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EP15 - Perspectives... Then vs. Now · Oh And One More Thing

0:10
Some old friends facing our fears, laughing through the
0:13
chaos and drinking some beers. So here's to the laughs, the
0:16
crumbs and the cheers. All the awkward moments and
0:19
we're still here 'cause in the end, we're just doing our thing.
0:22
It's our crazy life. 01 more thing.
0:25
One more thing. Welcome to Oh and one more
0:33
thing, a podcast where 2 long time friends try to figure out
0:36
what the heck is going on with this crazy thing called middle
0:39
age. It's a mix of stories of how we
0:40
navigate our lives and maybe some questionable advice.
0:43
Some days we're wise, other days we're just trying to remember
0:46
where the heck we left our phone.
0:47
So join us as we laugh, groan, and maybe even learn a little
0:50
something about surviving in the second-half of life.
0:53
Oh, and one more thing. Hey, I'm Rob, welcome to.
1:06
Oh, and one more thing. Hi, I'm Brian.
1:09
It's great to be back in the studio again.
1:11
Hi, Brian. We had a special guest last
1:13
week. What was that?
1:14
Cool. It was so cool.
1:15
It was. He did such a good job.
1:17
We hope you had a chance to listen to Mitchell Hall last
1:19
week. If not, please go check it out.
1:21
What did you think, Rob? I thought it was great.
1:23
We they said we we've known Mitchell forever.
1:26
So just to see his progress in in the musical world and how far
1:29
he's taken it, it's just it's fascinating to watch and it's
1:32
very cool. I'm very happy.
1:32
Yeah, he's a fun guy to be around.
1:33
Fun guy? Yep.
1:34
How about being back in the studio?
1:36
I've missed seeing your face every week this summer.
1:39
It's it's been so long since he recorded and had a Google how to
1:42
plug in a microphone. Turns out step one is stop
1:45
crying. You did have a tear over the
1:49
summer. Did it was sad.
1:51
It's been lonely. I'm so happy we're back.
1:53
Have you been out boating? We have we try to get out every
1:56
weekend when the weather allows us.
1:59
I traveled last week for work so there was no boating last
2:01
weekend, but other that we've been out almost every weekend.
2:04
It's been great. Now I may have mentioned this,
2:06
I'm not sure if I have or not. I know person, I mentioned this
2:09
to you about 6000 times, but they're building a roundabout by
2:12
our house. Oh really?
2:14
I've heard the fact that it takes you 45 minutes to go get
2:19
your boat. So if you don't have realized
2:21
that we do coffee every Tuesday and this literally comes up
2:23
every Tuesday 'cause I'm so irritated our boat is stored 5
2:26
minutes from our house but cause of the stupid roundabout they're
2:28
building which is good. It's going to be good in the
2:30
end. It's a very dangerous
2:31
intersection and needs to happen, so I'm glad they're
2:34
doing it. But literally for entirety of
2:37
boating season, damn roundabout is is in our way.
2:40
So it's 45 minutes one way. It's horrible.
2:42
Oh, Rob, can you see the violins playing my?
2:45
Heart leads for you all. First world problems.
2:47
Bodie's not quite as fun this year cause of the travel issues,
2:50
but we still have a great time went around.
2:52
A lot now you don't have. Travel issues?
2:54
I know it's just me being finicky 'cause I'm old so.
2:58
So I've noticed recently in a couple of our posts that we
3:04
created some new merch. We have some new merchandise.
3:09
Yeah, what do we have? We have T-shirts and baseball
3:12
caps. And how much are they?
3:13
Oh AT shirt will run you 20 bucks plus shipping thank you
3:17
very much. And 15 bucks for a cap.
3:19
Yes, they're very lovely, they're very stylish.
3:21
Everybody is wearing them, or at least the few people that we've
3:23
given about. Do so my wife is wearing it.
3:24
My wife's wearing hers too. I know end of the promotion I.
3:28
Know it's great I wore my hat out in public and somebody asked
3:29
me what that was all about I got to talk about it you did I did
3:32
it was so because. I wore my shirt to the grocery
3:34
store and the checkout person and asked me about it and I'm
3:37
like. Get out.
3:38
It was really cool. Awesome.
3:40
So it's it's actually working, yeah.
3:42
That's cool, I love it, love it. So if you like some merch, shoot
3:44
us an e-mail or one one more thing pod@gmail.com and we will
3:47
hook you up. And for all you personal
3:49
friends, just call us. Just let us know so we do have a
3:53
since this new season, we're excited to be back Season 2.
3:56
Woo Hoo woo. We just want corrections for
3:58
last season. We need to talk about.
4:00
And we really should do those corrections like the next show
4:03
that, but we'll get into that. That that sounds like we're but
4:06
here's the problem. See, we, you know, we, you know,
4:07
behind the scenes little info here.
4:09
We do record a couple weeks before we actually put the
4:11
episode. Out.
4:11
You're giving away the secret sauce.
4:13
I know, right? But, you know, shocker, we're
4:15
not doing this live. Because you know how many times
4:18
we messed up a lot. I don't think they want to
4:21
listen to that so. So we don't hear from people
4:24
till, you know, a couple weeks later.
4:26
So the last two came in at our last two episodes.
4:29
So that's why we're doing it now.
4:30
We need a fact checker. We need a fact checker.
4:32
So episode 13 making middle life more fun.
