I completely blew my kids' minds tonight.

[GailV]

2 minutes ago, Terabith said:

 

My kids have never even heard a dial tone.  

For some reason this made me think that ELO's song Telephone Line would seem really weird.

And then I realized that it was a really weird song either way. 

Now I have it stuck in my head, and I am sad about that. 

[katilac]

9 hours ago, J-rap said:

Yes!  That's the first thing I thought of too.  I grew up in California, and I'm sure we used to dial POPCORN once/week at least, just for something to do!  😄 

Thanks for this, I had no idea why she put "popcorn" at the beginning of her post, lol. 

6 hours ago, Elizabeth86 said:

A bit off topic, but I was telling my kids how when Netflix first started, you selected your movie online and they MAILED you the disc. They thought this was nuts. It’s crazy to me how that was just oh you know a decade ago!! How quickly things change!! The Mail in Netflix felt futuristic as all get out back then. Heck we didn’t even have access to high speed internet then! 

4 hours ago, J-rap said:

I think they still have their mail service-- I can't imagine it's very popular though!  And it makes you wonder how we'll be watching movies in another 10 years!  

It's not a choice on their listed plans. 

In ten years, we will just close our eyes and the movie will play in our head. 

[eagleynne]

32 minutes ago, katilac said:

It's not a choice on their listed plans. 

In ten years, we will just close our eyes and the movie will play in our head. 

Netflix spun off the dvd plans into a separate subsidiary company a few years ago, but they do still offer dvd plans. The new url is dvd.com

[Selkie]

1 hour ago, 2_girls_mommy said:

That is brilliant!! My the time I had a boyfriend, my dad had finally invested in a phone line upstairs for us teens- there were six of us kids in the house, 4 teens at once by then, lol. It worked too though, when I got caught leaving campus during a closed campus lunch one time though. They made each of us call home so they could talk to our parents. I called my bedroom line. It put off the inevitable got a bit, lol. 

Secondary phone lines were listed as "Teen's Telephones" in our small town phonebook. So a listing would look like this:

Smith, John xxx-xxx

and then right under it:

Teen's Telephone xxx-xxxx

[Indigo Blue]

54 minutes ago, GailV said:

For some reason this made me think that ELO's song Telephone Line would seem really weird.

Lol. I love that song. 😁 I love ELO. 
 

I remember when Netflix came in the mail. Wasn’t that long ago.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Indigo Blue

[TheReader]

These are all fun, and now I'm also remembering collect calls, and the commercial that had the new dad calling his parents from the hospital, and they get "you have a collect call from 'Itsaboysixpoundsfiveounces" and the parents reject the call, LOL! 

We do still rent movies from Redbox fairly often......I do wonder how long they'll still be around. 

I'm also still surprised that there are places in the US where you *don't* have to dial all 10 digits of a phone number to make a call, and I remember when our hometown went from having one area code, to two, and then when we went to required 10 digit dialing.....it was ages ago, and I honestly hadn't realized everywhere wasn't like that now until a friend last week or so posted on FB about her town going to that just then. 

(by the time our town had added the 2nd area code, my dad was living somewhere that you only had to dial the last 4 digits, even, for anyone in town....)

[Jaybee]

After bragging above about how I still remembered the phone number, I realized it was wrong! 🥴 But that was because I remembered the correct one. So I called it, and it is still time and temp! However, I didn't listen to the whole thing, because before it gives you the information, it now has an advertisement, and it's not worth it. 

[MEmama]

9 minutes ago, TheReader said:

 

I'm also still surprised that there are places in the US where you *don't* have to dial all 10 digits of a phone number to make a call, and I remember when our hometown went from having one area code, to two, and then when we went to required 10 digit dialing.....it was ages ago, and I honestly hadn't realized everywhere wasn't like that now until a friend last week or so posted on FB about her town going to that just then. 

(by the time our town had added the 2nd area code, my dad was living somewhere that you only had to dial the last 4 digits, even, for anyone in town....)

My state has only one area code.

Eventually that’s going to have to change, but every time it comes up people raise hell. Like, they are weirdly attached to it– like it’s an identity or something. There are even window decals. Lol

Edited November 11, 2021 by MEmama

[mathnerd]

Recently, I was cleaning out my garage and came upon an old box of electronic equipment and I explained to my son what a dial-up modem was and showed him my old 33.6K modem which was top of the line technology in those times and he said: "Wow, you were alive during the time that Bill Gates was famous!".

