Go For Pinks, Daddy-O!

Grease.  

Not only was it a great movie, it had an amazing sound track and it took us back to fifties when it was all about diners, greasers, rockabilly, leather jackets, wide skirts and red lips.

When goody-two-shoes Olivia Newton John (Sandy) and greaser, John Travolta (Danny) have a summer romance and find themselves attending the same high school.  

All sorts of adventures happen...

My favourite scene is the dancing scene between Danny and Sandy "Born to Hand Jive"  It's pretty obvious who is the dancer and who is trying to keep up.  It's quite sweet...all those petticoats swishing and cheesy moves.  Travolta really shines on the dance floor and the fact that his sexy slicked back, black hair and his chin dimples are on display, will make any lass swoon.

"Tell me About it, Stud!"....Watch this and take a trip back to the fifties.




I adore this rockabilly version of Led Zeppelin's Whole Lotta Love.





This kinda dancing makes me want to get up to boogie woogie and jive.




Couldn't have a post about rockabilly and NOT include the King of Rock 'n Roll - Elvis!!!

Vinyl Junkie

We all had Vinyl records growing up.  The old, think 78s were not during my time, but the dinky 45" singles and the 33 were still very much the trend during the 80s. 

We religiously wiped them with our valour fabric squares that we kept in a plastic zippy.  We'd gently settle the needle on the very edge of the record, being incredibly careful not to scratch or bounce the needle.

Then cassette tapes came along and we used our pencil to rewind our tapes when they got stuck in our Walkman, then in popped the CD and vinyl made a trendy come back this decade.

Everyone now regrets using their old vinyl records as décor at the family sixties parties, or used them as frisbies to entertain their pooch.  These days they are pretty valuable, especially the old rare printings of some vinyl records. Don't you just love how as time ticks by the trends come and go and come around again...

Pity I didn't hold on to all my dad's Decca 45s of the early Rolling Stones stuff. 

Happy Shopping at a modern day Vinyl Shop, Record Mad

Today's music feature is Van Halen

Under The Bramble Bushes

Remember clapping this Playground Classic?

My sister and I used to do clapping games at lightning speed - I still do it with my lassies too.

Under The Bramble Bushes
Under The Sea
Boom, Boom, Boom
True Love for me, my darling
True Love for you.
And When we Marry,
we'll raise a family.
Under The Bramble Bush...

We used this and other songs for clapping and skipping games too.

I loved skipping (with double ropes too) and Chinese ropes (which was just a bunch of elastic bands joined together).  You and a friend stood face-to-face about four feet from one another, hooked the elastics around your ankles and the person playing the game jumped in and out and on the elastic bands in time to the syllables of the song.

Not last night but the night before
24 robbers came knocking at my door,
I ran out, (run out of rope), to let them in, (jump back in)
and this is what they said to me :

Spanish dancers do the splits, (jumper doing the commands after each)
Spanish dancers do the kicks,
Spanish dances turn around,
Spanish dancers touch the ground,
Spanish dancers get out of town, (run out of rope, end of turn) 

 and loads of  risqué ones too

When Suzy was a school girl, she said miss, miss I can't do this I've got my knickers in a great big twist.  When Suzy was a teenager ... She said "ooh, ah I've lost my bra, I've left my knickers in my boyfriend's car".

I much preferred playing marbles in the dirty with the boys though.

Today's musical interlude is my favourite band as a teenager. I was so much in love with Paul Hewson aka Bono and had all their records.

Enjoy

Tank Girl

Tank Girl is a movie based on the British cult comic-strip, our tank-riding anti-heroine fights a mega-corporation, which controls the world's water supply. 

It's a fun film filled with quirky in-yer-face humour, sexy half-nude girls and great one-liners.




Look, its no Schindler's List, but if you're in the mood for a feel-good girl empowering film, this is the one to get you smiling. 

It's simple and predictable and full of sarcastic wise-cracks.





OMG! It's The Osmonds!

The Osmonds began as a barbershop quartet group with all the older brothers. I think there were five of them and later the younger boys joined, which made them seven in total. They started the band in order to raise money to buy hearing aids for their two oldest brothers, who were born deaf.

Their only sister, Marie, poor wee thing, didn't really sing with her brothers, but she went on to have a successful solo country career.  They grew up a very religious family and were very clean-cut.

Handsome Donny was, by far, the most popular of the brothers and quickly became a heart-throb and front man of the Osmonds.  Later, The Donny and Marie TV show took off, but it only ran for 3 years before they went bankrupt.   

It seems they all went to the same dentist as they all had the same row of shiny, perfectly shaped teeth.  Perhaps that is why they really went bankrupt?  Tooth high in dentist bills...

Although they had  a clean cut image, their family always seemed to be riddled with scandal.

Here's one of Donny and Marie's hits.

 

Nifty Nanny. Oy vey!

Remember that Nanny named Fran who spoke through her nose and laughed like a hyena on acid?  Yeah, I loved that TV show too. 

