Something you did as a child...

... that kids today will probably never do.

Think back to something you did as a child that you though was fun. Something that was fun and a bit unusual; something that kids today probably wouldn't do because of modern distractions.

When I was in junior school, there was a very odd fad doing the rounds at one point that involved shrinking sweet wrappers/crisp bags or whatever on a baking tray in the oven. Once successfully shrunk and cooled, you pierced one corner of the mini wrapper and popped a keyring loop onto it. Voila! Instant novelty keyring (and hopefully no house fires).

Over to you!

In my era, they commercialised that concept: we were sold a plastic sheet, with drawings of dinosaurs on, which we coloured in; then popped them in the oven for however long, and presto! Shrinkies, I think hey were called. I loved them when I was young. Then again, I also loved Power Rangers and CardCaptors Sakura... dubbed.

Anyway, to address the topic, simply playing in a garden. We had this stone path going among various bushes which I designated "the Amazon Jungle", and an old black door in the garden wall in the shade of a (highly toxic) laburnum tree, designated "The Secret Corner". Then there was the confusion caused by the "wild strawberries", much smaller and hairier but with the same colour scheme as the commercially grown ones, and me repeatedly ask my father why we couldn't eat them. Happy days.

I remember back in the day the play equipment was all real fun like the spin top thing where you kept going round and round until you either fell off or got sick.
But now it's all just so crap

Do kids still play on swings these days? Were it socially acceptable, I'd march down to the park right now and play on the swings if I could.

The thrill of using link cables to connect up Game Boys for some competitive Pokemon action. There would always be that one little prat who yanked out the link cable just before they lost against you though.

Stu_the_great wrote:

When I was in junior school, there was a very odd fad doing the rounds at one point that involved shrinking sweet wrappers/crisp bags or whatever on a baking tray in the oven. Once successfully shrunk and cooled, you pierced one corner of the mini wrapper and popped a keyring loop onto it. Voila! Instant novelty keyring (and hopefully no house fires).

Over to you!

You're right that is odd. *gets sweet wrappers* I shall even do it and post pictures to prove just how odd it is.

Stu_the_great wrote:

Do kids still play on swings these days? Were it socially acceptable, I'd march down to the park right now and play on the swings if I could.

Didn't stop me late last year I had a good swing

NintenDUCK wrote:

Stu_the_great wrote:

When I was in junior school, there was a very odd fad doing the rounds at one point that involved shrinking sweet wrappers/crisp bags or whatever on a baking tray in the oven. Once successfully shrunk and cooled, you pierced one corner of the mini wrapper and popped a keyring loop onto it. Voila! Instant novelty keyring (and hopefully no house fires).

Over to you!

You're right that is odd. *gets sweet wrappers* I shall even do it and post pictures to prove just how odd it is.

I'd love to see the results! If you're not careful, they burn and/or curl up.

@shanks:

Play football on the school field.

Obviously kids still play football, but the school used to just let us climb the chain link fences and play, however the schools are all high metal fences with ANTI-CLIMB paint on them, boo.

Three words:


Games on Cassette



(Another 3 words would be Read Error B)

Jimbob wrote:

Games on Cassette

I used to hate waiting for the cassettes to load, so I'd put the television on full volume, go downstairs and watch Going Live, and then run upstairs when I heard the title screen music (or more often than not: when I didn't, because the cassette had failed to load).

Groovy, man.

I dropped my Game Boy Color in the loo. A memory that certainly stuck with me as I remember exactly what I was playing at the time - Pokemon Gold - and I was trying to catch Entei.

Luckily my mother managed to dry it out with cotton buds (it still works!) but the D-Pad never worked properly since. And Pokemon Gold died.

I once rewound a cassette with a pencil! Rewinding CDs with pencils just isn't the same.

Our casette player used to have off days where it'd rip all the tape out of a casette! Those were the days.

SuperPaperLink wrote:

Play football on the school field.

Obviously kids still play football, but the school used to just let us climb the chain link fences and play, however the schools are all high metal fences with ANTI-CLIMB paint on them, boo.

