Things in living memory which seem very anachronistic now

[dcbwhaley]

Dark transparent plastic 'shades' that clipped over the top of prescription glasses to turn them into 'sunglasses'.Said shades were also prone to scratches. Now happily superseded by photochromic lenses and prescription sunglasses

Still available from Amazon. Much cheaper than prescription varifocals and have the advantage that they can be flipped up out of the way.

 

[swt_passenger]

Something which I don't think has been mentioned so far in any of the 109 pages. Residences with outside toilets.

We had a few posts about this, ie only outside toilets, in late January from about here:

Things in living memory which seem very anachronistic now

The main difference was that the offended person knew that little would be done about it, and they would just have to bear it. That's exactly the point I was making - nobody else would see it as far enough across the line to step in and do something about it.

www.railforums.co.uk

I thought it had more coverage but I found I was possibly remembering the subject came up a couple of times in the similar 2021 thread here about ‘things that used to be’:

Things that used to be common place in people’s homes

A few days ago I noticed when looking at homes for rent that on had a TV in the kitchen. Something I remember most people having however nowadays it’s pretty rare. It got me thinking of other items you used to see in everyone’s home but are now quite rare such as vhs players, vinyl record...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Anyone else vaguely remember those coloured plastic sheets which could be taped over a black and white TV to give it the appearance of being a colour telly. Had a blue strip along the top, a green one along the bottom, and the middle bit was orangey-yellow? Might be imagining it, but believe they really were a thing!

 

[Tester]

Anyone else vaguely remember those coloured plastic sheets which could be taped over a black and white TV to give it the appearance of being a colour telly. Had a blue strip along the top, a green one along the bottom, and the middle bit was orangey-yellow? Might be imagining it, but believe they really were a thing!

I can recall knowing of them, but never actually seeing one.

Which reminds me of another candidate - products marketed as 'As advertised on TV'. When did you last see that?!

 

[gg1]

Anyone else vaguely remember those coloured plastic sheets which could be taped over a black and white TV to give it the appearance of being a colour telly. Had a blue strip along the top, a green one along the bottom, and the middle bit was orangey-yellow? Might be imagining it, but believe they really were a thing!

Sounds very similar to the system used to fake colour graphics on the monochrome screen of a Vectrex, an early 80s gaming console.

 

[swt_passenger]

Anyone else vaguely remember those coloured plastic sheets which could be taped over a black and white TV to give it the appearance of being a colour telly. Had a blue strip along the top, a green one along the bottom, and the middle bit was orangey-yellow? Might be imagining it, but believe they really were a thing!

Probably designed for football in an open field between Watford and Wolves…

 

[greatkingrat]

Anyone else vaguely remember those coloured plastic sheets which could be taped over a black and white TV to give it the appearance of being a colour telly. Had a blue strip along the top, a green one along the bottom, and the middle bit was orangey-yellow? Might be imagining it, but believe they really were a thing!

Something like this?

 

[GordonT]

I also vaguely remember a one-off television transmission which to a very limited degree produced a bit of colour on monochrome pre-colour television sets for the brief duration of the transmission. Anyone else recall this?

 

[AM9]

I can recall knowing of them, but never actually seeing one.

Which reminds me of another candidate - products marketed as 'As advertised on TV'. When did you last see that?!

Can anyone here remember the large magnifying lens that were hung over the front of the then small screens (think 9 inches or so), that made the picture large enough for more than 2 viewers? Then there were the early attempts at stereo sound where one channel was received on radio (am!), and the other from VHF TV sound.

 

[Tom B]

Perhaps a tangent, but for the three years I've lived in Scotland, I've never had any issues spending Scottish banknotes south of the border. All except two occasions which were both on forum meets!

Similarly, when I've had poker winnings and been given £50 notes, I've found most places accept them fine.

I'm tempted to run three experiments:

1. Spend a Scottish £50 note somewhere in England, Wales, or NI.
2. Spend a Bank of Scotland £100 note somewhere in Scotland.
3. Spend a Bank of Scotland £100 note somewhere in England, Wales, or NI.

Of course not one of those people filming it for YouTube, or kicking off and shouting 'legal tender' at minimum wage service workers, but simply to see if they're accepted!

