Things ya used to do as a youngun

We had James Bond toys. Transistor radios that converted into guns at the push of a button. And a spring rocking horse that we called Flicka from a tv show called My Friend Flicka. There were characters named Ken and Uncle Joe. I think.

Also cardboard playhouses that we would put over the furnace ducts. Then we would cover the house in blankets and haul in a light and call it a fort in the winter. I read Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden.

I used to love playing hide and seek in the hay fields during the summer, then playing hay fights once they were cut. Chasing cows on our bikes, then waiting for a stampede of cows to chase us back and run out the field fast enough. One time I was not fast enough and had to leave my bike in the field, wait for the cows to calm down so I could grab it. I returned home to a huge bollocking for staying out until gone 10pm. I miss the country and all the joys of growing up there. I also miss my mega-drive and the hours of whoop-ass on fighting games with the neighbour's kids.

Quick question: Why can't we still do these things now as adults? I mean apart from the obvious pedophilic implications of playing with your neighbours kids...

edited 15th Mar '11 11:21:21 PM by KingFriday

"There's more evil in the charts then an Al-Qaida suggestion box" - Bill Bailey

Well, some of them require living somewhere quite different from where we live now!

I also grew up in the British countryside, King Friday — a lot that resonates in my life in those anecdotes. Were the cattle Aberdeen Angus, by the way? Those are about twice as aggressive as ordinary cattle — perhaps it's that that makes them taste good ...

A brighter future for a darker age.

I have no idea, but this all happened in Gloucestershire if that helps. I live in the Oregon now and I don't think I'd get away with chasing cow! (Imagines a group of heavily pierced hippies chasing the heavy-breathed lady chasing the cow). Nice to see a fellow UK COBBIE turned US COBBIE btw.

"There's more evil in the charts then an Al-Qaida suggestion box" - Bill Bailey

Final Fantasy V and VI, on top of my mind.

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Why thank you. Mine was all over; my dad was a gardener for the National Trust and then Head Gardener for several different lords' estates in Scotland. He then did his teaching qualifications and we moved to County Durham for a few years before moving to Oxfordshire when I was about thirteen or so. Stayed there 'til college.

How long ago did you move here? Tail end of '97 for me.

A brighter future for a darker age.

I moved here two years ago to marry my husband who's American born and bred (the Hovis way ). I was born in London, moved to Kent aged 5, moved to the Bristol then Shire aged 8 and then moved back to London for uni and spent a few years in Cardiff, then back to Kent again before moving Stateside! Daily I recant the phrase "oh my God I miss lamb"! I Moved around a lot as a child due to my fathers work in the Nuclear Power Industry (they like to place these power plants in the middle of nowhere)... It's funny, I grew up in a place called Charfield that was every bit the spitting image of the Hot Fuzz setting.

My husband loves the term "taking the piss" btw. I absolutely hate his abuse of the word "like"!

I did a several month stint in Edinburgh and I have to say it was one of my favourite cities in the UK, incredibly beautiful all year-round. Have you visited the UK often since your departure?

edited 16th Mar '11 4:12:02 AM by KingFriday

"There's more evil in the charts then an Al-Qaida suggestion box" - Bill Bailey

I haven't gone back at all, in fact. For a long time the INS had my immigration stuff screwed up and I didn't want to chance going abroad. More recently I've been too broke or too busy.

I'll probably find it very odd and changed by the time I do!

You can get lamb around here quite a bit — Costco sells it, and several of my local supermarkets have it. Not as wide a variety of cuts, though. For one thing, LA has a big Mediterranean / Middle Eastern population, and a lot of those cuisines use a lot of lamb.

A brighter future for a darker age.

we played Mighty Morphin Power rangers on the playground. We'd always fight over who got to be the pink one.

Doodles

I would have cried and screamed had I been the pink or yellow one. I thought both colors were lame. Unless they were on Nina of Windia who I thought was cute and cool.

edited 16th Mar '11 2:09:12 PM by Aondeug

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah

My cousin, sister, and I always did that, too.

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Play Power Rangers/Dragon Ball Z, pretend we were dinosaurs, race bikes, throw temper tantrums.

Was Jack Mackerel. | i rite gud

Oh! I remember that we all used to draw Mario Kart courses in our cul-de-sac and have races on our scooters.

