Pretty In Pink with Sixteen Candles lighting St. Elmo's Fire with The Breakfast Club. Bueller?

I've just run through a clump of 80's movies in my Netflix queue. It made me think of things I miss.

• Polos with the collar up (since popped collar is now taboo, I no longer own polos. They make me look like a butch lesbian, or a Best Buy employee)
  
• Rolling the bottoms of your jeans tight against your ankle (conveniently disguising the fact that the jeans were floods)
  
• Gaping at boys in Cavaricchis (they made their rear-ends look cute)
  
• BKs (never owned a pair, just miss them)
  
• Big hair (at least until you just slightly shave the sides of your head and your mom spots it. Then it's small hair from then on)
  
• Big belts worn on the outside of your shirt (vinyl and pleather works of art)
  
• Soccer hair (now referred to by me as "hockey hair," since hockey players seem to be the only ones still wearing mullets...well, hockey players and rednecks)
• Disposable jobs (McWhat?)
  
• The novelty of driving (eventually legally too)
  
• Egging houses (If a teen buys two cartons at 7-11 at 11:30 at night, no, it's not for breakfast)
  
• The novelty of drinking before your time (with the fear of God and/or parent in you, anyway)
  
• Generra Hypercolor shirts (always fun when your armpits were a different color than the rest of the shirt)
  
• The Benetton shirt I appropriated from my then-boyfriend (it looked better on me. And he was a douchebag)
  
• Immortality (conveniently coinciding with ignorance)
  
• Contest overnighters (especially watching your mom belly-crawl across the darkened gym floor in pursuit of junk food)
  
• Witnessing The Rock bursting into flame (not the wrestler, the LPHS rock on the corner of campus)
• John Cook (this one's going to need to be its own post)
• Passing notes in class (btw, keeping them after 19 years just proves you were a dork in H.S. Or now. Maybe both.)
  
• The feeling you get on the last day of school (boing boing boing boing)
  
• Doing your homework 5 minutes before class (thus freeing up your evenings for what-have-you)
• The feeling you get on the last day of summer vacation (yea friends! boo school!)
  
• That new boyfriend feeling (boing boing boing boing (not specifically that boing)
  
• That first kiss feeling (see previous bullet point. Maybe specifically that boing in this case)
  
• That feeling you get when you back away from your date at the dance when he begins to convulse to the music (Oswald, I'm looking at you)
  
• Decorating your locker (even when you have a 6 inch width to work with)
  
• Indiana Dunes (especially when the car breaks down somewhere between Gary and Chicago. In the dark.)
  
• Boy's cars (A Triumph Spitfire, an AMC Eagle, a 60-something Camaro, "The Green Monster", "The White Monster")
• Scribbling on notebook covers (Mine were mostly movie quotes, of course. The gathering of useless information started fairly early)
  
• Getting out of class early for pep rallies (except that one with the wrestling demo...I would've rather stayed in class)
• Secret clubs, handshakes, insignia (Buttholes, too complicated to explain here, a poker chip with the center punched out)
  
• The pride of public victory (What?? I marched good!)
  
• Chasing each other around campus after a full day of band camp (yes, band camp) with coolers full of ice water (Oswald, I'm looking at you)
  
• Coming home to a crowd of applauding parents (and the occasional giant inflated....purple monkey??)
  
• Marching in the pouring rain at a competition (and still winning)
• Parachute pants (never owned. wanted badly. never received. got over them)
  
• "Quejada" (two parades a year...we didn't play this one enough)
  
• Flashbulbs (those F*$*#ers burned!)
  
• The first note of "Pique Dame" as demonstrated by the crowd (it was like the wave, only toward the back wall)
  
• Chemistry class (mixy mixy, blowy uppy, greeny foamy)
  
• The opportunity to be graciously allowed to "hang out" with upperclassmen (shooting warm tequila without barfing was a plus, but not a requirement. Bonus points for not letting your eyes water)
  
• Being awarded your first nickname ("Bug." Don't ask)
  
• Being late for graduation due to "The Sex" (yes, that's exactly why I look all sweaty and bed-heady)
  
• Watching the sun come up with your friends (nuff said)