Yeah, or something like that. My Easter holidays at school were typically spent down the Oval (local park/cricket ground) kicking a ball about with my mates and all sorts of folk from morning until teatime. Then we'd go back for more football after dinner. I live round the corner from three parks, and they're all ghost towns compared to when I was a wee boy only fifteen years ago. You used to also see folk play cricket, basketball, street hockey, rugby and all that just about every day. Not anymore. Still, at least the local Sainsbury's built us two new 5-a-sides pitches.

In my town, the Oval also has a a swanky-looking venue called The Space Place, which was designed to be a youth club for the twenty-first century. It was mobbed everyday and night when I was younger (and was absolutely brilliant: free pool, cheap sweets, cheap arcade machines, always-on PSone with all the good games and all the free internet you could handle), but I don't think I've seen a single person in there for at least three years. It's a real shame. Whatever happened to youth clubs? The local church one that I sometimes run only has about eight or nine folk turn up each week.

Stu_the_great wrote:

I'd love to see the results! If you're not careful, they burn and/or curl up.

Well my oven was being slow to heat up so I...er...put them in the microwave. the wrappers (snickers from a box of celebrations) just jumped about and made the odd popping sound and many. many sparks . Needless to say all I have now are singed balls of odd smelling tin foil (or whatever those wrappers are made out of)



On the bright side I didn't break anything!

Hahaha! Ye don't put any kind of foil/metal in a microwave.

Yes that was a derp! But I only know not to put foil in a microwave having done it myself, naturally...and it wasn't a mere Snickers bar. I put one of those whole roast chickens you get from the hot deli counter at the supermarket into the microwave, not realising that the inside of the white paper packet was lined with foil. The microwave was sparking away and I swear it was about to explode, but like a true superhero I lunged at it and opened it probably in the nick of time. The metallic smell lingered in the kitchen for days...

NintenDUCK wrote:

Well my oven was being slow to heat up so I...er...put them in the microwave. the wrappers (snickers from a box of celebrations) just jumped about and made the odd popping sound and many. many sparks . Needless to say all I have now are singed balls of odd smelling tin foil (or whatever those wrappers are made out of)



On the bright side I didn't break anything!

Do it for science, you crazy diamond.

When I was a kid, I climbed over a fence and got a scar just to get someone else's scooter.
And weirdly, they gave it to me!
Woo! Hoo!

Ate sand.

There's a pic of me sat in my sandpit when I was about 4, both hands full of the stuff, one hand being in my wide open gob xD

I'm totes normal. *twitch*

We must have all eaten odd things as children! I ate grass, paper on a reasonably regular basis, and, when I was very young, rabbit droppings. (I thought they were raisins. )

awesomedude wrote:

When I was a kid, I climbed over a fence and got a scar just to get someone else's scooter.

I missed the scooter fad. And the Rubik's Cube fad. And much of the Pogs, Pokémon cards, Micro Machines and yo-yos fads. The videogames "fad" hit me hard, needless to say.

I remember I accidentally ate well swallowed my kinder surprise's Pop - Eye hat off his head and that's about as wild as I got.

I also missed the Pogs and scooter fad but did get into the Tazo fad as well as the Pokemon cards until the hoenn region came about then gave up trying to collect em all

NintenDUCK wrote:

Stu_the_great wrote:

I'd love to see the results! If you're not careful, they burn and/or curl up.

Well my oven was being slow to heat up so I...er...put them in the microwave. the wrappers (snickers from a box of celebrations) just jumped about and made the odd popping sound and many. many sparks . Needless to say all I have now are singed balls of odd smelling tin foil (or whatever those wrappers are made out of)



On the bright side I didn't break anything!

How did I miss this post?

Not setting the house on fire is always a plus.

Balladeer wrote:

We must have all eaten odd things as children! I ate grass, paper on a reasonably regular basis, and, when I was very young, rabbit droppings. (I thought they were raisins. )

awesomedude wrote:

When I was a kid, I climbed over a fence and got a scar just to get someone else's scooter.

I missed the scooter fad. And the Rubik's Cube fad. And much of the Pogs, Pokémon cards, Micro Machines and yo-yos fads. The videogames "fad" hit me hard, needless to say.

Yeah the scooter thang was so cool back in 2006 for me, but now it's just so crappy!
Well, atleast for me.