Why Rehab is like sex?

Every generation thinks they invented it.

Sometimes that really is all there is...

I stick my finger where?

One of those things that sets one generation apart from another - behold, the princess phone. When I was a girl, this was the must-have technology for every girl's room. It actually had a dial that lit up so you could find it and dial in the dark. Like, wow.

Oh, and that word "dial" is what it actually did. If the number was, let's say, 555-5512, you'd put your finger in the 5 hole and turn the dial clockwise till it hit the little silver do-dad. Pull you finger out and the dial turns back clicking once for each number. That was how the telephone switching equipment knew what number you were calling.

It was common on tv spy shows of those far off times to have the good guys figure out what number the bad guys were calling by counting the number of clicks...seriously. And there were a lot of spy shows in those days - Man from U.N.C.L.E. , I Spy, The Avengers, Department S, The Saint, Danger Man, The Prisoner (okay, that wasn't a spy show, just plain weird but in a fun, creepy way), Mission Impossible. No, the original ones...in real Black and White. Yes, that old.

what was once so important

This is an old picture of the London Stone, it used to mark the city limit of London England. Supposedly all roads were measured by their distance from this marker. Here in Victoria we have something similar in that we have pubs still named for their mileage from the old Fort - The Four Mile House, The Six Mile House and even The Seventeen Mile House where the dusty, thirsty traveler could stop for a beverage and maybe an evening's accommodation, if he was on his way to a further spot along the coast.

The London Stone was once a vital measurement for the country but it got shifted around, lost, found then lost to memory again only to resurface in a display at the foundation wall of a bank. I guess what I'm trying to say is something that seems so permanent as a milestone - literally made of stone - is only a big rock once the idea behind it gets forgotten.

I'm not that old...am I?

Let's see, I remember hula hoops, the Kennedy assassination - both of them, Marilyn Munroe's suicide ( my mother just kept saying something about 'that poor girl') and the day the music died. I guess that makes me old. But I'm still into keeping up with technology and like to do things like break podcasting and blogging (private joke among us old folks - once we start doing something, it's broken as far as our kids are concerned).

When I went to school girls wore dresses and skirts. If it got really cold, I'm talking -25 Fahrenheit, skin freezing in 5 minutes cold, we were allowed to put pants on under the skirt but had to remove them once we got to school. Otherwise, ya toughed it out with really uncomfortably tights. Heavy wool tights with a crotch that you could never pull up more than just above your knees so you walked like a penguin. Now add a wool scarf wrapped around your face so you have to breathe through it (or your lungs will freeze....yeah, right) and by the time you've waddled a block the outside of the scarf is coated in ice and the inside is so soggy from your breath your cheeks get chapped almost raw from rubbing against wet, cold wool. Ah, the good old days.


It wasn't until High School that the dress code lightened up enough to allow us to wear pants - but only pant suits or dress slacks and shirts/sweaters were not to be tucked in...Seriously. Then again, this was a Catholic High School - but not a private school, Alberta had a dual school system that divided the population into non-Catholics and Catholics. Depending on what the predominant religion was in the community, that would be the "Public" School system. The other would be the "Separate" School system. So, we were a little more conservative than our Public school friends but we did get extra holidays whenever a Holy Day of Obligation rolled around Yeah, we did have to go to Mass but after that...