I thought Fran was hysterical with her grumpy Yiddish grandmother, Nanny's short skirts, colourful wardrobe, big hair and opaque tights.  Oh she was soooo 90s and such a quirky character.  I loved that she sometimes looked directly into the camera when delivering one her of snappy sarcastic one-liners.  I love her Mum, who had even bigger hair than Fran, that was forever shovelling food in her face and that she believed Barbara Streisand walked on water.

I must admit the kids were annoying and so was Maxwell, but I enjoyed the butler's gags.  Nile and Fran always ganged up on CeeCee, ripping her apart and playing daft jokes on her.

Who was your favourite character in The Nanny?

Todays music is 90s boy band 'N SYNC.  Certainly not my favourite boy band, but they were extremely popular in the 90s.

Happy Listening.

Making Out in the Eighties

Growing up, I always wanted a real horse.  I used to spent hours drawing horses. I used to dream about having my very own pony.  I used to imagine what I'd name him and how I'd spend my time after school brushing his silky mane and plait his tail. 

I loved anything to do with horses, so when My Little Pony came on the market I wanted one! 

I'd spent ages combing the hair, washing the hair, re-combing the hair and the art was to keep the curl in the tail in tact.

It were a great wee Hasbro toy - small enough to hide in your school bag or pocket.  You could ALWAYS have your horse with you.  If your mum and dad were wealthy your Little Pony could have pretty transparent wings.

Keen Kodaking

As most of you know, by now my theme for the A to Z Blog Challenge this month is Retro Nostalgia. 

I love all things vintage and retro so let me take you back...

Remember the Kodak Polaroid Camera? 

It was revolutionary in its day...instant photographs?!  My dad had a Kodak Instamatic and the refills came in cute packs of 10 instant photos.  They were like wee gold sandwiches in our house.  It was uber cool to look at your pictures only minutes after you took them. 

Blow It and Shake It - Remember?

Reminds me of the song by Outkast "Hey Ya"..... "Shake eet Laaik a Poloroid Peekture".

We even a Kodak Polaroid at work during the 90s.  I worked for a recruitment company and we used them to take instant photos of all our candidates to attached to their profile and resumé.  It was genius and a great way of remember what the candidate looked like (before all the laws were in place not to ask any personal details about an applicant)

I can still remember the smell of the photos as they came out.  It was a great way to take naughty photos without having the woman at the developing shop, peeping at your pix and giving you the stink eye when you collected them.

Nowadays, you can order polaroid look-a-likes of your Instagram uploads by Nifty250.  I loves these print outs.  There are so many funky crafts you can do with them.

Music Feature today is The Kinks. They were brilliant! Besides, Lola this is one of my favourite tracks by them.



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Gag Me With A Spoon

Let me take you back to the 80s for the A to Z Blog Challenge Letter G.

The eighties were definitely NOT the best era for flattering fashion.  In fact, the fashions and styles were downright ridiculous and often ugly!

This particular item brings back awesome memories for me. 

I started being a serious gym bunny when I was 17 years old and I haven't stopped since.  If I don't have a gym contract or working out, I feel that something is missing in my life.  I've been through aerobics, step aerobics, calanetics, kata box training, zumba, weight training, circuit training, you name it, I've probably tried it at one time or another.

G-String Leotards

My exercise routine started off doing classic aerobics in the late 80s, when the fashions in the gym were sexy and risqué! 

G-String high-cut skimpy leotards with flesh coloured footless tights, wide coloured belts and head bands and not forgetting the fuzziest, brightest coloured leg warmers you could find. 

Don't forget the LA Gear hi-tops, which any dedicated Gym Bunny just HAD to have, with the same colour laces as your fluffy roll-down socks, of course.  Nothing demure about the eighties! 

LA Gear

Oh yeah, those were the days of Jane Fonda educating us on "feeling the burn" and squeezing our glutes until we thought they'd actually fall right off!

Today's retro music feature is George Michael.  I thought I'd stick with the eighties...

Remember, You Gotta Have Faith! 

Fuddy-Duddy Clifford

So many A to Z Participants this year! WOWZER! Its quite overwhelming!

The April A to Z Blog Challenge has come a long way from its first year way back when. Its a great blog challenge and I've met so many awesome bloggers through this challenge and through Alex. It's always a wild ride and completely different every time.

Back to the Nostalgia Theme.

Something that makes me nostalgic and takes me way back, is my very first car I bought and owned.

I was so proud that I'd saved enough money to buy my very own second hand car.  I even named him!  Clifford, my MK2 Ford Escort was a bargain and I could wait to drive it!  

A couple of days into owning my very own wee car, I realised why it was such a bargain... It was only running on only 3 cylinders, which meant I had to avoid steep hills and going up certain roads, because it was only a 1300 to begin with. Clifford had pretty much no power.

