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Boys enjoying a backy. Picture: BananaStock
Boys enjoying a backy. Picture: BananaStock

with drivetime DJ Andy Walker

I saw something the other day as I was driving that brought back memories of being a child – ‘backies’. Remember them? It’s when you would let your friend sit on the seat of your bike and you would cycle standing up. I saw two boys sharing their journey like this and thought two things.

Firstly, I remember doing that when I was a child and secondly, I could not get away with that now.

It’s true and I asked you on kmfm Drivetime. Things you did as a kid that you can’t get away with now proved a popular talking point. I mean, I would love to see people at work offering backies home from the office, dressed in suits. But although it’d be hilarious, it would look peculiar.

You cannot stay out until your dinner is ready and agree on a time to come back home to eat. This is an arrangement we had with our parents of course, but as an adult in a loving relationship, there is no way I can stay out while she cooks indoors! It is a shared reasonability now.

You can no longer use the opposite sex toilets either. As a male toddler it was perfectly acceptable for my mum to take me in with her back in the 1980s. Every mum took their son and every dad took their daughter into their toilets while out shopping. I am not sure at what age that stops, I guess when those looks start. You could not get away with that now.

You can no longer spend all of your money on sweets. Remember when you had your pocket money and you would buy a quarter of Toffee Crumble, a football magazine – for me, it was Shoot – a can of Tab Clear and a packet of cheese and onion Frazzles. I would still have enough money for the bus home and a CD single. A fiver will now buy me a hot chocolate and a cake.

Jade Berry posted a status on the kmfm Drivetime Facebook page saying as an adult you can’t have lightsaber fights in the street anymore. This is also true. There would be cries of “get a life” from the neighbours.

We cannot play with toys anymore as adults.. Have you seen a dad playing with a train set? (Don’t answer that!)Why was it ok to let your toddler do their call of nature on the hard shoulder of the motorway but as soon as you become an adult you get looks from passing motorists and the occasional toot of their horn.

Natalie text in to say as an adult you can not just take your clothes off in public when you simply don’t want them on anymore. Nothing has ever been so true. As an infant it was ok, but a person in their 20s in the middle of the high street would be frowned upon, and possibly arrested.

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