Ah, the days when children knew how to pour a good, stiff drink.

What happened to those days? I can remember showing my mother a little drawing I did of a butterfly and some flowers while she was talking to Mrs. Hoffmeyer from next door and she said "That's nice, sweetie. Now run and go make Mommy a martini."

Why it seems like my introduction to barware was just yesterday, but I must have been five or six. My stepfather kindly taught me the difference between a highball and an old-fashioned. I fondly remember mixing up a few Tom Collins for my dad and his friends. And making Mom a bloody Mary when she "didn't feel good" or fetching her shots of Wild Turkey for her cramps.

Ah, the old days. When every child was a bartender and your toys could kill you.

Lawn Darts, anyone?



Maybe a toy woodburning tool like my brother had, with the non-UL listed, 12" long cord we used to plug in near the drapes?

Those were the days, I'm tellin' ya........

I never had a bike helmet and got several concussions falling off. (I'm sorry, who are you again?)

And damn it, I miss Jarts!

I thought I was the only kid who could make an Old Fashioned at age six. ;)

at the age of six and was often told to sing it loudly, very late on school nights, with my drunk stepfather. This was after he had cried a bit about Jesus and before he started smashing plates and cursing republicans. And before my mother got up and started screaming at us.

God I miss those days. ;-)

Whiskey River, take my mind
Don't let a memory talk to me
Whiskey River, don't run dry
You're all I got, take care of me
I'm drowning in a Whiskey River
Bathing my memory's mind in the wetness of its soul
Feeling the amber current flowing from my mind
To warm an empty heart you left so cold

(Sorry, Bouncy, for the thread hijack here)

about closing him up (again) and they have to determine if he has pneumonia, and if so whether it is viral or bacterial. (He's been on anti-biotics for the surgery recovery so if it's bacterial it must be a rather rugged strain.)

so he has to be able to lift those boxes of mail into his SUV again for delivering. (He's applied for an early medical retirement, but we've heard that they always turn people down the first time they apply. By the time they would approve him, well he'd bee rather close to his real retirement date. :eyes:)

both AUTHENTIC and NEW

One of the early Spinal Tap names. :7

I could have little sips on occasion.

We rode our bikes barefoot and without helmets.

We rode our skateboards with no helmets or pads.

There were no carseats. Hell, I remember when there weren't any seatbelts in our little white Ford sedan with the red vinyl interior.

get-togethers. Not sure if that had anything to do with him winding up at A.A. 15 years later or not, though.

it might have.....

Damn. We were naughty. It was at an outdoor BBQ/cookout. We had a lake house in a weekend home neighborhood that was populated completely by doctors and surgeons. All of the doctors and their wives and kids got together on Saturday evenings for dinner by the lake.

Never the twain shall meet.

I'm typing without thinking on my lunch break. I'll edit.
:)

I have a picture of myself at around seven or eight months old and my mother has just taken me to the doctor for a checkup. She got home, opened the door of their 68 Camaro and my dad snapped a picture, because I had fallen asleep on her chest, sort of sitting on her lap.

Thing is, I noticed:

a) the interior was black vinyl, there was no a/c and it was late summer. No wonder I'm red as a beet.

b) I'm between my mother and a steel steering wheel. Um, if she had been in an accident, my soft little head would have been like a ripe grape between her and that wheel. YIKES!

But hey, those were the good old days! When just going to the doctor as a baby was a life or death experience! Will it be heat stroke, smushed head, or will we arrive home ok? The gamble of just LIVING back then! LOL!

From having the whole freekin' world blown up in those days... what's a little heatstroke?

I remember my stepfather ordering us to go out and FIND the seatbelts in my mom's Oldsmobile Toronado.

We eventually found them and asked him if he wanted us to find them in his Ford F150 pickup and he said hell no, he wasn't wearing any damn seatbelt, let 'em GIVE me a ticket!

He sloshed a bit of whiskey when he emphasized that last part, I remember.

You'd be safe. Those were the days.

(my parents' motto: "Babysitter, Schmabysitter!") and we would beat each other with spatulas and slotted spoons from the kitchen.

Fuzzy watercolor memories.....

now look at me :P

You reminded me: me and my cousin Lisa would steal cigarettes from our grandparents and smoke them in the side yard. One time her mom (my aunt) caught us and she got a whipping with her dad's belt right there in her wet bathing suit, because they were Mormon and she wasn't even supposed to have a Dr. Pepper, much less a smoke!

:rofl:

My parents found out and said "don't do that, it'll kill ya."

I never cared for the taste of them, anyway.

this morning when I saw a bit on GMA (I know, I know, but it gets me out of bed) about kids letting people into their houses. the GMA people had a guy pretend to have lost his cat and knock on doors, the kids invarialby let him in. (teenagers, mind you) one boy even to Diane Sawyer's shock, gave him some water! can you imagine? giving a thirsty guy some water? the parents kept saying "i can't believe it, I taught him better than that" Remember, these are teenagers, not 10 year olds. I hate the fact that we teach children to fear strangers, not to help them. One of them, a blonde girl, had a large cross on the wall, and her mom was yelling at her, and crying, that the man could have raped her, or killed her, anything. I wanted to ask her if she could find where, in the bible, Jesus slammed his door in the face of someone needing help.

sad that we live in a paranoid world.