4:36
Yeah, I messed up on that. This was you totally messed up.
4:39
OK, So what we were talking about?
4:41
What was It was my favorite lady, and it wasn't Katharine
4:44
Hepburn. It's Audrey Hepburn.
4:47
Yes, there's a little. Bit of an age difference, yeah.
4:49
Yeah, and let's just point out that Rob's mom corrected me.
4:52
Yes, she did, and she was very happy to do that so.
4:55
Thank you, Marianne. And then also in episode 12,
4:57
Where's My Hammer with Jeff Hoxie.
5:00
This one we actually heard from Jeff's wife.
5:02
I know, this was actually really funny.
5:03
So in the episode, if you remember, we were talking about,
5:07
you know, Jeffrey, ever found anything weird at a house?
5:09
He's like, no, not really. His wife taxes us.
5:11
And it's like, my husband was a big fat liar because when they
5:15
moved into their house, so they bought a house that was
5:17
previously lived in. So they are going through and
5:18
they're remodeling it and they ripped open some walls and they
5:22
found some videos. And that's the kind that we
5:24
should talk about, no? But as any normal person, you'd
5:28
be curious and you'd be, huh, I wonder what's on these videos.
5:30
And of course they popped him in and brown chicken, brown cow.
5:32
They probably should be watching.
5:33
That yeah, we'd have to have a explicit on this podcast if we
5:38
talk about that. Yeah, So shame on you, Jeff.
5:41
You lied. But we're excited to jump into
5:46
this episode after that short summer break.
5:49
But today's Hot Topic, it hits home for us.
5:53
It's all about the way things have changed over the years,
5:56
from gadgets we used to use, the way back, how we communicated.
6:01
It's wild to think about the difference of life then and now
6:05
in the way we grew up. Yeah, and what's funny and, you
6:08
know, being as we are middle-aged, it doesn't seem
6:09
like that long ago, but. It doesn't.
6:11
It seemed like just yesterday, yeah.
6:13
But we're like in our 50s pushing 60s and it's holy cow,
6:16
that was, that was a long way. I I didn't, I said pushing.
6:19
Who? Who's pushing 60?
6:20
Not me. Not me.
6:21
No. Yeah.
6:24
But you know that everything we do or are dependent on today is
6:27
so different, and everything we thought was normal and high tech
6:30
back then has changed so much. So let's talk about it.
6:34
This idea was provided by one of our avid listeners, Manny, who
6:37
emailed us at O1 One more thing pod@gmail.com.
6:39
Oh, nice plug. Right.
6:41
He asked what we talked about. Here's what how we grew up in,
6:45
how it is compared to now and I think kind of what our
6:47
perspective is of kind of then and now.
6:49
OK, so we'll try to take some of these ideas and talk about that
6:53
aspect. Yeah.
6:54
So how, how's it different? And I think he was also kind of
6:56
more curious, like, you know, like what kind of affected us
7:00
and like changed us and made us into who we are today kind of a
7:03
thing too. So I think some of the stuff
7:04
we're talking about directly effects kind of why, why, why
7:07
are we doing this podcast? But everything we did then
7:10
affects us now for sure, because we do have that knowledge of the
7:14
past and how it's all changed, right?
7:17
So I think that does change our view.
7:20
Right. So we're the old guys know
7:21
everything. Young kids know nothing, right?
7:23
I still don't know anything. Right.
7:25
So there was this meme I saw a while ago that you'd get a point
7:29
for everything that you did or used in the past as a standard
7:33
part of your life. For example, have you ever used
7:36
a Rotary phone? So the challenge, it was called
7:39
the Gen. X challenge.
7:40
I don't know if you've seen it on Facebook or anything like
7:42
that, but I think that kind of fits what Manny was talking
7:45
about. So we can then talk about how
7:47
that relates back to Oh yeah, today.
7:49
Yeah. There you go.
7:49
OK, like that. So let's start with the obvious,
7:51
OK, one we just mentioned the Rotary phone.
7:53
Rotary phone, OK? Do you ever use a Rotary?
7:55
Phone. Yeah.
7:56
Heck yeah. Now I we it.
7:58
Yes, we had a Rotary phone was really young.
8:02
And then we got the, the, the, the touch dial, the right,
8:04
right. My grandparents had a Rotary
8:06
phone forever though, so anytime we went there, they had the one
8:09
on the wall. Yep.
8:10
Dial and I I grew up with the Rotary phone on the kitchen
8:13
wall. It only had a three foot cord.
8:16
Oh, how did you know? So talk about that.
8:19
So today's cell phones, you go anywhere you want, right?
8:21
You talking private? Yeah.
8:22
No, no, no. You were on display in the
8:25
kitchen. Yeah.
8:26
Talking to your girlfriend or whatever.
8:27
Whatever was going on. Yeah.
8:29
See. See, we had a 25 foot cord, so
8:31
no, at least walk around the corner.
8:32
I'm I'm much older than you. Yes, you are, and you know it.
8:38
Then you'd you'd also pick up the phone.
8:40
And if anybody knows what this is?
8:41
Party line. Yeah.
8:43
Yeah, someone else was talking on the phone.
8:44
We only had one phone. Yeah, but it was party line.
8:47
So you paid a lesser rate to share a line with other people?
8:52
Yeah, see that we never had party lines.
8:54
I grew up with party lines. Yeah, yeah.
