Remembering The 80's

Who here has lived through that time?
Late 80's, early 90's.
Before cellphones and computers.

Share your memories here so that our younger generation can see the horrors we had to deal with.

For example, just tonight I was discussing the land line long distance phone call wars . It was expensive to call someone long distant . Ma Bell got broke up, and the competition for lower long distant phone calls began.
I remember often changing long distant providers for a cheaper price because I lived far away from my family.

Here is an article I came across regarding some of these primitive ways of our generation.

An article in a recent USA Today reported that in an online survey of 1000 adults, “three-quarters of Americans believe the country was better off in the ‘80s than now.” Notable about the poll was that some who answered in the affirmative weren’t even alive during the 1980s. It seems the ‘80s have become the new ‘50s. In a sense, those polled were on to something. The ‘80s were a grand decade. Compared to the high tax, dollar cheapening, Cold War fearing 1970s, the ‘80s marked a very positive rebirth of the grand idea that was and is the United States. Much like today, many in the ‘70s felt that America’s best days were behind it. Happily, Ronald Reagan felt differently given his belief that as opposed to desire having exited the American spirit, it still existed; the enterprising nature of Americans having been suffocated by bad policy from Washington during the “Me Decade.”

www.forbes.com...

I am 53 years old now, but those were some good years in my 20's.

i turn 40 this month.

we had a rotary phone when i was smaller... what a pain in the butt to dial a number, took forever. and plus, if someone wanted to get a hold of you and you weren't home, they just had to try again later. no answering machine, no voicemail.

i did some telemarketing in college, trying to get people who had left AT&T to switch their service back, and get special long-distance rates. we had tables of rates for times, countries, locations... and i got cursed at a lot as soon as people heard me say AT&T.

if you saw someone on a show or a movie and they looked familiar, but you weren't sure where you saw them... get used to living with not knowing. no google, no imdb. my dad still resents that we can just look that up now, while he's still trying to remember.

no computer at home for most of school... papers had to be handwritten and then typed up on the computers at school. then we had a computer, but still no internet. i didn't have internet until i got to college, and got my first email address when i was 18.

no streaming, no tivo, no guarantee a show you liked would last, let alone go into syndication... so if you thought it was good you better tape it with your VCR, and hope you had good timing if you were trying to cut out the commercials.

that's just off the top of my head. i prefer living now, definitely.



ETA: not sure how much of the 'younger generation' is here to read this, hehe

So many eyes were shot out.

I really, REALLY, try not to.

6.99 on ebay

a reply to: Lysergic

The movies from the 80's are good. But culturally oh my what a mess.

originally posted by: fiverx313
i turn 40 this month.

we had a rotary phone when i was smaller... what a pain in the butt to dial a number, took forever. and plus, if someone wanted to get a hold of you and you weren't home, they just had to try again later. no answering machine, no voicemail.

i did some telemarketing in college, trying to get people who had left AT&T to switch their service back, and get special long-distance rates. we had tables of rates for times, countries, locations... and i got cursed at a lot as soon as people heard me say AT&T.

if you saw someone on a show or a movie and they looked familiar, but you weren't sure where you saw them... get used to living with not knowing. no google, no imdb. my dad still resents that we can just look that up now, while he's still trying to remember.

no computer at home for most of school... papers had to be handwritten and then typed up on the computers at school. then we had a computer, but still no internet. i didn't have internet until i got to college, and got my first email address when i was 18.

no streaming, no tivo, no guarantee a show you liked would last, let alone go into syndication... so if you thought it was good you better tape it with your VCR, and hope you had good timing if you were trying to cut out the commercials.

that's just off the top of my head. i prefer living now, definitely.



ETA: not sure how much of the 'younger generation' is here to read this, hehe

I would get checks from AT&t and other phone companies for switching to they're plan. LOL !

Got my first email account through AOL in the early 90's, still have my email account from 1996 from msn.

I was trained in college on the 8088 chip around the mid 80's in college to get my associate degree in electronics.
Worked on vcr's, and cd players when they first came out. Especially the 12 in video disc they used for video games.

The '80s were my childhood.

Two memories in particular:

1. Getting my first CD player for my rack system (now *there’s* a phrase) in 1987 and salivating over what CDs to buy first. I ran down to Tower Records and, breezing past the still-substantial vinyl LP section, went to the CD area with all the other cool people and picked out The Cars Greatest Hits and Sgt Peppers.

