Great questions, but I need to think and I am 'on break' from wallpaper removal.

One thing- I did have a nickname that my parents only used- it was Moonie, but it did not mean anything!


How about you?

I liked my bike.
Favorite game was probably tag, out back in the alley. either that or big-wheel & tricycle demolition derby.
No nickname that I recall......

the green machine totally totally rocked!!
I am envious!
I bet all the boys were all "oooh" and "aaah".

I liked kick the can- we played almost every night til way past dark! Oh the good ole days!

Nickname:
First Nickname-Pee Wee
Second Nickname-Little Danny

Danny Eastman was almost five years older than me so, I was given those names to separate us.

Favorite toy:
Matchbox cars. You could blow them up, burn 'em, smash em with a hammer, drive around and say "hi" to guys named Joe. We were all named Joe. Is that because of the full size G.I. Joe we played with? (second fav)

Saturday morning cartoons. Road Runner, Bugs Bunny
Weekdays: Gilligan's Island, I dream of Genie, Bewitched (yum), Lost in Space, Star Trek, Batman, Green Hornet. We sure were lucky!
Weekends: Shock Theater, Midnight Special, Don Kirschner's Rock concert

I once had my license plate read, RETROMN then, FLOTRX (Speed Racer Reference)

Haha! You have to love the simple beauty of childhood! Oh legos were the coolest! Although my dad would beg to differ, given the number of them he stepped on in his bare feet! MTV? Who was your fave MTV celeb?

Hahaha! Funny! For me, MTV was the bible of cool! Fashion, music, attitude. I never missed an opportunity to see Prince videos because I thought the little runt was so hot! {{lol}} I often executed my architectural masterpieces with legos, tinker toys, and lincoln logs all together! So what's the coolest thing you ever built with those beautiful chunks of plastic?

Good stories! I was an experimenter that tortured her Star Wars and Strawberry Shortcake figures relentlessly with my lego concoctions! I bult a lego ship once and sent Boba Fett out to "sea" (Green Lake), never to return from the watery depths when my little ship fell apart and got away from me. Dad didn't notice me launching it from the sailboat! {{lol}} I tried to build a skyscraper once and did pretty good but ran out of legos. Before I could continue with new legos, my sis, AKA the Baby Giant, sat on it and proceeded to try and eat the lego rubble. Oh, the doomed ambitions of a young lego architect! {{lol}}

Once, all the kids on my grandma's street and I tried to build a jump for our bikes (Big Wheels and my Green Machine) using our collective legos and a board. There were many skinned knees that day, and sadly no new Evil Knievil was born from the aftermath. Funny what ideas you get as a kid...

Did you grow up in Milwaukee? Were you a bicycle kid?

OH MY!

I bet I'd get some looks tooling down my block on an adult Big Wheel!

It would be SOOOOOOOO cool to pull up next to some little kids on their big wheels and offer to race for pink slips

I did have one, but I usually passed on it in favor of the bike.

You know, I really didn't.  Looking back I wish I would have, but I was very anti-fashion.

I didn't follow any trends really.

Which is suprising because I loved shows like Miami Vice and stuff, so you would think I'd pick up on some of that fashion, but not me.

My father used to always tell me that he was so proud of me as a kid because I never wanted all the "hot" items.  I kid you not, I often bought my shoes at our local food store!  A ten dollar pair of off-brand tennis shoes!

I think that goes a long way in explaining why I was such a babe magnet in high school

My childhood obsession was The Monkees. I haven't really changed much!

I too had a Bigwheel and loved it! I think you all know how MTV-obsessed I was.

Never had a proper nickname, although I always wished for one.

Favorite toys were stuffed animals. Never liked baby dolls. Fashionable Barbie-type dolls were great, but I never cared to play "Mommy" to some self-wetting doll. Interesting because as an "adult" I love animals, and don't like babies. My Mom says she had the toughest time trying to get me to hold or play with babydolls, which just never interested me. I still have lots of stuffed animals. They're the best.

P.S., Garougal - the little runt is still TOTALLY hot!!

Oh man, where to start?

