I am not usually one for posting the sort of email like the below, but it made me laugh to a point then 'Oh! s**t!' at the end!

This may have been posted before, which I am sure MB will correct me about.

Enjoy....

Nick

According to today's regulators and bureaucrats, those of us who
were kids in the 60's, 70's and early 80's probably shouldn't have
survived, because our baby cots were covered with brightly coloured
lead-based paint which was promptly chewed and licked. We had no
childproof lids on medicine bottles, or latches on doors or
cabinets and it was fine to play with pans.

When we rode our bikes, we wore no helmets, just flip-flops and
fluorescent 'spokey dokey's' on our wheels. As children, we would
ride in cars with no seat belts or airbags - riding in the
passenger seat was a treat.

We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle and it
tasted the same.

We ate chips, bread and butter pudding and drank fizzy juice
with sugar in it, but we were never overweight because we were
always outside playing.

We shared one drink with four friends, from one bottle or can
and no-one actually died from this.

We would spend hours building go-carts out of scraps and then
went top speed down the hill, only to find out we forgot the
brakes. After running into stinging nettles a few times, we learned
to solve the problem.

We would leave home in the morning and could play all day, as
long as we were back before it got dark. No one was able to reach
us and no one minded.

We did not have Play stations or X-Boxes, no video games at all.
No 99 channels on TV, no videotape movies, no surround sound, no
mobile phones, no personal computers, no DVDs, no Internet chat
rooms.

We had friends - we went outside and found them.

We played elastics and rounders, and sometimes that ball really
hurt!

We fell out of trees, got cut, and broke bones but there were no
law suits.

We had full on fist fights but no prosecution followed from
other parents.

We played chap-the-door-run-away and were actually afraid of the
owners catching us.

We walked to friends' homes.

We also, believe it or not, WALKED to school; we didn't rely on
mummy or daddy to drive us to school, which was just round the
corner.

We made up games with sticks and tennis balls.

We rode bikes in packs of 7 and wore our coats by only the hood.

The idea of a parents bailing us out if we broke a law was
unheard of...They actually sided with the law.

This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers and
problem solvers and inventors, ever. The past 50 years have been an
explosion of innovation and new ideas. We had freedom, failure,
success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it
all.

And you're one of them. Congratulations!

Pass this on to others who have had the luck to grow as real
kids, before lawyers and governments regulated our lives, for our
own good.

For those of you who aren't old enough, thought you might like
to read about us.

This my friends, is surprisingly frightening......and it might
put a smile on your face:

The majority of students in universities today were born in
1986........They are called youth.

They have never heard of We are the World, We are the children,
and the Uptown Girl they know is by Westlife not Billy Joel. They
have never heard of Rick Astley, Bananarama, Neneh Cherry or Belinda
Carlisle.

For them, there has always been only one Germany and one
Vietnam.

AIDS has existed since they were born. CD's have existed since
they were born.

Michael Jackson has always been white.

To them John Travolta has always been round in shape and they
can't imagine how this fat guy could be a god of dance.

They believe that Charlie's Angels and Mission Impossible are
films from last year.

They can never imagine life before computers.

They'll never have pretended to be the A Team, RedHand Gang or
the Famous Five.

They'll never have applied to be on Jim'll Fix It
They can't believe a black and white television ever existed.
And they will never understand how we could leave the house without
a mobile phone.

Now let's check if we're getting old...

1. You understand what was written above and you smile.
2. You need to sleep more, usually until the afternoon, after a
night out.
3. Your friends are getting married/already married.
4. You are always surprised to see small children playing
comfortably with computers.
5. When you see teenagers with mobile phones, you shake your
head.
6. You remember watching Dirty Den in EastEnders the first time
around.
7. You meet your friends from time to time, talking about the
good Old days, repeating again all the funny things you have
experienced together.
8. Having read this mail, you are thinking of forwarding it to
some other friends because you think they will like it too...

Yes, you're getting old!!