8:55
We never had that. So you pick up the phone and you
8:57
hear someone talking and you just politely, quietly hang it
9:00
up and check later to. To save a couple bucks.
9:03
To save. Well, I suppose I mean.
9:05
Right. How about the Did you ever call
9:08
4110 my? God all the time.
9:10
And let's explain what is 411, which is a little bit different
9:14
than the idea of it today. Yeah, because 41411 is like,
9:19
what's the download? What's the information?
9:20
What's the, what's the deets, right?
9:22
Is that what they say? I don't think they say that. 20
9:24
years ago maybe. OK, look at me.
9:26
Right, OK. But in the early 80s, it was an
9:29
information line. You could, they would look up,
9:32
you'd actually dial 411 and talk to a live person and they could
9:37
look up a phone number for you. They'd give you the time, any
9:40
information you needed, they would provide that information.
9:42
They'd give you the address. They, yeah, they would give you
9:45
the addresses and it was, it was really quite.
9:49
It was useful. Useful at the time, right?
9:51
And did you know I just learned this when I was looking up the
9:53
411? It was still in service up till
9:57
January of 2023. Get out.
10:00
I don't know how that is possible.
10:01
That was somebody's job in in 2022, to sit there and take 411
10:05
calls still. Whose job?
10:07
I mean, are you kidding? Yeah.
10:09
So that's really odd. My God.
10:11
But back then it was. That was the cool thing.
10:13
Oh, yeah. You could just dial it and get
10:15
information. And now we have the phone and
10:18
computer in your pocket. You know, and Speaking of 411
10:21
though, but we used to have a number you'd literally dial to
10:24
get the time and temperature. I just look at my phone.
10:29
It's. Six.
10:29
It's 659 and 80° in Minneapolis. Yeah, that's amazing that.
10:33
Was it? That's all I did.
10:34
Somebody all day. That was it.
10:36
I know that's. Boring.
10:37
That's great, I know. But again difference the
10:40
difference from then and now. So back when I took typing
10:45
class. Everybody had to take typing.
10:47
Yes, I used an electric typewriter.
10:50
OK. Not manual.
10:52
In high school when I Ted typing class was electric typewriter
10:55
too, but we had a manual typewriter typewriter at home.
10:58
So those I don't know what is a manual typewriter?
11:00
Okay, so we've all seen them on the old murder She Wrote right
11:05
shows right? And it would you push the key
11:07
and the the little the lever would flop up and hit some black
11:13
ribbon and make the impression in the.
11:15
Paper. So every letter had its own
11:16
little little lever. Every, every letter had a yeah,
11:19
yeah, every one of them. And.
11:20
If you went too fast, they got. Stuck.
11:21
They got stuck or your tape got stuck.
11:24
Yeah or yeah, It was crazy. But that's I learned from my mom
11:27
how to use that manual typewriter.
11:29
Yeah. And then so then they went to
11:30
the electric ones. They had the the IB Ms. had the
11:32
cute little ball. Yeah.
11:33
Yeah, 'cause it still pushed out the same style of letter, but it
11:36
was a little ball. It went really fast, that
11:39
little. Sucker would spin and flip flop
11:40
and you hit all the right letters and it went crazy.
11:42
Yeah, and remember, he had to be tested on how many words a
11:46
minute you could do. I sucked at that.
11:48
Correct words you could do. Yeah, correct.
11:50
He could be wrong. I could type fast just
11:52
correctly. That was the challenge.
11:53
It was terrible but now I type crazy fast I think.
11:58
Not everything's on the computer.
11:59
Yeah, still typing. Still.
12:01
Typing, yes, but it's on the computer and you know, back when
12:03
he wanted to save something, he was on a floppy disk.
12:08
Yeah, but Rob, tell us what a floppy disk is.
12:12
It's a little plasticky little square thing that the first they
12:15
were huge. They're 5 1/2 inches.
12:17
They were on the final five and a quarter was the 1st, 1/5 and
12:19
1/4. And they were literally huge
12:22
bent. Yeah, they bent, they're floppy.
12:24
They they bent. They were there, they flopped
12:25
around and they inside, it was like a like a little felt box
12:28
inside and it had a circle disk in there.
12:30
You put it in and it would write to this disk.
12:32
I mean, same thing. Hard drives, not till recently
12:34
still did today. They just did a lot faster and
12:36
internally but. Right, we're super slow.
12:40
Oh my gosh. But then they went to 3 1/2's
12:42
which were hard plastic. Yep, and you had a whole catalog
12:45
of your 3 1/2 inch disks. I remember installing Windows,
12:48
it was like 9 disks. It was just a kind of tough
12:53
cover. In today's standard 0 space, but
12:56
zero space back then, yeah. Hey, do you ever take in a
12:59
picture with a film camera? Oh, absolutely.
13:01
Do you still have one? Do I have the camera?
13:03
No, but if you want to go in my storage room over here I have a
13:06
box. All the pictures from my youth.
13:08
Oh, I still have all the pictures and I still have my
13:10
film camera. Oh, you do.
13:12
I actually took it out of the the bag just recently to look at
13:16
it again. Yeah.
13:16
And inside that bag is a roll of film my.
13:20
God, it can't be good. I don't know, I haven't tried
13:23
it, but I'm like, I don't want to use this, yeah.
13:26
You know, film is, I want to say it's making a comeback, but it's
13:30
being used more now than it was even 5-10 years ago.
