Imagination - Playing Army!

I read a blog post recently where the author was commenting about how kids today had so much electonic stimulation of what isn't real that "...they are forced to imagine what reality actually is".  That's a really powerful and rather thought provoking concept.  Like most of you, I grew up playing with the neighborhood kids and we all actively employed our imagination in almost all of our play times.  And I am thankful that we had that in our lives.

I grew up in North Seattle and lived near the Puget Sound.  Some of the best times we had as kids were when we went down to the big park by the water and played army.  It’s a lot more developed now, but when we were kids it was a mainly a huge hillside of sand and Scotch broom bushes.  You can check it out here:

http://www.yelp.com/map/richmond-beach-saltwater-park-shoreline

…here's a view in google maps that shows it pretty well.

I remember that we would literally spend hours there playing war.  Even though there was only half a dozen of us, we would scamper up and down the hills – hiding in scotch broom outcroppings, behind old rusted out cars, sidling up to the few lone trees – and taking every chance we could to “kill” each other.  In our minds eye, we were all Vic Morrow on the TV show Combat! – taking out all the ‘krouts and Japs – not very PC today, but definitely the verbiage of our generation.

Mind you, we didn’t have fancy electronic guns that would make shooting noises for us.  No – that was all up to us – and the kid who could make the best “pekuuu” (single shot)… or “pphthththth” (machine gun) sound was cooler than everyone, even if he did get killed.  And some of the coolest guns we had were those that we hand made out of old broom handles, hunks of 2x2 and a mass of black electrical or duct tape.

I drove through our "battleground" last time I visited my family - it’s now full of nature trails, BBQ’s and playground platforms, and lots of amenities for the family.  I’ll never forget that in my youth, it was a hillside full of imagination of intense warfare in a Wolrd War 2 setting, and made for endless hours of awesome memories.

Future Pilots in the '70s!

Someone said something the other day that sparked a memory and I had to write about it.  This was one of those times when I realized that we did a lot of simple things growing up and had a lot of fun doing them. 

We lived on the west side of Washington state, and we often vacationed on the east side of the Cascades.  It was almost always warm and sunny over there and we would go stay in campgrounds and state parks.

We often went to a place called Entiat, a beautiful state park on the Columbia River.  We would spend hours as kids playing in the river, playing frisbee, playing on the camping playground and generally just having a lot of fun being kids.

One thing that was a real treat was when we would go to the little general store in town and buy those little balsa wood airplanes that had the wind up rubber band to power the propeller.  Entiat was a nice park and had a huge green grassy area which was perfect for playing with these planes.  If I remember correctly, they came with an extra rubber band which was good, because that ended up being the limiting factor on how long the planes lasted.

The whole length of the park had a row of huge Poplar trees that acted as a windbreak and were cool to climb in.  Sometimes we had to climb the trees to retrieve our planes and we weren't always able to find or reach them.  I bet to this day you can still find 40 year old balsa wood plane skeletons in those trees.

Sometimes, we would splurge and spend a little bit extra to buy the planes that had the little set of wheels on them.  While the grass wasn't ideal for take offs and landings, it was really cool to have them and made us feel like we were running our own little airport.

These were really awesome and gave us hours and hours of outdoor, fresh air fun.  I bet kids to day would love to play with them, too.

My 1973 Camaro

OK - I know you can see this above - and I know it's oversized on the screen - but here it is!!!

I've seen a couple of early '70s Camaros recently that reminded me of my beauty.  Here it is in its hey day!  It was 'only' a stock 350 4bb, but it could bury you in the seat when you stood on it.  and yes, that's a fiberglass L88 hood that really added to the cars sexiness and sleekness.

If I ever get rich and famous, I wonder if I'd get myself something like this again?  It is really sweet and fun to drive - and what better way to promote the '70s that to drive a car from the '70s?  If I play my cards right, I could write it off on my taxes as an expense necessary to sell my books... :)

Anyway - with the weather getting nicer and the hot cars coming out, It would be awesome to have this to cruise around town... I'll let you know how that goes. ☺

What's Your '70s Addiction?

So - I haven't had many addictions in  my life...

