Kathryn's Inbox

I am sharing this clip, because it is almost impossible to listen to this song without smiling. According to YouTube Pop Muzik was one of the earliest new wave songs to make an impact on the music charts.

Video Killed the Radio Star was old by the time I first heard it (when I was about eight, and got told to look at the TV because, apparently, the little girl in the clip looked just like me,) but it is one of those songs that isn't forgotten in a hurry. It is generally considered to be an "eighties" song, though as you can see at the end of the clip, it was actually released in 1979.

I have been writing a lot of Baby-sitters Club nostalgia posts recently. I did a few when I first started writing this blog, and in recent times, I've started writing them again. The reasoning is pretty simple--those books were a huge part of my life during my pre-teen years and, consequently, I remember the books quite well. (Especially as I read many of them more than once.) One of the strange things about revisiting things from my childhood, though, is that I tend to look at them with a more well, discerning eye. It's easier to see the flaws, but I loved the books so much that I really don't care that the main characters seemingly repeated eighth grade several times over or that we're supposed to believe that their adventures included winning the lottery (well, okay, they won second prize which was just enough to cover the cost seven airline tickets to California,) being shipwrecked on an island (okay, Claudia and Dawn were shipwrecked,) and well, you get the id...

This one is 1980s Nostalgia, sort of. I don't remember this episode of Edward and Friends at all. A little wet, but entertaining ...

Just wanted to share this clip from the short lived but lovely Edward and Friends television series that was based on Lego's Fabuland theme. I don't know how many times I saw this particular episode as a child, but I surprised myself when I started watching it on YouTube and realised that I could remember every word! On a less innocent note, I can remember making up a dirty version of this as a teenager, where the fuzzy thing in every picture was not Edward's trunk, Hannah was a prostitute and where Wilfred Walrus kept blackmailing him for the cost of the film and ending up at the bottom of the canal wearing cement shoes when Edward's gangster older brother found out what was going on, but that's teenage fan fiction for you ...

We had one of these posters in my primary school library in the late 1980s/early 1990s. I had forgotten all about it until I stumbled onto the image on google. I think it holds up pretty well.

Well, it might be winter, but here is something to warm the hearts of Nostalgia fans. Who remembers these great Slip! Slop! Slap! ads that reminded us all to be sun smart during the 1980s?

Anyone who grew up in Australia in the late 1980s/early 1990s, should remember this! For those of you who don't, this clip featuring The Black Cat was a regular feature on Play School.  PS--Contrary to the title of the clip, the cat is not named Barbara. However, the song was performed by Barbara Frawley.

Every bit as funny as it was when it was originally published in 1981, George's Marvellous Medicine tells the story of eight year old George, who comes up with a clever way to get revenge on his horrid and selfish grandmother, and ends up causing absolute havoc with the special new medicine that he creates for his grandmother. Suddenly, Grandma's head is pushing through the roof and George's dad--a farmer--is keen to create more of the medicine and to bottle it, as he thinks that he can make a fortune by feeding it to the animals. In true Roald Dahl style, there are lots of great laugh out loud moments and everyone ends up getting exactly what they deserve. I enjoyed reading this one, as it was a childhood favourite, though I was surprised by how little I remembered of the story. I suppose it is eclipsed a bit by some of Dahl's books that I read a bit later on-- Matilda, The BFG, the Witches-- and this easier to read junior novel was mostly forgotten. Anyway, th...

I decided to pick up Roald Dahl's clever The Twits again and go on a bit of a nostalgia trip after reading Danny Champion of the World recently and also Dahl's autobiography, Boy . In this short, clever book for children there is a lot of humour as Dahl depicts the gross and ghastly behaviours of Mr and Mrs Twit. Dahl dislike of beards is obvious (Mr Twit has a shocker,) and the eventual revenge that both the monkeys and the birds get on this horrible pair is as perfect as it is hilarious. And so too are Quentin Blake's illustrations. I wish that I could add more to this one, but it is what it is. Some books don't require in depth discussion and recommendations, they exist to be enjoyed. Anyway, this one is great for a nostalgia trip and also great for sharing with primary school aged children. Highly recommended. 

