Getting Busy with the Reminsicing

My favourite piece of car-related economic activity happened a few years ago, when demand for Deloreans increased dramatically.  The reason?  An entire generation who had grown up with Back to the Future suddenly reached that stage in life where they had enough disposable income to buy the car they had been coveting since they were ten years old, and did. Clearly, nostalgia sells.

Cue the re-launch of SodaStream in the UK.  You might know about this already; there have been TV ads, posters and web-based marketing campaigns going on for the last few weeks.  I went to one of their PR events last week.  You may think, hearing this, that I'm a cool, hip media type with my finger on the pulse.  I am not, but my friend Dan is, and he told me it was on.  We had a lot of fun.

We tried some of the new flavours (green tea with berries was nicer than it sounds, pink grapefruit less so)  and swiftly moved onto cocktails which had been made from them.   In case you weren't sure, I can definitely confirm there are worse ways to spend a Friday afternoon than drinking free cocktails. 

 Early in the piece, my friend Dan said to the nice man from the PR company "Didn't Heston Blumenthal put Blue Nun into a Sodastream to make champagne?"

"Oh yeah", said the nice man from the PR company. "Er, we don't really want to encourage that though.  Have you tried all of these fantastic new flavours?"

A few mojitos later, Dan tried again.  "Didn't Heston Blumenthal once put Blue Nun....."

"Hell yeah! Let's give it a go!" said the nice man from the PR company.  Or words to that effect.  I can't remember exactly what he said, but I do remember drinking some rather nice, er, champagne-style sparkling wine (I don't think I have any French readers yet, but just in case I do, I don't want upset them) a few minutes later. 

At this point Dan had to go back to work.  I, on the other had, did not, and after reflecting briefly on what a grand idea this freelancing business was,  settled in for the afternoon, Moscow Mule* in hand, to reminsice with the other people there about the originals.

We came to the conclusion that our generation (anyone now in their late twenties to early forties) can be divided into two groups: those who had a SodaStream as a kid and those who wanted one.  I'm genuinely interested, now, to find out who ends up buying them this time around.  My guess is it will be the people, like me, who belong to the second group; those of us who still need to fill what someone described as 'the Sodastream shaped hole in our lives'.

We also worked out that the other must-have gadget of the era was a Mr Frosty machine.  No household, we think, ever owned both.

(Did they really think they needed the cute kid in this photo?  It's a MR FROSTY for goodness sake!!  It makes crushed ice beverages! Of many colours!!)

I thought these were the two main toys I wanted as a child.  Since then I have remembered several more:

A wooden labyrinth

I was desperate for one of these. Our dentist had one in his waiting room, and I never got past number 12. The fact that I still know this just goes to show: some scars run deep.

Simon
I would have happily traded in my little brother, also called Simon, for one of these:

Remember them?  The lights flashed in a sequence, which you had to remember and then repeat.  The further you got, the longer the sequences became and the harder they were to remember.  I have huge respect for whoever was in charge of marketing this;  I expect I was not the only child  who pestered their parents constantly for what is basically a memory training device.  And a pretty cheap looking one, at that.

The Game of Life

I have never, ever, got to the end of a game of The Game of Life.  All of my friends who owned it hated playing it, and by the time I had convinced them to get the box out and set up the spinner and find the little plastic pegs to put in the little plastic cars, it was time for me to go home. One day, I will finish a game.  I WILL.  I am under no illusion that I might actually enjoy this experience; everyone I have ever met who has played it tells me it is rubbish.  But that's not the point.

Operation

There were bones with comedy names  and it made a buzzing noise.  What's not to love?  My Dad is a doctor, though, and I am pretty sure we weren't allowed to have this for professional reasons.

I am sure that there are iphone apps available for at least some (if not all) of these games.  I am sure that, at some point, I will cave and buy at least one of them.  Am I the only one? And are there any I have missed?

*1 part vodka, 1 part lime juice, 4 parts ginger beer.  Heavy on the ice.