Understanding Athelind's Argot: Uphill, Both Ways

[athelind]

From Bill Cosby's epic routine on parents and grandparents:

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My father walked to school, 4 o'clock every morning, with no shoes on -- uphill. Both ways! In five feet of snow. And he was thankful.

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(Jump to 1m57s.)

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Used to indicate how tough things were when the speaker was a kid, acknowledging that there might just be some humorous exaggeration for effect. Also used in response to a speaker who's ranting about that topic, as a curt dismissal: "Yeah, yeah, we know. Uphill. Both ways."

More than the moon landing, more than the Nixon resignation -- this was the defining moment of my generation. Every Baby Boomer and the early batch of Generation X has heard this routine, and knows this phrase, even if they can't place the source.

And yes, heard it, not "seen" it: back in those days, we didn't have your YouTubes or your DVDs or your Comedy Centrals. We had to get our comedy on LPs -- big, black hunks of vinyl with sound physically etched into it that you had to play back with a needle, a real, physical needle, not a beam of light.

Analog. None of this fancy "digital MP3" mumbo jumbo.

If we couldn't get our hands on a comedy LP, we might make scratchy, bootleg tape recordings off the radio -- if we were lucky enough to have an FM station that carried The Doctor Demento Shows for a couple of hours, once a week.

Most of us just had AM radios that played disco and elevator music.

And we were thankful for them!

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Comments

[araquan.livejournal.com]

Now now, comedy came on 8-Track too.

And I still have my cache of Doctor Demento tapes...

For which I'm thankful. }:>

[athelind.livejournal.com]

My stereo had an 8-track recorder. I had to scramble to pop the tape out at the 90-minute mark on Doctor Demento, or I'd wind up recording over the first few minutes of the show as the tape cycled around to Track 1 again.

I would have mentioned that in the main post, but I didn't want to give my younger readers nightmares.

[araquan.livejournal.com]

Nice. Mine are all on cassette, as my dad had never bought heavily into 8-track, but did get cassette gear by 1980. I had to flip my tape over at 60 minutes in, but that usually corresponded with a break anyway. Usually.

Later, when I was in high school, I had my own stack of gear and a set of switches that could rout anything to just about anything else... I came upon the idea of adding a line such that the VCR could be used for long-format audio recording from the radio- with the side-effect that I could rout the inputs then use the VCR's programming functions to record radio at arbitrary times when I wasn't around. This I used to great effect, editing the commercial breaks out when transferring the show to cassette.

Still, I recall my first exposure to Richard Pryor being on an 8-track recording of one of his routines from the mid '70s. I think there may have been a George Carlin tape in the mix as well. Good times.

[dragonrift.livejournal.com]

Oh the memories come flooding back with this clip... I still have a few vinyl albums of his stand-up routines tucked away somewhere, they were absolutely a riot to listen to. *feels really old now*

In this age of digital streaming, it blows my mind how happy we were, even though we had no portable audio/music devices to take with us on the go.

How much we take these things for granted... o_o;

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

I had a cassette player myself, not allowed a recorder for several years. Eventually I did get one. Dad's "bit stereo" had 8-track and reel-to-real recording. The fun on the reel-to-real was that you could record on left or right track and if you were recording mono, you could put twice as much on a reel.

Oh the memories of being able to mix your own music! And sitting by the radio and yelling at KFRC because they always talked over the intro and before the song ended.

[terminotaur.livejournal.com]

Hehe, I saw this on video actually. Betamax! The best format. :) And you're right, I think its one of those things that everyone of a certain age knows.

[silussa.livejournal.com]

Actually, my father [b]did[/b] walk uphill both ways.

His house was on top of one hill; the school was on top of another.

:)

Seriously, being old enough to remember when there was vinyl records (including 45s), very expensive long distance phone rates, and AM Radio was still popular for music....I'm quote glad for the modern era.

Did I mention no Internet? Nothing against FidoNet, but still.....

[leonard-arlotte.livejournal.com]

I have hundreds of songs from Dr. Demento on cassette. I have no idea if they're still playable.

I have this Cosby album on cassette as well.

[sternbunny.livejournal.com]

Let the Beeeeeeatings Begin!

[mocha-mephooki.livejournal.com]

Had this on tape... along with his older comedy albums and my Cheech and Chong collection... all kept in an old shoebox on my dresser.

[soreth.livejournal.com]

I grew up listening to those bootleg tapes from my parents. I still have parts of Cosby's routines memorized. :)

[morphyloon.livejournal.com]

I miss Dr.Demento... but I miss my stash of Dr.Demento tapes recorded off FM even MORE. Played them till they broke. :(

At least I have my Dr.D Basement Tapes CD collections to keep my company (Kinda pricey at almost $30, tho you also get club goodies and a newsletter)