Back on the Sixties...
Yeah, I'm old.

We lived on a dirt road in the middle of nothing, woods all around. Along the sides of the road were raspberry bushes, overhanging the road. In June you could walk along there and eat raspberries to your fill and never come close to depleting them.

Once a ear Mom would send us out with plastic containers to gather as many wild raspberries as we could. We would spend the day gathering them, bringing back our containers to Mom who poured them into a kettle on the stove. She spent the day making jam out of them, and at the same time baked loaves of bread.

That night we would eat jam and bread for dinner, as much as we could fit.

It only happened once a year, and maybe all of five times. But I still remember the wonderful smell.
( Wanderer, Mon 29 May 2017, 21:05, 2 replies)

My old Dad used to take me shooting for pheasant
Not a big, expensive shoot - bag was only about 50 for the whole day - but a ragtag group of gin-sodden locals at an ancient retired admiral's country house in the soft Fife countryside.

I loved those days. Once I stood on a hill and watched a fox hunt pass through the winter landscape: it's still, by miles, the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Now I live in London and the only change in the seasons I see is what comes out of my wardrobe. On the plus side, when the zombies come, I'll know my way round a double-barrelled shotgun.
( After you my dear Alfonse No. After you., Sun 28 May 2017, 16:24, 1 reply)

I once wanked into a car exhaust

( drimble he'd been white, he'd been black, Thu 18 May 2017, 21:47, 2 replies)

I once wanked into my grandfather's Wellington boots
and he never even noticed.
(Dr Skagra glorious glargzhem, Thu 18 May 2017, 20:25, 1 reply)

I once wanked into a cocked hat

( Two Hats 🎩🎩, Thu 18 May 2017, 16:44, 2 replies)

God its a drab fest of replies
Fave child(ish) memory, reaching 15, being allowed a pt-time job at the local Supermarket and earning money! Then one night me and a friend had this idea of hiding behind a hedge and stretching some disused fishing line across a quiet road to a random door knocker. Back behind the hedge we pulled on this line for what seemed like an hour.
"Knock, knock, knock"
"Knock, knock, knock"
"Knock, knock"
"Knock, knock, knock"
Hilarious stuff but no-one answered so I yanked on the line, broke it and we emerged from behind the hedge.
Then this woman screamed "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING!!??", so we scarpered. A day later the local paper ran this article about how hooligans had played a deadly prank and stretched some line/cable fuggin Destroyers anchor chain etc across a road that could've garrotted a motorcyclist. Bad enough but the best was yet to come.
Cue Saturday morning and I turned up to my Supermarket job. What news awaited? That enraged woman who screamed at us for the prank - I fucking worked with her.
(luckylife , 0 guests and 3 bots are online, Wed 17 May 2017, 23:30, Reply)

Space, The Final Frontier.....
Before I tell my story, a quick Public Service Announcement. In about 14 hours, Mrs Legless will be giving birth to our first child.

A B3ta baby. We met through B3ta, QOTW to be specific, and have been together for more than ten years and married for almost 3.


I know we're not the first B3ta baby - I know of any least one who was conceived on a bash - but, if B3ta is still going in another 15 years I'll tell our daughter where her parents met and how we got together.



Anyways - on with the tale.


It's not my happiest childhood memory but it is one of the most profound. It was on July 21st 1969. At school, my class had been taken down to the TV room to witness the moment when Armstrong said those iconic words:

"One small step for a man - one giant leap for mankind"


My little brain almost 'sploded. We (meaning the Yanks) had put a fucking man on the moon!! It was beyond awesome. I was already a prolific reader but most of my adventure reading was earth based. Exploring the Amazon, Eygpt, Africa. I was into H. Rider Haggard, George McDonald Fraser (Flashman), Rudyard Kipling and early Tolkien - pretty much, The Hobbit.


But the moon landing changed everything. I discovered sci-fi. Asimov, E.E.Doc Smith. Hienlen. I read everything from the Golden Age of science fiction. Space was the next frontier. We'd reached the moon so Mars would be next. We'd build a lunar colony, humanity would start to reach for the stars...


But it all turned to shit. Then we had Nixon, the oil crisis of the 70s, and stagnation in really getting our arses off this rock.

But now we have new blood. Neil Dr Grasse Tyson - one of the most elequont speakers for science and space I've ever listened to. Elron Musk - a complete nutter who risks everything on his vision. The guy has huge balls. But he wants to get us into space, onto other planets and start mining asteroids and comets.


I'm rambling now but, the point is, when I was a child, I dreamed that I might get to space. Today, I'm on the cusp of being a dad for the first time and I really think that my daughter might have a fighting chance of doing what I dreamed about as a child.

But only if she wants to.


Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Wed 17 May 2017, 14:26, 19 replies)

Endless meadows of fun
I grew up in a house surrounded by open fields. Behind us, cows grazed during the autumn when the grass had been cut, but during the summer it was waist high grass. Ideal for making "tunnels" on your hands and knees that connected flattened areas to sit in an hang out. The farmer would cut and bale the grass, and pay us 20p a day to help load bales onto his flat bed trailer. In the next field, there was a pond to catch newts and sticklebacks, and plenty of dry stone walls to sit against as shelter from the wind, or again just hang out.

