Ah, the good old days...really?

looksee

A copy of the Indo dated 1973 has just emerged from the attic with some interesting stuff in it -

A competition for 'Woman Driver of the Year' sponsored by the Dublin Road Safety Council, and the Indo, - judged by an all male committee (including a priest) - lists perfectly reasonable driver questions, but why they would be considered suited specifically to women?

An announcement of 'withdrawal of consumer subsidy on cheese'

A flight from Dublin to Paris or Brussels with a six day car hire thrown in, for £44 a significant amount of money at that stage and the car hire would have been the cheapest aspect of it!

And an ad for a comptometer operator.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

They were indeed far from the 'good' old days. High inflation. Interest rates on mortgages were astronomical, unemployment was rife, the average person couldn't afford a phone, let alone a car or a holiday. Badly heated homes. Lucky to have a bathroom. The list is endless.

Give me the comforts and prosperity of today anytime. I know people think it's tough out there today, and for many it is, but the standard of living, access to education and employment, and general wellbeing is much superior nowadays.

looksee

And around that time the rolling power cuts and petrol rationing. A petrol ration book was recently found among the clutter being de-cluttered. Never used, but they were issued.

I recall the power cuts and don't really remember any great stress with them though, I suppose life was not as electricity reliant then.

And the bank strike! IOUs and cash only for a good few months as I recall. Somehow it seemed to work out ok.

Edit - Its the third bank strike I remember, in 1976, I was not here in 1970 which was the longest one.

Jellybaby1

I remember the 70's as being brutal. We had just got married and a few months on there were power blackouts, petrol shortages, and for some reason I think coal shortages as I remember travelling far and wide for bags of coal. Wasn't there a bin strike too, or was that just the UK? Banks were on strike too. We bought a lot of candles. Staff in my husband's company went on strike. Yes, miserable times but we managed, I don't know how. I agree that today we have so much to be thankful for but we pay through the nose for everything. I don't think I could manage now if we were getting married and wanting to get a mortgage and I don't think I'd like to bring children up in today's world.

The Woman Driver of the Year story doesn't bother me, that was another time and we weren't bothered about it in those days either. The only thing that bothered me was that when I told my boss I was getting married he thought I was leaving my job. I informed him I was getting married, not handing in my notice. It was just a different time. We think differently these days and thirty years hence heaven knows what society will be thinking.

CelticRambler

As I was harvesting my potatoes last month, I was thinking that all my parents' friends started their married life in a new 3-bed semi in suburban Dublin with a front garden full of drills of potatoes. You never see that on today's new estates! :pac:

Jellybaby1

We didn't start with drills of potatoes but when I saw my next door neighbour working in his garden and found he was planting veg I decided to get stuck in too. It was great, we had loads of veg growing in the garden, much more than we could eat but there was hardly any furniture in the house as we couldn't afford to decorate the whole house or to buy all the furniture for all the rooms. This is swiftly becoming that Monty Python sketch!! I'm sure we've been here before but its fun!

looksee

The difference is that at the time we didn't mind many of these things. I gradually furnished my house first with second hand stuff, then replaced with new stuff that I could afford and then new stuff that I actually liked. I don't think I would have got nearly as much satisfaction from being able to go and furnish the entire house at the start as I did from finding and rescuing stuff. We were recycling long before it was fashionable!

One of the best buys I made was a large heap of white melamine coated 'planks' with those screw together fastenings on them. Narrow planks and wide ones. I had no idea what they were but there were lots of them for very little money, so I bought them. It was like a 3D jigsaw puzzle. As far as I remember they made two bedside tables, two small book cases, a tall bookcase, and one of those large shelving things similar to what you get from ikea, cubes stacked up. We got great use of them in our new but sparsely furnished house, and while they were utilitarian rather than beautiful, I was delighted with them!

OldGoat

I got a parttime school job with a landscape gardener and I had to plant spuds in the gardens of new housing estates. The act of planting and harvesting the potatoes conditioned and enriched the soil allowing lawns to be sown the following year. These days I dig up lawns to plant spuds.

looksee

OldGoat wrote: »

I got a parttime school job with a landscape gardener and I had to plant spuds in the gardens of new housing estates. The act of planting and harvesting the potatoes conditioned and enriched the soil allowing lawns to be sown the following year. These days I dig up lawns to plant spuds.

