Wednesday, April 26, 2023

V for...

#AtoZChallenge 2023 letter V


VCR, VHS, VIDEO GAMES AND VIDEO RENTALS:

It wasn't until 1988 that my house finally got a VCR, and going out to rent VHS tapes and recording stuff from TV became a habit. 

I never recorded porn or football games😁🤣, and we did not have a camera for recording videos. I did, however, have an ever-growing collection of various tapes like these. Whenever we'd get free previews on cable for pay stations like HBO, Showtime, Cinemax, The Movie Channel, Encore or Disney (back when it was a premium station), I often went crazy taping movies and shows, making sure to label them on the stickers that went on the tape spine. 

Before Blockbuster came to my town, there were several local video rental stores, all of which rented videos in solid-colored plastic boxes. Most of the local ones had closed by the early 2000s, leaving Blockbuster the lone video rental place in town until it closed in 2011. By that time I'd transitioned to DVDs, and began getting them via Netflix beginning in 2007. And now that Netflix will be ending the DVDs-by-mail service at the end of September, I plan to keep it going until then. I also get DVDs from the library, which I may continue to do after Netflix ends it mail service.

Does anyone remember--or did you even have--the CED, an early failed video format that had an even shorter and worse life than the Laser Disc or Beta Max? My aunt and uncle had a CED player which I vaguely remember. CEDs were like a vinyl record.

I was never big on video games. I never had a player myself, and did not attempt to play the one at my aunt and uncle's (the same ones mentioned above) house. They had Atari when it was big and later got into Nintendo. I cannot ever recall playing this standing video games either. There were no arcades in my once-really small home town, but these games often were (and still are) at pizza places. This just was not my kind of thing.




VIEW MASTER:


In case you don't know or have forgotten, watch this video to see what the View Master was:


Though I was sure there were some of you out there who knew what this was 😃 It was always fun to look at this things. I cannot even speculate what reels I had as just about every movie or TV character or star imaginable had a reel made. Though I never knew how to make my own film to view on the View Master--didn't even know this was a thing.



VENDING MACHINES:

We still see ones like these in stores:








But some can remember when they looked like thisAnd when they had machines for stuff like cigarettes. A burger joint in my hometown had one of these. It's obvious why these don't exist now.


And it seems there were ones for weird stuff, like toilet paper. Who knew? Never saw any of these. And the Playboy drink machine is quite bizarre!

Putting coins into vending machines is like gambling for youngsters. You might hope for a pink toy in the claw machine or a blue gum ball and get something else.


VELCRO:

Velcro could be found just about everywhere, including on shoes or backpacks. One or more of my Trapper Keepers had a velcro closure (some had snap closures) and I may have had a velcro-closure wallet (not too sure about that one, though). I wasn't much on velcro shoes, as far as I know.




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VERY glad to have you stop by. WE'LL be back tomorrow.

5 comments:

Debra She Who Seeks said...

This post makes me feel really old . . . YES, I had a Viewmaster as a child! YES, I once bought a pack of cigarettes from a vending machine that looked exactly like that picture. I had to feed it quarters FOREVER to reach the purchase price. Clearly, I was a desperate addict in those days. NO, I'm not old enough YET to have velcro shoes but once you hit the nursing home, that's all the staff want you to wear (never come undone, easy for staff to put on and take off, no tripping hazard from undone laces).

Liz A. said...

We had a Beta VCR. Because my father thought that one was better. Then having to convert... And then it went away. Renting videos was harder with Beta, so we didn't much until we went to VHS.

Oh yes, we had a Viewmaster. It was fun.

I had velcro on everything. I had the wallet. I had the Trapper Keeper. I had the shoes. I still have velcro tape in my sewing stuff that I've used for various projects.

ghostmmnc said...

Lots of smiles remembering these things. Especially VHS tapes and recording tons of shows off the TV. I had over 500 at one time, and a notebook with each cataloged as to number and title. I finally sold them all in a bunch at a yard sale though. Still I miss them.
I never got into the arcade games, but vending machines are still around. In Japan they had all kinds of things to buy.
thanks for the trip down memory lanes in your posts. :)

Sandra Cox said...

These really take me back. Vending machines. View Masters.
Another great post.

Chrys Fey said...

I still have a VHS player and tapes that I still watch with it. LOL