Child Of The 1980’s

Have you been watching the latest series of Doctor Who on BBC1?  Only a couple more episodes left to go!  What do you think?  Is it better than the original series?  Do you like David Tennant?  Or are you still fond of the classic years of Tom Baker?  This weeks survey is to find out which of the various timelord incarnations from over the years is your favourite.  How will the Doctors of the 1980’s fare I wonder?

And before anyone says I missed Peter Cushing, apparently his Doctor wasn’t actually a timelord…  I’m not counting those actors from the mass regeneration Children In Need sketch either…

There can’t be a kid in the land who hasn’t built something out of Lego at some point in their life. Lego has always been a firm favourite of mine, simply because you can use it to create anything you want. There have been many kinds of Lego over the years, but the late 1970’s and early 1980’s saw the introduction of the familiar poseable Lego man that is still in use today. So, were you a Lego Town kid, did you prefer Lego Space or were you more of a Technic fan? Let us know!

This weeks survey isn’t particularly dedicated to the 1980’s, but it is themed around being a child. A teenager, more specifically. Every kid had to go to school (it’s the law) and of course each day was filled with a variety of different lessons on different subjects, some of which you liked, and others which you didn’t.

So, we’d like to know which was your least favourite subject at secondary school. Foreign languages have been grouped together since different schools favoured different languages, but I’ve left the three science subjects separately since even if your school made you do some form of combined sciences course, the subjects taught normally still fit neatly into a single scientific grouping.

The 1980’s was unquestionably the most popular period for the Australian Soap Opera.  Our screens were full of them from The Young Doctors and The Sullivans to Prisoner Cell Block H and Sons and Daughters - how many of those had you blotted from your memory, eh?  Sorry to drag them back into your mind!

 Of course, the real heat was between the “lunchtime and again at teatime” soaps of Neighbours on BBC1 and Home and Away on ITV.  Both appealed to teenagers due to having several teenage characters, a member of the Minogue family, and lots of Aussie slang (Rack off! I saw you playing hookie this alvo, you dag).  Funny now how they’ve both been relegated to Channel 5.  Anyway, this weeks survey question is…

The Back to the Future series made Michael J. Fox a household name, and have stood the test of time very well indeed.  The storylines are still fantastic (if a little confusing in Part II) and the special effects hold up well.  I also liked the way that the movie posters start with just Marty McFly stepping out of the DeLorean, but he is then joined by Doc Emmet Brown for Part II and the Doc’s love interest Clara Clayton being added for Part III.  Anyway, this week we want to know which of the films you liked best.

Play School kept more than one generation of kids amused, and one of the ways in which they did this was to teach childrens the ways of the world with the help of the Play School Toys. Who can forget lovable rotund Humpty, possible furry siblings Big Ted and Little Ted (were they brothers? We may never know!), Jemima with her long stripy legs, and Hamble, the, er, rather disturbing looking doll.

Over the years they kept us amused with Humpty falling off countless walls, Little Ted being “football crazy, football mad“, as the song goes, and Hamble forever falling over or apart. The question is though…

Firstly I’m not going to bother detailing the winner of our previous survey as it turns out I misunderstood the way the survey plug-in I’m using works! I thought only a single survey could be active at any one time, but it seems this is not the case. This is good though, since it means the surveys can carry on indefinitely, which seems like much more fun to me.

This week I’m interested to find out from all the girls whether they consider themselves a fan of those two arch rivals in the dress up doll department, Barbie and Sindy. If you’re a boy then you can always get your better half to vote, or vote for your sister or something.

Of course, if you’re a boy and you happened to have your own Sindy or Barbie doll, then vote for your own particular preference…

Yay!  I’m pleased to say the my own personal choice for 8-bit home computers, the Commodore 64 was the winner of our last survey, although I’m not surprised to see the ZX Spectrum coming in second place with just one vote less.

 On to this weeks survey then, which I’m sorry to say has been a bit late making it on to the site (it’s a Sunday Survey I suppose).  This week we want to know which TV channel was the most often watched in your household for children’s TV.  I know some people had parents who were adamant that their off spring should only watch TV by the British Broadcasting Company.  This being a 1980’s site of course, you’re limited to just the two broadcasters.