grace Kelly exhibit and retrospective coming to Toronto and I mentioned it to our student intern and, no, he'd never heard of her.

[Stephen]

You know you're ancient when...

The actor you used to feel guilty about liking because he was too young for you starts letting his grey hair show in roles.

Anyone else notice the whisps of grey in Robert Sean Leonard's hair in the latest season of House. He was so beautiful in Dead Poets Society... and so young!

[Bill, Moderator]

Tom wrote: "...There's a Grace Kelly exhibit and retrospective coming to Toronto and I mentioned it to our student intern and, no, he'd never heard of her. "

They always get that blank look when I say the most beautiful woman I've ever seen is Greta Garbo.

Stephen wrote: "...The actor you used to feel guilty about liking because he was too young for you starts letting his grey hair show in roles...

Wow man, this has happened so many times. I keep looking for new fantasy youths to replace those that have gone over.

[Michelle]

your younger brother is taking forever to buy a baseball cap and the shopkeeper says' Your son is very choosy'. 7 years between us like.......

[Harry]

You remember dial phones......

[Byron]

Brad, don't be mean. . (go look in your parents garage. )

[Stephen]

Brad wrote: " They're pretty cool looking in a retro way. Very old fashioned. How do you text on them???..."

Try 1 800 WESTERN UNION

IF THAT'S UNCLEAR WIRE FOR DETAIL /STOP.
BEST WISHES /STOP.

[Byron]

*lol* well responded. . Stephen

[Ann]

You know you're ancient when...

You remember what every item in the supermarket used to cost twenty (thirty, forty) years ago.

And you're really ancient when you can't remember what you're there to buy now.

[Byron]

You know your ancient when


you try to go to a club you used to go to and find out it closed 5 years ago. . :-\

[Bill, Moderator]

...when as a 6th grader mom gave you a quarter to get a pack of cigarettes from the corner store, and you bought a coke with the change.

Or, you drove up to the gas pump and 4 cute young guys ran to your car to pump the gas, wash your windows, check the water and oil, and air your tires, charged 20¢ a galleon and said thank you, smiling all the time.

[Stephen]

Kernos wrote: "...you drove up to the gas pump and 4 cute young guys ran to your car to pump the gas, wash your windows, check the water and oil, and air your tires, charged 20¢ a galleon and said thank you, smiling all the time. ..."


C'mon No one's THAT old! Next you'll be telling us your pet Dino is now part of the gasoline those cute boys were pumping! Or that in your day four on the floor meant that you and Barney were both running.

[Bill, Moderator]

LOL - It's true though. I can remember being quite nervous the 1st time I had to pump gas all by myself. This could have been part of my fascination for cute boys. ('boys' = legal males of any age)

Does anyone remember the original Volkswagen bugs that didn't have a gas gauge? They had a lever under the dash for an emergency tank which held a galleon in case you ran out of gas. And, it's true. they did float as I can attest from personal experience.

[Stephen]

OK, I actually do remember getting our family car filled with gas at the station that the family frequented, and my wanting to go to the one across the street cause they had a cute son who sometimes worked the pumps. But four smiling cute guys? You sure you're not thinking of one of those old Texaco ads?

And as to old VW's... I don't recall ever seeing one without a gas guage, but I do remember riding shotgun and manning the ice scraper when the front windshield would ice up in the winter.

[Stephen]

You KNOW you're ancient when you remember these toys.

the Give-a-Show projector!
the Spirograph
the authentic Davy Crockett Coonskin cap

[Bill, Moderator]

Ah! I was so proud of my coonskin cap and could sing ALL the verses of "Davy Crocket, Davy Crockett, king of the wild frontier..."

Then there was Spin and Marty. I was so in love with Spin and kept harassing my parents to spend the summer at a dude ranch.

Anyone remember watching Don Winslow or Captain Video?

[Stephen]

No to Winslow or captain video but I do recall Spin and Marty. From the Micky Mouse club show, no?

BTW you know you're ancient when you read Sprout and our snarky protagonist refers to Josh Hartnett in The Virgin Suicides as an "old movie."

[Bill, Moderator]

And, you know you're old when the kids in the group don't (or can't) even comment on your brilliant repartee!

[Jeffrey]

ok im feeling particularily old today... it being my 50th birthday and all. And here are three memories that confirm a number of my fears...

(1) seeing The Godfather at the cinema with my sicilian grandfather
(2) saving for 2 years to buy a $1000 jvc VHS video recorder back in 1980
(3) taking a student loan for $6,500 to buy the new ibm pc xt only to find that DOS was not included... then buying DOS and having to go back a second time to buy the extra memory to run DOS!

oh how about one more...

(4) Going to my first gay club at the age of 25 (windy city bar in chicago). Thelma houston's dont leave me this way was playing and I was standing beside a twinkie who screamed out... oh my god they remade the communard's song!

[Nancy]

Happy birthday, Jeff! My 50th will be next month.

[Jeffrey]

Thanks!

[Bill, Moderator]

Buying my 1st New car, a Ford Fairlane for about $4500.

[Rob]

... if you remember when computer disks were the size of LPs and the drives the size of washing machines.

& for the Brits

... if you have 'O' levels and know what to do with log tables!

[Bill, Moderator]

Rob wrote: "... if you have 'O' levels and know what to do with log tables!"

or your slide rule...

[Jeffrey]

Rob wrote: "... if you remember when computer disks were the size of LPs and the drives the size of washing machines.

too funny. I had an HP 3000 hardrive in my living room for years as a curiosity. Revved up like the loudest washing machine you ever saw.

How about remembering carrying a stack of punch cards across campus for a comp sci class and then dropping the damn things. aaargghh! hey and the little punches as confetti at sporting events... even geeks served a sports related purpose in those days!

[Stephen]

I Recall that during finals week the lines for a keypunch machine were so long that one fellow brought in a manual card punch... sort of looked like an autoharp. "Two. Two. Two obsolete technologies in one!"

[Bill, Moderator]

DId you ever drop your box of punch cards leaving them scattered all over the place :-(

[Debbie]

you still have such small tupperware containers:
http://dorothy-snarker.tumblr.com/day...

[Jeffrey]

ok, i hate to admit that i didnt even know that 35mm film containers were obsolete. I assumed they were still in use. Guess i havent kept up on the digital photo revolution

[Stephen]

Obsolete! They still exist they're just not common. Sorta like those yellow plastic things you put in your 45's so you can play em on your 33 turntable spindle... er strike that.

[Bill, Moderator]

Stephen wrote: "Obsolete! They still exist they're just not common. Sorta like those yellow plastic things you put in your 45's so you can play em on your 33 turntable spindle... er strike that."

Or your 78 turntable ;-)

[Stephen]

Yep but I'm getting too old to wind that one...

[Stephen]

You know you're ancient when somebody is described in period fiction as an "E-Ticket" and your first thought is NOT the airlines or the internet.

Hint: Think Disneyland.

[James]

I'm a little late to the party here…but I remember when a Hershey Bar cost a nickel. I'm guessing that puts me in the ancient-old-coot demographic.