mod cons

The pasta rake post got me thinking about things that are common now but were, not so long ago, practically unknown. Who would have thought that in 1957, there were people in Britain gullible enough to believe that spaghetti grew on trees? It's funny to think it was so exotic.

Consider the zip lock baggie. I do remember that when I was a kid, sandwiches went into a plastic baggie with a fold over top. You can still get these but most people get the locking kind, right? I don't remember when these new fangled baggies were introduced but I'm going to guess it was sometime around 1970 because that's when our Aggravation game was made (according to the date on the box).

For $5 we picked this up at a flea market in near perfect condition. It was a great purchase and we actually do play it all the time (though not as often as cribbage, of course).

The reason I bring it up though, is the part storage bag that's included with the game. It's a zip lock type baggie but introduced when the masses still needed to be educated about the magic of the zip lock. Note the instructions:

I wonder if, when zip lock bags were first introduced, someone looked at it and rolled their eyes. And wished they could write about what a stupid and unnecessary invention it was.