In my day, kids earned their treats...

I am sure a lot of other folks out there are like me, with special games and toys from their childhood that just make them nostalgic for being a kid. And nothing says summertime of my childhood like this bad boy:


Were you like me and had a serious love-hate relationship with the Snoopy Sno-Cone Maker? I loved it because of the delicious frozen treats it rewarded you with. Icy, brightly colored, sugary cups of deliciousness. I use the word rewarded because Snoopy made you work your ASS off to make those sno-cones. You had to put ice cubes in and then jam that little snoopy down to push the ice cubes towards the shaver, while simultaneously turning the little shaver tumbler. By the end of the summer, there were 7 year olds walking around with major guns. "Hey Timmy, you been lifting this summer?" "Nah, just hitting the Snoopy Sno-Cone maker every day"

I feel sad that kids today don't have that same experience. Maybe that little sno-cone maker was just a part of cultivating a generation's attitude and work ethic. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying my generation is amazing and everyone's a hard worker and a great citizen. But I can tell you this, we are better off than kids today because they are getting pampered with this nonsense:


Seriously? A Dairy Queen at-home Blizzard Maker? This is just another thing wrong with kids today and it is adding to their overwhelming sense of entitlement. When I was little DQ was a treat -- your parents took you after little league or soccer. It wasn't a kitchen gadget that spat out free treats for you anytime you wanted it.

Look how freaking happy those kids on the box are. No chance they had to go through the rigorous physical labor to produce those ice cream treats like we had to endure to end up with one little sno-cone. You saw a little kid passed out, with jacked up arms and a permanently blue-stained mouth, and you knew he had put in a hard day cranking out some Snoopy sno-cones for him and his pals.

Ah, I miss those days.