Feeling Young

October 2004

Everything is relative!

Just in case you were feeling young today...

* The people who are starting University this autumn across the nation were born in 1986.

* They have no meaningful recollection of the Thatcher era.

* They were prepubescent when the First Gulf War started.

* Black Monday 1987 is as significant to them as the Great Depression.

* Their world has always included AIDS.

Even worse......

* From their earliest years, a camera was something you used once and threw away.

* Few, if any, have lived without an answering machine.

* Few have used a TV set without a remote control and they don't know they come in black and white.

You're probably aged 23 to 33 if...

* You wore a Kagool, especially those windbreakers that folded up into a pouch you could wear around your waist.

* You're starting to believe (now that it wouldn't affect YOU) that maybe having the kids go to school year-round wouldn't be such a bad idea after all (and neither would wearing school uniforms).

* Bo, Luke and Daisy Duke are fond memories. (Even if the first ones were the best...)

* Knickers and leg warmers were cool.

* Doctor Who made you hide behind the sofa.

* This rings a bell: "and my name is Charlie. They work for me."

* You owned a pair of rainbow braces just like Mork used to wear and said 'nanu nanu'

* Mark from Eastenders will always be Tucker from Grange Hill/Tucker's Luck.

* You could sing "99 Red Balloons "in English and in German.

* You remember a 'Man's got to chew, what a Man's got to chew'.

* You remember when there was no breakfast TV and when TV shut down at midnight, and when there was nothing on TV in the middle of the day except for that test card girl with the stupid clown and a blackboard.

* You remember Farleys rusks tasting nice, but when you had one about 5 years ago they were bloody awful!!

* One word.....SPANGLES!!!

You are a true child of the 80 s if . . . .

* You never questioned why the A-Team was always imprisoned in places that had sufficient tools to build an armoured tank.

* You know the theme tune and the names of all the actors and characters in Dallas & Dynasty.

* Your first crush was on Daisy, Luke or Bo.

* Parachuting Action man was your favourite toy.

* You wanted to be either Nancy Drew or the Hardy Boys.

* You remember when Keith Chegwin & Maggie Philbin were the hottest romantic couple....

* You tried to set up a "Famous Five" or "Secret Seven" gang with your school friends.

* You tried to convince your Dad to fit a strip of red lights on the front of his Capri so it looked like KITT.

* You grew up believing that filing cabinets and telephone boxes possessed magical powers of transformation.

* After ET, you wanted a Speak & Spell even though you were top of your class

* You remember when PC had one meaning, rather than three.

* You grew up in Trumpton, Chigley or Camblewick Green.

* Ooh, you could crush a Grape!

* Giant Haystacks and Big Daddy have ever featured on your Saturday afternoon

* You wore legwarmers, tried to do the splits while jumping in the air, while singing you were going to live forever.

Ray Thompson