They must have been fierce fussy builders OG, its more a case of digging up the 'builder's lawn' to remove all the old bags of concrete, stashes of sand, lengths of timber and concrete blocks in any new estates I have experienced!

OldGoat

looksee wrote: »

They must have been fierce fussy builders OG, its more a case of digging up the 'builder's lawn' to remove all the old bags of concrete, stashes of sand, lengths of timber and concrete blocks in any new estates I have experienced!

That's exactly what I had to dig up. The builders would throw an inch or two of topsoil down and seed it. The grass would be nice for a few months while the houses were sold but it would soon die off. The local landscaper made a killing by repairing the lawns for new owners, and near killed me with the digging.

CelticRambler

OldGoat wrote: »

The act of planting and harvesting the potatoes conditioned and enriched the soil allowing lawns to be sown the following year.

That's how my dad explained it to me at the time (as well as being a cheap source of spuds!). These days, I do exactly the same when I clear a patch of brambles or other scrubby stuff from the garden.

Jellybaby1

Hippy types (not hipsters, mind) used to build shelves using bricks at each end and planks in between!

Rubecula

I was, as mentioned before a film extra in the Chariots of Fire film, and we were given papers to read on set, from 1924. one of the things that stuck in my head was an advert for a house 7 acres with stables and fishing rights 8 bedrooms ans a 3 carriage building (garage) and numerous other things I can not remember now... price... £1000

JuliusCaesar

OldGoat wrote: »

I got a parttime school job with a landscape gardener and I had to plant spuds in the gardens of new housing estates. The act of planting and harvesting the potatoes conditioned and enriched the soil allowing lawns to be sown the following year. These days I dig up lawns to plant spuds.

That's gas, I thought they were mainly for weed clearance. I did it myself some years ago clearing an overgrown back garden.

Then I realised it was the digging that actually cleared the weeds.

Graces7

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

That's gas, I thought they were mainly for weed clearance. I did it myself some years ago clearing an overgrown back garden.

Then I realised it was the digging that actually cleared the weeds.

Been cutting down brambles here and will plant potatoes basically no-dig under black plastic soon. Place is overgrown with the vines.

Jellybaby1

I well remember 'digging'. The no dig has been getting a lot of attention recently and I am presently following Charles Dowding on Youtube. If I can get away without digging these days I'll be a very happy bunny.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

I well remember 'digging'. The no dig has been getting a lot of attention recently and I am presently following Charles Dowding on Youtube. If I can get away without digging these days I'll be a very happy bunny.

No dig potatoes have a few disadvantages. The yield is much smaller, slugs can be a problem and they need to go in when all risk of frost i gone. It's easier to shove them in to soil loosened by the harvesting of another crop, it you don't want too much digging.

Jellybaby1

I always dug over the years - always had sluggish problems! Really!

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

I always dug over the years - always had sluggish problems! Really!

I'm sluggish most days. Coffee's a great cure and deterrent.

Graces7

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

I well remember 'digging'. The no dig has been getting a lot of attention recently and I am presently following Charles Dowding on Youtube. If I can get away without digging these days I'll be a very happy bunny.

It is a Godsend for us disabled. When at one house I had a polytunnel installed in a field, I was told to layer cardboard/paper, then manure, then straw and plant through. No digging; digging wakens many seeds.

By 2 years of great crops, the medium had turned into soil and all the field weeds except rushes had died off .

Potatoes outdoors do well under black plastic. Heel them in, no digging, then when they push against the plastic, make holes. ( save that plastic). You can plant earlier and the yield is great and the weeds die off. Second year, plant through the holes and add a second, entire sheet

I now do not even have a spade, just a trowel . Love gardening but cannot physically dig

Graces7

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

I always dug over the years - always had sluggish problems! Really!

The last two places I rented were plagued with slugs. In the last one they invaded the house itself. Yukk.... Only seen one here. Maybe they dislike the sea air...;) Found that any sweet liquid will lead them to being drowned, not needfully alcohol , and in empty cat food tins there is mass suicide..

We shall see....first year is always fascinating

Jellybaby1

I'd say slugs don't like the seaside 'cos there is salt in the soil and the air. They just doesn't love salt like wot I do on my chips!