I used to use £100 notes from time to time when, as a student, I might need to move money from one bank to another in time to meet a direct debit for a rent payment. The quickest way of doing so would be to withdraw the £300 from one bank and deposit it in the other, with no time needed for it to clear. A cheque would take 5 days to clear and a bank transfer 3 days.

I did used to carry a few £1 notes in the back of my wallet to confuse cashiers in England. I expect that the surprise would be higher nowadays and the acceptance rate lower!

 

[DelW]

Can anyone here remember the large magnifying lens that were hung over the front of the then small screens (think 9 inches or so), that made the picture large enough for more than 2 viewers? Then there were the early attempts at stereo sound where one channel was received on radio (am!), and the other from VHF TV sound.

One of my uncles had one of those magnifying lenses on a TV in the late 1950s (which was before my parents had a TV of any sort). I remember it as hanging from canvas straps, maybe fixed behind the set? It probably brought the screen size up to about 12 - 13", at the cost of added distortion.

 

[AM9]

One of my uncles had one of those magnifying lenses on a TV in the late 1950s (which was before my parents had a TV of any sort). I remember it as hanging from canvas straps, maybe fixed behind the set? It probably brought the screen size up to about 12 - 13", at the cost of added distortion.

I think that some of them were hoolow and filled with liquid (water?) to save cost. That much acrylic would be very expensive. They were held in front of the screen by two straps that went over the top of the TV cabinet.

 

[GordonT]

When it was fairly common for families (at best) to have one car which the male parent travelled to/from work in with children mostly travelling to/from school on foot. This meant that the phenomenon of multiple cars stopping at hazardous locations on roads close to schools at school start/finish times was seldom an issue.

 

[dgl]

Something like this?

That system was originally invented by Baird, I understand, and also had a two colour 3D variant. Used for the CBS colour system that was not successful, partially because it was not compatible with regular black and white TV's
Some small broadcast CRT displays had a setup where the CRT itself was greyscale but used an alternating colour LCD based filter in front of the display to produce colour. JVC called it LCCS.

 

[Mogz]

I used to use £100 notes from time to time when, as a student, I might need to move money from one bank to another in time to meet a direct debit for a rent payment. The quickest way of doing so would be to withdraw the £300 from one bank and deposit it in the other, with no time needed for it to clear. A cheque would take 5 days to clear and a bank transfer 3 days.

I did used to carry a few £1 notes in the back of my wallet to confuse cashiers in England. I expect that the surprise would be higher nowadays and the acceptance rate lower!

Scottish £1 notes! Do they still issue those, I wonder?

They were always fun to get in the 90s as a kid because you could get four or five and feel minted!

 

[Sun Chariot]

Scottish £1 notes! Do they still issue those, I wonder?

They were always fun to get in the 90s as a kid because you could get four or five and feel minted!

As a 70s youngster, I used to get 50p weekly pocket money from my parents. When we visited my paternal grandmother, who hailed from Alloa, she would furnish me with a Scottish or English £1 note. Youthful wealth indeed!

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Scottish £1 notes! Do they still issue those, I wonder?

Don't think so, and not for some years. Certainly not in polymer versions.

 

[GordonT]

Scottish £1 notes! Do they still issue those, I wonder?

Regular production of them (by Royal Bank of Scotland) stopped in 2001. They are still legal tender and some are still in circulation but are hardly ever seen now.

 

[Statto]

Is shops being open for half a day in midweek still a thing, most areas it was Wednesday, but some areas it was Tuesday or Thursday were shops would open until 12pm, or 1pm then shut for the rest of the day, think some Market Towns still had (& may still have) half day opening one day a week in midweek well into 2000s?

 

[The exile]

Indeed - Like you I live in Scotland but do not recall ever having seen a Scottish £100 note, and not many £50 notes either.

IIRC the £50 note is a relative newcomer in Scotland.

 

[EdinRH]

IIRC the £50 note is a relative newcomer in Scotland.

Royal Bank of Scotland started issuing £50 notes in 2005. Bank of Scotland and Clydesdale Bank issued them long before that though.

