Tag: nostalgia

Memory Lane: Spring Shoes REPRINT

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From January 7, 2017

For years I’ve been looking for these, and the closest I could come is this video. Actually, the “Diet Helper” shoes demonstrated by this pair of sages very closely resemble what I have in mind.

My friends across the street always seemed to be the first to get really weird toys that defied our efforts to play with them. Stilts, for instance. But weirdest of all were these shoes with great big springs under them, that were supposed to help you bound around the playground like a kangaroo.

They looked like they should work exactly as expected, but no! We tried and tried, but all that ever happened was, we fell down. Maybe we weren’t heavy enough for the springs. Otherwise, the shoes sort of fit. You just couldn’t go anywhere in them, except down.

Sixty years later, I would love to give them another try. True, the pogo stick was my true art form. You shoulda seen me pogo-stick up and down the bleachers on the football field, up and down the cellar stairs. If my mother could have ever seen that, she would have taken forceful action, if she didn’t keel over in a faint first.

But spring shoes? Oh, to locomote like a human super-ball! Fond dreams of youth…

Memory Lane: ‘Melvin the Moon Man’ Reprint

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Image result for melvin the moon man game

From June 9, 2018

 

Before the advent of video games featuring blood and guts flying all over the screen, children had to be content with benign, peaceful, harmless games–like this one.

Remco put out “Melvin the Moon Man” in 1959, and it was a hit. My parents got it for us for Christmas, and it was simple enough for all three of us to play: my sister, age 4, my brother, 7, and me, 10. If we had had a cat, he probably could’ve played, too.

You spin the handle of the unique Tumblebum dice glass (that, and the colorful graphics, were the game’s big selling points), and your plastic Spaceman traveled around the United Craters of the Moon collecting Moonbucks. The one with the most Moonbucks wins. No tactics or strategy involved. Just follow the map according to the roll of the dice.

I don’t know what Melvin cost in 1959, but it’s selling on eBay today for up to $150. In 1959 anything over $5 was a major expenditure for my father which my mother would have to weigh carefully. They really must have loved us to buy us silly stuff like this.

And that’s what makes this memory so sweet.

The Doll That Scared a Boy Silly

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From September 22, 2018

It is not the usual thing for boys to be afraid of dolls. Nevertheless, I knew a boy, who grew up to be a star athlete and a model citizen, who had a dreadful experience with a certain doll. I must not reveal his name, lest he be embarrassed by this anecdote. For the sake of convenience, I’ll call him Ariobarzanes.

As he was a new boy in the neighborhood, my friends and I decided to introduce him to our local wilderness, preparing him with lurid tales of Hangman’s Tree, which stood at the very heart of it. To this day, we whispered to him, as we followed the trail beside the creek, some evil force continued to string up people from that tree. But it ought to be safe to go there in the daytime. Probably.

Meanwhile, my friend Ellen, a very good tree climber, went on ahead to set the stage.

We had poor Ario pretty well pumped up by the time we entered the clearing where the tree glowered down on all of Middlesex County. And there Bobby and I stopped short, pointing and crying out, “Oh, no, not again! Oh, no!”

A hapless little doll hung from the lowest branch, swaying dismally in the wind.

With a great cry, Ariobarzanes turned and ran all the way back home without stopping even once, showing great promise of the track star he would one day be. He didn’t even need to use the path: he made one of his own.

I admit that this was a naughty prank, but Ario soon laughed it off and he and I became great friends. Best freakin’ shortstop we ever had, too.

But now you see, I’m sure, that under the right circumstances, a boy can be scared by a doll.

‘Memory Lane’ Contest, Day 3

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In a bid to keep sanity, we bring you Day 3 of our Memory Lane Contest. Post your memories here. Two weeks later, someone wins a prize. It could be you!

Meanwhile, here’s this…

WATER-POWERED AQUAZONE ROCKETS

These water-powered rockets were big, big, big! on TV when I was a boy. Oh, how I wanted one! As you can see, they’re still around. I finally got one when I was in my forties… and it didn’t work! Grrr! Didn’t even sort of work. It just went “Pssht!” and fell off the launcher. Every time.

And now for some of your memories!

Memory Lane: Movies That I Never Saw

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Scudda-Hoo! Scudda-Hay! - Rotten Tomatoes

How can I remember movies that I never saw? No, it’s not past lives. It was the TV listings in the Star-Ledger. I wasn’t allowed to stay up past 8 o’clock, so all I had was the newspaper.  And for a lot of those late-night movies, the description was so minimal as to leave you without a hint as to what the movie was about.

Here are three whose titles tantalized me for years.

*Adventures of Tartu (1943): wartime skulduggery among the Rumanian oil fields. I never knew that until much, much later. Something about the title led me to anticipate a show with puppets instead of actors. Or maybe it was some kind of Flash Gordon thing. WWII movies were a dime a dozen back then… but this was the only one about “Tartu.”