Rubecula

lots pf slugs here even though I live on coast.

Graces7

Rubecula wrote: »

lots pf slugs here even though I live on coast.

We shall see... at the last place the windows would be crawling with them. snails too and they crawled under the doors. Onto kitchen counters... I am ready for them!

I am literally less than 1oo yards from the water here.

Rubecula

wow that is darn close

Graces7

Rubecula wrote: »

wow that is darn close

HUGE grin here! I live that about this place. I can see the ocean wherever I am and watch the changes. The ferry is an 8 seater curragh!

Jellybaby1

Grace, are you battening down the hatches tonight? Its fierce windy in Dublin.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

Grace, are you battening down the hatches tonight? Its fierce windy in Dublin.

I've had to transfer the bins to the garage here. South Easterly gale and it's much stronger on the East Coast than the West. Average 45km/h East, 25k /h West.


How did we manage years ago without regular or accurate forecasts? We seemed to just get on with things; now we're obsessed with specifics of the weather.

Jellybaby1

Yes, I'm very specific that it is definitely windy outside tonight!

Graces7

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

Grace, are you battening down the hatches tonight? Its fierce windy in Dublin.

I think it is starting to ease here but it has been horrific. Something came off the roof this afternoon but i had the sense not to go out to see!

Stay safe..

looksee

Er, lads, just for the sake of appearances, do ye think ye could keep the chat on some sort of topic. I mean, you could have all this chat in the off topic thread, but at the moment we have three rambling threads I don't mind really, but you never know when we might get an audit or a mystery shopper.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

looksee wrote: »

Er, lads, just for the sake of appearances, do ye think ye could keep the chat on some sort of topic. I mean, you could have all this chat in the off topic thread, but at the moment we have three rambling threads I don't mind really, but you never know when we might get an audit or a mystery shopper.

Yes, this morphed into the weather thread, which has rambled way beyond the weather event it, in turn, was designed for.
We're old, we're inclined to ramble. But like most of our generation we comply with reasonable requests without grumble.


While flicking through the TV channels I thought how deprived we were years ago with just a couple of channels, in black & white, that we had to get up and turn a dial to tune in. Vertical hold slipping, horizontal hold then waltzing, and the long wait for the set to warm up.
The wireless wasn't much better.

Good old days? Never!

looksee

Do you remember the truly horrible early attempts at colour - and the brief earlier phase of a coloured transparent thing that you stuck in front of the screen and it pretty much randomly coloured bits of the picture?

Graces7

looksee wrote: »

Do you remember the truly horrible early attempts at colour - and the brief earlier phase of a coloured transparent thing that you stuck in front of the screen and it pretty much randomly coloured bits of the picture?

Our posh neighbours had that! and their TV was huge and in a highly polished wooden cabinet

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Graces7 wrote: »

Our posh neighbours had that! and their TV was huge and in a highly polished wooden cabinet

We hadn't the colour transparency but my fist tv had wooden rolling doors like a bureau but vertical - very stylish!

Jellybaby1

When we got our first colour TV I didn't like it very much. I kept getting headaches watching it and my eyes felt strained. I wanted to go back to Black and White. Himself said 'stick with it, it'll settle down eventually"! Wasn't sure if he meant the TV or the headaches.

looksee

I remember at the time thinking I would rather have good black and white than the horrible, garish colour.

Graces7

What is this thread about again? Oh yes, the good-maybe old days! Right at home here with that. Basic it is ! No modern junk! Well, except the laptop but hey that does not count!

My brother made a cat's whisker radio.. now that was clever ...

Box brownie was THE camera, black and white... Poor peacock was disgusted..

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Graces7 wrote: »

What is this thread about again? Oh yes, the good-maybe old days! Right at home here with that. Basic it is ! No modern junk! Well, except the laptop but hey that does not count!

My brother made a cat's whisker radio.. now that was clever ...

Box brownie was THE camera, black and white... Poor peacock was disgusted..

Yes, had the homemade radio in a shoe box too. And the box brownie & older.
But give me most of the modern "junk" any day. Crystal clear reception on the DAB radio, with specialist channels. Digital TV - love it!
The digital camera I can take or leave but must admit it's versatility is astounding and we wouldn't have any of the incredible uploads of photos on the Nature forum without it. I prefer the 35mm SLR myself.