Favorite childhood game? Probably make-believe. I never had a single imaginary friend, but I was never in the real world. We wouldn't need toys to play, we could make it all up in our minds. I remember when my mom and my best friend's dad went out on a date (that was a mistake, he was a loser, but I think they decided to try it because us girls were always around each other anyway), the two of us got to get stick on earrings from a nickel machine. We rode int he back set, put our earrings on and pretended to be part of Jem's band riding in a limo! Or, there were many things me and the girl next door came up with when my mom and stepdad moved in together. We were in the hopscotch championships and foiled the pretend rival girls efforts to sabotage us, or we were hosts of a cooking show (but for some reason, all of our food was mud brown). I saw Bridge to Terabithia yesterday, I was a lot like that.

I was also a bike kid. I had a tricycle first, then got a cabbage patch big wheel when I was 5 (which I rode down to the park), but when my mom moved in with her boyfriend, it was into a not so nice neighborhood, so I wasn't allowed to ride around on it. When we moved out of his house a few months later, he kept a lot of our stuff and wouldn't give it back, big wheel included. I also remember he kept my play guitar that I really wanted back. He was an a$$hole. Then my dad got me a bike for my 7th birthday. We lived on an alley at the time, and I remember at first I was only allowed to ride it up and down the alley. Then around the block. Then later, all the way down to my best friend's house, 5 blocks away! Then after my mom moved in with my stepdad, it was a small town neighborhood, the borders of the neighborhood were pretty defined, so I got to ride around the whole neighborhood.

I had a few nicknames, but my mom hates nicknames. She always said, "I named you Michelle. If I would've wanted you called something else, I would've named you something else." But I wanted a nickname so bad. In Kindergarten, I said my nickname was Shell, but then we moved and it didn't follow me. When we moved into the new neighborhood, one of the kids called me Mich (pronounced "Mitch") because that's the way she thought my name should be pronounced. She still calls me that whenever I see her. My mom always called me The Kid or Brat. Since my sister was born, I just became The Kid and my sister is now The Brat.

MTV was my childhood. Even during the rough times when it was just me and my mom, we still got cable so we could watch MTV. It was the only thing that was ever on our TV, our evening news was MTV news! My favorite VJ at the time was probably Downtown Julie Brown. My favorite video was Sledgehammer when it came out.

Oh yeah, he kept a lot of family photos and stuff too. I've never understood my mom's taste in men, with the exception of my dad. All of the other guys she dated were jerks (unfortunately, for quite a while, my stepdad included). I actually think I get a lot of my personality from my dad, he's pretty calm. But a lot of the guys my mom dated had anger management issues.

I'm sure the way I grew up has a lot to do with the way I look at things, but I think in a more positive way. Keep in mind, my mom was 17 when I was born, so my mom and I practically grew up together. I think it also made me grow up a lot faster. I feel like I can relate more to people my mom's age than my own age. But my mom made a hard decision, and not necessarily the easiest one, she could've decided not to have me. My mom and dad weren't ready for me, nor were they ready to get married. Obviously I'm biased, but I still think the best guy for my mom is my dad, and it may have worked out if they weren't forced into it.

So really, I learned from my mom's mistakes. But my dad, and my paternal grandparents more so, really had a hand in raising me too. My dad had to move 100 miles away for a job, so my grandparents made sure I got to go see him on a regular basis. It's my dad that got me my bike, and my dad and grandparents always made sure I had new clothes for school. I know it's not the way of life they would've picked, by my mom and dad did a pretty good job.

Sheesh, this is getting depressing. Back to the fun kid stuff. Like Lady Strange, I wasn't a doll girl. The most I played with my Barbies was to put them in the elevator on the doll house and yank the string so they would go flying up in the air. But, I played with my stuffed animals a lot more. They really replaced my dolls. But there was one doll I practically wore out: She-Ra, Princess of Power!!!

If anyone wants an in depth dissertation on all things Prince, just give JD about four shots of Jack Daniels and he'll stop what he's doing and give you an hour and a half of personal views & reviews on the Purple One.

Right JD?