Diet Pepsi - I could easily drink a 6-pack a day. (I've actually sworn off the stuff - in fact I haven't had any pop in 18 months!)

TV - I watch too much, but at least I can do things like design houses and write blogs while I watch! :)

Donuts - Again - I could really down them, but I've also sworn off of them.  In fact - I had my first one in 18 months just yesterday - a maple bar.  It was good, but I think I have to wait another year and a half.

But - one of my biggest addictions was the video game Defender.  There was a game located at a bowling alley just a half a mile away from where I lived.  This also happened to be right between where I worked and my home.  It was TERRIBLY convenient and very easy to just stop on my way home.

The bad guys

Defender is an incredible game.  If you're unfamiliar with it, the mission was to fly your spaceship over an alien planet surface and pick up a bunch of humans that were stranded on the ground.  You flew either left or right on the screen - which was a long wrap screen - and you could both  fire a laser gun and you could drop a "smart bomb", which would obliterate everything currently on the screen.  
You were up against an arsenal of landers, mutants, orbiters, bomber, pods and swarmers that came out of an exploded pod.  All of  these had only two purposes... to kill you, or to capture and mutate all the humans on the ground..

The game was fast paced and though only two dimensional it was very challenging.  One of the neat features was that it had a "radar" type screen that was a horizontal band at the bottom of the screen which enabled you to see everything happening on the entire surface.  For instance, you could see when one of the landers was trying to grab one of the stranded humans.  They would then rise on the screen and into mutants if they got to the top.  If you could see them getting picked up on the radar, you could race over there, shoot the mutant and catch/save catch the falling human.

I spent a lot of time playing it... a lot.  And I spent a lot of money.  Sure - it only cost a quarter, but when you play a lot, the quarters add up.  However - the advantage is that when you play a lot, you get better... a lot better.  During my early times of playing, I would play for a long time and spend a lot of quarters, but at the end of the time I was playing, I play for 30 or 45 minutes on one quarter.  I did actually turn the machine over a million points - a feat that I only ever saw one other person do.  Of course - back in the '70s - it wasn't like my family could just call me on my cell and ask where I was... I just wasn't home yet.  I'd just get home late and had a variety of excuses as to why I was late / where I was / etc.

Should I do this to my office?

So - I came to the realization - and I think my brother actually did an intervention (although we just called it "talking some sense into you" back then) that I needed to stop letting the game rule me and start ruling the game - or more importantly - my time.  Eventually, I chose to totally quit, and it has been YEARS since I've played.  I have seen that you can actually play it on line now. but I don't think I'll go there.

I suppose that if I ever really got back into it I'd probably lay out my office like this picture.  I wonder if having it there to play at any time would ruin me or if I could better control myself?  Of course, now I have a wife who can have a *wee* bit of influence on how I spend my time.  I'll probably never know.

How about you all - did you have any video game addiction?

Call Time!

I remembered something the other day quite by accident.  My wife asked me what time it was from across the room.  Without even thinking about it, I said out loud "At the tone, the time will be 5:45 and 30 seconds... *beeeep*".

As soon as I was finished I blurted out, "Oh, my gosh - do you remember that?  Do you remember how we used to "call time"?  A wave of memories came over us as we recalled that this was something we all used to do.  You'd pick up the phone and "call time" to get the correct time, and a recorded woman's voice would recite the current time down to - It think - the 15 second mark.

As I thought it over, I figured out why it was so common that we did this back then.  We all had watches.  Most had to be wound, and those with batteries would start to slow down.  Wall clocks had batteries, most appliances didn't have batteries.  The big thing was that we didn't have computers or our phones that keep totally accurate time - ALL the time.  We also didn't have electronic readouts on every single appliance and electrical thing we owned.

The bottom line was that in order to make sure that our watches and clocks were accurate, we had to "call time" to check them.
Now days all of our electronic devices are totally accurate and even change to the correct time zones as you travel.

I found a great little article by a guy about it here:

http://littlenuances.blogspot.com/2010/09/remember-when-we-used-to-call-time.html

And apparently, the service just completely and officially ended in a few years back...

http://www.switched.com/2007/08/29/at-the-tone-the-time-will-be-up/

Wish I'd thought about about this before, I would have like to call and listen to the "time lady" one more time...

