On 19 Dec 98 at 23:42, Tony Duell wrote: SNIP At the risk of exposing myself as an "old fart" , I was 12 50 years ago and no one I knew was into that. Many did not have telephones, they were expensive. We were more into "crystal sets" and Chemical kits. But yes you did learn casting and toolshop techniques even if your eventual goal was university. You have to realize the pace of change has been tremendous and there are limitations on what you retain unless you're using the technology on a constant basis. I'm sure our parents were as shocked at our lack of agricultural lore as we are at the absence of mechanical skills in the present generation. But you can always relearn something you've learned before. That is possibly one of the tragedies of our educational system. Kids are not given the tools that allow them to learn new skills. It's funny that slide-rules were forbidden in school Tests in my time as calculators were for a later generation. I remember being shocked when my son explained to me that he would be at a disadvantage without one at a later time " No calculators" had by then gone the way of other impediments to the great god "progress". I still remember my memorized by rote math tables. Don't know if the present generation is deficient in that respect or not, but they're sure slow without a calculator in hand. I'm odd-ball in that I like to have the control that comes from being able to manipulate my environment, whether cars or computers and dislike Win98 or OS/2 for that matter since they remove that control from you. Have always disliked electric windows and guages on cars that don't give you an analogue indication of temp. or oil pressure. The present generation couldn't care less why or how something works, the loss of control over your environment is a given and either something works or it doesn't. Being controlled is a given. ciao larry lwalker(a)interlog.com