• toynbee@lemmy.world
    0·
    2 months ago

    In my childhood household, at all times, there were in-progress books on the back of the commode. You would simply select the one relevant to you.

    • Nusm@yall.theatl.socialEnglish
      0·
      2 months ago

      Yes! I still have a number of these around here somewhere. They’re old, and many of the articles are out of date, but they’re still enjoyable reads!

  • Rentlar@lemmy.ca
    0·
    2 months ago

    Learning French (Spanish in the US) by reading the back of the toothpaste bottles and whatnot. Newspapers, crosswords and magazines were very common in household washrooms.

  • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world
    0·
    2 months ago

    We had print media that hadn’t died yet.

    That’s why the boomers are so mad at younger generations. Used to be you could get a newspaper delivered to your porch daily, and magazines delivered to your mailbox monthly.

    Why didn’t they put the newspaper in the mailbox? Because the 12 year old on a bicycle at 4am doesn’t have time for your particular brand of bullshit.

    And now, it’s all on screens that hurt their eyes. My mom LITERALLY turns on airplane mode, and THEN turns it off. Completely off. Just so she can charge it. When I asked why she does that, she told a room of people “because thats how you charge your phone”.

    She then began argueing that airplane mode needs to be on, and THEN power off before you connect the cord. Otherwise you’ll use radios and it doesn’t charge right.

    The entire room, knowing how crazy she was just nodded their head. Yes mom, that IS how you charge your phone and/or tablet. We’re not just saying this because it’s easier to agree with you on something that ultimately is harmless vs argueing with you, with no real benefit on either of our ends.

    But yeah. This is how boomers view technology. And print media is dead. You can only read a shampoo bottle so many times before you realize the word “poo” is in the name “shampoo”, which you’re reading while you poo.

    And thats why boomers are mad.

    • TexasDrunk@lemmy.world
      0·
      2 months ago

      Why didn’t they put the newspaper in the mailbox? Because the 12 year old on a bicycle at 4am doesn’t have time for your particular brand of bullshit.

      Federal law prohibits anyone from putting materials into a mailbox without postage.

      Otherwise I agree with you.

      • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 months ago

        Oh shit…I didn’t know that. And it means I unknowingly committed federal crimes when I was 14.

        I used to write these really fucked up letters, addressed to “Satan, or current home owner” with their address on the envelope. But I never put postage on it. I just put it in their mailbox.

        And what I did was took a jar of strawberry jelly, and let it liquify. Then I’d dip my pinky in the liquid and use that as the “ink”. Well on white paper, the whole thing looked like blood. And I would write these nonsensical letters to “Satan Claws”. As if he were Santa, and would spread horror once a year on halloween.

        Keep in mind, the whole letter looked like it was written in blood. Then I’d end the letter by saying “This weeks Pokemon of the week is…” and I’d staple a random picture of a pokemon cut out from Nintendo Power.

        I did this once a week every week through summer break 1998.

        The last letter before school started back up just said “Today was a good day, but now I have to die…” and then a “bloody” handprint. No pokemon.

        After that, I never wrote another letter, but everyday in the 1998-1999 school year, I left an apple in his mailbox every week day. No explaination. Then it ended when summer break 1999 started.

        Thats when we picked a random phone number and prank called it every day in the 1999 summer break until they used the police to trace the number and tried to sue my dad. Thats when the judge noticed my dad was a middle aged white guy, not a 1970s street pimp named JaMarcus. The best part is while they were IN COURT I was at Geauga Lake which was an amusement park. While they were in court, I used a payphone to prank call that number one last time.

        I’d never do that stuff today, but I do laugh at how much of an asshole teenage me was. We never did hear from the guy who we wrote letters to, and left apples for. He may have been amused, or he may have disturbed. We’ll never know.

        • TexasDrunk@lemmy.world
          0·
          2 months ago

          That’s kinda disturbing. We’re the same age and I’ll tell you right now that you’re exactly the kind of person that I would have been friends with because I did fucked up shit as well. Just not with as much dedication as you.

    • OpenStars@discuss.onlineEnglish
      0·
      2 months ago

      Because the 12 year old on a bicycle at 4am doesn’t have time for your particular brand of bullshit.

      For 25¢ an hour, little Jimmy better damn well make the time! Sheesh, kids today have no work ethic. Back in my day, we sacrificed our souls to Lucifer Walmart for no pay or benefits and we liked it, just as Y̷̨̮͇͔̼̘̞̞͓̘̠͒͐̆̈̓̈͋̃̀̂̃̒̃͝à̵̛̬̫͈̟ḩ̶̛͕͈͍̳̩̩͎͈̀̈́͌͂͝͝w̸̡͉͚̞̟͔͕̰̭͙͍̦͛ë̸̡͓̼͔̬͇͖͇̖̟͓́ͅh̷͕̮̭̜̥̟̪̞̺̹̯̻̲̳̗̱̼̃̓̅̿̀̆̇͆̂̃̉͐̓̿͝ intended!

      • Death_Equity@lemmy.world
        0·
        2 months ago

        Vintage static softcore is just better. It is all about what you can’t see that makes it more arousing. I mean, yeah, we can’t see her dilating butthole, but imagining what her winking turd cutter looks like means it is the hottest possible gaping balloon knot imagineable.