Hence 'good old days - really?'.
Simpler- yes, easier - probably not overall.

I have to say, for me, the comforts of modern life trump most of the nostalgia. I threw out the rose coloured glasses years ago.

Ah, the rose coloured glasses....remember them?

looksee

Yes, we got them as a wedding present...

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

looksee wrote: »

Yes, we got them as a wedding present...

Always useful in a marriage.

Rubecula

I have to be honest here I am something of a Luddite. Despite being trained to work on aircraft I wish I had stayed in a lower technical role.

Graces7

Rubecula wrote: »

I have to be honest here I am something of a Luddite. Despite being trained to work on aircraft I wish I had stayed in a lower technical role.

accidental , cirumstantial or deliberate luddite?

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Stepping in to the house, having felt the chill settling in to the evening while in the garden, I threw a switch and within minutes the house was warm. Reminded me that years back you'd have to put a match to the fire (assuming it was set), wait a while and then one room would be warm. I still light the fire but those days of chilly rooms, frost inside widows on a winter's morning, and a general dampness about the house can all take a running jump to the dark cupboard that holds the not so good old days.

garancafan

Maxine Clean Barefaced wrote: »

Stepping in to the house, having felt the chill settling in to the evening while in the garden, I threw a switch and within minutes the house was warm. Reminded me that years back you'd have to put a match to the fire (assuming it was set), wait a while and then one room would be warm. I still light the fire but those days of chilly rooms, frost inside widows on a winter's morning, and a general dampness about the house can all take a running jump to the dark cupboard that holds the not so good old days.

Ah yes. I remember chilblains and slacked fires and arriving 20 mins early for my piano lessons so that I could thaw out my fingers. All of this was before the arrival of the Aga. Ah the Aga - it changed our lives!

looksee

I almost never put on the heating upstairs, I prefer cooler bedroom - and I have just remembered that the small window in my bedroom has been wide open all day. Still the house is rarely very cold. In the house I grew up in there was (naturally, it was a while ago) no central heating, no insulation etc, and while kids are very adaptable and I did not think anything of it at the time, the bedrooms were arctic! Cold lino under your feet first thing! And the frost patterns on the windows. I have no desire to give up the heating!

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Looking back, I wonder where my mother stored all the heavy winter coats, that were strewn on the beds in Winter in an attempt to keep us warm, when summer came. We hadn't much in the way of wardrobes nor storage and I can't recall ever seeing them anywhere but across the beds.

Jellybaby1

I have no idea where you are all coming from with your lovely warm homes these days. Our heating used to be great but recently just doesn't do the job so we are going to have to have it checked out soon - its gonna be expensive I bet. As a child I was rarely cold in my parents' home as our mum would have been up early and had the gas fire on so we could get dressed cosily. She was the one who braved the cold on our behalf. On returning from school the open fire would be lit and the room lovely and cosy just for us. Mums were, and are, wonderful!

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Just remembered that old Billy Connolly joke.

Mrs Connolly had the parish priest visiting and having tea. There's bedlam in the room upstairs.
"Will you be quiet. I'm trying to talk to father Flanagan."
"It's him, mommy, He has taken more than his fair share of the coat."
"What are you talking about, coat. There's no coat in there. The coats are all in the cloakroom. It's an eiderdown, you stupid Boy"

Some time later Bedlam, bedlam, bedlam,
"Will you stop that, in there! I won't tell you again."
"It's him, mommy, it's him again."
"What's he doing this time?"
"He is shoving his legs through the sleeves of the eiderdown."

Jellybaby1

I remember that joke very well. Hilarious!

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Jellybaby1 wrote: »

I have no idea where you are all coming from with your lovely warm homes these days. Our heating used to be great but recently just doesn't do the job so we are going to have to have it checked out soon - its gonna be expensive I bet. As a child I was rarely cold in my parents' home as our mum would have been up early and had the gas fire on so we could get dressed cosily. She was the one who braved the cold on our behalf. On returning from school the open fire would be lit and the room lovely and cosy just for us. Mums were, and are, wonderful!

La De Dah with your gas fire! We didn't even have gas.