England v. America, Part I

One of our close friends was from England, originally, though she could fake an American accent better than anyone I've ever met.  She took great pleasure in telling us regularly how superior English food was to American food, particularly the chocolate.  I have been to the UK recently, and I can say that I truly can't tell the difference between the Cadbury there and the Cadbury here, though my newer friends from Over There insist, like N did, that theirs is, in fact, better.

I Dream Of St. Elsewhere

I don't recall ever watching that show, but I've listed it here as one of my favorites. 

Desert Island Picks

A double post today, to make up for my absence.

Freshman year was a flurry of football games, dances, and group dates at the mall.  New guys everywhere we looked.  By sophomore year, we were tired of those guys, too old for the weekly dances, too young to drive anywhere to meet anyone, and experiencing a serious social drought.

Christmas Dance

First of all, my apologies for the three straight days with no posts.  I've been dealing with a temperamental scanner, and the first week of school for the kids.

Since we went to an all-girls school, our dances were all Sadie-Hawkins style.  We asked the boys, we paid for dinner, limo, whatever.  This also opened up a lot of possibilities--you didn't have to wait to be asked, and you not only went to your own school dances, but those of whatever boys might ask you to theirs.  As a result, I went to ten formals in four years.  That's a lot of dresses and boutonnieres!  As fifteen year olds, we started searching for Christmas Dance dates sometime before Thanksgiving.  Not the best idea.  Often, you'd ask a boyfriend, then break up with him before the dance.  Nobody ever went stag to one of these things, to my recollection.  So you either went to the dance with someone you despised, scrambled at the last minute for a date, or forfeited your bid money.  (I have no idea why they called the dance tickets "bids".)  I almost always earned the money for the tickets, boutonnieres, dinners, and transportation myself.  My mom made most of my dresses, bought one or two, and I swapped the rest with friends.  It seems most of the teenagers I know now don't earn their own money for this stuff.  Am I wrong?

Brian and the Harem...

This is actually the continuation of a story N started in another notebook.  Pretty racy for a 15 year old--straight out of a Harlequin Romance.  Definitely juicier than my whining about D.

Kayleigh, Ty, and Alec

Okay, the truth had to come out sooner or later, so it might as well be now.   My own notes are hideously boring.  Just about everyone whose teenage thoughts are exposed on this blog has enough talent to be published in one way or another, but I'm the exception.  But, I figure if I'm exposing everyone I knew (with their permission, of course), I should at have to suffer as well.  And, apparently, you do too.  If you make it through this drivel, there's an update at the end of this post, and I promise something juicy (or at least amusing) is on the very next pages, to be posted tomorrow.

So...Did we live up to those lofty goals I laid out in 1985?  S, H, and I are actually "happy homemakers", though, we only have five kids between us, all of them boys.  N has a boy as well, and I do belive her career involves writing, though I don't know if she calls herself a writer.  Actually, S does call herself a writer, as well she should, as she's had a screenplay considered for production and is currently shopping for a publisher for her latest work which, I must say is fabulous.  I hope to see it on the shelves before my oldest child reaches adulthood so he can read it.

None of the boys are named Alec, Ty, Clayton, Ryan, or John Jackson.  Oh, and D never did make his intentions clear and I eventually moved on. 

My Baby is a Jebbie Lineman

Of note:  The "N" referred to as "the biggest whore in the free world" is NOT the same ""N" you'll see referred to a lot, one of our friends.

Wow...dissing Elvis at 15...

An Offer You Can't Refuse...

It might be better to kick off this blog with something that keeps people coming back, so starting tomorrow, the posts will be in serial format, of sorts.  We used to buy spiral notebooks and pass them between a few of us.  The person with the notebook usually took it home for a night or two and wrote several pages in it.  Because there's only so much to tell in the average teenager's life, we tended to get creative, adding cartoons, stories, whatever.  I have two of these notebooks in my possession.

But for today....anyone have a mom that made you sign contracts for chores?  I'm thinking this is the last resort of a desperate single mom with two teenagers.  What cracks me me up is the specificity--"time will be determined by the clock on the stove".  The clothing this was more for my brother, who was in a death metal phase, and prone to adding some hideous band patches on his clothes.

And in the "Other Junk" vein...anyone remember this? 

Wine coolers and Twist-A Beads

If you're having trouble seeing anything on this blog, you can click on the images to make them larger.

Today's note:  Will N skip musical theater rehersal for a night of wine coolers with the girls?

"win kewlerz":  my best friend and I wrote often in what we called "Spell it Like it Sounds".  You'll see more of this in the future.  Also of note:  you'll see a lot of "RN".  RN was a senior when we were freshman, and actor and a singer, and gay.  I'm fairly sure he was out of the closet, even then, and he didn't know his gaggle of freshman worshippers even exisisted, but this really didn't matter to us.  There are notes from every one of us with his name plastered all over them, cartoons of us defending him from Louie Welch (of Houston mayoral "shoot the queers" infamy), and pledges of undying love and adoration.  He actually went on to become marginally famous as a comedian, actor, and playwrite and occasionally performs a one man show that references his years as a teenager at an all-boys school.  Wonder if it would be cool to post a link to his stuff here, or if I should let him remain anonymous, at least for the sake of our (the gaggle's) dignity?

And in the " Other Junk" category, I found this instructional sheet on various methods of wearing your Twist-A-Beads.  Remember these? 

While searching for a photo of them, I found an article claiming that they were coming back in fashion.  Who knew?  Although I saved every seemingly worthless scrap of paper that ever drifted my way, I didn't hang onto anything really cool, like my old toys or fashion fads.  But in case they are truly in fashion now, here's how to wear them.  If you'd like to see the back page of this, let me know and I'll email it to you.

79Q Street Sheets

Very cool...the local pop station printed these and they were available for free in the convenience stores around town.  There are from around '83-'84.