I was talking about things like 9/11 and the start of the internet with an old college friend of mine earlier this weekend. Made me realize there were some things that happened back then I didn’t fully appreciate when they happened. However, there were also things I thought cringy back then that people are only recently waking up to how messed up they were.

I was born in 1980, which makes me either late Gen X or early Millenial depending on who you ask. I’ve been called both a snowflake and a slacker, sometimes on the same day. But I’m going to start with things I miss from the 80s and 90s (and things I don’t miss at all).

Things I miss from the 1980s and 1990s

Pizza Hut’s Book It program

Music videos on MTV

Athletes and Business Tycoons who were indifferent to politics

The books of R.L. Stine

The books of Bruce Coville

Wearing Flannel even during the summer

Collecting baseball and Pokemon cards

Having friends who did both D&D and high school sports

Lifting weights to the music of AC/DC and Metallica

Watching MST3k on Saturday nights

Tom Osborne as the coach of the Nebraska Huskers

Watching Michael Jordan play basketball

Having Garth Brooks, Tupac, Mariah Carey, and Marilyn Manson in my CD collection

Getting to talk to people who experienced the Great Depression and World War 2 first hand

Hunting through video rental stores hoping to find lost gems

The movies of Brendan Fraser and Pauley Shore

Surge Soda

Jones Soda

Conspiracy Theories being fringe

Arnold Schartzanegger in his prime

People thinking Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan were the worst leaders

The music of Korn and Hootie and the Blowfish

Trying to learn how to play Nirvana songs on an acoustic guitar

MTVs Unplugged Albums (notably Alice in Chains and Nirvana)

Jamming out to 311 at parties

Things from the 80s and 90s I don’t miss

Abercrombie and Fitch

Cold War politics

Pay phones

No internet

Harvey Weinstein movies

The Satanic Panic

The whole latch key kid thing

The War on Drugs

The War on Terrorism

Not cool being smart

Not cool using a computer

The comedy of Tim Allen

Having to learn about sex from stolen Playboys

Everybody smoking, even at funerals

No Paypal

No Uber

No grocery delivery

CNN and Fox being your only choices for news

The only sci fi being dystopian

TV evangelists

Sexism and Bigotry being cool

Most Teen movies from the 80s

People forgetting about pandemics and plagues

Not realizing the same kids jamming out to Madonna would be the same parents complaining about the music of Billie Eilish