The Fabuland House, as featured on Brikipedia Like many kids born in the early 1980s, I had a Fabuland set (okay, I actually owned several,) and spent many happy hours building the sets and coming up with new creations. Made by Lego, Fabuland was first released in 1979 and was intended to be a kind of bridge between Duplo and the smaller and more complex regular Lego sets. Fabuland featured characters with animal heads and humanlike bodies and the instructions came in the form of an awesome booklet that included pictures of the figures putting the sets together. Fabuland proved to be quite popular and in 1986, a television series based on the sets Edward and Friends was produced. (This was later developed into a series of books.) Lego stopped making Fabuland 1989, though some Duplo sets have figures that look similar and many of the same pieces were included in the Mickey Mouse Lego sets in the early 2000s.  Edward and Friends has never been released on DVD (despite the fa...

Last week, I posted about the Canadian television series, You Can't Do That On Television . Similar in nature was this little gem from the UK, Your Mother Wouldn't Like It which was made during the mid-1980s. I remember it airing in Australia sometime around the summer of 1988-1989. What I remember best about this show is certain character called Tapeworm and the fact that it inspired years of my brother, Damien, and I saying to one another, "I've had just about enough of you ..." whilst doing an imitation of Mr Briefcase ...

I have to admit, I was absolutely delighted on Wednesday morning last week when the Adelaide Remember When page on facebook shared a link about the ABC children's educational programme Hunter . Like a lot of kids who were born and grew up in the 1980s, I have a lot of fond memories of watching this one in the TV room at my primary school.  Hunter was a bumbling, budding scientist with an interest in how things worked, while his companion, Computer Cat was well, a smug know-it-all. Shortly afterward, someone else shared a link on the page to the above documentary on YouTube. Well worth a watch if you remember the series ...

I still remember the first time I read this short novella for younger readers. I was eight years old, almost nine, and our school librarian, Mrs Peterson (who has subsequently gone on to have quite a successful beading supplies store but that is another story,) chose it as a book to read out loud to my grade three class. This was the second Roald Dahl book I had ever read (the first being a picture book titled The Enormous Crocodile ,) and in the months to come I would feel sad when I heard of the authors death. In the years following, I would read many of his other books for children including my personal favourites, Matilda and T he BFG and his volumes of short stories for adults.  The Fantastic Mr Fox  contains many of the elements that make Roald Dahl's books a hit. The story is darkly comical and has the usual underdogs (or in this case, underfoxes,) versus the gross and selfish farmers. Mr Fox is a clever and witty man who wants only enough food to feed his wif...

Today I'm paying tribute to one of the more ahem, troubled, members of the Babysitters Club, Mallory Pike. Although Mallory was one of the less interesting characters in the series (let's face it, she didn't wear weird clothing like Claudia did,) Babysitters Club author Ann M. Martin surprised the now grown-up fans of the series when she stated that she had no strong feelings about Mallory Pike. (Read more about it here .) But who is Mallory Pike really, and what did she contribute to the BSC? Mallory Pike debuted as a ten-year-old sitting charge in the first book in the series, Kristy's Great Idea . The oldest of eight kids, Mallory was annoyed that she still had to have a babysitter. As the series progressed, the members of the BSC released that Mallory was mature for her age and eventually asked her to help out as a junior helper at a playgroup that they established one summer. Later, after Mallory had turned eleven and Stacey left the club to return to New Y...

It was a beautiful day in Sweet Valley. You know, because every Sweet Valley High novel opens with it being a beautiful day. Or something. Anyway, I found this little gem, a slightly battered old Sweet Valley High super edition on sale for ninety-nine cents and decided to read it for nostalgic purposes. Special Christmas was one of the earlier books in the series and was the first Christmas that Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield spent as juniors at Sweet Valley High (several more were to follow.) At this point in the series both twins are single, Todd having moved away to Vermont and Jessica is busy crushing on Hans, a foreign exchange student whose stay in Sweet Valley is so brief it is unlikely he is ever mentioned in any other book in the series. You know, unless one or both of the twins happened to holiday in Germany later on in the series. Things are going well for the twins. Todd is planning to visit Sweet Valley over Christmas and Jessica is excited about some kind of wei...