2. I worked with a guy in the late 80’s who was moonlighting as a salesman for Compuserve. For those that don’t know what that is, drive down to the local library (if it’s open) and ask the nice lady there to help you . Or just use the Internet.

originally posted by: IgnoranceIsntBlisss
I really, REALLY, try not to.

I had a really good time back then. First wife left me, moved to the beach and partied till I was in my 30's before messing up and getting married again, getting a house, mortgage, kids and all.

I'm a 90's teen so looking back on pompom shoulder pads, glam metal, all that BS society allowed MTV to perpetuate, its some dark stuff even by my standards.

originally posted by: Monsieur Neary
Two memories in particular:

1. Getting my first CD player for my rack system (now *there’s* a phrase) in 1987 and salivating over what CDs to buy first. I ran down to Tower Records and, breezing past the still-substantial vinyl LP section, went to the CD area with all the other cool people and picked out The Cars Greatest Hits and Sgt Peppers.

2. I worked with a guy in the late 80’s who was moonlighting as a salesman for Compuserve. For those that don’t know what that was, drive down to the local library (if it’s open) and ask the nice lady there to help you . Or just use the Internet.

I remember my first cd player I got, maybe 1990, and the first cd was Nirvana, I think.

a reply to: Groot

Are you from Glasgow and your name is really Get Out as GROOT

Confused

the 80s were great man

Ahhh, the good old days, no one had a smart phone, Intellivision was the #, and next to the rotary phone on the coffee table was the cable tv remote, a brown box with 20 buttons and selector switch literally connected to the tv with a long cable.

a reply to: SituationNAFU

SNAFU on Intellivision.

a reply to: Groot

Oh we walked 2 miles to Musicland at the mall, through the forest and the cemetery, at like age 13, and jacked our first CD's LOL. The CD cases came in those double long cardboard sleeves but it didnt matter. We made poster trophies out of them. We got Public Enemy Fear of a Black Planet, Pantera Vulgar Display of Power, Nirvana, Megadeth Symphony of Destruction, House of Pain, and NWA Efil4zaggin.

We were such bastards LOL.

originally posted by: stonerwilliam
a reply to: Groot

Are you from Glasgow and your name is really Get Out as GROOT

Confused

the 80s were great man

No, man.

Born and raised in the deep south in the great USA. I was a teen in the 70's.The 80's, I went to college and started my career, 30 years and still going.

Ahh ... the good ol’ days when I used to get so much more done because I didn’t have the internet.

All kidding aside.. I miss that decade 😕.. I was focused on raising young children ... and devoted time to them and the household. I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat, though I may change some choices I made. Wouldn’t miss the technology one bit.

The Atari,and the Commodore 64,
The latch key kids with the keys for the doors,
Cabbage patch kids and and gettin' paid for chores,
The nerds on the bus talking sports and scores,
Transformers plus the voltron force,
Wrestlemania screaming till voices were hoarse,
John hughes was a tour de force,
The brat pack,young guns on a horse,
Eddie Murphy, comic books ,
before it was cool to be nerdy,
Before hip hop got dirty,
before Wayne's world was worthy,
I'm talking church lady,
Mommas family,
Anologue and grainy...






Respectfully,
~meathead

I was born in 1952 so that makes me a child of the 60's.

The seventies was when I got my first color T.V., I was already married and I bought it used, it lasted about 2 weeks, it sucked.
After we got settled in our marriage more we bought a Curtis-Mathis cabinet T.V., that was something, it was more furniture than T.V., the picture was still bad compared to today's standards, but if you had the rabbit ears just right you could pull in a few channels that were fair for the time.
I wasn't even able to receive cable until the early 80's, then not long afterwards we were able to get DirecTV, now THAT was something!

I rode a 1966 Triumph Bonneville motorcycle I bought used in 1972 then a 1975 Triumph Trident, 1981 Yamaha 1100, and on and on...
I still ride, but those were the days, especially when you didn't have the traffic that we have now, people actually smiled and waved at you if you were on a bike. You might get 'the finger' now if you're at a red light. heheh

Hated the disco era but loved the 80's 'new wave' stuff, I still miss that stuff, it seemed to come and go fast, I thought it was good, maybe I was the only one.