ericbrow

Buried family stories

Posted by Critical-Bad7993@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 73 comments

ericbrow@reddit

My 70+ year old aunt went to visit her 90+ year old aunt. The oldest lady decided to finally share that my aunt's 2 siblings (she's my aunt by marriage, but I've known her siblings as aunts and uncles) did not share the same father. She told my aunt that her mom ran around a lot, her husband was impotent, and that none of them shared the same father. I don't really care. They're great people.

What’s your favorite candy bar from back when.??

Posted by curious-thatguy@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 377 comments

ericbrow@reddit

My father was a salesman for Clark Grave Vaults.. We had huge garbage bags full of mini Clark bars in our freezer. He would take them to funeral home conventions.

What pop culture moment shines out most brightly from Gen-X’s childhood?

Posted by FantasticStooge@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 438 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I broke my arm, and had to stay overnight in the hospital, missing the Dukes of Hazzard Demolition Derby special. Im still bitter about that.

Need to print from XP machine

Posted by CarolinaKernel@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 104 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I've worked around legacy systems like this before by turning the old machine into a VM and abstract the hosts printer to the VM. I've done this with DOS based CAD and a few others.

What’s happening to my body

Posted by dma202@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 47 comments

Computers bug out only when a certain user is logged in can't figure out why

Posted by brohemoth06@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 330 comments

ericbrow@reddit

OK, I've filed this story under urban legend, but it may fit. There was an older guy who worked in IT his career, and retired to teaching computer classes at a community College. He developed cancer, and had to undergo aggressive chemo therapy. After he recovered, he went back to the community college teaching computer classes. He found that when he touched a monitor, it would get fuzzy. If he touched the case, mouse, or keyboard, it would glitch out: computer freezing, blue screening, randomly reboot. It was attributed to a massive change in his body's electrochemical balance from the chemo. Probably a fake story, but I've always wondered if there were similar cases like this.

Welcome to Generation X in a nutshell.

Posted by Craig1974@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 43 comments

Middle age is becoming a breaking point in the U.S.

Posted by Average0ldGuy@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 667 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I've been feeling this more and more lately. Just tired of stupid bullshit, tired of paying bills, paying taxes, tired of working. There is some comfort in knowing its not just my impressions of my situation.

What the fuck are we saying?

Posted by don_croy@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 24 comments

Challenger disaster was 40 years ago today

Posted by ruggerbear@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 294 comments

I've seen many American films where children dissect frogs during biology lessons. Are biology lessons still like this, or has it changed? What are your thoughts on this?

Posted by sofiarosatti@reddit | AskAnAmerican | View on Reddit | 1373 comments

ericbrow@reddit

We dissected earth worms, a plasticized fetal pig (where they pump different colored plastic through veins, arteries, etc). My favorite part was the experiment on live frogs. Please don't come at me for this, I was only a kid at the time making none of these decisions. The teacher had an assistant who would use chloroform on a frog, and then pith (?) it, where he would push a small scalpel into it's neck, paralyzing it from the neck down. We were then instructed to make an H cut in the chest, exposing the heart. We were then supposed to record the heartbeat by counting with a stopwatch. Next we put one drop of liquid adrenaline on the heart, and count the hart rate until it went down to close to our baseline. Then 4 drops, etc. The teacher was very clear, and repeated multiple times, "Make sure it's only one drop. DO NOT SQUEEZE A WHOLE DROPPER ONTO THE HEART. IT WILL EXPLODE, AND YOU WILL GET COVERED IN BLOOD!!!" You can guess exactly what happened to 2 different lab groups of 14-18 year old students. The teacher wasn't joking.

Found these unopened disks for an operating system I have never heard of

Posted by AnotherMovieStudio@reddit | vintagecomputing | View on Reddit | 308 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I installed OS/2 Warp once. And then there wasn't much I could do. No apps to install, I don't think web surfing was a thing just yet. It was just a little different than Windows 3.11.

"We're not allowed to copy files"

Posted by WaldoOU812@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 94 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I had to help multiple software companies figure out the exact database permissions they needed when I worked as a DBA. They wanted sysadmin for a service account, when in reality, they needed far less.

What are your opinions about Bob Newhart?

Posted by PierceHawthorne66@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 1387 comments

What's a commercial jingle from your youth that you still sing to yourself to this day?

Posted by Leather-Highlight150@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 1148 comments

HBO nostalgia. The Top 50 most aired movies on HBO in the '80s.