I mean, there ARE sickos in the world. I speak as the mom of a 10 year old girl. She's always encouraged to help others, stick up for the defenseless, but when it comes to letting adult strangers into the house when we're not home, no way, nothing doing, sorry.

would you trust her to make her own judgements?

I mean I know there are sick people out there, and a 10 year old can't make that kind of decision, but a 16 year old?

Sorry, I can't see straight on this issue when it involves my daughter letting a stranger into the house when she's alone. Heck, *I* don't do that. If someone needs water, I will bring it out to the porch.

it's all a matter of perspective, I guess (I am not minimilising your experience or your concern, but even you admint you 'can't see straight' on the issue) we all want people, especially children, to be safe, I'm just saying that the more we try to remove risk from their lives, the less they experience.

seen monkey bars lately?

:D

I don't try to minimize all risk for her. She rides her bike to and from school, about five or six blocks away. And I recently stopped driving ahead of her and sitting on the side of the road to watch her lock up her bike and go into the building. ;-)

Someone said having a kid is like taking your heart and letting it walk around outside your body. The sense of vulnerability is enormous. And my own mother took too many risks with us, all the time, including leaving us unsupervised a lot at young ages. We were just lucky nothing really horrible happened, besides my brother burning down the kitchen when he was four.

But you cant judge a book by it's cover- Ted Bundy was handsome and charming- how did that work out fro women who trusted him?

Nope- I don't want to be callous- but I don't want my kids hurt wither.

I'm not arguing with it, but we cannot live in a civilised society if we teach our children that strangers are a threat. We wonder why the US is so damn xenophobic.

I don't tell my kids to more suspicious of someone because they are from somewhere else. As a matter of fact, I make a concerted effort to expose them to foods, music and arts of many different cultures. We learn all about the nations and people of the world.

Unfortunately, it really isn't safe to let strangers into your home, especially without an adult present. Is it more likely than not that nothing bad will happen? Probably. But really shouldn't any adult know better than to ask a child (even a teenager) home without a parent to let then into the house? I wouldn't do it and I would never harm a child.

I wish we could be more trusting too- but the reality of the world is that there are dangerous people out there- and as a mother my primary obligation is keep my children safe. I don't lock them up., we live in a NYC suburb and go into the city all the time, they ride their bikes, they do things. But they are not allowed to let strangers into the house when we are not home. I don't think that makes me paranoid.

All the dumb kids that used to die have been protected to the detriment of us all.......

I used to have the good old fashioned Creepy Crawler set, the one with the open burner..

Also, rememeber when everyone DIDN'T get a trophy?

Remember when only the birthday kid got gifts and everyone didn't leave with a goody bag?

"When everyone's super, no one is" was the cry of the villain!

Earlier on Mr. Incredible laments going to his son's fourth grade graduation because "they keep finding new ways to celebrate mediocrity."

And that's true. Really, really true. But I wonder how to reconcile that with giving kids a sense of self-worth, like they matter.

:shrug:

That nobody loses if they've done their best. That is not the same as making everyone feel "special"

I was a pretty bad football player in High School, but I stuck with it and the satisfaction came with the fact that I stuck it out....

I'd say so. But I feel bad thinking it.
I have been conditioned by the man!!

And you know, those participation trophies didn't mean anything, because you *know* everyone got one.

You know, like not getting something like a trophy, yet still knowing you accomplished something.

I know a lotta RWers like to whine that we have become a bunch of over sensitive sissy crybabies that need constant validation. I think it's not so much that everyone needs constant validation, but, people do need to feel like they have value and far too many kids still feel like they lack value.

To pick up a six pack of Bud, a fifth of Jim Beam, and a couple packs of Camels for Dad.

Jarts, oh yeah, throw them as high as you could, and scurry out of the way before they landed.

Klackers, those wonderful acrylic balls on a string, that you could rapidly whach together to make an unholy din, that is until one of the balls shattered and put your eye out.

BB guns, fireworks, all of these and much much more.

But you know, life was much simpler then, and even with all of its faults, I wouldn't mind going back. Of course I'd have to watch out for falling Jarts:evilgrin:

to the drug store (who remembers Motts Five and Dime? Wasn't that a chain?) to get things for our mom.

And when I was 15, didn't know how to drive and had no license, my mother would have me go to the grocery store in her Oldsmobile with my brother to pick up a few things.

We won't talk about that.

But it wasn't all good.

And the cashiers and managers all knew you. Never had a Motts in town, Ben Franklin and TG&Y were the five and dimes.

Yeah, driving underage, especially on the back roads. My first lesson in driving came from Dad, who gave me the wheel at age fifteen. . . on I-70:scared:

Hell, even when I was of age, I made it a regular practice not to renew my license for a few years. Why bother, especially when I didn't have a car:shrug:
But yes, I got the grocery shopping duty soon as I could drive. Taught me a lot about food and prices, etc. etc.