13:32
So it's kind of like records, you know, maybe come back,
13:35
vinyl's coming back. It's kind of the same thing.
13:37
But the challenge though, is there's so few places places
13:40
that develop it now. Right.
13:41
You can't go and just down the street and have developed, you
13:44
have to send it somewhere. You can't drop.
13:45
To a lab. You can't drop it off at
13:47
Walgreens or Target like you used to.
13:48
And then there's the, you know, compare that to today, where our
13:51
phones have thousands and thousands of pictures on them.
13:53
Your thousands of pictures are sitting in a box in the storage
13:56
room. Yes, they are.
14:00
Yeah. One my, my, my target days back
14:02
in the back when I worked back, way back when I worked in the
14:05
electronics counter and developing film like that was a
14:08
huge deal. Like we had a whole counter.
14:10
It was, it was, it was about 12 feet and 24 feet long of all the
14:14
bins to hold all the, all the pictures that developed.
14:16
Yep. You'd go to the little counter,
14:17
fill up the little envelope, drop your little film in there.
14:19
And some guy would come once a day.
14:21
He was like some weird freaky guy that was he always smelled
14:23
of smoke. And he was typically pretty
14:26
large with a long beard. And he would come in this huge
14:29
bag and he'd dump them in and then they'd have to sort, we'd
14:32
have to sort them all out alphabetically.
14:33
And then he'd take this dump, fill the bag up and take them
14:35
with them and. All of us artsy people who
14:37
developed film, Yeah, Were kind of that way.
14:40
Well, yeah. But but you didn't carry like 8.
14:42
1000 in high school, I I did that.
14:44
Did you really? Oh, so I was on the I was
14:46
photography in high school and I would go in the dark of and
14:48
develop the film for the yearbook.
14:50
Oh nice. Nice.
14:51
Yeah, it is really cool. Yeah, it's cool, I'm sure.
14:53
I think we mentioned this earlier.
14:55
You never played a lot of video games as a kid did.
14:57
You. I didn't, did not.
14:58
I play a lot of video games. It just wasn't something that my
15:01
mother thought was appropriate. OK, Did you play Pong?
15:04
I had. I did play pong, OK, I was at
15:06
someone else's house. Sure, sure.
15:08
So what? Yeah, What is Pong?
15:09
What is Pong? Yeah, it's a very slow game of a
15:15
little ball bouncing between two paddles.
15:19
Right. That is it.
15:21
That's it. And so that was just like, so
15:24
cool at the time. Yeah.
15:26
Now, of course, there's any video game you want at the touch
15:29
of your finger, and it's crazy the difference in that, just in
15:33
technology, how it developed. Yeah, I remember I same thing.
15:35
I never, I never had it. Friends had it and I remember
15:37
the control paddle was a little, was a little dial paddle and the
15:41
faster, yeah. Faster and the little bar battle
15:44
up and down, that's just like the game breakout, yeah.
15:46
Same idea. That's exactly what it is.
15:48
Yeah. I thought that was just the
15:49
coolest thing ever. And then you play it for 5
15:50
minutes, like, OK, this. I'm done.
15:53
Yeah. So before we go on, let's hear a
15:55
little bit from our favorite sponsor, Spring Green.
15:58
Yes, let's do that. Hey, this is Rob.
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springdashgreen.com. Ah, good old Spring Green.
16:52
I want to give a shout out to all my Spring Green peeps.
16:54
We had a national conference this last week and I talked to
16:57
lots of them. They're all listeners now.
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I'm so excited to have new listeners.
17:00
All of them are listening. All of them are.
17:01
At least that's what they told me to my face.
17:03
Hi all. Spring Green listeners, we like
17:05
you. Welcome.
17:05
To the podcast. So I bet you used to listen to
17:08
music on cassette tape back in the day.
17:09
I did. Yes.
17:11
I don't think I owned an 8 track my brother.
17:14
Did I didn't own one. Cassettes for sure.
17:17
I did, you know, I remember, I've distinctly remember the 18
17:19
track that I had, the Village People.
17:21
No, really nice. Swear to God, yeah.
17:24
That was IMCA. Yep, Yep, Yep, Yep.
17:28
But yeah, yeah. But yeah, right.
17:29
Me, me and the cassette. That was mostly yeah, do.
17:31
You remember using a pencil to rewind them?
17:32
Oh heck yeah. Or when the the tape pulled out
17:34
and you had to figure out how to get them in there really
17:36
carefully so you didn't scratch the music.
17:38
Absolutely. My distinct memory is making a
17:41
mixtape on the radio. Yeah, trying not to get the
17:44
announcer, but you want the beginning of the music and damn
17:47
it, they always talked over the top of the music.
17:49
Always talked over the song it was.
17:50
So, so annoying. Cause kid, make the mix tape of
17:53
all your favorite music. Yeah.
17:55
Yeah, because you only have the radio, right?
17:57
Yeah. And I didn't have the dual tape
17:58
player to do them back-to-back. Yeah, that was later in life.
18:02
So at this point, we need, we need, we need a young person to
18:04
ask this question too. I wish my kids were here cause
18:07
back when I was, you know, teenager ish when kids are older
18:10
than that. But teenager ish years.
18:12
If you, you know, kind of liked a girl, you'd make her mix tape.
