One thing amongst many for me...The return of independent video rental shops. You couldn’t beat going in with no idea what you wanted to watch and having to browse first. Always a pain to have to return it but the going was fun.
Your experience of video rental shops was obviously very different to mine. I found them to be quite depressing places. You'd go with a few films in mind, only to find them all out, with a waiting list as long as your arm, so you'd be reduced to browsing through a load of fairly ancient films most of which you'd already seen or had no interest in. And if you did borrow one, when you got it back home you'd find the quality was lamentable, tracking issues where previous borrowers had repeatedly replayed the best bits, and so on.
I really cannot understand why anyone would prefer video recorders to modern HD recorders. Aside from the quality of the recordings, HD recorders make it so easy to skip through ads, and to archive your recordings. Mine will allow me to play back any film or programme that I have archived to my PC - who needs shed loads of VHS boxes cluttering up the place.
I likewise converted all my records and audio tapes to mp3 very quickly. Much easier to play, and you can edit out the filler tracks on an lp, make up your own playlist, and so on. My PC is connected to my stereo to play them back. As far as I am concerned, no question that modern technology wins hands down.
To be honest, I have struggled to think of anything that I would bring back. There are a few of my favourite chocolates, such as the cherry bounty or Fry's 5 flavour, that I wouldn't mind back, and Heart ices. However, I recently found some Tutti Frutti ice cream in Tesco, that used to be a favourite of mine, now a disappointment (that might just be me remembering it better than it was, or crap Tesco quality).
The biggest thing I miss is the slower pace of life. We used to have time to have a laugh at work, now it is neverending pressure to meet deadlines. And there seems to be this constant pressure nowadays to make the most of your time, whereas when I was young we seemed to have more time than we knew what to do with.
