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It is Sunday afternoon and I have just come back from a lovely walk through woods! One of the things Mr Foxy and I discussed is how our youth have changed. When we grew up in the 70s/80s life’s simple pleasures were playing in the street with your mates (Bulldog usually), riding your bike or fishing in the streams. Now our teenagers are more worried about their phones, their social media presence and seemingly more about what their friends think of them.
Television was so different growing up! Saturday afternoons watching Big Daddy whilst my nan brushed my hair – I remember her being a little obsessed with wrestling! Giant Haystacks is not something you can forget! When I was about 5 on a family seaside holiday I remember being taken to see a live show and found it all so very disturbing! Suffice it to say The Black and White Minstrels had a profound affect on my life and for the very obvious horrendous reasons! I thought I would share a few memories from my childhood to see if any resonate with you. Some of them I just cannot include here due to blatant non PC but then this was the 70s!
Black Beauty – thus causing a life’s obsession with horses! (Reg Dent trained all the horses and this was filmed in Rickmansworth! Made my Mum take me there!)Â
Tales of the Unexpected – this seriously freaked me out especially when they were filming in Chesham but as the stories were all written by Roald Dahl filming was local!
Magic Roundabout – every child loved this (it is funnier watching it back now!)
Pans People – Top of the Pops (about the old good music programme on for us teens!) I spent ages practising these dances with my best friend Nicky! (Sorry to admit that publicly).
Monkey -super obsessed with this cult Japanese show (BBC2 on a Friday night) – Ahhhh Pigsy!Â
The Tomorrow People – time travelling crime caper! Mr Foxy’s choice!Â
Butterflies – still love watching this! Rhea (Wendy Craig) as the downtrodden housewife, Geoffrey Palmer the husband and their two sons (might have been Nicholas Lyndhurst’s tv debut). Rhea is my kitchen goddess!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fc5ed_xBUZM
Pipkins – Hartley Hare – once you see this you will wonder how we grew up normal!Â
Space 1999 – This is one for Mr Foxy! I never watched anything remotely sci-fi but apparently Catherine Schell was the Schizzle who could transform into any animal, terran or otherwise!Â
Dave Allen – Mum would let me watch this but always preface with he can be a little rude! I never appreciated his absolute genius in material, timing and deliverance until I was much older!Â
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkLehNtJCQw
These are just some of our favourites (yes I did say favourites)! As per our header image (Charlie’s Angels courtesy of CNN) we saw an influx of American programmes and we all became a little super-hero obsessed as you were either Wonder Woman, the Six Million Dollar Man OR you were falling in love with Starsky & Hutch! In fact I will leave you with one final clip – Ken Hutchinson who is better known as David Soul! This was a hard choice as both Silver Lady and Don’t Give Up On Us are still 2 of my favourite tracks; I leave you with this and will be back next week with the 80’s!
Foxy love xx