18:15
Ohh Rob like. Do do the kids nowadays, they
18:18
like, do like, like? Like playlists?
18:21
They make a love playlist, do they I?
18:22
Don't know. Is that a thing?
18:23
I don't know, so I'm asking. I'll somebody we'll have to put.
18:28
Let's ask that question, shall we?
18:29
Yeah. Somebody e-mail us, let us know.
18:32
Is that the thing today to make a playlist for the girl or boy
18:36
that you like? Right.
18:37
That's gotta be a thing, right? And that that's generational.
18:39
It has to be. I would imagine I would.
18:41
Imagine this too, yeah? Did you have a Walkman?
18:43
Oh. God, yeah, who didn't have a
18:44
Walkman? I know it was amazing.
18:45
Yeah, outside of Diskman. But the Walkman came first,
18:49
right? And that played your cassette
18:51
and he had the little foam headphones that went over the
18:54
top of your head, not the earbuds, right?
18:56
And then after that came the Diskman, yes, which played the
18:59
CDs. Which always skipped.
19:01
It never worked. Well, cuz the whole vibration
19:04
idea, it didn't calibrate as well as what life is like today,
19:09
right? Right.
19:10
And then if you were trying to jog, which I didn't jog or do
19:16
any sort of movement, it could skip.
19:18
Right. And of course, your entire
19:19
collection was filled from Columbia House.
19:22
I know I loved Columbia House. So did I Oh my gosh, it was the
19:26
worst. So did you order Columbia House
19:28
then? Oh, all the time, yeah.
19:30
Yeah. I mean it was your like. 10 or
19:31
12 free cassettes, Yes. And then the hook.
19:34
The hook? What was the hook?
19:35
Oh, you gotta buy like 8 more, You gotta buy 8 or whatever it
19:38
is. And of course the regular price
19:39
was like 3 times that you could pay for them in in retail.
19:42
So if you do the math, you weren't making out any better.
19:45
But you thought you were you. Thought, 'cause they're gonna
19:48
give me 8 for free or for a penny or whatever.
19:50
They had and when they came in the mail and you got all your 8
19:52
or 10 or 12 or whatever it was, you were in heaven because you
19:55
played those suckers back-to-back.
19:57
Oh. Absolutely.
19:58
You did. Yeah, non-stop.
19:59
But yeah, it was always painful. You had like 2 years to buy a
20:02
year through the rest of them you had to buy.
20:03
Yeah, it was kind. Of And then right before it
20:06
would run out, they'd hit you with another 12.
20:09
Yes, they would. And you'd jump right back in
20:11
because that was all new music. Two years later and today I have
20:16
cases of cassettes. Do you still have them?
20:19
I still have them. Oh my gosh.
20:21
They're in the basement I. Think, I think we talked about
20:24
this on a previous episode, right, right.
20:26
I probably turned all my CDs into, yeah, got an iPod.
20:30
Yeah, we talked about. That right?
20:30
Yeah. Yeah.
20:31
You sent it away. Yeah.
20:32
To have all of them put on the iPod.
20:34
And you trusted the mail system. I did first of all big mistake,
20:38
big mistake but but it worked for you but it.
20:40
Worked. I got an iPod and I don't have I
20:43
I have the digital file still on a on ACD somewhere.
20:47
Yeah, because I have stacks of CDs.
20:51
But my Italian music collection is now on.
20:52
It's what's not ACD, where it's like it's a DVD or whatever.
20:55
Yeah, there's a lot more storage on it.
20:56
Yeah. And they're all like on one or
20:58
two of those on a shelf over here.
21:00
So like 600 CDs are like on 2 DVDs now?
21:02
But when we when we moved from cassettes to CDs, oh that.
21:06
Was huge. Did you do the same thing with
21:08
Columbia House? 'Cause they were doing that
21:10
shoe. Yeah, I did.
21:11
Of course I probably have. I don't 304 hundred CDs at home.
21:14
Oh. Yeah, just stack.
21:16
And then you gotta start replacing your cassette
21:17
collection because it sounded so much better on CD and you're
21:20
burning out your cassette from playing it so much.
21:22
Oh yeah, I had, I had what? A scam.
21:25
A queen, Yeah. Best of Queen CD or sorry tape.
21:29
Yeah. That when you played it would
21:30
go, 'cause I played it so much. Mine was Beastie Boys license
21:36
still. I played that nonstop.
21:39
I I can see it. I can see it.
21:41
Yeah. How about we talk about fashion?
21:43
Sure. I don't know how that relates to
21:44
today, but did you ever pop your collar?
21:47
What, You don't know what that is?
21:49
Come on. I know what it is, I just never
21:51
did it. Oh no.
21:53
You know, he had the cool polo shirt.
21:55
Yeah, and he popped the collar up.
21:56
You'd wear that to school. They're called preppy.
21:58
They're called preppies. We picked on those kids.
22:00
Yeah, well, I was a preppy and an art student, so it fits.
22:04
Fit that and then your hair was big and feathered.
22:07
Oh yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
22:09
Feathered. Feathered was big, Big hair.
22:10
Yeah. What about your jeans?
22:12
Ever peg your jeans? Totally pegged in jeans.
22:14
Never pegged my I think that never is not a strong word.
22:17
I would roll them up and then you do the cuff right and then
22:19
roll it again. Yeah, you need to stay I.
22:22
Never pegged them. I would roll them.
