9 Skills NJ Kids Had in the 90's That Have Little Value Today

I recently had a conversation with a friend about obsolete skills. It's really pretty amazing how many skills we had to have back in the day, that today have little or no value.

It's hard to imagine surviving without those skills back in the day.

Here's a list of skills that were necessary in the 90's but not so much today.

Remembering telephone numbers

Back in the day, there was no such thing as a contact list on your phone. You either had to remember your friends' numbers, or you wrote it down. Did YOU have a little black book?

The Ability to Read a Map

I benefitted greatly from technological updates in this area. I was horrible at reading maps. Remember how your parents would go to AAA and pick up a TripTik? You'd call AAA, and tell them where you were going, and they'd give you a map with the route highlighted with a yellow highlighter.

Using Encyclopedias to Research a Topic

Before Google became a thing in 1998, if you had to do research, you'd go to the library and use the Encyclopedia Britanica. I was always confused by one thing. The blue encyclopedias always seemed to have the information we needed, but the red ones never did. My family got the red set from a supermarket.

Many of Us Had to Learn to Drive with a Stick Shift

I haven't seen a car with a standard shift in years. I loved them. I felt like it gave me more control driving. I'm guessing that with all the other distractions in cars today, it would be impossible to drive one of these classics.

Learning How to Record Music Off the Radio

As a kid, if there was a great song I wanted to keep, but couldn't afford to buy, I'd record it off the radio. I'd pop a tape in and as the song began, I'd hit record. Today, there's a million ways to find songs without recording them.

How to Schedule the VCR to Record TV Shows

Thank God for DVRs. I could never figure out how to properly set our VCR to record my shows. It was frustrating coming home to watch a show I recorded, only to discover that it started recording late, or stopped early.

The Ability to Remember the Time and Channel your Favorite TV Show was On

In the 90's, there was no such thing as binge-watching. If you wanted to see a show, you actually had to know when it was on and what channel it was on...unless you VCR'd it, but we never mastered THAT skill (see above).

Burning CDs

I was never really good at that anyway, but I had a friend who was so good at it, people like me would pay him to burn cds, so we could listen to them in our cars.

Inserting Film in a Camera

Hard to believe, but in the 90's, we actually used something called a camera to take pictures. Some were more sophisticated than others, but all required film, and you had to insert that film yourself.

People born before 1990 share their outdated skills - Upworthy