Posted by inasimplerhyme@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 204 comments

ericbrow@reddit

Poltergeist? When we first got cable in the early 80s, we got 3 months free of all the subscription channels like HBO, Showtime, Cinemax, etc. One night I was bored and surfed through those channels, and EVERY SINGLE CHANNEL had that movie playing.

Bad temper

Posted by cityrc@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 560 comments

The Bloodhound Gang - cackling witch

Posted by Euphoric-Sell-5272@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 34 comments

How old when you arrived home alone after school?

Posted by RogerMoore2011@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 579 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I was the oldest. I stayed alone after school starting in 3rd grade. When I hit 4th grade, my 1st grade brother was my responsibility too.

Never be the youngest person in a seniors group

Posted by Federal-Fox7587@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 185 comments

Did anyone else's grandparents have furniture covered in plastic?

Posted by SlowPokeInTexas@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 58 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I was an early teen when it dawned on me that I could remove the rubber sheets from my grandmothers guest bed. She put them down every time I visited because I had an accident once in bed when I was two years old and work up crying because I didn't know where I was.

Yoda, Iroh, Mother Abagail, Merlin?

Posted by in-a-microbus@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 52 comments

Have you ever…

Posted by profcate@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 347 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I shave my head. I bent my head slightly forward to dry the back of my head and put my neck out of place. Another time, I re-laced my workout shoes and tied them tight. Ran around all day. When I took my shoes off that night, I felt like a horse stomped on my foot. Crippled me for 2 days.

Which sitcom parents closely resembled your parents.

Posted by Objective-Lab5179@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 126 comments

Saw this on another sub and thought of us, fam

Posted by souris_maison@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 124 comments

What’s the best thing you’ve done so far in life?

Posted by Reader288@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 568 comments

Man from Atlantis

Posted by Ancient_Seat_7456@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 17 comments

Just found out I frequently use old timey idioms - is this a GenX thing or a me thing?

Posted by JuJuBee_Whoopee@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 2417 comments

ericbrow@reddit

In a college lecture, I dropped "So you can see, there's more than one way to skin a cat". I didn't realize these students had not heard the phrase. They gasped, wondering why I would do such horrible things to cats.

I remember as a kid when I thought Sha Na Na was the epitome of cool

Posted by Bostonterrierpug@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 171 comments

Me back in 1988 @ 2nd Level, a nightclub for teenagers. Can you image that being a thing now?

Posted by BudapestGrrl@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 300 comments

What was the last band t-shirt you wore and under what circumstances?

Posted by DieMensch-Maschine@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 1550 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I've been on an old guy tour lately. I'm wearing a Barry Manilo shirt i got last summer. Yesterday, I wore the Santanna shirt I got this summer also. Tomorrow I'm going to wear the Herb Alpert shirt I got at his concert I attended last weekend.

Anyone watch Titus?

Posted by Egg-Tall@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 171 comments

The Cult’s “metal phase” was absolute fire…

Posted by BrokenPinkyPromise@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 47 comments

ericbrow@reddit

Electric came out spring of my senior year in high school. I have very clear memories of blasting Lil Angel followed by Born to be Wild on Electric. Really nice and warm sunny morning early in May, windows down in my buddy's 78 VW Rabbit.

Was this a thing or just me?

Posted by coolcoinsdotcom@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 719 comments

Whatever happened to these? Loved ‘em…

Posted by Stardustquarks@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 116 comments

ericbrow@reddit

My father was a traveling salesman for Clark Grave Vault Company. For funeral trade shows, he had 2 huge garbage bags filled with fun size Clark bars. He kept them in the freezer, and would only take a few pounds to each convention. This meant I had unlimited access to bottomless Clark bars. Thankfully, I didn't have a big sweet tooth, and didn't eat many, but it was real popular with my friends.

Your Favorite Consecutive 10 Years Of Music

Posted by BaritoneAstoria@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 261 comments

How popular were The Three Investigators amongst GenX in the U.S? I grew up overseas and everyone in my class loved them.

Posted by copperpin@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 304 comments

Did anyone else have the 'board of education ' at your school? Ouch! 😳

Posted by PinkOutLoud@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 126 comments

ericbrow@reddit

Grade school, late 70s, was the last time I saw a kid get paddled. It was one of those days where everyone was wound up for no reason. Teacher ended recess early to have us line up so they could yell at us for being squirrelly. One kid, Mike, just couldn't turn it off, not being horrible, just couldn't stop running his chops and running in circles. Principal came out and gave him one big wack with the paddle, and Mike promptly puked all over the principal's shoes.

Pace of technology in our era... crazy!

