3 hours ago, charliearon said:

At a younger age, my Prince Valiant sword and shield!

Me too! Loved it! But the Erector Set I got a couple years later was better. I had the deluxe model, with the motor...

Speaking of goldfish: when I was 12, I spent the summer of 1969 with my sister's family in Milwaukee (my sister was 17 years older than me).  One of the things we did was go to the Wisconsin State fair in Madison. My favorite thing was the carnival row, where they had all those games where you could win prizes. Of course, most if not all of those are somewhat rigged, but it's fun anyway.  I actually won something, where they have all those goldfish bowls crowded together, and you try to throw a ping pong ball into one of them. I was able to do it, and was handed a goldfish in a plastic bag with water.

It was pretty cool, an unexpected bonus.  So I set up a bowl for it at my sister's house and got fish food.  One day, I was in the kitchen to change out the water in the goldfish bowl.  I was at the counter adjacent to the kitchen sink where I was transferring the goldfish into a jar.  Before I could get it into the jar, the goldfish jumped out and landed in the sink, where it slipped down the drain.  I immediately put my hand down the drain to try to catch it.  My sister came up behind me, pulled my hand out of the drain, and turned on the garbage disposal!!

I was in shock! After about 2 seconds, fury took over. "WHAJADOTHATFOR?  YOU KILLED MY GOLDFISH!!!"

She said "Michael, you wouldn't be able to get it.  It's in the dark, flopping around, it's slippery and with your hand trying to get it, it will die anyway, it would be cruel to let it suffer like that."  I said "DEATH BY GARBAGE DISPOSAL IS NOT CRUEL? THAT WAS MY GOLDFISH, I WON THAT GOLDFISH!"  I suppose the remains of my goldfish eventually made it to Lake Michigan 😪

Edited December 3, 20214 yr by Mike A
spelling

@Mike A Garbage disposal goldfish=fertilizer!  How many folks remember "pet" alligators and how many moms flushed 'em down the toilet?  Plenty of gators in the sewer system of Los Angeles!  Wasn't there a movie about that? 🤔

17 minutes ago, charliearon said:

Wasn't there a movie about that? 🤔

 

Back over 60 years ago my wife and I

1 hour ago, Penzoil3 said:

Me too! Loved it! But the Erector Set I got a couple years later was better. I had the deluxe model, with the motor...

Back over 60 years ago my wife and I went camping in the Sierras with a borrowed tent. It was one of those double-sided ones. Really big. It took us almost 5 hours to set it up. We finally realized the problem was that we had no erection instructions. I never knew you needed those.....Doug

"Do you remember sugar cubes with a drop of Salk's polio vaccine and nobody had a problem with it?"

 

If you were living in Western Australia at the time, then you should remember Robin Miller, "The Sugarbird Lady".

She was a one woman RFDS, caring for those out in the bush. She flew her own airplane, her father was Australian Aviation royalty, she ferried airplanes from the States back Down Under on several occasions, and she ended up marrying the Director of the RFDS.

Tragicially, she died of cancer in 1975, at the age of 35. Her Mooney airplane is displayed at Jandakot Airport in Perth.

5 hours ago, Penzoil3 said:

I had the deluxe model, with the motor...

Cranes and windmills were my favorite.

But I think of all the toys I ever got for Christmas the working steam engine was my all-time favorite until I was 12.  Then it was Mosberg .22 cal rifle with the scope sight.

Noel

18 hours ago, birdguy said:

Probably a can of lighter fluid Fr. Bill.

It was a pressurized can of something (perhaps hair spray?) that was highly flammable. I held a lighter as I sprayed across the open flame. Woosh! Fire and Fury! 😲

4 minutes ago, n4gix said:

It was a pressurized can of something (perhaps hair spray?)

I used Lysol air freshener.

19 minutes ago, Mike A said:

I used Lysol air freshener.

Funny how safety warnings like “CAUTION: CONTENTS ARE FLAMMABLE” are actually invitations to fool around with stuff 🤔

5 minutes ago, Mike A said:

Funny how safety warnings like “CAUTION: CONTENTS ARE FLAMMABLE” are actually invitations to fool around with stuff

I posted a story here once called The Mystery Explosion on Larkin Street.  I cut open a bunch of left over firecrackers from Chinese New Year and collected all the gun powder.  Then I made a bomb with a section of bamboo clothes pole.  I think it was the only time in my childhood I was really terrified.

The other thing we did, but not nearly so dangerous, was play with matches.  Those old spring loaded clothespins Mom used to hang up clothes with could be rearranged to shoot wooden matches against a wall and flare up.  Paper matches made good short range rockets.  Wrap some tinfoil around the head of a match with a pin or a needle lying along the length of the match.  Ties it off with thread from Mom's sewing basket.  Put it on the edge of a table or chair and use another match to hold under the tinfoil.  It would light off and shoot across the room leaving a small smoke trail.

Noel  

On 12/4/2021 at 10:04 AM, birdguy said:

Put it on the edge of a table or chair and use another match to hold under the tinfoil.  It would light off and shoot across the room leaving a small smoke trail.

Am I the only one who wants to try this now? 😄

Hook

OK, here it comes!  Match head rocket motors......break off the match head and stuff them into used CO2 cartridges.  Or buy rolls of caps and carefully scarping out the gunpowder and making aluminium bombs.

Sounds like we have a bunch of pyromaniacs here! 🧨

How many folks used a pair of vicegrip pliers to pinch off the 2nd P on a PicoloPete firework and lit it off?  It would howl until it burnt down to the pinch and then explode!

 

Most boys are born pyromaniacs Charlie.  And the lucky ones like me get to join the Marines and become EOD Techs and set off BIG explosions that make Piccolo Pete look like something you light cigarettes with.

Noel

On 12/4/2021 at 4:04 PM, birdguy said:

I posted a story here once called The Mystery Explosion on Larkin Street.  I cut open a bunch of left over firecrackers from Chinese New Year and collected all the gun powder.

 

I used to throw chemicals from my chemistry set into the coal fire and see which ones were the most exciting. Then I combined them and rolled them up into a piece of paper to make a firework. It kind of worked. 

 

My most exciting experience was as follows...

My father told me what the ingredients of gun powder were. Well yes, I had them all in my chemistry set except charcoal, so I burnt up some wood to make charcoal. He also told me how, to stop the ingredients from separating the gunpowder would be backed in a flameless oven and then crumbled up.

Great idea I thought, so when my father was at work and my mother was away at her morning job, I got one of my fathers old tobacco tins and mixed up the ingredients. I then placed the tin on the gas oven and started to bake my gun powder. 

I think you can probably guess what happened. The whole lot ignited, sending black smoke and sparks up the ceiling. Not much I could do, but luckily it was all burnt up pretty quickly. 

I recall some black stains on the kitchen ceiling tiles but luckily my parents didn't notice.  😀