Oct
02

Memory Lane: Top 5 Forgotten Gems

Boy did this one give us a rollicking good time in the office.  I had to close the list for submissions so that we could get on with our day – the discussion got a bit out of hand…

What can be said about the following five items that could rival the memories they’ll surely spark in your hearts and minds?  Nothing. That’s what.  So I’ll just get on with it.


The Water Bed
Isn't it gorgeous? Photo via eHow.com

As it turns out, I am the ONLY person in the office who didn’t have one in highschool.  I’m not totally out of the club however, because I had a basement-dwelling boyfriend who did.  My memory of the water bed: not appropriate.  But I’m sure there was more than one ‘80s comedy that had a scene with a water bed being punctured, and a few horror films that had a petrified cast member gasping for breath just beneath it’s plastic surface… What was that from…anyone?

Central Vac System
Even more gorgeous than the water bed photo...  Via Instructables.com

I’m sure some of you are going to protest this one, but I don’t know anyone who has even uttered the words in the past ten years.  Actually, I’m lying; my girlfriend randomly asked me what I think of a central vac system because she was completing a reno, and briefly considered – at the contractor’s urge – supping up her walls with the central vac.  Once she posed the question out loud, we both laughed.  It just feels wrong.  Why?  Is it the unsightly and cumbersome mile of vac tubing?  Doesn’t it tickle your funny bone a little?  I mean, from what I remember – and I remember many of my friends having one – it really wasn’t much easier to use than a normal vac.  Plus it scared me a little back then.

Potpourri
Photo via Coastal Enterprises.

Ah.  This is a good one.  As much as we will miss putting coloured woodchips and shrunken lemons in bowls on our toilet tanks, we can now draw an ambrosial breath of plug-in goodness. Right?  I’ve a plug-in, don’t you?  They still sell those sad, crunchy bags of nostril tickler, but when I see it in that discount bin at the craft store, I smirk at it.  
 

Phone in the Bathroom
I couldn't even find a good photo of a wall-mounted phone in a bathroom, it's that gone...

Right now I’m humming “Mirror in the Bathroom” by the English Beat.  But I digress.  That same barnacle phone that was suctioned to the wall in your kitchen – the one in a mute salmon colour or perhaps that sickening cream, with the mile lone cord – that same phone made it’s way into the bathroom for a few decades there.  And don’t even try to deny it.  I’m sure you had one, or knew someone who had one, and they probably bragged about it like their bathroom was straight out of Scarface or something.  (I didn’t have one because we spent those said decades in a gross apartment building, and that kind of luxury would have been wholly pretentious.)

 
The Thigh Master
Photo via ButThat'sNotAll blog

HA ha ha ha hahahahahahhahhhhhhhhhh!  I had one.  (Suzanne was hot thought, it's true.)

 

I'm sure you've something else to add to this list, lets hear it!

Previously on Top 5 Friday: The Ironing Board Gets a Makeover?

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Comments:

I might be the "last one standing", but after 30 years we surrendered our waterbed to our adult son. For our 1st wedding anniversary, my husband surprised me with a full wave bed for which he had built a beautiful wooden frame. Finding the proper water-level was tricky but after trial and error, we were hooked. I have neck and back injuries and the support and the warmth of the bed made sleeping much easier, spoiled trying to get comfortable in a conventional bed. About the name of the horror flick, sorry I don't have any idea.

October 2, 2009 11:40 PM

 

Thanks for that Patricia, I do understand the comfort factor.

October 3, 2009 12:55 PM

 

The first Nightmare on Elm Street, wasn't it Johnny Depp who was killed on a water bed?

October 3, 2009 6:24 PM

 

Remember the movie...was it really Johnny Depp?

I used to think that waterbeds were only bought by bachelors who thought they were hot stuff.  (the thought turned me off)

I love my central vac.  My hose doesn't bother me and we actually have a nice hose sock over it to prevent damage to furniture or the stairs.  And it's much easier to just pull the hose when doing the stairs.

Potpourri can either be tacky or nice.  Gotta be careful with the scent, where it's placed and in what.  

Back to the tacky beds...how about mirrored headboards/ceilings?

October 3, 2009 8:04 PM

 
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