Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

[Trenchfriend]

^^^^^^
I clearly recall signs posted at entrances to restaurants reading “microwave oven in use.” It was meant as a warning to people with implanted cardiac pacemakers, the thinking being that leaked microwave radiation could mess with the devices’ functions.

Yeah, when you mentioned it, I remembered these defibrillator warnings!

Actual situation:

-no direct contact between entertainment electronics and "aggregat"

-no direct contact to "Mag(net)Safe" smartphones!

-25 cm distance to induction stove
-60 cm distance to RFID systems/devices
-15 cm distance to smartwatches and fitness straps, DO NOT WEAR AT SLEEPING

-no direct contact to theft-protection systems, pass as fast as possible!



But in general, todays devices are very very good shielded.

 

[Zombie_61]

I wish that I had Jessie's Girl.

I can't remember exactly when it was, but some years ago Rick Springfield was "in concert" here in southern California, and my late wife asked if I would take her to see him perform if none of her friends would go. Now, I knew this was bunk, because she had one friend who was most definitely a fan of Mr. Springfield and would go if she had to walk through fire, and my wife had any number of other friends and/or relatives who would have gone with her if she had asked. No, this was her way of saying she wanted ME to go with her, but doing it in a way so I could "save face"--"Yeah, I went with her to see him. What can I say; I was being a good husband." So I did. Now, I wasn't a fan, but I didn't dislike Mr. Springfield's music, so we had fun. At one point he switched guitars, and neither he nor the stagehand could get the sound to come out of it regardless of which cable they plugged into it. After fiddling with it for about 10 minutes, instead of throwing a fit like some stars might Springfield looked at the audience smiled, and shrugged. "Hey, it's a live performance; these things happen sometimes." So he and the band performed the song without Springfield's lead guitar, and without him throwing a fit, and moved on. Points for handling it so professionally.

 

[BobHufford]

Decorative insulation backing paper. For when you can’t afford to drywall or panel over it? (We’re re-plumbing the farm house)

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^
I can’t recall ever seeing that stuff. But then, it’s not that I’ve had so many opportunities to, either.

 

[Woodtroll]

I remember that stuff! Almost seemed a little comical to me, but if you've got to print something on the paper may as well make it decorative and useful. Sort of like the feed and flour sacks with gingham and "flowerdy" prints on them so it could be used for dresses and curtains.

 

[tonyb]

Yesterday

I remember that stuff! Almost seemed a little comical to me, but if you've got to print something on the paper may as well make it decorative and useful. Sort of like the feed and flour sacks with gingham and "flowerdy" prints on them so it could be used for dresses and curtains.

And true vintage sacks of that type fetch real money these days. I was given a few burlap coffee sacks at a garage sale a few weeks back (I bought a couple-three other items and the sale was drawing down and the seller just wanted rid of them).

I paid something like eight bucks for a vintage hundred-pound poultry feed sack at a junktique emporium in Cross Plains, Wisconsin a couple years ago. (Grandpa would’ve gotten a chuckle out of that.) I framed it.

 

[Trenchfriend]

@tonyb

Poultry concentrate??

Do you put that in Tacos or petfood only??

 

[tonyb]

Yesterday, upon seeing a neighbor’s well-used Honda Odyssey minivan up on jack stands with its wheels off on the street in front of his house, I was again reminded of how unusual a sight that is these days.

Back half a century ago, when cars were simpler and municipalities hadn’t gotten around to banning the practice, on-street DIY car repair was common. It’s contrary to code here, too, but no one around here seems given to dropping a dime over it. That’s another thing to like about this place.

 

[Zombie_61]

Poultry concentrate??

Do you put that in Tacos or petfood only??

Poultry concentrate is mixed with chicken feed, then fed to the chickens. It can provide protein, lysine, methionine, calcium, phosphorus, salt, vitamins, trace minerals, and probably anything else that chickens might need in their diet to remain healthy and grow larger.

 

[Trenchfriend]

@Zombie_61

Aah, Kraftfutter, I see!

 

[Zombie_61]

@Zombie_61

Aah, Kraftfutter, I see!

Yes, I'd say that's an accurate description.

 

[BobHufford]

I haven’t witnessed this hand gesture in decades.

 

[Trenchfriend]

@BobHufford
Yes, now I remember! We did this gesture as kids in the 90s.

 

[tonyb]

Embossed motor vehicle license plates.

They haven’t gone away yet, but printed plates are becoming more common.

 

[KILO NOVEMBER]

The pencil sharpener, once ubiquitous in classrooms and offices, anyone seen one lately? I was watching a Perry Mason episode the other day when a man snooping at another man's desk saw a pad of paper with indentations from a now-torn-off sheet above. He emptied the pencil sharpener (a high-tech electric one) and smeared the graphite powder over the indented sheet to reveal what had been written there. He didn't even need the writer's password to snoop on his note!

 

[tonyb]

^^^^
A friend presented me with a vintage screw-it-to-the-wall pencil sharpener several years ago. I still have it. I have yet to screw it to the wall. It’s on a shelf in “the blue room,” a 100-square-foot bedroom lined with groaning bookcases.

I use pencils, though, and I have a little AA battery powered electric sharpener.

 

[KILO NOVEMBER]

"A friend presented me with a vintage screw-it-to-the-wall pencil sharpener several years ago."
Ah, the acoustic pencil sharpener!

 

[tonyb]

Are pencil sharpeners still commonly seen in primary school classrooms? Like the kind we knew? Mounted to the wall?

I suppose the retronym would be “manual pencil sharpener.”

 

[Trenchfriend]

Are pencil sharpeners still commonly seen in primary school classrooms? Like the kind we knew? Mounted to the wall?

I suppose the retronym would be “manual pencil sharpener.”

Mounted to the wall was not common in 90s East-Germany. Every kid has its own sharpener in the FEDERMAPPE.

 

[Trenchfriend]

But I liked, when I saw the SFPD in Basic Instinct still do meetings with pencils for notes.