Old Fashioned Treats

So - I had a memory pop into my head the other day, and it was like "No Way!  Was that right?"  I called my brother to verify I wasn't just making things up, and he confirmed it.  When we were kids, on hot summer days, we had a very special treat... ice cubes.

Yes, you read that right...

Ice cubes.

We'd be running around like little banshees and sweating up a storm.  Almost on cue, we'd run into the house and start whining at mom for some sort of cooling refreshment.  Well - this would have been a common occurrence on hot summer days - and I'm amazed at my moms resourcefulness.  At some point, she must have been out of anything else, so she opened the freezer and got out the ice trays.  And then, in a moment of sheer brilliance, she probably asked "Who wants an ice cube?!?"  Being dumb, hot kids, we all yelled, "I do!"

She grabbed some paper towels, wrapped them up and presented us with our "treats.  Ice cubes!  Wrapped in a paper towel so our hands didn't get cold and wet.  Knowing us - we probably spent as much time playing with them as sucking on them - but they definitely did the trick.

I tried to replicate this, but between my automatic ice cube maker's much smaller ice cubes, and the fact that I couldn't get the camera to focus right - you'll have to use your imagination. 

Suffice it to say - though it didn't look like much (and admittedly, it wasn't) it was a great treat for us.  And - we were dumb kids - it was all great to us. Kind of makes me wonder what kids today would do with such a "treat" presented to them.

You gotta check this out...

To begin with - I was out on sick leave the past week (read "near-death-with-a-terribly-infected-leg-but-it's-almost-all-better-now") - so I apologize for being away for a bit.  The injury I sustained while back-packing last summer, I found out, is now a weak spot in my body.  So - I'm susceptible to recurring infection there, and that's what happened. Missed a week of work... slept for 24 hours straight...  on three different anti-biotic drugs...

I'm doing much better now, but it was a bit of a rough patch there.

Today I'm going to brag on my daughter.  I'm right-brained - artistically inclined - and I'm so amazed and delighted to see how she has taken after me in this way.  I love to take pictures.  I was one of the first in my family to get anything other than an instamatic.  A Pentax K1000 SLR.  Bought a lot of lenses, filters, etc. over the years and took a lot of pictures and did pretty well at it.  Then - As the years went on - and for a lot of varied reasons, photography took a backseat to the rest of life and my other hobbies / interests.

My daughter got the photo bug at about age 18.  She has continually upgraded her camera, read up on techniques and methods, and has taken thousands and thousands and thousands of pictures - an advantage she has in digital photography that we couldn't have begun to imagine in the '70s and '80s.  She now has a really nice camera, a Facebook page for her photography, and is close to setting up a website and trying to start a business.

She's really good and is naturally talented.  She's mainly into landscape photography and has a great eye for subject matter and composition and does a excellent job of capturing it all with the lens.  These are just a few examples of he work.  I encourage you all to take a look - click on them for much larger images - her pictures are for sale!  you can check them out on Facebook!

Here's the link: http://www.facebook.com/kainicolephotography

Troll Dolls

So - I'm sure that I probably at least made mention of some of the toys that I grew up with here in my blog at one time or another, but I was just reminded of a certain one the other day.

Jimmy Fallon had Kyra Sedgwick on his show and she got to talking about how much loved those little Troll dolls.  And Jimmy loved them, too!  You remember them...the little yellow/fleshy skinned guys with huge frizzy wild colored hair and the funny little grin?!?

Notice the gemstone-less belly button!

Well, it turns out that there is quite a history behind these things.  The Troll dolls were originally known as Leprechauns, and were also known as Dam dolls, Gonks, Wishniks, Treasure Trolls and Norfins.  We only ever called them Trolls.  They were a huge fad from 1963 through 1965.  Their popularity faded out for awhile, but surged again for brief periods in the '70s, '80s and '90s and were made by a bunch of different manufacturers.

