Hello all! We spent the weekend up on the north shore, enjoying friends’ wedding festivities, the lake (Superior), and the outstanding weather we lucked out with. I’ll share some photos later this week, but for today I wanted to get in a dose of Remember this, before I… forgot! (har har)

Here it is-

Remember This? Episode 14

1. Lurlene McDaniels books: Okay, I looked into this because I couldn’t remember the names of any of these novels that I tore into circa 5th grade, but I just knew they were all about kids who were dying or had terminal illness. Sure enough, I looked it up and there was a series of her novels called “one last wish,” and they all centered around a house for terminally ill teens. The names are uber cheese fest such as, “she died too young,”  “a time to die,” “sixteen and dying,” “please don’t die,” and “mother, help me live.” Good grief, why did I buy into this garbage? I’m embarrassed to even be writing this but hoping someone, SOMEWHERE, read this crap too and can tell me I’m normal for having read so many of these within a year or two of middle school? anyone?

source

2. Mood rings: Okay, I didn’t grow up in the 70s when these were first a fad or whatever, but in the NINETIES when all of the 70s trends came round again, I was mega into these. I had one that I found on the sidewalk that didn’t work anymore but was heart shaped, and I still have it. I think mood rings are the coolest! I also had a little strip of paper I bought at Claire’s or somewhere that could just use your finger’s temperature to tell your “mood” instead. The rings were cooler, though. They also came in necklaces and such.

3.  Reality Bites:  Okay, so to be fair I didn’t really understand this movie and the generation it defined when I first saw it, but then when I rewatched it in high school or beyond it suddenly made a lot of sense. I saw it on TV recently and couldn’t help dancing along with Winona Ryder and Janeane Garofalo to “My Sharona” and making fun of slacker Ethan Hawke as he whines the lyrics to a Violent Femmes song… Oh, the 90s. Oh the humanity. Love this film.

source

4. Sega Genesis: Oh man, when this system first came out I about died of excitement. I spent hours playing Sonic and Tails. Years, hours, entire weekends… entire SUMMERS trying to defeat our “Aladdin” game. I don’t know why Sega resonated with me so much more than the Nintendo games, but I guess I just liked the music and style more. I still can hear the opening brand music singing “Seeeegaaaaaa” with the bright blue letters on white background.

5. Troll dolls: I don’t think I’ve actually written about these yet, but I FEEL like I have because they were so pervasive. The regular sized troll dolls, the miniature ones, the ones with little jewels in their belly buttons called “treasure trolls,” the Bridal trolls, career trolls… what on earth? My sister and I even took a “group photo” of our 75,000 troll dolls we had amassed at some point (I think when we had grown out of them and suddenly realized with a shock how out of control our collection was) and it probably numbered a population of about 50. Yowza. You gotta hand it to toy makers, though- this was a creative fad!

source

So tell me- WHO READ THOSE TERRIBLE BOOKS WITH ME? Or will you guys at least fess up to the troll dolls and mood rings, if not the terrible melodramatic dying books?

Meri