 

[styles]

I used to use £100 notes from time to time when, as a student, I might need to move money from one bank to another in time to meet a direct debit for a rent payment. The quickest way of doing so would be to withdraw the £300 from one bank and deposit it in the other, with no time needed for it to clear. A cheque would take 5 days to clear and a bank transfer 3 days.

I did used to carry a few £1 notes in the back of my wallet to confuse cashiers in England. I expect that the surprise would be higher nowadays and the acceptance rate lower!

When I was organising the bills for my student house, a Sri Lankan housemate used to pay me the gas/leccy in reddies. I don't think he appreciated that they could be faffy to spend, but I also think he'd taken a stash of them out at the start of the year and was just working his way through them. First thing I would do was take them to the bank. I sometimes wondered if they'd been taken out and redeposited into the same branch the same day! This was about 15 years ago mind.

I went to a gig at Nottingham Arena and tried to use a £50 to pay for some merch. The staff member didn't even say anything, just laughed at me and shook her head.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 13 Sep 2025 ==

Is shops being open for half a day in midweek still a thing, most areas it was Wednesday, but some areas it was Tuesday or Thursday were shops would open until 12pm, or 1pm then shut for the rest of the day, think some Market Towns still had (& may still have) half day opening one day a week in midweek well into 2000s?

We have a butchers and a fishmongers like that. They're open from about 7am though, and they open on Saturdays I think 7-3, so their Wednesday early doors is I guess like their remaining 0.5 days of their weekend.

 

[GordonT]

Is shops being open for half a day in midweek still a thing, most areas it was Wednesday, but some areas it was Tuesday or Thursday were shops would open until 12pm, or 1pm then shut for the rest of the day, think some Market Towns still had (& may still have) half day opening one day a week in midweek well into 2000s?

See also earlier posts scattered within the range 1,063-1,099 (Pages 36 and 37).

 

[Tom B]

I suppose it depends on the location you are trying to spend the £50 note and how often they make large cash transactions - a chicken shop or corner shop would be less likely to see them than, say, a petrol filling station or a cash and carry.

 

[dcbwhaley]

Is shops being open for half a day in midweek still a thing, most areas it was Wednesday, but some areas it was Tuesday or Thursday were shops would open until 12pm, or 1pm then shut for the rest of the day, think some Market Towns still had (& may still have) half day opening one day a week in midweek well into 2000s?

That is why you have clubs like Sheffield Wednesday football club and Hull Thursday Cycling Club. Meeting sand competing on the towns half day closing

 

[Statto]

That is why you have clubs like Sheffield Wednesday football club and Hull Thursday Cycling Club. Meeting sand competing on the towns half day closing

Its why i mentioned if half day opening was still a thing, Sheffield Wednesday were originally a Cricket club, that played on Wednesday afternoons, the football side of things was formed as to keep the team together during the Autumn/Winter, they were known as The Wednesday FC until 1929, when they changed the name to Sheffield Wednesday FC.

There is an amusing sceene in Ted Lasso, were they're discussing Sheffield Wednesday, & Ted gets confused over the name.

 

[Sun Chariot]

Its why i mentioned if half day opening was still a thing, Sheffield Wednesday were originally a Cricket club, that played on Wednesday afternoons, the football side of things was formed as to keep the team together during the Autumn/Winter, they were known as The Wednesday FC until 1929, when they changed the name to Sheffield Wednesday FC.

Every day is a schoolday. Since boyhood, more than fifty years ago, I've wondered at its origins.

 

[GordonT]

Personal message adverts in newspapers, occasionally somewhat cryptic.

 

[AM9]

Personal message adverts in newspapers, occasionally somewhat cryptic.

I remember them, especially when craving to be top of the listing, some advertisers started their entry with the word 'A'. Then another entry starting with AA, then AAA and so on until the first line was full of A's.

 

[3141]

Personal message adverts in newspapers, occasionally somewhat cryptic.

There was a time when the whole front page of The Times consisted of a personal column, births and deaths, and so on. The item I liked particularly was the regular one remembering the assassination of Julius Caesar. There was no news of the normal kind, though The Times itself claimed that these items were news.

The Evening Standard in London still has messages on the lines of "You were on the Northern Line at 5.15 last Thursday between Bank and Kings Cross and you had long brown hair" by someone who hadn't the courage to speak to the person they admired at the time.