Another Classic.............

[Doug Johnson]

Yep!

I think I did all that. Biggest differance was that I had a .22 at age 10, think I had a BB gun when I was seven or so. Shot lots of sparrows. Never had in-door plumming till I was a Junior in high-school. Quite a differance from now days!

Doug Johnson

[Frank Walsh]

And the term "bailout" was something you did for your deadbeat brother after a wild weekend.

[Ed Spoerl]

Frank,

I was the youngest of 10 and I learned all I wanted and then some about respect, diversity and tolerance within the household. No need for the public schools to teach me about diversity or tolerance; the teachers could actually just focus on reading writing and math! Oh yah and civics!

Amazing how much fun a stick was! But then we had pretty creative imaginations growing up and never seemed to be bored. Of course all the choirs better be done!

My Father had a belt with little Indian beads on it that hurt like hell across the back of the legs, but the thing that was crazy about doing something wrong is that I never did it again! In fact as I would be sitting in my room I was more mad at myself for being so stupid rather than angry at my parents for doing something wrong, not sure how they did that?

I used to play on the pipes in the furnace room like they were monkey bars and remember all the dust from the asbestoses insulation falling in my eyes and mouth. We (6 boys) slept in an unheated attic and would run down stairs on winter mornings and lay beside the baseboard radiators to warm up. It was there that I would chip off trophy size lead paint chips suck on them and spit them at my brothers!

Might explain why I spend thousands of dollars catching a fish I just release anyway?

Ed

[fishwizard]

Although I was born in 1979 I'd like to mention that I identify with the above 100%. Although I did have a Nintendo when I was young, but I spent a lot more time riding my 80cc mini-bike through the nearby park and getting chased out by the cops on a weekly basis. The times I spent entire afternoons playing with a box of strike anywhere matches and a couple gallons of gas were usually interesting. Many G.I. Joes and toy cars met their fate, but somehow I never managed to burn anything down too important.

Many of the things I've learned in this world I've learned because I initially did them wrong, but today too many kids aren't given the chance to learn from their own mistakes. It goes to show that while kids today may do better in school, very few have the same common sense that seemed so important in the past. I lived a little more on the edge than the average kid, but I wouldn't change any of the experiences I've had in life.

[dpear]

Now I know why Fishwizard scares me,we had a similar guy in our HS class.He'd take a box of 'farmers'matches(wood ones)and sit by an ant pile for hours burning ants.
Don't really want to say where he ended up but suspect he's still wearing a tight fitting white jacket wherever it is.

[BWold]

When we were kids, out in our cow pasture, we had two enormous ant hills. One had black ants, one had red ants. You guessed it. Get a big stick....dig around in the black ants til they were pissed and crawling all over the stick, then run it over and put them in the red ant pile. Once the red ants were done with the black ants it was time for revenge, get some red ants over to the black ants and let them have their way.

Favorite was gopher trapping though. Always made it interesting somehow! Jump on the John Deere "B" tractor with a shovel, traps and some hub caps and head to the fields. If we were lucky enough to catch two live gophers, then we would play gladiator with them. Had to make farm work interesting.

The other night my family and I were sitting at the dinner table and the discussion of what the wife and I used to do when we were our children's age came up. When we told them that we did chores, worked and played outside all day long they were in utter shock. Couldn't believe we didn't have playstation or xbox to play and that our moms would kick us out of the house during the day to go and play. How the times have changed, eh?

My oldest son, who is almost 16, thinks that working at Burger King or Subway is going to be to much labor intensive work. I have some farmer friends that could use his help picking rock this spring. Bet after a few days of that, Subway wont be looking too bad!!!!!

[Muskie Nut]

Now I know why Fishwizard scares me,we had a similar guy in our HS class.He'd take a box of 'farmers'matches(wood ones)and sit by an ant pile for hours burning ants.

This guy is so wasteful. Doesn't he know its much easier to use solar power to cook ants??? We used to make wise use of our magnifying glass.

[fishwizard]

Yeah, sometimes I scare myself. Actually my wife often marvels at how I'm still alive after many of the things I've done in my childhood. Thankfully I've stopped doing most of them.