22:24
Roll. Them yes, yes, yes, because
22:25
there are a lot of people who would like pin them yeah him
22:28
stay. That would be the pegging.
22:29
Yeah, I never did that. And I don't know how that comes
22:32
back to, you know, popular fashion today, which I think it
22:36
might because all those things repeat.
22:38
You've seen the bell bottoms come back.
22:39
You've seen the 80s fashions come back, right?
22:43
So all that stuff comes back. That's funny because I was
22:45
scarred as a young kid because again, I back to another story,
22:48
I used to wear tough skins which tormented me as a child, but
22:52
they were always short. So I you know, where, where's
22:54
the flood? Because your friends are so
22:56
short, right? I got picked on relentlessly as
22:58
a kid. So when I got old enough, I
22:59
started buying longer jeans because of that.
23:02
And then what the hell do I do? I roll them up.
23:05
Like makes no sense. But but they weren't short
23:09
pants. No, they were long, I guess.
23:10
Had to roll them up because that's that's what we did,
23:12
right? Yeah.
23:13
So watching Movies Now is. So easy, just so easy for the
23:18
younger crowd. Now you get me who has to try to
23:22
stream it from multiple different services.
23:24
Yes, I get so frustrated I give up.
23:27
It's easier if you know what you want to watch and where it's at
23:29
then you. Go right, right.
23:30
But if you like, I just want to watch a movie, right?
23:32
But you don't have any specific genre.
23:34
I'm just trying to look through the services.
23:37
There's so much choice. It boggles my mind.
23:40
And then I get freaked down. But I'm done.
23:42
Yeah. So it's kind of like going to
23:44
the video store back in the day. Not yet.
23:47
Sort of, sort of. You walk up and down the aisles.
23:50
Right. And browse and browse and
23:51
browse. I don't know, it felt different.
23:54
It felt it was totally different because 8 your selection was so
23:57
much more limited. It was limited, but yet it was
23:59
extensive for the space you were.
24:01
Looking in, yes. And I think there's something
24:04
different about physically handling.
24:06
Yeah, the movie, the VHS or I, I would even dare to say Betamax.
24:09
I don't know a lot of people who had a Betamax.
24:11
We did not. Yeah, we didn't.
24:12
Neither do VHS all the way. We had VHS.
24:14
I still have Avhs. I so do layer.
24:16
I so do we. As buried in the house here,
24:18
Yeah, I had to put my my TV tape as I still have it, just for
24:22
that. Well, we have to keep, we have
24:24
to keep it because there is, I think our wedding video.
24:27
Yeah. And some videos of our children,
24:30
Yeah, used to carry around that massive box, big box on our
24:34
shoulder to videotape. Huge.
24:37
Yeah. So we still have it, probably
24:39
keeping it for that reason. I don't know.
24:40
I just I'm a hoarder. Yeah, you know, I was watching
24:44
TV this weekend and you know what?
24:46
August 1st. What happened on August 1st?
24:48
You know what? This was and I would have been
24:50
the math. Math is hard 44 years ago.
24:53
Oh no. August 1st, 1981, MTV went on
24:56
air for the first time ever. Really.
24:59
Yes, and with the word spoken by one of Mt VS creators, John
25:02
Lack. Ladies and gentlemen,
25:05
Rock'n'roll as the as the Spaceman, You know, then yeah,
25:08
all kind of so cool. Do you know what the name of the
25:13
the band that played the very first song on there?
25:16
The first song, which which was video, killed the radio star.
25:20
I do because I am a trivia aficionado.
25:23
You are the Buggles, one hit wonder.
25:25
There you go, they were the first one to play.
25:27
That's why one of the most asked trivia questions always.
25:29
What was the first video ever played on MTV?
25:32
It's constantly in in the in the trivia rotation.
25:34
So. OK, yeah.
25:35
So put some to marry people. The Buggles video killed the
25:38
radio star. Please note, when we get to our
25:41
bar trivia podcast, I'm going to take that one out because
25:46
seriously, I already wrote it. Spoiler alert, I know the
25:51
answer. I'm taking it out.
25:53
You don't get it off, it's gone. And you know you wouldn't be
25:56
able to watch MTV without cable. Cable television.
25:59
I know that was a big deal. Now.
26:00
So when when did you get cable? Oh, I don't?
26:03
Well, I don't know. You don't know?
26:05
No. Do you actually remember when
26:07
you got? Cable, I don't remember the
26:08
date, but I remember. So again, our friends had cable
26:12
forever, but we lived where we lived in Plymouth.
26:14
It took seemed like it took forever for us to get cable.
26:17
Okay. And I just think to remember
26:19
this, if my mom is gonna be here next week, you can ask the
26:21
story. This is totally true.
26:23
We finally get cable and my dad and I are like super excited.
26:26
Like, yeah, we're getting cable, we're getting HBO, we get to
26:29
watch, we get MTV, we get ESPN. We're we're psyched.
26:32
Cable guy comes over and talks about it and how much it is and
26:35
they look, the cable guy came to your house.
26:36
Salesman. The salesman came to your house,
26:38
right? Who does that right?
26:41
But cableman comes to your house and tells a whole story.
26:43
And my mom just saw the prices and then how expensive it was
26:46
and finally she just she realized she's it's a losing
26:49
battle, took the checkbook, literally threw it at my dad and
26:51
stormed out of the room. But we had cable.