They were originally created in 1959 by a Danish fisherman and woodcutter named Thomas Dam - Hence the "Dam dolls" name.  He couldn't afford a Christmas gift for his youngest daughter and so he carved the doll from his imagination.  How cool is that?  These dolls that we all grew up with all came from him making a toy for his daughter!

Some of the clothes that the Troll dolls wore

We used to play with them - somehow it was ok for us boys to playing with "dolls" since they were Troll dolls!  We had clothes for them... we brushed their wild and colorful hair... we really did play with them.  Kind of weird now that I think about it.  But - it was a part of my growing up, it was a cool thing of the '70s (although I think I really did this more in the late '60s); and it's neat to look back on them now!

A boy Troll and girl Troll - It was all determined by colors

It seems like I couldn't find many pictures of the older ones.  The newer ones have gemstones in their belly buttons. Did you all have Troll dolls growing up?

Invinvcible

One of the good things about satellite TV is the hundreds of channels that are available.  And... one of the bad things about satellite TV... is the hundreds of channels are available.  You know how it is...

But the other night, there I was, surfing up in the 200's and I saw a great movie.  I'd seen it before - but I watched it again and it was really good.

  It's called "Invincible" and it stars Mark Wahlberg.  It's a great, heartwarming story about a guy who was a walk-on on the 1976 Eagles and did great on the team.  It's based on a true story and has a "Rocky" type feel to it.

The REALLY cool thing is that it's set in '76 and is super well done as a period piece. It's chock full of clothes, cars, incredible music, actions, attitudes and everything from that era.  The movie is great already, but the '70s eye candy makes it all the better. If you've never seen the movie, I highly recommend it.  I think that you'll enjoy it, and I know you'll enjoy the trip to the '70s.  Since the Superbowl is tomorrow, this is a good after-the-game movie - whether your team wins or loses.

Remember me?

Ok - I will make no excuses.  I've been a bad, bad, boy!  Halloween was quite awhile ago, and that was my last post.  I... uh... I've been... um.  You see, it goes like this... I was, that is, I've been... uh... busy - and - like, stuff happened and...

No excuses.  I'm guilty.  Life hit me and some things got waylayed... and blogging was one of them.  And I do apologize to all my blogger friends - whom I have also largely ignored over the last couple of months - I have been spending a lot less time on the computer at home in general, as well as just taking care of a lot of other things.

This tickled my funny bone...

Of course - a lot of things have happened over the last couple of months - and I bet I can even find a few of these things to blog about.

I really do hope to get blogging here soon.  Here's one of the things that has been taking up my time...


http://www.taximusic.com/hosting/home.php?artist=darryll-sherman

looking forward to getting back in the swing of things... 

Halloween

(well - better later than never...)

So - As I was reminiscing about what this holiday was like back in the '70s, there were a couple of things that I remembered so vividly.

The first was making Halloween drawings and cutouts.  Piles of orange and black construction paper and our imagination.  Witches, ghosts, jack-o-lanterns, skeletons, old dead trees, tombstones, bats, etc.  We would spend hours making all of these things.  We would decorate the windows and the walls and anything else mom would let us tape to.

The other things was candy.  My brother, cousin and I would go out together and we would draw out maps of our neighborhood and plan our routes.  We would start as early as we could and stay out a late as possible for maximum candy!

One other thing - a friend of mine and I made a little haunted house.  Our big thing was wet pieces of string hanging down that felt like sticky cobwebs.

It was fun - I hope kids still have as much fun today doing handmade stuff as we did back in the day!

Wind-up Watches

Did you know that you can still buy a wind-up watch?  I remember when you couldn’t buy anything BUT a wind-up watch.  It’s hard to effectively convey the amount of responsibility that you felt when you got your first watch. 

First off, most of the watches had glass faces.  Not only did this make them susceptible to getting scratched, it could also crack and /or shatter if you weren’t careful.  And being a kid, you had to really be mindful of your arm now that it had a watch on it!

 

Next – you had to wind it!  If you didn’t do this, it stopped running – and it did so by slowing down – so you would unknowingly be late because you forgot to wind your watch. It was VERY important to remember to wind it at least once a day!

Also – they weren’t cheap.  If you got a watch as a gift, it was a gift of substance.