[athena1277]

15 hours ago, history-fan said:

My kids couldn’t imagine when I told them at midnight the tv would play the national anthem with a picture of the flag blowing in the wind and when the song was over it was just static till the next morning! No tv channels after midnight!!  It was the worst!!

I was a kid in the early days of Nickelodeon.  It went off the air at 6pm.  I think Danger Mouse was the last show of the day.

[QueenCat]

16 hours ago, footballmom said:

I recently had to make a call on my cell and didn’t want the call receiver to have my cell #.  I hit # and two numbers that I thought would block my number from appearing.  Nope.  I hit the two numbers that would FORWARD my calls to the number I dialed.  So, I’m on the road, I’ve pulled over and I frantically called my oldest to have him google how to unforward call forwarding.  You should have heard his annoyance at my ignorance “that you can’t forward calls, mom.  That isn’t a thing”.  I went from zero to screaming in 10 seconds so I could hurry up and reverse the call forwarding that I had just set up for a practical stranger to receive all my calls. Sigh....

 

I had a teenager in our town accidentally due call forwarding to my phone number. After getting his calls for weeks, I was getting exasperated. Right when school got out, they'd start. Finally, his dad called and asked me to help him figure out the problem. He finally took his son's phone to Verizon and some whiz there figured it out.... A few months later, we switched churches and the teen was in youth with mine. His son was telling "this" funny story and my son said, "hey, I think that was my mom!" 

[73349]

A recent chapter in the Spanish book featured a picture of movie listings in a TV guide. I had to explain to DS that remember how Daddy and I said when we were kids, shows were only on at certain times? There were actually printed guides so you could see the schedule for each channel for the week. Yes, it was as ridiculous as it sounds.

[ScoutTN]

10 hours ago, Elizabeth86 said:

A bit off topic, but I was telling my kids how when Netflix first started, you selected your movie online and they MAILED you the disc. They thought this was nuts. It’s crazy to me how that was just oh you know a decade ago!! How quickly things change!! The Mail in Netflix felt futuristic as all get out back then. Heck we didn’t even have access to high speed internet then! 

I still have this Netflix bc they have lots of old movies on disc that they don’t have streaming.

[katilac]

3 hours ago, eagleynne said:

Netflix spun off the dvd plans into a separate subsidiary company a few years ago, but they do still offer dvd plans. The new url is dvd.com

That makes sense, they probably don't want it muddying the waters. 

It's actually kind of tempting to try, even just for old time's sake 😄

[Elizabeth86]

5 hours ago, katilac said:

Thanks for this, I had no idea why she put "popcorn" at the beginning of her post, lol. 

It's not a choice on their listed plans. 

In ten years, we will just close our eyes and the movie will play in our head. 

Oh this made my day!!

[popmom]

My daughter and I went to an antique mall a few years ago. She saw one of those fancy Victorian looking rotary phones and was oohing and aahhing over it. I asked her to make a call. She had no idea what to do. It was so cute watching her try to figure it out. 

[Terabith]

4 minutes ago, popmom said:

My daughter and I went to an antique mall a few years ago. She saw one of those fancy Victorian looking rotary phones and was oohing and aahhing over it. I asked her to make a call. She had no idea what to do. It was so cute watching her try to figure it out. 

My parents still have a rotary phone, so my kid was actually the only one to correctly identify the phone on a really old preschool vocabulary test.  

[J-rap]

8 hours ago, gardenmom5 said:

Did you tell them about dialing your own phone number, hanging up, and the phone would ring?

or party lines . . .  (each line having a different ring.)

Oh that's right!  We used to love to do that on April Fool's Day, and have my parents answer.  (As though they didn't know even before they answered that it was us! 😆)

[J-rap]

7 hours ago, eagleynne said:

Netflix spun off the dvd plans into a separate subsidiary company a few years ago, but they do still offer dvd plans. The new url is dvd.com

When I go to our Netflix account, it still has a DVD option on top in bold letters.  I wonder if that's because our account might still be linked to our very rural address (which we no longer have).

[Tanaqui]

15 hours ago, J-rap said:

I think they still have their mail service-- I can't imagine it's very popular though!  And it makes you wonder how we'll be watching movies in another 10 years!  

There are, iirc, more options in their mail-in service, because they don't need to buy the *rights*, just the *dvds*. It's therefore popular among people who don't have broadband *and also* people who really want the less-popular titles that aren't on Streaming.