Posted by justplainjon@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 83 comments

ericbrow@reddit

Full time IT here. One of my co-workers, who is 3-4 years out of college, got wild eyed in a meeting recently, "Man, they didn't teach us all this new stuff in college." I had to stifle my laugh as almost nothing we use now existed when I was in college, and a lot of what we use only became available in the last 10 years.

Does anyone else get giddy when monsters cereal comes out every year? Count Chocula is a good man. And thorough.

Posted by bwanabass@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 186 comments

Encyclopedia Brown

Posted by DStinner@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 86 comments

Anyone's parents go on vacation and leave you at home?

Posted by tvieno@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 516 comments

ericbrow@reddit

Between Junior and Senior year, as I sat on my favorite chair in our front living room reading a book, my parents left for a week in Florida, and told me not to have any parties. I was working in a kitchen at a nursing home that summer, usually 4 hours in the evening. But the day my parents left, a bunch of co-workers walked off the job. I got asked to work 12 hour days for that entire week. They got someone hired, and a week later, I only had a 4 hour shift, so I was sitting back in my favorite chair, reading a book, when my parents came home. "Didn't you do one goddamn thing while we were gone?" was their greeting.

GenX veterans: Does anyone know that you served?

Posted by copperpin@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 317 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I did National Guard for 8 years. I very rarely admit it. I only got called to active duty during the Flood of 93 to fill sandbags. I developed shingles and got sent home after a week. Our unit had WW2 era howitzers, and Viet Nam era personal gear, and we were told it would cost too much to upgrade our equipment and train us on it, so we never got sent to the first desert storm. I feel like I barely served. It was fun, though.

Gen X what is your dream car?

Posted by GuadalupeWarren6425@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 94 comments

ericbrow@reddit

Senior year, 1987, early spring, it was a beautiful morning even though it was a school day. We drove to school with our normal crew, 4 guys in a beat up VW Rabbit. The school parking lot was full, so we had to parallel park on the street, and those spots were quickly filling up. We got parked, and one of our classmates parked behind us. She was a nice girl who had had a major glow-up over the last year. When she got out of her car and said hello to us, it was like a scene in a movie where the main character falls instantly in love, where every slows down, wind blowing her hair, and she smiles and waves. She was driving an early 1960s bananna yellow Karmann Ghia. So my answer is an early 60s Karmann Ghia.

So what was up with that parachute in gym class, and forcing us to square dance?

Posted by roadtrip-ne@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 279 comments

ericbrow@reddit

I thought I read somewhere that square dancing came from a huge grant program started by a racist millionaire who wanted to reinforce white-ness in public schools after the Supreme Court decision that required racial integration of schools.

Worst after hours call

Posted by IamMortality@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 295 comments

ericbrow@reddit

When i was a DBA, i often had to work with a contentious dev, as in, he would sabotage things and try to blame me. He built some data load process that would fill the tempdb at 2am. Id get the emergency call about a full disk, but by the time I got logged in, the problem had gone away. After 3 nights of this, I dug into the problem, and found it was his new data load job. I politely asked if he could commit the data more frequently so the tempdb wouldn't fill the disk. His response was that the disk was not his problem, it was the DBAs problem. I couldn't force him to change his code, but i did have access to the application that listed who to call after hours for an emergency. I was able to enter his contact info for that server in the event of a full disk, instead of me. He corrected his code after his first 2am wakeup.

What’s a Christmas gift you appreciate now that wouldn’t when you were younger?

Posted by bigt197602@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 184 comments

I remember loving the CHIPS Disco Skating Episode

Posted by Melca_AZ@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 23 comments

ericbrow@reddit

This reminds me of the time I got so mad because I broke my arm the afternoon before the Dukes of Hazzard Demolition Derby special episode, and they had to put me under to set my arm, so I missed it.

Did you guys collect cans for extra money?

Posted by FreedomSquatch@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 75 comments

ericbrow@reddit

My mom worked for a guy whose business was behind a grocery store. Down one side of her boss's property was a long bush, between the grocery store and his business. When school let out, he'd hire me to clean that hedgerow, as garbage would blow over from the grocery store parking lot. Also, when the grocery store closed, several of the guys would split a 12-pack of beer, sit on the back dock and throw their empties into those bushes. Back then, there was a 5 cent deposit on glass bottles like that. Mom's boss would let me turn in any bottles I found for the deposit. More than once, I got more money in deposit refund than I did what her boss was paying me.

Does anyone ever go back and binge 70's/80's/90's shows?

Posted by Sa7aSa7a@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 326 comments