Things we used to do

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pawl

Legendary Member
Take lemonade bottles back to the shop to get the deposit back.
Then nipping round the back of the shop to nick them and take them back to the shop the next day.
 

Philh

Über Member
Location
Congleton
All this brings back so many memories.
As well as all the above
Cow horn handlebars, we used to put bangers in the ends then ride down the road
Beer at 1/10 a pint
2 channels on the TV
Bath every Sunday night
Sixpennorth of chips
Swimming in the cut
Making fishing rods from a bamboo cane
Coal deliveries on Christmas morning
Shopping every day, no fridges.

I can go on and on
 

Dan B

Disengaged member
Things we used to do....

  • Invade countries and slaughter the indigenous barbarians who refused to share our religious ideals.
  • Persecute the disadvantaged to feather the nest of the wealthy and privileged.
  • Celebrate the success of those who took it upon themselves to murder, manipulate and corrupt their way to the "Top"
  • Spread disease and pestilence
  • Use high polluting internal combustion engines to fill the towns with smog and vile air.
Yup, real glad we don't do any of that stuff anymore.
When did we stop?
 

Profpointy

Legendary Member
Buy potassium nitrate and flowers of sulphur at the chemists.

done both those. But there was a stern lecture from the chemist before he handed it (the KNO3) over - and I was with my Dad - dare say both are still readilly availableas they have legit uses. Although gunpowder was genuinely not my primary aim - was just doing general chemistry dabbling - it did get made eventually but was a bit of a disapointment.
 

Jon George

Mamil and couldn't care less
Location
Suffolk an' Good
Walking to school by myself at the age of five.
Counting the empty coal sacks as the coal was delivered to make sure we weren't being swindled.
Doctor Who stored his Tardis on the main road and the police frequently went inside for a chat with him.
(Oh, being the only one to yell 'He's behind you!' when William Hartnell did pantomime at Ipswich.)
 

slowmotion

Quite dreadful
Location
lost somewhere
done both those. But there was a stern lecture from the chemist before he handed it (the KNO3) over - and I was with my Dad - dare say both are still readilly availableas they have legit uses. Although gunpowder was genuinely not my primary aim - was just doing general chemistry dabbling - it did get made eventually but was a bit of a disapointment.
With a formula from Encyclopaedia Britannica (1965 edition?), we were able to source all the essential ingredients of gunpowder from the local chemist, no questions asked. We blew things up with our DIY concrete and steel encased mines, detonators courtesy of steel wool , Jetex fuses, and motorcycle batteries.
It was great fun but I very nearly killed myself in a self-inflicted shrapnel explosion, and decided to quit at the tender age of fifteen.
Luckily.
 

classic33

Leg End Member
See a fat child. I can only remember one in a school with 800 pupils.

[Probably related to the above ...] See a child being brought to school in a car.

I speculated that in my lifetime computers would improve so much that it would be possible to fit one in a large suitcase, powerful enough to be a communications hub, do animations, and play and compose music on. They would only cost about £25,000. An old schoolfriend reminded me of that conversation recently and told me that it had sounded like a science fiction story at the time. In fact, it happened about 40 years sooner than expected, at about a fiftieth of the price, and taking up less than a hundredth of the space!


That one is chilling ... I read THIS just the other day.

There used to be a Cape Asbestos factory in Old Town, above Hebden Bridge. Hundreds of former workers have died agonising deaths as a result of the time they worked there, and they are still dying now, decades after the factory was shut down and the site cleared. Read about Acre Mill HERE.
Used to work in that last one, for a short while.
 
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