[daijobu]

23 hours ago, theelfqueen said:

Forget the time call... MOVIEPHONE. 

 

[KungFuPanda]

15 hours ago, TheReader said:

These are all fun, and now I'm also remembering collect calls, and the commercial that had the new dad calling his parents from the hospital, and they get "you have a collect call from 'Itsaboysixpoundsfiveounces" and the parents reject the call, LOL! 

We do still rent movies from Redbox fairly often......I do wonder how long they'll still be around. 

I'm also still surprised that there are places in the US where you *don't* have to dial all 10 digits of a phone number to make a call, and I remember when our hometown went from having one area code, to two, and then when we went to required 10 digit dialing.....it was ages ago, and I honestly hadn't realized everywhere wasn't like that now until a friend last week or so posted on FB about her town going to that just then. 

(by the time our town had added the 2nd area code, my dad was living somewhere that you only had to dial the last 4 digits, even, for anyone in town....)

All of WV has the same area code. I grew up thinking 10 digit numbers were only for long distance calls. 🤣 The Baltimore Museum of Industry has a phone booth and most of the kids who visit have never seen one. They love that thing. 

[gstharr]

A few years ago, I was sitting in an old courthouse next to a couple of late 20s year olds.  When one of them left, the remaining one asked me what was that tiny little room.  The little 3x3 area room with the built in bench, and bifold doors.  As I was expressing my shock that she didn't know that it was an old telephone booth, her friend returns and asks the same question.

[Janeway]

I actually just called the number from my hometown which is still up and working after all these years because of this post, lol.

I actually showed videos to my kids of the going off the air stuff that happens at the end of the day for TV.

[Janeway]

I spent a lot of time with my grandparents growing up and in their town, you only dialed four numbers to call people.

[Catwoman]

1 hour ago, gstharr said:

A few years ago, I was sitting in an old courthouse next to a couple of late 20s year olds.  When one of them left, the remaining one asked me what was that tiny little room.  The little 3x3 area room with the built in bench, and bifold doors.  As I was expressing my shock that she didn't know that it was an old telephone booth, her friend returns and asks the same question.

I can understand how they might never have seen a phone booth in person, but I would have thought that most people would at least recognize one. I mean, didn't they ever watch old movies -- or even old TV shows?

[Just Kate]

1 hour ago, KungFuPanda said:

All of WV has the same area code. I grew up thinking 10 digit numbers were only for long distance calls. 🤣 The Baltimore Museum of Industry has a phone booth and most of the kids who visit have never seen one. They love that thing. 

WV now has TWO area codes! It’s a very exciting and confusing) thing for folks around here. 😉 And I grew up thinking the same thing about 10 digit numbers. 

[Lady Florida.]

On 11/10/2021 at 11:18 PM, katilac said:

My kids are like why and I'm like because there was no internet, that's why! 

This is the best answer! 

On 11/10/2021 at 11:41 PM, cjzimmer1 said:

And I was just telling my kids tonight how when I was a kid we had 5 tv channels and the extent of kids programming was cartoons on Saturday morning and Mr. Rogers and Sesame street.  

We had 3, 4 if you could manage the rabbit ears in such a way to bring in the one uhf channel.

On 11/11/2021 at 1:17 AM, ***** said:

Tell them about party lines, that’s even better. 2 or 3 households shared the same phone line. (From what I remember), each house had a different ring, so you knew when someone was calling your home. and could answer it.   The mind-blowing part was…you could pick up your receiver (what’s a receiver?!) and listen in on someone else’s conversation. And I think there was an operator involved at some time.  As a little kid, this was becoming obsolete in our area, so I don’t remember the particulars, but it was still common knowledge.

 

My grandparents had a party line. My cousin and I thought it was fascinating and would try to listen when we were there (usually if my grandmother was babysitting both of us). We'd get in trouble because the other "party" would think my grandmother was trying to listen in on their conversations. She kept telling them it was her grandkids and that they were told not to do it. 

On 11/11/2021 at 6:33 AM, MEmama said:

When I told DS about spending endless hours waiting for a favorite song to come on the radio so I could tape record it, and then how we would play the song back a bazillion times to figure out all the lyrics, I think he just felt very embarrassed for my generation. Lol. 
 

You had to be right there at the radio, ready for the song so you could hit record at the exact time. The trick was trying not to get the DJ blathering on over the song intro.