It was Similar to this...

I remember that one of my first watches was a beautiful silver trimmed Timex with a deep burgundy face that made the black hands really pop.  It had a genuine dark leather wristband to boot!  I felt like a million bucks when I wore it and it helped me feel more confident, too.

el-cheap-o!

I had some great watches growing up, but eventually the world advanced and cheap Casio watches with batteries that were small and lasted forever came in mass supply.  And they were digital with LED crystal displays…and black plastic wristbands.  Winding watches was a thing of the past, akin to if you are reading this on an IBM 286 with a 7" amber monitor.

And, I know I said that you can still buy them, but I would guess you have to look for them… does anyone have one?

Did you have a cool wind-up watch growing up?

– or – have you never even heard of such a thing?

– or – the big question – Do you even wear a watch?  They definitely seem to be vanishing from the wrists of our youth now that phones have evolved…

Recess

When I was a kid, just the word evoked excitement – there were so many fun things to do.  If the weather was nice, you got to go outside!  A break from school!  There were rings to ring, rungs to run, slides to slide down and all sorts of bars to clamor over.  There were balls to throw and kick, girls to chase with hair to pull, and painted lines to hop over, serve into and get played out of.  There was grass to run in, sand to dig in and dirt to slide on.  If you were a loner, there were bugs to crawl after, butterflies to try to capture, and clouds to imagine make shapes in.  There were people to watch, shade to sit in and little rocks to kick.  There was a whole world of adventure and it was just outside our classrooms in the schoolyard.

 

Even if the weather was terrible, we still got recess.  Sometimes we got to go to the gym.  There was basketball, foursquare and the dreaded dodge-ball.  There might have been mats with balance beams, and some other things to crawl around on, or there might have been a stage where we could act like we were putting on a show.  Sometimes we stayed in the classroom.  Often the teacher would have planned ahead and we would have a fun activity that involved us all doing something with our hands while imagining with our minds.

 

I don’t have little kids anymore – mine are 20 and 21 now – but I sure hope that the little kids these days have the same opportunities that I had growing up.  I hope they don’t just sit around texting and playing video games on their phones.  It’s one thing to get outside and get some fresh air, but the exercise of the body and the mind are more important.

Anything in Life is Possible … Make it Happen!

I’ve noticed that Darrin over at Dad’s Dish Retro Blog. (who, by the way, is one cool dude!) has been doing some awesome blogs as of late where he is reminding us of some forgotten folks from years gone by.  What a great concept!  There are so many great entertainers and famous folk from our era that have all but slipped into obscurity, so it’s great to remember them and to even see what they’re up to these days.

When I was a kid, I remember my mom watching TV and using a chair or the table and watching this guy in something like a leotard.  He was stretching, and breathing, and bending and stretching his arms and legs – this was before there was anything even remotely like “working out” for the masses.  Only real athletes did that.

Of course, she was watching the incredible Jack Lalanne.  Many younger people today might only know him as that really old guy who’s on an infomercial selling a juicer.  Jack Lalanne is the original fitness guru.  He is more dedicated to a life of health and exercise than anyone else.  He ONLY eats right, he ALWAYS exercises, and he’s a TOTAL optimist because he constantly lets us all know that we can do the same.  The title of this blog is just one of his many sayings of health!

When he started his show back in 1951, it was the thought that it would be short lived.  It became nationally syndicated and ran for 34 years!  I remember my mom responding to his encouragement of “Get up, work out, and feel better!”  Being kids, we just had fun bouncing around and thinking this was fun and new.  He really was the father of modern workout videos.

He routinely performs feats of amazing strength and endurance every year on his birthday.  You know – little things like swimming to Alcatraz while wearing handcuffs;  Or setting a record of 1033 push-ups in 23 minutes!  (That’s an average of 45 per min.);  Or swimming while towing 10 row-boats with 77 people on board more than a mile in less than an hour.  You can read all about him here.  You can even watch videos from his original show and exercise right along with him!  Grab a chair!  We would all do a lot better if we did only a quarter of what he does!

Ok - I'm done blogging - back to my ice cream.