*Scudda-Hoo! Scudda-Hay! (1948): You’d never guess from the posters, but this was a movie about mules. There must’ve been kissing in it, so parts of it would’ve been boring. But I’m sure I would’ve liked watching the mules, if it hadn’t always been on so late at night.

*Sandokan the Great (1963): If I’d only known it starred Steve Reeves as a Malaysian pirate battling the British, head-hunters, and man-eating tigers, I’d’ve surely found a way to see it! But no: I thought it was about a magician. “Italian: 1963” is a pretty sketchy description.

I guess this helps disprove the claim that all movies made before 1970, except musicals, were immortal works of art.

How about you? Were there any movies that you always wondered about but never saw? I’ll bet we can turn up some treasures, if we dig.

 

 

A Christmas Conspiracy

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Eco Talk: Hellbender salamander an example of water quality effects

The computer will not let me post any image that has anything at all to do with the subject matter. So here’s an angry salamander. I’m allowed to post that.

My brother and I once made a conspiracy to give each other Genuine Oriental Malay throwing knives, available at our downtown hobby shop, as Christmas presents. Yes, it left something very much to be desired, as a way of commemorating Christmas. Fishing pole, yeah, okay. A knife for you to throw at somebody–no, not okay. But I often look back at my youth and wonder, “What was I thinking?”

Our Genuine Oriental Malay (are there any Occidental Malays?) throwing knives were made out of some cheap metal that would have prevented the growth of civilization, had it come along earlier. When you threw them at a target, say a tree-trunk, they struck with a “Blap!” sound–and never, never, never hit point-first! They were great for judo practice, though, because they couldn’t cut anything. Any formless piece of cheap metal could do what they did… which was basically nothing.

I have discovered that “Oriental Malay” (must be a brand name) throwing knives are still available online. Supposedly these are made of steel instead of dried-out rubber. But I have no plans of giving them as Christmas presents.

‘Home’ (2016)

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43 Sheridan Ave, Metuchen, NJ 08840

Here’s a picture of the house that I grew up in. There’d be no point in trying to show you its surroundings. Everything I knew has been torn down, paved over, and made as if it had never been. And all the people are gone.

Home

The computer’s being balky and sullen this morning, and I’m having a devil of a time trying to find the picture that goes with this post. Well, we’re in The Age of Nothing Works, aren’t we?

If I could just sit for one day on our old back porch–!

‘Memory Lane: A Night at the Drive-in’ (2016)

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Once upon a time, Spartan warriors had to listen to this song before they went to battle.

Dagnabbit, I miss the drive-in! What could be better than packing a cooler full of snacks and going to the drive-in… to revel in Godzilla  vs. Giant Panty-Liner Bugs from Orion, or something equally edifying?

Memory Lane: A Night at the Drive-In

But around here, all our drive-ins are long since gone. The only sign they ever existed is the wasteland where the Amboys Drive-In used to be, on the bank of the Raritan River. There they tore down the drive-in and the indoor theater and never put anything in its place.

Just once more… just one more time…

Memory Lane: Sgt. Bilko

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If you were born after, say, 1990, it might strike you as very strange that once upon a time in America, every male, with only a few exceptions, had to serve in the army whether he wanted to or not. But it’s true. When I was a boy, every male over 18 had to register for the draft and pretty much everybody got sucked up. (Well, God told us through Samuel what a king would do to us, didn’t he? Too bad we didn’t listen.)

And so The Phil Silvers Show, also known as simply Sgt. Bilko, struck a universal chord back then that it doesn’t strike anymore… because we have no draft, thank God.

Sgt. Bilko (Silvers) was a smooth con man working in the motor pool and being a thorn in the side to his commanding officer, Col. Hall. Paul Ford was just great as the hapless colonel, perpetually bamboozled by the slippery sergeant.

This was an awfully funny show, although a military draft is not funny at all. God did warn us about increasing the size and power of the state (I Samuel Chapter 8)–but no, the people had to have a king like everybody else! The show ran from 1955 through 1959 and was very popular. Gee, I can hardly believe I was only 10 years old when Sgt. Bilko went off the air.

Seems like only yesterday…

The Ballpoint Pen That Can Be Used For Everything

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You have no idea how badly I wanted to try this, when I saw it on TV circa 1962. Shooting a Bic pen out of a rifle! Bam! Or a crossbow. Or you could use it to drill through a wooden plank, or even attach it to a figure-skater’s skates! And it would still “write first time, every time.” Even if the rest of the pen was totally destroyed.

True, some of us actually used ballpoint pens only for writing. You didn’t always have a crossbow handy. Uncle Ferdie had a rifle, but wouldn’t let us use it to shoot Bic pens at boards. (How could the man be so selfish?)

I wonder if there is anybody in the Defense Dept. working on top-secret military uses for ballpoint pens. That “dyamite” ball is “the hardest metal made.” Should be good for scaring off the Russians.