Things you don’t see much of anymore, and other observations:
SKATEBOARDS: Gone, down south anyway. I’ve yet to spot even one.
ACNE ON TEENS: What happened to zits? Where have all the pimples gone, long time passing? When I was a teen acne was like a contagious disease. I might have been a carrier.
I had acne on top of acne; my face looked like the surface of Mars, if Mars is indeed red and filled with peaks and pocks. Now kids all look like Hollywood models with skin as flawless as a Potter Valley peach.
SUN DRIED TOMATOES: Disappeared.
BEAN SPROUTS: Banished from menus nationwide.
BARS IN UKIAH: This deserves a whole column, sob.
REDNECKS, STONERS, GOAT-ROPERS at Ukiah High. All as disappeared as Valedictorians, Honors students and Lettermen jocks.
FIRST THEY’LL LOSE half their value, and then another 50 percent after that: Used electric guitars, Harley Davidson motorcycles, season tickets to the Oakland A’s.
STORAGE LOCKERS: I’ve yet to see them in the Carolinas, whereas in California they’re 10 percent of the landscape.
BUMPER STICKERS Concerning teaching tolerance, celebrating diversity or multiculturalism.
SUPERMARKET CROWDS: I never wait in line for a cashier here, but Ukiah’s Co-op always seemed mobbed. Solution? Tell a clerk there’s a Subaru in the parking lot with its headlights on; Store will be empty in 30 seconds.
KILLER BEES
MURDER HORNETS
GUYS AT OFF-RAMPS holding up cardboard signs that say “Will Work for Food.’ Did they all get jobs?
RACISM: Used to be you’d hear disparaging remarks about any old ethnic group anyone wanted to point a finger at, including Polocks, Dagos, Blacks, Jews, etc., but those days have been gone since around the time Ike was President.
Now, despite the best efforts of the NY Times and other leftists, you’d no sooner hear people call someone a Kike or a colored person than you’d hear them call women broads or refer to men as “toxic” males.
Oh wait. Never mind.
RINGTONES.
TURN SIGNALS: Ukiahans have grumbled and muttered for decades about drivers not using their turn signals, but they ain’t seen the real pros yet.
Here in the south turn signals are still a novelty and I’m thinking they must be very expensive luxury options on cars.
A lot of people just can’t afford them, so they take the money they would have spent on turn signals and invest it in great big engines with really loud mufflers.
EGGS: No eggs, but lots of chickens? Explain.
TIDE PODS and the people who ate them. Poof! Gone!
DOGS with names like Rex, Lucky, Spot and Fido. Now everyone’s dog has a person’s name, probably to let the world know we consider Lucy a family member.
UGG BOOTS, and good riddance. Footwear that made even the loveliest of ladies look like Clydesdales.
ACID RAIN.
MAGAZINES: Real ones, not People Magazine or a Complete History of Led Zeppelin or Haunted Houses in North America.
SEDANS & CONVERTIBLES: All of a sudden we can’t get a Chevy Impala (or Malibu), a Ford Taurus (or Fusion) or most any other regular family car that’s been the bedrock of American cars for a hundred years. When did we decide we only want SUVs and electric cars?
MATH: Or, why we’ll all soon be poor, especially our grandchildren: A Million seconds goes by in 11 days, a Billion in 32 years; a Trillion seconds takes 32,000 years.
SWIMMING POOLS: Endangered species.
DSM’s elastic guidelines
Remember all the hysterical “experts” in frenzied sweats shouting that the previous President was unfit for office, afflicted as he was by various personality disorders? Those same shrinks are now silent, and believe Doddering Joe, a senile old coot who couldn’t find the White House if he was standing in the Oval Office, is a model of robust intellectual vitality.
Calling on George
RECEPTIONIST: “Thank you for holding, Dr. Kramer. I have Congressman Santos on the line. Go ahead, sir.”
“Hello,” he lied.
(Tom Hine and his invisible typist live in Ukiah sometimes and North Carolina some others.)
Someone’s been dipping into Damon Runyon.