26:55
We must have got it before 81 because I remember watching MTV.
26:59
Oh, OK. Well, see, we got it after that.
27:00
I think it was by 8485. Yeah.
27:02
But yeah, it's, and that's, I mean, it was, it was, we had it
27:05
in three rooms and Oh my God. Yeah.
27:07
So we had, we had it. So I knew we had the extra
27:10
channels, but you didn't have a remote control for the TV.
27:13
Who was the remote control? Me, the kid.
27:16
The the children always get up and turn the channel.
27:18
Yeah. And we only had the basic four
27:20
or five channels. Four or five. 1011 and sometimes
27:23
17 in in Minneapolis. PBS.
27:25
Yeah, PBS. Which is always good.
27:28
Children, please watch PBS. Yes, please do.
27:31
Yeah, I I was a channel changer and we actually had an antenna
27:34
on our roof. That we we did too, yeah.
27:36
Hooked in as we had to do the rabbit ears, but now rabbiters
27:39
are back in style like like that's have you have you done,
27:43
have you put antenna on your TV and scan channels recently?
27:45
No, I have not. There's over 80 channels you can
27:48
get now. Really it's it's.
27:49
Amazing. I always wanted to get a digital
27:51
antenna to place and I know where the signal comes to my
27:54
house from the cities and stuff. I know that, right?
27:56
And I always wanted to do that. But now we have YouTube TV, so
28:00
I'm streaming, yeah. So we have when we moved into
28:02
this house, we have the previous owners had an antenna in the
28:04
garage attic. So I just added a booster to it
28:06
and the cables ran to all the TV's in the house.
28:08
All of our TV's have an antenna hooking for him.
28:11
Yeah, it's crazy, crazy how many channels you can get now.
28:13
I mean 90% of us are all doing old reruns from the 70s and 80s
28:17
but. It's awesome.
28:19
Well, that's what we watch, right?
28:21
Right. 70s and 80s shows. Yeah, exactly.
28:24
You had a boom box growing up, right?
28:25
Of course I had a boom box. That was the big Christmas gift.
28:27
I mean what? Were you gonna play your
28:28
cassette tapes on right? That's what I was making my
28:31
mixed tapes on. Was that right?
28:33
Silver boom box, which all the ads of the day showed it holding
28:39
on your shoulder. You know, I never did that.
28:41
Nobody did that. No, that was, yeah, weird.
28:43
But yeah, I had the boom box, had it for a long time.
28:46
Did. You have the dual 'cause that
28:47
boom box. No, 'cause then I could have
28:49
recorded one. I know I didn't.
28:51
Yeah, I. I didn't for a while, but
28:52
eventually I got the dual and that's was very useful.
28:54
And then for my high school graduation, I got a entire
28:57
stereo system. It was amazing.
29:01
Was it in a wood case? It was in a.
29:02
Wood cabinet, Fake wood case cabinets.
29:05
Yes, the vinyl wood siding absolutely had a a turntable on
29:09
top, had the cassette had CD, had everything and it was great
29:14
and for the longest time it was in my garage as my garage music
29:18
and now it's gone it's. Gone.
29:21
It's gone. But I replaced it with another
29:23
one that does all the same things all.
29:25
Right. So this is probably not 80s, but
29:27
it's still a Gen. X thing.
29:28
Internet, AOL. Did you ever have an AOL?
29:31
E-mail address, never had Internet growing up, OK,
29:34
obviously because it didn't come out that early, right.
29:37
But I think the first time we had Internet, I mean, I was
29:41
already married in probably 1995 when I had moved down to
29:45
Illinois and we had a dial up. Yep.
29:51
Yeah. To get online, Yeah, yeah, like
29:54
so annoying. Somebody's choking.
29:56
It would be like almost 2 minutes.
29:57
And the worst part is you get online, Speaking of the party
29:59
line, but even in your own house, if somebody was online
30:01
and somebody picked up the phone, it would drop your.
30:03
Internet. It would drop your Internet,
30:04
yeah, yeah. So you could only do it at
30:06
certain times, Yeah. 'Cause it was wicked slow as it
30:08
was, you just made it worse, right?
30:10
Yeah. And so, you know, compare that
30:12
to today. Oh my gosh.
30:13
So you mean just just that whole notion of how life was then,
30:18
which was that was top of the line.
30:20
That was cool. Yeah.
30:22
To have that you're right now to today, I mean, there's what
30:27
streaming everywhere constantly is data's pushing past your face
30:30
and your head and your every all day long.
30:32
Like you literally can't function today without some sort
30:35
of Internet access. Right, you can't.
30:37
Like when we lose our Internet at work, our work is shut down.
30:40
I mean our phones, our phones are Internet, our our
30:42
communications Internet. Like we cannot as a company, our
30:45
drivers and their devices, they all use Internet.
30:48
Like we cannot function if we lose Internet.
30:50
Right. And I think that's almost every
30:51
company, Yeah. And in fact, I'm actually
30:54
looking online right now at the content that we are talking
30:57
about. Yes, we are.
30:58
It's all in the cloud. Yeah, it's crazy, isn't it?
31:00
Yeah. How about Casey Kasem?
31:02
Did you ever listen to Casey Kasem in the Top 40 countdown?
31:05
Who didn't? He was amazing.
31:08
I would wait for that Sunday morning and and I'd listen to
31:12
that religiously because it was the thing, you know, he needed
31:16
to know what song was in the number one.