On 11/11/2021 at 9:10 AM, RootAnn said:

 

I remember calling the movie theaters to hear which movies were showing at what time that day.

I remember this. It was a recorded line so sometimes you had to listen to several movies and times to hear the one you wanted.

21 hours ago, TheReader said:

 

I'm also still surprised that there are places in the US where you *don't* have to dial all 10 digits of a phone number to make a call, and I remember when our hometown went from having one area code, to two, and then when we went to required 10 digit dialing.....it was ages ago, and I honestly hadn't realized everywhere wasn't like that now until a friend last week or so posted on FB about her town going to that just then. 

 

Our entire county has one area code but so many people have cell phone numbers from where they used to live that if you call someone's cell you often have to dial 10 digits. 

20 hours ago, athena1277 said:

I was a kid in the early days of Nickelodeon.  It went off the air at 6pm.  I think Danger Mouse was the last show of the day.

Didn't it go to Nick at Nite after that?

17 hours ago, popmom said:

My daughter and I went to an antique mall a few years ago. She saw one of those fancy Victorian looking rotary phones and was oohing and aahhing over it. I asked her to make a call. She had no idea what to do. It was so cute watching her try to figure it out. 

When ds 24 was 18 we went to dh's family reunion in Tennessee. A group of us were walking around the downtown area of Knoxville and came upon a vintage store. They had a rotary phone there. Ds was shocked that you had to stick your finger in the hole and "dial" each digit of a phone number. Then we told him you had to wait for it to go back each time for the entire number. He just shook his head at how primitive our lives must have been. 😂

 

Re collect calls: When I was in college I'd call home collect when I got back to my dorm. I'd ask for a non existent person and my mother would say the person wasn't there and no, she wouldn't accept the call. This let her know I was back. I wasn't the only one. It was a common code college kids used to let their parents know they got back safely.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Lady Florida.

[Starr]

5 minutes ago, Lady Florida. said:

Re collect calls: When I was in college I'd call home collect when I got back to my dorm. I'd ask for a non existent person and my mother would say the person wasn't there and no, she wouldn't accept the call. This let her know I was back. I wasn't the only one. It was a common code college kids used to let their parents know they got back safely.

We did this too. Not much information but they knew we were alive. 

[KungFuPanda]

3 hours ago, Just Kate said:

WV now has TWO area codes! It’s a very exciting and confusing) thing for folks around here. 😉 And I grew up thinking the same thing about 10 digit numbers. 

Say it ain’t so! I had no idea. 🤣

[kbutton]

11 hours ago, Just Kate said:

And I grew up thinking the same thing about 10 digit numbers. 

Me too, though we had long-distance numbers we could dial by putting a 1 in front of the other 7 numbers, no area code required. I lived in the county seat, and everyone could call us for free (presumably so that essential services were not a toll call), but we couldn't call out hardly anywhere without it being long distance. 

[Ceilingfan]

My dad used to do this twice a day, I sent this to my sister and she appreciated it

[Halftime Hope]

I'm not quite sure I remember how this worked, but for a long time, my grandparents dialed phone numbers with two letters, and then the numbers.  I'm pretty sure their church directory was that way, too.  Like this:  SY4-3970.   The letters really represented numbers, but for whatever reason, the people all used letters.  

I'll bet someone else remembers it better than I do, but I know I've seen old TV shows when someone spoke to an operator, asking them to dial (using the example above) "Syracuse 43970".

Anyone else?  

 

 

[Lady Florida.]

18 hours ago, Halftime Hope said:

I'm not quite sure I remember how this worked, but for a long time, my grandparents dialed phone numbers with two letters, and then the numbers.  I'm pretty sure their church directory was that way, too.  Like this:  SY4-3970.   The letters really represented numbers, but for whatever reason, the people all used letters.  

I'll bet someone else remembers it better than I do, but I know I've seen old TV shows when someone spoke to an operator, asking them to dial (using the example above) "Syracuse 43970".

Anyone else?  

 

 

Yes, we had this in NJ until I was about 12. I remember two of our phone numbers - LAmbert 3-3031 and ARmory 8-8241, I don't know why they dropped the letters/names but the latter number is the one we had until we moved to Florida. At some point not long before we moved we started to say the number exchange (278) instead of the name. IIRC you didn't give the first two letters, you said the name such as Lambert or Armory.

ETA: I found this.

https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/61116/why-did-old-phone-numbers-start-letters

Edited November 15, 2021 by Lady Florida.