Terms Which Have Disappeared

[2jakes]

Hey 2Jakes, I watched those Commando Cody serials a little later, on afternoon kiddie shows on NYC local stations in the early sixties. I even made myself a rocket suit helmet out of a Clorox bottle. Here's a great site on 'em:

http://colemanzone.com/Cody's_Commandos/

Trivia tidbit: The seventies western swing/country rock bandleader and pianist Commander Cody (George Frayne) took his inspiration from these serials, specifically the chest control plate of the rocket suit. He thought the controls perfectly encapsulated the era's hedonistic drinking/drugging approach: just two buttons - UP/DOWN and SLOW/FAST.

Commander Cody, 1991...

"How do I look?"
"Like a hood ornament!"

 

[Doctor Strange]

Yup. The Rocketeer's clear inspiration was always obvious to those of us who'd seen the fifties Commando Cody serials first!

 

[2jakes]

Yellow Pages

 

[2jakes]

Sounds of... ”Click, Clack, & Ding”

 

[3fingers]

Makes sense. While I can't name them, I've seen that come up in movies of the era and in period movies based on the era. And we know that many in less-dire situations used movies for their air-conditioning when, in the '30s-'40s, they were one of the few air-conditioned places the public could "hang out" in.

I have mentioned here before that since I grew up without any AC that a summertime movie was a double treat.
Walking out into the wall of heat and humidity was a bear, but it was absolutely worth it.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

"Riding the rods”
On freight trains beneath slow moving cars, we’d hang on to the rods.
Pretty dumb and dangerous, but at the time it was fun or so I thought.

“Riding the rails”.
Riding my Bonneville on the edge of the railroad tracks with my buddy Rick
back in ’64.
I have done so many stupid things in my life,
I'm darn lucky to be alive.

To be old & wise, one must first be young & stupid.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

I personally like this Commander Cody.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I have mentioned here before that since I grew up without any AC that a summertime movie was a double treat.
Walking out into the wall of heat and humidity was a bear, but it was absolutely worth it.

I used to go into crappy little neighborhood stores and stick my head in the beer cooler until they yelled at me to go home. To this day the smell of stale, spilled beer and damp mold say "Summer" to me.

 

[2jakes]

Skinny-dipping!

Going down to the creek in the summer time was the best way to cool down with no one around to tell you otherwise!

 

[Bruce Wayne]

Who here measures distance by how the crow flies?

 

[3fingers]

Who here measures distance by how the crow flies?

Me. It's still heard here, though not as often as it used to be.

 

[2jakes]

Who here measures distance by how the crow flies?

Folks in some small towns.
One weekend, asking for directions to get to an
antique swap meet I stopped at local ice-house.
The man at the counter replied:
(Think of a Dustin Hoffman accent from the movie,
"Little Big Man").

He said....
"ye git down der....jest follow yer nose, taint fer...reckon bout couple
miles as the crow flies!"

All the while he had a fly swatter which he would whack at the counter
top in between his sentences.
He never looked at me eye to eye.

I forgot to mentioned that when I walked in... everyone and I mean
everyone there sitting and drinking...stopped what they were doing
to look at me from head to toe.
My first thought, "so this must be how women must feel when men
stare at them".
I believe I said.... " I'm a thanking you kindly!" in my best
Gary Cooper and smiled.
He did not smile.
I shuffled out of there quickly.

 

[Zombie_61]

Who here measures distance by how the crow flies?

"Here it is - Cocoanut Manor. 42 hours from Times Square by railroad. 1,600 miles as the crow flies and 1,800 as the horse flies."
Hammer (Groucho Marx) - The Cocoanuts, 1929

 

[Upgrade]

Unfortunately automobile driving directions rarely follow straight through routes like that.

Unless you’re on one of Roosevelt’s famous point to point walks.

 

[Woodtroll]

Who here measures distance by how the crow flies?

We still use that here pretty often. In the mountains the straight-line distance and actual driving/walking distances are usually very different. It is also more common to talk about how long it will take to drive somewhere, rather than speak of distance, because the road conditions vary so much. "About five miles" can take anywhere from a couple of hours or more to just a few minutes, so the time to travel actually is more meaningful information.

 

[Zombie_61]

We still use that here pretty often. In the mountains the straight-line distance and actual driving/walking distances are usually very different. It is also more common to talk about how long it will take to drive somewhere, rather than speak of distance, because the road conditions vary so much. "About five miles" can take anywhere from a couple of hours or more to just a few minutes, so the time to travel actually is more meaningful information.

That's very common here in southern California as well. "How far away is it?" "Oh, about 20 minutes." The actual distance is almost irrelevant; they just want to know how long it'll take them to get there and back.

One of my brothers-in-law in Chicago used to measure travel times by the number of cigarettes he'd smoke: "Oh, that's about a two cigarette drive." Of course, that meant nothing to non-smokers, and for a heavier smoker that same trip might be a three or four cigarette drive, but that doesn't matter any more 'cause brother-in-law stopped smoking.

 

[BobHufford]

“Deader than a door nail...”

 

[3fingers]

My favorite is "deader than Julius Caesar". I do get some baffled looks with that one.

 

[LizzieMaine]

One of my brothers-in-law in Chicago used to measure travel times by the number of cigarettes he'd smoke: "Oh, that's about a two cigarette drive." Of course, that meant nothing to non-smokers, and for a heavier smoker that same trip might be a three or four cigarette drive, but that doesn't matter any more 'cause brother-in-law stopped smoking.

The radio comedy writer Goodman Ace used to measure the quality of his scripts by the number of cigars he smoked while writing them. A one-cigar script was top-notch, a two-cigar script was ehhhh, and a three-cigar script was a stinkeroo.

 

[2jakes]