31:17
What? Was the best part about the
31:18
show. What was the best part?
31:20
The long distance dedication and.
31:23
It's always some older song in a heart, right?
31:26
Tear jerking, heart strung story.
31:28
Always sappy about. Every time I'd like to dedicate
31:31
this song to my girlfriend. Right, it has some some poor
31:35
lasso who found the key to life. And here's the song.
31:41
Yeah, every time. Every time.
31:42
Yeah. But did you know that Casey
31:44
Kasem's show, Radio show ran from July 4th, 1970 to August
31:49
6th, 1988? OK, did not.
31:51
So that was a long time he was on the radio.
31:53
Yeah. Yeah.
31:54
And it still plays today. On Sunday mornings.
31:57
I know, yeah. And whenever I find it, I'm
31:59
like, oh, I got to listen because it's always the 80s.
32:01
Yes, it's on and local here in town.
32:02
It's on Cool one away in Sunday mornings.
32:04
OK, 7.9. I'm going to listen.
32:06
That's awesome you've used an encyclopedia, I've heard.
32:09
All the time. Yeah.
32:10
I grew up with an Encyclopedia Britannica in my house.
32:14
You. Had the full set in your.
32:14
House we had the full set because why?
32:17
Why the traveling salesman came to our door.
32:19
And my mother was how are my children ever going to learn if
32:22
I don't buy this for them? And it was homework circa 1976.
32:27
So in the 80s, when I was doing my book Reports from the
32:30
Encyclopedia of 1976, my facts were usually never right.
32:36
That's an outdated fact, Brian. Exactly.
32:40
It's like the piece so. Anything after 76 I didn't know
32:43
what happened. Ohh, my gosh, isn't that funny?
32:45
Like I I just imagine like, like when you bought those, like that
32:48
was courage as of them, but yeah, they're useless.
32:50
Like a year later they're useless.
32:51
But they that's what we had. I know right?
32:53
Oh my gosh that's so funny ohh. So wow, that was quite a list.
32:58
I'm sure we can go on forever, but we're kind of wearing out
33:00
this topic. Yeah, Manny, who was the
33:02
inspiration for this episode, asked me what's changed or how
33:05
have things changed from the 20s, from our 20s until now?
33:08
And we're more to the point. What took us from then until
33:10
now, or how did we turn out to be so great at midlife?
33:13
Oh my gosh, we are so well, we're getting great at midlife.
33:17
How about that? We are getting.
33:17
Great, so I think I have a little snippet here of I found
33:21
this online and I thought this was perfect to kind of explain.
33:24
Our generation. This is awesome and.
33:27
Truly why we are the best generation.
33:28
So I was at this leadership conference and one of the
33:31
speakers was talking about generational strife and she
33:33
talked to about the boomers, then she, then the millennials
33:36
and then the zoomers. And then she said Gen.
33:38
XI didn't forget about you even if the rest of the world has.
33:41
But I have no advice for you for a few reasons.
33:44
First, you don't need it. You are the most independent and
33:47
self-sufficient generation the history of mankind, and there's
33:50
literally nothing I can teach you.
33:52
Second, even if I did have something to tell you, you
33:54
wouldn't care, right? Yeah. 3rd The reason we ignore
33:57
you is because the rest of us are all terrified of you.
33:59
Zombie apocalypse ever happens. We're all hiding behind you.
34:04
Somehow you'll know what to do. I like this quote.
34:08
This is great. And seriously, I mean, I'm not
34:10
just saying that because I'm a Gen.
34:12
X, but it's on point. I mean, it is.
34:14
We were forced to learn how to survive on our own.
34:16
We were latchkey. Kids, right?
34:18
People say it all the time. Did you really just come home
34:21
and either your parents were there and you get to fend for
34:23
yourself? Absolutely.
34:24
All the time. Yeah.
34:25
Yeah. My mother was always there
34:26
'cause she didn't work. But the whole notion of get
34:29
outside, mm, hmm, go out and do something.
34:33
Go away, come back when it gets dark like that was our
34:34
direction. That was it.
34:36
And so, well, we would go play on the railroad tracks, right?
34:41
Because that's safe. And it's funny too, when it
34:44
comes even even to work. I'm not disparaging any other
34:47
generation by any means, but it just it seems that there's a
34:50
little bit of a different work ethic with our generation as
34:53
compared to other generations. OK.
34:55
Would you not agree? I don't have the same situation
34:58
you you do, so I I work alone. Well, I worked a lot of retail.
35:02
Yeah, it's more. Did not.
35:05
I did not work retail. Yeah.
35:06
And it did work in fast food. Yeah.
35:09
Which is a whole podcast by itself.
35:11
Absolutely it is. Absolutely it is, yeah.
35:14
OK, we're done with that. As always, please follow us on
35:17
the socials at 011 More Thing Pod on Facebook and Instagram
35:20
for highlights and news of our upcoming shows.
35:23
And if you have a show idea for us or just want to give us some
35:25
feedback, send us an e-mail to. Oh and one more thing,
35:27
pod@gmail.com we would love to hear from you.
35:30
Oh, and one more thing about the technology we have today.
35:33
Don't take it for granted. It will be nostalgic in a few
35:36
years and we will be having another one of these
35:38
discussions. Oh yeah, we will.
35:40
All right, bye everyone. Bye.