Flashback Friday: Great 80's Sitcoms

Welcome to Week Twenty-Four of Flashback Fridays where the old and new collide on everything from books to movies to first loves to favorite vacations. This week I've succumbed to 80's sitcom nostalgia.

As the Chilean miners were being brought to the surface, someone on twitter mentioned how it reminded them of Baby Jessica. If you lived during the 80's, you remember when eighteen month old Jessica McClure fell into an abandoned well in her backyard in Midland Texas, and her rescue captured the nation's attention. I was just a kid and out camping, against my will, with my parents. Since I was missing my favorite show at the time, Rags to Riches, one of my dad's friends had taken pity on me and used his generator to rig up a tv. Just as I settled back in my lawn chair ready to watch my show, NBC broke in to show live footage of the rescue. Yeah, I was totally pissed that I had to miss my show....I was eight, you know!

So all of that got me thinking of Rags to Riches, which I like to think of as a Glee before its time since each episode was like a mini-musical of revamped 50's and 60's songs. The show isn't on DVD, but through the wonder that is the internet, I found where I could buy DVD's of someone's transferred VHS's. I was stoked! Then I started thinking about some of the other favorites from my childhood.

First up, is the aforementioned Rags to Riches. Ah, the innocence of the 80's....a rich CEO adopts 5 orphans to improve his corporate image. Even though the show took place in the early 60's, it wouldn't happen today because of all the pedofile implications of a bachelor raising teenage girls. It had great musical numbers, and it took on serious issues like sex, discrimination, and racism. I remember my mom and dad even watched the Sweet Sixteen episode with me because it dealt with Diane turning 16 at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis. My cousin, who was like my sister, and I would tape the episodes on our cassette players and then reenact the musical numbers with cosumes and lip synching....ah, good times!



FAMILY TIES
Can we just say how much I loved this show growing up? Not to mention the megasized crush I had on Michael J. Fox. I loved when they introduced Nick as Mallory's love interest. They were hilarious together!




GIMME A BREAK
Loved me some big and beautiful, Nell Carter! I also can remember NBC's Thursday night line up in the early 80's because it had something for both me and my parents. I also remember when tragedy struck the line-up and every show lost a cast member. The dad off Gimme a Break died of a heart attack, Selma died on Night Court, Coach on Cheers, and one of the detectives on Hill Street Blues, my parents all time favorite.


FACTS OF LIFE
My cousin and I loved this show growing up. I guess that Jo was my favorite. I also loved in the later shows when George Clooney worked at the store Mrs. B owned.





MY TWO DADS
Such a clever and cute show. I remember crushing on a Paul Reiser while my cousin crushed on Greg Evigan. As I've gotten older, I wonder what was I thinking? Greg was way hotter!

And how could I forget two greats from Nickelodeon? You Can't Do That On Television & Hey Dude. My cousin and I used to totally reenact the locker scene with YCDTOT with the linen closet door at my grandparents house! And we may have used a tea pitcher to do the "water" scenes over our heads!

So, did you love some of these shows? Or what are your favorites from the early, mid, or late 80's?

Flashback Fridays: Those Memorable Books We Grew Up With

We're starting a new weekly segment at GotYA called Flashback Fridays. We'll be talking about everything from books to movies to first loves to favorite vacations as well as relating them to the YA literature scene. We'll be "flashbacking" on our own blogs, but most of all, we want YOUR participation as well. So, mark Fridays as your blog days to gaze into the past and smile!

The first ever Flashback Friday is on the books we grew up with. The ones that have stuck with us after all these years for both good and bad reasons. Think of the books your favorites and blog about them!

Here's the links to our personal Flashback Fridays: Krista, Jamie, Debra, Veronica

Jennifer

Are You There God It’s Me Margaret, Superfudge, Ramona, the Pest, The Babysitters Club, Sweet Valley Twins and Sweet Valley High, Harry Potter, & Fear Street. Hearing these titles can make us salivate on cue like Pavlov’s dogs. Why? Because us they take us back to the excitement of devouring books and before the pressures of life’s responsibilities robbed us of our coveted reading time. But not only that, they were our first forays into Young Adult literature.

So, sit back as we take a stroll down memory lane with some books that may or may not be familiar...

Ah, The Baby-sitters Club…there was someone for everyone: the jock, the artist, the California girl, the sensitive one, the dancer, the writer, and the hip NYC fashionista. What about sporting

Team Logan or Team Alan shirts back in the day? You know for Logan Bruno, Mary Anne Speir’s Southern hottie with the drawl, and Alan Gray, the immature pest who couldn’t man up and tell Kristy his feelings? Okay, maybe not.

The Babysitters Club is being resurrected, and no, not like Claudia and the Art School Zombie Crush! Like a lot of us who are growing older, they’re being dusted off and revamped. Here’s some information about the relaunch.

Babysitters Club Set for Relaunch

The Babysitters Club Returns

Want an absolutely HILARIOUS recap of your favorite BSC books? Then you must, and I do mean must, check out BSC Headquarters. Tiff, a 20 something gal, is blogging as she rereads through her old BSC books. I spent way too many hours spitting coke zero on my computer screen at some of the recaps.

If you couldn’t get enough of Claudia’s crazy digs, then check out What Claudia Wore. It not only breaks down Claudia’s fashion forward, er, perhaps worst dressed moments, but it recaps the other characters as well along with a healthy dose of witty repartee.

You might have been under a rock if you never read one of the Ramona Quimby books growing up. If you’re feeling especially nostalgic, you can check out the upcoming Ramona movie, Beezus and Ramona, with Selena Gomez, Joey King, and my own personal favorite, John Corbett. It’s premiering in July. And how cool is it that author Beverly Cleary began penning novels in the 1950’s, and she is now 94 years old! Go Beverly!

How many of us gleefully scared the pants off our preteen selves by reading the Fear Street books? RL Stine gave us a diverse variety of characters and settings, but the creepy factor rang true in all the books.

Good girl, bad girl. Good sister, spawn of Satan sister. Before we were old enough to realize how a lot of soap operas delved into the cliche evil twin brother or sister, it was happening prime time in the Sweet Valley Twins and then Sweet Valley High books. Okay, maybe Jessica wasn’t evil. But come on, she was a megabitch, right? Most of us felt sorry for poor Elizabeth at one time or another, but it didn't keep us away from seeing just what antics Jessica would get into next.

And how bout' those classics? Anne of Green Gables with the daring and precocious "Anne with an E", her wonderful Gilbert, her bosom friend Diana, and the stern, but loving Marilla.

And the Little House on the Prairie series with Laura, her sisters Mary and Carrie, along with Pa and Ma told the story of a family overcoming the odds on the harsh, untamed frontier with love and laughter.

Now it's your turn to tell us about your favorite books from childhood. Leave us a comment with your link.