The very next field was a pre digital Porn Hub. It was a common that was used to dump spoil from a few houses near by. As a dumping ground we would find various items - tins of dumped paint that I liberated so my dad could paint the inside of his garage, old bikes and mopeds etc. But there was almost an endless supply of jazz mags - with tattered edges and sticky pages, and big titted birds with what looked like tribbles glued to their gashes rather than the modern day fish-finger. My greatest find was a set of playing cards with nudes on the back, that was so appealing in many ways - fitted in my Wrangler pocket, could be concealed under my bed or in my school (carrier) bag, and produced at will as a source of merriment or when relaxing in a gentleman's way.

Oh, and we used to get really fresh eggs.
( Piper Alpha is being a grumpy northerm bastard on:, Wed 17 May 2017, 12:42, 1 reply)

I won a Scalextric, aged 6.
It was a Kellog's competition on the back of a box of Frosties. Some tie-in with rally cars where you had to put various car components in order of importance - we didn't even own a car.

I found out I'd won, many months after, when "father christmas" delivered a Mini Cooper Rally edition Scalextric and a letter from Tony the Tiger telling me to stay "Gggggggrrrrreeeeaaaatttt!".
( Linbox has a serious dunk habit, Wed 17 May 2017, 2:51, Reply)

Tits

( broadsword now that's fresh, Tue 16 May 2017, 23:34, 1 reply)

The Grand Tour...
My father was very fond of history, and decided that since I had reached the grand age of 7 he would take me to Rome to show me the sights. We walked the catacombs, took a fascinating tour of the Colosseum, explored and marvelled at the majestic St. Peter’s. He explained to me the magnificence of the Pantheon and regaled me with tales of the Circus Maximus, and the marvelous machinations of the forum. He was overjoyed when I was impressed by the beauty of the Trevi Fountains and the stunning art on display in the many galleries and churches, and we really did have a great father/son time.
Months later he visited my school and was looking through my work and spotted a folder labelled ‘Trip to Rome with dad’ – he opened it with a beaming smile and read my essay:
“Me and Dad went to Rome and saw lots of history things. On the way back we went to London Zoo and I saw a monkey eat another monkey’s poo and throw it at other monkeys. It was ace.”
(Tugnut Ex of this parish, Tue 16 May 2017, 12:01, 2 replies)

Lavender
The scent still clings, somewhere. I'm sure it's synthetic; some jarring in my olfactory bulb that confuses my brain and makes me think I can smell her. My memories are hazy and piecemeal, like a synaesthetic collage. The curve of her hair, the warm softness of her hand, enveloping mine. The rich sound of her voice, bestowing a safety and security that I've never really felt since. But mostly, the smell.

Her perfume was Yardley English Lavender. She wore it subtly, so the smell mixed with her own aromas: vanilla, cocoa butter, Imperial Leather soap. It was a smell that filled my nostrils as I hugged her, when I'd skinned my knee, when I'd broken my toy car, when I'd eaten too much jelly and ice cream and felt sick. It was a smell that I'll forever associate with comfort, with complete love and protection.

The smell lingered for a while after she'd gone. I think my father was loathe to clean too much, lest he completely washed her away. His need for it was probably as great as mine. In time, we healed, albeit with scars: invisible to the naked eye, but very real, and very tender when prodded in the right way. I kept a bottle of the perfume, and every year, on her birthday, I spray just a little bit onto my pillow, and cuddle it, pushing my tear-streaked face into the warm softness, just like I used to as a child.

Sometimes I catch the tiniest amount of it on the breeze. Perhaps someone wears something with a hint of lavender; maybe someone has a bush in their garden. For a second, I'm caught up in the swirling vortex - the curve of her hair, the warm softness of her hand, enveloping mine. The rich sound of her voice, bestowing a safety and security that I've never really felt since.

I might not remember you too well, Mum, but I miss you.
(SalariosDecentes was under the radar on, Tue 16 May 2017, 8:33, 1 reply)

fighting and fucking my way through Streets of Rage 2
Cheers
( $$ ✅, Mon 15 May 2017, 13:36, 5 replies)

Wanking over the ladies underwear section of the Gratis catalogue

( spanishfly is so fucking sexy people impersonate him, Mon 15 May 2017, 12:34, 2 replies)

Disney in California and Florida as a kid
They were pretty epic. Running around all day in the sun, eating ice creams, going on rollercoasters, watching fireworks at night, your entire life seeming to depend on getting the unbelievably cool glow stick bracelets (the devastation when they stopped working the next day was also quite epic!).

It will be great to take the little one someday, but it's probably not quite as much fun when you've paid for it/nagged about suncream/worried about sugar and calories in ice cream/lost the energy of a 9 year old...
( rachelswipe with a fork, Mon 15 May 2017, 11:18, 5 replies)

Me and my then best mate in nursery school flooding the nursery toilets to turn them into a paddling pool.

( stuj (^(^;;^)^) GO TEAM SPIDERS!(^(^;;^)^), Mon 15 May 2017, 2:33, Reply)

Calling Mrs Dillon a bitch after she marked 3 of my maths homework answers wrong when they were right.
The bitch.
'Don't lose your cool in MY class, stuj!' She shouted before sending me to the headmaster for a caning.
'Don't mark me wrong when I'm right then bitch!' I muttered under my breath, replying 'Nothing Miss.' When she said 'WHAT did you just say?'
Still got me another 6 with the cane. Even though the headmaster checked my fucking maths book and saw my answers were correct.
( stuj (^(^;;^)^) GO TEAM SPIDERS!(^(^;;^)^), Mon 15 May 2017, 2:32, Reply)

My dad taking me to see Jaws.

( stuj (^(^;;^)^) GO TEAM SPIDERS!(^(^;;^)^), Mon 15 May 2017, 2:21, 2 replies)