Everyone who was anyone in first grade in 1969 had a pair.

But they were an excellent weapon to bean somebody upside the head:evilgrin:

I have a friend who still has two pairs of vintage Klackers!

The booze was kept in a lower cabinet, we knew what Angostura Bitters were, the lemon or orange rind required, and the cherrys. Rye Old Fashioned was my dad's favorite...

Then dad got the soda canister gizmo that required the cartridges for the canister. That was great.

Mom preferred gin.

Thanksgiving morning, Grasshoppers all around...

We've got more family photos that include cigarettes and booze than I can say.

Damn, I remember that little bottle with the weird label. Do they still make that stuff? My mom adored gin and tonics.

And I loved the strainer and the shaker. My dad had a whole bar set with a leather covered ice bucket and lid, little ice tongs, etc. My brother and I would play "bar." It's amazing neither one of us are alcoholics.

Candy cigarettes. Had those.

And gum that was pretend chewing tobacco (Big League Chew?).

Now I'm in college and I never even heard of it before. What exactly are you supposed to do with it? It goes with gin and tonic?

(BTW, yes, it's still in a funny-looking bottle, more like BBQ sauce than liquor.)

mention that in the same paragraph. I don't remember which drinks we added a few drops of that to, but I think you can also use it in cooking.

:shrug:

We haven't used any yet, but just from the smell it seemed like it wouldn't go too well with a g&t. The only thing I ever add to those is lime. Of course, now I'm back to square one.

:shrug:

Or a Rob Roy. Only two drinks I can think of that have that as part of the recipe.

I mean you have them wearing bike helmets, and pads, and no lawndarts. Man growing up my parents had the tv on a tv tray, and no outlet covers. I did not wear a helmet riding my bike. If I busted my head I busted my head. It hurt but we went on. I will never forget the alligator teeth tearing the back of my ankle all to pieces, and I had to ride a mile to get it doctored. These kids today need to dodge some cares get a few knots on their heads, and get electricuted, builds character.

Now I know that will get me flamed.

But I'd rather they not get electrocuted, if you don't mind!

There is a danger in romanticizing the past a bit too much. I mean, teachers and doctors also didn't call CPS when a kid was clearly being beaten/physically abused/neglected/molested, etc. and that wasn't good.

Also, remember a lot of kids died needlessly in accidents back then. There is a certain bragging factor in saying we survived more dangerous times, but I don't want anyone to misinterpret my original post, which was very tongue-in-cheek, as saying I think we should go back to those days.

But I also don't wrap my daughter in bubble wrap when she goes out to play. She's had her share of injuries, even stitches.

I just do it differently. I would not let my child be electrocuted. Though some parents I see, are so wrapped up in making everything so very accident proof. You have to get hurt sometimes to let you know where your limits are.

With real creme-de-menthe.

Hell I didn't know. I thought it was a flavour. I'd get myself a dish of ice cream and pour about three ounces on when nobody was looking, eat up the whole thing and then get really giggly and sleepy.

It wasn't as if they used a lot of syrup.

But I guess it's as good an explanation as any for my brain damage... :evilgrin:

When I get up, every kid had to have some sort of firearm.

Pellet rifles, 22's - you name it.

A friend and I used to blast away at tin (yes, real tin) cans with a .22. Pity nobody told us about backstops. Who know where some of those rounds ended up.

our parents were trying to kill us. All those raw eggs in cake batter and cookie dough that we scraped from the bottom of a bowl. How did we ever make it? *snort*

mercury for about $2 (it was so curiously heavy for such a small bottle). The druggist would just fill a 2-oz dropper bottle from his big stash, and I'd take it home and do stuff with it: rub it on dimes to make them slick and shiny, chase the little droplets around on the floor and recover them to pour back in the bottle. Ah, youth.

I wonder if that has anything to do with my seizures?

:D

Yikes! LOL!

the corner grocery store to pick up her beer and cigarettes:

A six of Old Milwaukee and Marlboro 100's.

Good times, good times....

Ice in the glass, two fingers of bourbon, soda water, angostura bitters!

My mother, now wonderfully sober, always grimaces and says "Don't remind me," when I mention it.

My mother drank occaisionally when she went out when she was in her twenties. My father never had gotten drunk. My grandparents never had alcohol in their house in my lifetime. There was never any alcohol served at family functions.
My sister has been dating a man from an ethnic family where alcohol is the center of every family celebration, including children's birthday parties. She finds this so odd.
Talking to my co workers, I have found that alcohol at family functions is common amongst people who have lived in America for several generations too. Several of them have or had drinking problems. I have heard that in Europe though that exposure to alcohol young decreases the chances of alcohol dependence, but from what I've seen, I don't know about that.

a straight double of rubbing alcohol out of the old bathroom cabinet. My mom held my head straight while shoving a couple bottles of Gerbers down my throat to soak it up. They remind me of it every time I wonder aloud whether I was adopted.

Don't tell anyone, but my family still owns a set of lawn darts.
Illegal fun for all!