AC:NL Dream Address: 5200-2582-5967

My family would get into these cutthroat Shaskopf games playing for pennies, nickels and dimes. My mom was easy to fleece because her theory was the cards were always in the blind. The family finally learned euchre as well but Shaskopf and cribbage were games we played that no one else did in our part of Indiana.

I would play with my sister in the backyard, or we would put on our mother's make-up  ^*

. When I was alone, I would pull up dandelions and their buds and make bracelets out of Clover flowers.

In other words, I was that kid who always had to wash their hands when they came back in.

“Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?”

I have fond memories of playing games with an acquaintance. Nothing formal, just using legos or other toys. With me always the villain...come to think of it, I was almost always the villain in such things.

What's the frequency Kenneth?|In case of war.

Ori: Same, except me and my friends were boys so we fought over who got to be the Green Ranger.

I used to have one of the GR's flute daggers when I was a kid too. I actually saw a bunch of original run MMPR toys while working at Amazon. It was ridiculous to see bits of my childhood floating around there...

We didn't get cable till I was 12 or 13, so I spent a lot of time outdoors. Riding my bike, running around in the woods, setting things on fire, blowing stuff up, getting into fights, swimming; all kinds of fun stuff.

Setting things on fire is fun.

AC:NL Dream Address: 5200-2582-5967

@OP: I played in the woods. Until I was 4 we didn't even have electricity in my house, and I was 6 before we got a TV. Before that I built massive, awesome forts in the woods with my friends.

Our crowning achievement; a fort built in the middle of a field of nettles and Devil's Club. That was our "moat". To get to the fort, we built a rope-swing. It was the best thing ever, until the parents found out about us swinging over a field of sticker bushes/stinging plants and made us tear it down.

If I were to write some of the strange things that come under my eyes they would not be believed. ~Cora M. Strayer~

I spent a lot of time in the wilderness as well, though afaik we always had electricity and a TV at least.

I was convinced I was a wizard, and I would play with small animals.

Those were fun times.

I spread my wings and I learn how to fly....

As a child I spent far too much time slaying dragons and saving princesses with my trusty sword. I even tried to fight off a doctor who had the gall to try and operate on my for my own benefit!

A few weeks ago I started sword training.

It brings a little warmth to my heart to look at myself now with child's eyes, and to see the things in myself I saw in knights and heroes as a child.

Swordsman Troper — Reclaiming The Blade — Watch

I remember my dad used to give me unfettered access to the computer on weekends.. Since I was home and he worked.

I COULD USE THE DIALUP ALL I WANTED! And my mom would always come home and forget that she wasn't supposed to pick up the phone, causing Team Fortress Quake or Mechwarrior to stall out on me. :(

Lots of playing outdoors. Up the street from my parents’ house was an undeveloped area we simply referred to as “the fields.” It was mostly grassland criscrossed with dusty trails but there were access to groves of trees and the San Francisco Pablo Bay. You had to cross the Southern Pacific tracks to access the latter (including a tall bluff we called “Monkey Island”) and how we never managed to get hit by moving trains is a mystery I’ll never understand.

One of the tree groves was a dark and creepy willow thicket we called “Spooky Hollow.” It’s now located in parkland and I re-visited it as an adult...but did not venture inside when I saw that it was overgrown with poison oak. That must have been all over “the fields” and yet, I don’t ever remember getting poison oak as a kid.

There was also a stand of eucalyptus where someone installed a rope swing (you could even see the plywood ladder rungs they hammered in to climb the tree trunk). So there was no shortage of juvenile fun to have in “the fields,” riding bikes and catching garter snakes were other popular activities.

“The fields” are mostly gone, now; long since paved over with tract housing. A little strip remains as parkland with a paved bayside trail and people, largely fishermen, still illegally cross the train tracks (now owned by the Union Pacific) to gain bay access.

edited 14th Apr '11 12:48:29 PM by Bananaquit

Confirmed Bachelors: the dramedy hit of 1883!

I miss being able to go back for seconds and thirds at dinner and not having to worry about my waistline.

edited 14th Apr '11 2:53:04 PM by pittsburghmuggle

"Freedom is not a license for chaos" -Norton Juster's The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics