Johnny used to work on the docks.....and other 80's references

Quick, think of what you looked like in High School, more specifically your hair. I’ll wait while you reminisce, either fondly (like me) or cringe (say if you were a child of the 80’s). Now that we have that over with, let’s move on. I myself had my moments in High School and shortly after. I shaved my head (twice) and discovered that I have the funkiest hairline in at least three counties. I have what we dubbed the tri-widows peak. It peaks at three places along my forehead and has a nice half-moon in-between the peaks. While I have a fantastically shaped dome, my hairline frightened people and people started asking me to count with an eastern European accent. However, I hit my peak (pun intended) my senior year with hair. It was the mid 90’s. Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Nirvana still ruled the radio. X96 went from 96.1 to 96.3 which was a huge deal to a teenager growing up in Bountiful. The 96.1 frequency never worked in B-town but 96.3 did. It was life altering. People still wore flannels, with shorts and 8-hole Dr. Marten’s boots (thankfully those pictures of me have been lost) and Kurt Cobain, although dead for two years was still a huge influence on music and pop culture and on me. I have argued this before and you can disagree with me or not. Kurt Cobain was my generations’ Lennon. Before, you stop following my blog for disrespecting the great Lennon, let me explain. Both of them changed a stagnant music scene in their time. Both were some of our best songwriters and both were underrated musicians. Both married women who were more messed up than they were. Both of their lives were both cut tragically short. I still remember where I was when I heard the rumor that he overdosed. I was walking to 2^nd period art class when, for the record. To a kid of the early to mid-90’s Cobain was a big deal. Hence, this awesome head of luscious locks:

Ok, maybe it wasn’t quite Cobain like, but it was damn close (if you are still reading after my Lennon/Cobain reference thank you for sticking with me. However if you disagree how awesome my hair was, feel free to leave now). At least it wasn’t from the 80’s. That decade single handedly killed our ozone with Aqua Net #4.

All of this brings me to this week’s Connorism. My fantastic in-laws celebrated their 27^th wedding anniversary last week. They decided to post their wedding picture to Facebook.

*editor’s note, this is not actual wedding photo but a representation of the decade in which it was taken. Yes the hair is almost spot on.

Mandy decided to show this to the boys. Alex responded with a simple, “Woooooooowwwwwwww.” Connor was predictably Connor, “What’s up with Grandma’s hair? Looks like she tangles it up like a monkey.” While I have never known a monkey to want to look like David Coverdale (Google Whitesnake you’ll get the reference), it was still worthy of a Connorism. But wait Grandma’s response when she was texted the statement is worthy of mention. “Hilarious! Tell Connor that when he gets older he will learn why Grandma’s hair looked all tangled up like a monkey. He will read about it in history class. It was 1980’s, a very dark time in U.S. history of fashion.” I could not agree more. Although the decade gave us Def Leppard, Poison, Bon Jovi and most importantly U2, it also gave us Warrant, Slaughter, leg warmers, pegged pants, and New Kids on the Block (shudder).

 

P.S. Thank you to Linda for being a great sport and allowing me to lampoon her hair and the decade. She is much better person than Madonna who was represented above.

P.P.S I can still peg my pants on request.