Have you ever thought about the once prized possessions from our childhood? The "must-haves" of the 90s that didn't make it to the millennium? Where did they all vanish to? This list will pay tribute to the many necessities of our youth and their ultimate downfall. So pour some out for our fallen do-dads.
1. AOL
The highlight of my day was having that piercing screechy static radiating through the desktop as I waited for the little yellow dude to find his family. Oh Dial-Up, you are not missed!
2. Beanie Babies
I only collected the cute ones: the unicorn, the frog, the pelican, and like 700 others. But the hype of their "intended worth" kept them around in our closets for two decades! I had to bid mine farewell when I had to put gas in my car... TY beanies, you did come in handy!
3. Chat Rooms
Okay, we are all too guilty of those sketchy chat rooms! And what happened once you signed in? A/S/L? PIC 4 PIC? WANNA CYBER? UGH! Do people even still say that? Oh how "creative" we were as a generation, there wasn't enough time to strike a real conversation. (It's like too much time was spent signing into AOL, so they needed to get right down to it.)
4. Digital Cameras
Remember charging these bad-boys before an epic night out? I loved that we could actually see the pic before we printed it out. (This was way before the fancy-shmancy camera phones!) Think of all the time it took to upload them to MySpace. My grandma had one, (you remember my grandma, the karaoke sensation), had one and once she had accidentally erased her photos, she gave up on the digital camera and resorted back to Kodak disposable ones. Does anyone have one, (and use it), anymore?
5. Everybody Loves Raymond
"Everybody Loves Raymond" was a classic! Good old Marie running across the street to check on her son as Ray would hit the lights, priceless!
6. FRIENDS
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Probably one of the best shows of the 90s. I'm still dangerously precise in my opening title four-claps.
7. Goosebumps Books
Probably the only thing I read as a kid, especially those "Reader Beware-Choose Your Own Scare" books where you get to choose the outcome of each scene. YES I had nightmares, but at least I was reading, right? (And now I write, go figure.)
8. Happy Gilmore
Golf should always be played with a hockey stick, Adam Sandler was doing it right.
9. "Ice-Ice-Baby"
Ice, Ice, Baby. There's not much else to say, I'll just "stop, collaborate, and listen."
10. "Jumpin' Jumpin"
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This was the jam! Everyone bounced with Destiny's Child. (Except for when Beyonce bounced Michelle out the group, then jumped into the spotlight without her posse.) This will forever be my favorite track from the good old days of DC!
11. Kris Kross
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Kris Kross make ya JUMP, JUMP! (Destiny's Child wasn't the only group to make you JUMP, JUMP!)
12. Lip Gloss
They were so cheap that I had every flavor, (yes, I said flavor because they tasted so good!) I loved how the deli had them sitting on the counter by the candy and the metro cards. BEST IMPULSE PURCHASE EVER!!! (Watermelon was legendary.)
13. MapQuest
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Seriously, how did we survive behind the wheel while reading directions? What happened when we made a wrong turn? No recalculating route, but once upon a time, in the 90s, we made it to our destination!
14. Napster
Everyone had Napster, EVERYONE! I couldn't even tell you how I maneuvered through its intricate codes of algorithms and KB/S... but I did know how tofill my Winamp playlist perfectly!
15. Ouija Board
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Voted the scariest thing I ever owned, I still think it's real. The first and last time I recall playing with this, it moved! Why is this even marketed as a toy?
16. Pogs
Now these were dope! Colorful circular discs you, wait--what do they even do? I collected them for their awesome colors and glitter. The slammers were meant to do something, but I preferred showing them off in my nifty Pog tube. (My friend Taylor wrote about another classic, Mr. Bucket! I carried that thing EVERYWHERE!)
17. Quazimoto
18. Razor Scooter
I'm still terrified of this contraption, I love my ankles! All the kids on the block were rollin' in style, but I stuck to my big wheel. This thing was a death trap!
19. Sisqo
This song and this silver-haired man will never be forgotten! The anthem for many, and although he is off the map, we will never forget what he gave he world... "thong, th-thong, thong, thong."
20. Tamagotchi
Way before there was "16 & Pregnant," we had preteen mothers. I think we should go back to a time where it was perfectly normal to manage your Tamagotchis from a chain around your neck! I would've still had my eight or nine if it wasn't for my parental neglect when I jumped into a pool with them attached to my neck. Now the world is moving rapidly into a generation of gaming consoles and these poor virtual kids are ancient history.
21. U-G-L-Y You ain't got no alibi, you ugly!
I honestly didn't know where this chant came from, but it was too damn catchy. It originated from "Wildcats" with Goldie Hawn but escalated quickly through the 90s as a comeback anthem.
22. Velour Tracksuits
These were gold. You weren't a somebody without a weird-colored velour tracksuit, and you know it's true! I remember actually asking Santa for these badboys, like it was more of a necessity than Furby!
23. Warheads
The one way to ruin your enemy, hand them a Warhead. We held tournaments of who can last longest without making a face. Halloween was that much better with a fistful of Warhead candies.
24. Xena
Xena came on TV afterschool but I turned the channel after Power Rangers or Zoom was over. I wasn't a fan of the warrior princess, but many were in the 90s.
25. Yu-Gi-Oh
In my opinion, Yu-Gi-Oh was and will always be a knock-off, low budget version of Pokemon. I rarely understood its concept, and prefered to play with the cute and cuddly Pokemon critters in battle. Yu-Gi-Oh was to Pokemon, what Dunkin Donuts is to Starbucks. It wasn't my cup of tea. But it was a huge success so that's why it's here on my list.
26. Zenon
"ZOOM, ZOOM, ZOOM, make my heart go BOOM, BOOM, my super nova girl!"
Cetus-Lupeedus, Zenon was my favorite character in the 90s. I wanted to go see Proto Zoa live in Outer Space! Now, home girl is a regular on the soap opera, "General Hospital." That escalated quickly.
How many of these gems did you have, listen-to or watch in the 90s? I say we should bring some of these back, who doesn't need $1 lip gloss that tasted like it should? I already have a Tamagotchi hanging on my wall, waiting to be given a fresh battery.