That didn't put me off!  I was young and my motto was... "have car, will drive" and drive I certainly did.  I went everywhere in wee Clifford.  My Ford Escort was baby blue with a trendy vinyl roof and I thought I was the shizzle.  I even bought matching fuzzy car seat covers and put in a tape deck so that I could play my MixTapes.

Loads of fun was had in that wee car.  Clifford could even tell a few stories about the Drive-In...

Enjoy this track by Fleetwood Mac....Go Your Own Way from 1977.

Eat My Shorts!

Happy Monday, Pretty Plonkers.

Today is the letter E for the 2015 A to Z Blog Challenge.

As you know my Nostalgic theme is two-part; the first part of the post will be something retro or vintage that I remember from my childhood, or something that I remember my mum and dad talking about or passing down to me.

Today's feature is ta-raaa - The Easy-Bake Oven.

What little girl in back in my time DIDN'T have an Easy Bake Oven? And let me tell you, if you didn't own one, you were cramping your fingers writing countless letters to Santa begging him to bring you one.  It was every wee lassie's dream.

Many hours were spent playing with the oven, but when your mixes and accessories ran out it was pretty much useless.

Today's nostalgic tune is the 80s duo of Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart in the Eurythmics.  They had plenty hits but this one is pretty catchy.  Enjoy and sing along! 

Dirty Dancing, Duh!

Happy Easter Everyone!

So, if you haven't noticed yet, my Retro post names have been all retro or vintage slang..

I hope you're enjoying the challenge as much as I am.  I haven't been commenting as much as I'd want to because we're actually on holiday.  My family and I are enjoying a well-deserved beach holiday and I'm able to visit my mum and dad too.  Our internet signal isn't good at all, so I might not be posting again until Wednesday. 

It's great to see my folks, but I just wish they lived closer to me.  700km is really far to drive for a cuddle from yer Mum.

Back to the challenge....remember Patrick Swayze? 

The 80s dreamboat, who could wiggle his rear and be cool at the same time? Oh Yeah, Daddy-O! 

For you blokes....remember Jennifer Grey?...hot body, cute personality, but that schnos!?! 

Yeah, after she got the nose job, no one actually recognised her and no one gave her any other good film roles...poor thing.

I wanted to post a Depeche Mode song, but unfortunately I can't seem to access from our holiday destination :-(.

I will be back in the land of the Wi-Fi on Wednesday. 

Where’s the Beef?

Welcome to the Letter B of this year's A to Z Blog Challenge.

Who remembers the TV series Beyond 2000? 

Here's an episode from 1987 taken from Betamax.  Remember Betamax? 

Yeah, well our wee family had the Phillips 2000 video recorder and we thought we were the shizzle!  

The Phillips VCR had fancy analogue double-sided tapes like audio tapes.  Twice the amount of recording time - Booyah!

The commercials an frikken epic. 



My retro musical feature for the letter B is the B-52's who had huge hits in the 80s like "Love Shack" and "Planet Claire".  They were pretty new wave and not everyone's cuppa tea.  This was my favourite song of theirs.

See you tomorrow for the letter C....

A is for Atari

Welcome to the very first day of the 2015 A to Z Blog Challenge. This was a very last minute decision to take part this year, as I haven't been regularly blogging for a while.  

I look forward to sharing my Nostalgic Retro Vintage posts with you and visit as many blogs as I can during April.

Atari means "to hit the target" in Japanese and is also the name of the corporate and brand name started in the year I was born, 1972. 

Nostalgic? 

I remember spending tons of my childhood hours jigglin those joysticks and fighting with my pals on who's turn it was next. 

Atari pioneered the 20c arcade games that we love and remember - PacMan and Space Invaders? These incredibly wealth guys, and probably quite dead by now, helped define the electronic entertainment industry from when I was born until the late 1980s

And now a step back in time to the year 1981 and a disco dance hit that we all wiggled out bums to.  Enjoy the totally bitchin' toon.


 

A to Z Blog Challenge Theme Reveal

This is a last minute decision to take part in the 2015 A to Z Blog Challenge. 

I haven't blogged in almost a year, so I thought this would be a brilliant way of getting back into the swing of things. 

I have done four previous A To Z Blog Challenges successfully, so I thought I'd give it another go just for old time's sake.

 And that, my Pretty Plonkers, is exactly what my Theme this year is going to be....Retro Nostalgia.

 


 Here are the hosts:

Arlee Bird @ Tossing it Out

Ninja Captain Alex J. Cavanaugh

Jeremy @ Hollywood Nuts

Nicole Ayers @ The Madlab Post

Author Stephen Tremp

Heather M. Gardner

AJ Lauer

Pam @ An Unconventional Librarian

Matthew MacNish @ The QQQE

Zalka Csenge Virág @ The Multicolored Diary

S. L. Hennessy @ Pensuasion

C. Lee McKenzie @ The Write Game

Joy Campbell @ The Character Depot

Susan Gourley @ Susan Says

John  Holton @The Sound of One Hand Typing

Lisa Buie-Collard, Author