Reddit users share the disproven and useless things Gen-X'ers were told growing up. Unsurprisingly, some people still believe them today. We all heard growing up that you shouldn’t swim for at least thirty minutes after eating. I always questioned this but believed my mother blindly because, hey, I’m just a kid, and Mom knows best. As it happened, that turned out to be untrue, as were many other...
There’s a new politically correct term floating around. “Sensitivity readers” or “sensitivity experts” (a title I use very loosely). What are those, you may ask? Allow me to sum it up as succinctly as possible. A “Sensitivity reader” (or “expert”) is a wanna-be writer who either a) didn’t have enough talent to write a book or b) tried to write a book and failed because, like reason ‘a’, they have...
Once upon a time, a fourteen-year-old boy began listening to Top 40 music after years of listening to country music. He was passingly familiar with the genre because of the record-breaking success of Michael Jackson’s thriller. His sister, Meg, played her cassette tape of Thriller often, leading to our hero’s curiosity about music outside of country music. She had records of various hits from the...
Once upon a time, a fourteen-year-old boy began gravitating away from country music in favor of Top 40. The transition didn’t happen all at once. In the evenings, he started by listening to Baltimore’s Top 40 station, B-104. This is where he learned some of the best one-hit (sometimes two) wonders of the 80s. Baltimora’s “Tarzan Boy,” Falco’s “Rock Me Amadeus,” Starpoint’s “Object of My Desire,”...
Once upon a time, a fourteen-year-old boy went roller skating on a Sunday in March at Liberty Skate in Eldersburg, Maryland. He’d planned to go a few weeks earlier but got sick with the flu, delaying the anticipated trip to the skating rink. Perhaps the illness was fate, for on this Sunday, our hero would meet the girl who’d become his first official girlfriend for the next year and five months...
Disclaimer: The following exposition should not be construed as legitimate medical advice on whether or not to jab. These are my opinions and mine alone. You make up your own mind. You're a full-grown adult, after all. Hopefully.
Recently, a friend from Summerville, where I live, asked me, “How do you think Gen-Xers feel about ‘the jab?’”
When was the last time you listened to a new song or new music? If you’re past the age of thirty-three, research suggests it’s probably been a little while.
Now that I’m in my fifties, I’ve noticed that the music I loved as a teenager and even in the first half of my twenties means more to me than ever.
Once upon a time, a fifty-one-year-old man received an email from an old friend, T.J., from his America Online days circa 1996. He’d been reading episodes from Tales of a Gen-X Nothing and had a question for our hero.
“This is not a joke or an insult, Kevin: Are you aware that you are likely an Aspie?
Once upon a time, there was an eight-year-old boy who was a rabid fan of The Dukes of Hazzard. It was an obsession. But weren’t all red-blooded boys in the late 70s and early 80s? He also had a few friends from his Cub Scout pack who weren’t part of the bully crowd. They, too, were avid Dukes of Hazzard fans...
Ah, Yordle, the yellow dragon. While not the most challenging dragon out of the three in Atari Adventure, he was the most obnoxious. What an epic pain in the ass he was. Atari released Adventure in 1980 and speaking for myself, I was damned grateful to have it. We were a lower-income family then, and having an Atari was a gift, even if my sister and I, as kids, didn’t fully understand that at the...
What does it mean, "exact change?" 
I am Generation X.
I was born in 1971 and am a resident of Summerville, South Carolina, by way of Woodbine, Maryland. Sarcasm is my first language. I am caustic, politically incorrect, and fiercely opinionated. I have no filter, and I don't do 'woke.' My pronouns are 'fuck around/find out.' I don't care about your truth or your feelings, if you're offended, or what anyone thinks about me.