Among many other things, the high school hallway is a Wild West of sorts.
Just one stroll down that locker flanked tube of chaos gives one the sense that all the dynamics of human development are on full display.
Aside from the status-mongering and short-sighted romances there is one major variable: breaking the rules, testing limits.
That anti-establishment energy often takes the form of contraband—namely, the sale of contraband.
But contraband is in the eye of the beholder. So high school kids sell anything and everything, all proudly touting the illegality of the item as it's strongest asset.
A Reddit thread pulled together all the strangest—and smartest—high school rackets
Turtleking23578YT asked, "What was the black market in your school?"
Create Demand
"In high school there was this game/fad where people would try to stealth zip tie other people's bags to their desks, shoes together, whatever so they'd be stuck when the bell rang."
"One guy sold the heavy duty zip ties and another sold mini scissors for easy escape."
-- Ayy11
Give the People What They Want
"In my ninth grade English class, there was this kid who would bring soda and Poptarts to class and sell them. We weren't allowed to eat in class, so I had to eat my chocolate fudge Poptarts discreetly."
"Eventually, the teacher put a stop to it, but it was a good run while it lasted."
Economics On Display
"Energy drinks in middle school. There were two kids who just happen to have parents who owned liquor stores in the town. One kid started taking stuff from their parent's supply, and selling it out of his backpack."
"Other kid caught wind of it and figured he should get into the game too. Honestly, the other kid finding out was the best thing for me because the market adjusted just like it should have."
"Kid 1 was selling warm monster energy drinks for $5. New kid came in and sold em for $4. Kid one came back with 3.50 and they were like kinda cold lol. Eventually they both got caught and got in trouble but I took advantage while they were around."
-- lineman77
It’s All About Branding
"I literally sold stretched-out, dried baby wipes for two quarters apiece. Baby wipes get super soft when they're dry (or at least that brand did) and my classmates were fascinated. I claimed to have sewn these mini blankets myself."
"It worked for the entirety of third grade before I got called out and canceled in fourth. /:"
-- bloodfields
A Barter Economy
"Wasn't really a black market but people would offer service for things. Not many people liked giving money so here's how it would go:"
"'Dude, can you get me a can of dip and some booze? I will come to your farm (or ranch) to work for it.'"
"'Sure. Just come and feed the cattle Saturday morning and it's yours.'"
-- Aqetor
Must Have Been Some Sandwich
"There was a kid who gave away sandwiches for free, but the school stopped him because he was "'creating a gang culture.'" -- THACC-
"Jeeze what kind of sandwiches was he giving away." -- Redhoodgothamknight
"Obviously 'gang culture' at it's finest. Lunch ladies had pp&j with grape jelly, the kid had pp&j with strawberry jelly. Boom" -- thatmomthere
Serial Entrepreneurs
"Me and my friend had several "get rich quick" schemes that never paid of. A few that come to mind:"
"We got the idea of breeding my and his dog to get puppies and sell them. So he brought his dog over and we locked them in my room to get the deed going. After about 30 minutes we got talking and realized both our dogs where castrated, and males... So we dropped that plan."
"Second plan was when my older brother got a surround hi-fi stereo in his room (this was 1999 so that was still somewhat uncommon). Me and my buddy charged a fee for people to come and watch movies 'cinema style' at my house."
"Third: When we found a dildo in the room of my friend's mother we charged a fee for people to come and see his mom's dildo."
Tiny Things
"When I was in grade school I started making mini clothes out of fleece and sewing them on my Hello Kitty sewing machine. I charged like a quarter for each outfit but it very quickly became an issue with people trying to steal my supplies and others not being able to purchase the clothes."
"It got shut down and I had to low key sell the clothes at recess."
-- caseoats
A Monopoly in Movement
"Aside from the actual illicit things like drugs and smokes, we had basically a forerunner to Uber eats."
"Seniors who were allowed to leave during lunch break and had a car would go pick up lunch some place for a fee. This was especially good if you had a free period before lunch as you could run out, grab the food and the customer had hot lunch from wherever at the start of lunch period."
Paper Currency
"Funny story, back in grade school we had these 'caught being good' paper passes that teachers gave you on rare occasions. They would give them to kids and put it in a raffle at the end of the month for a gift or something."
"Me and my friends got someone to let us see it. We printed out a bunch of them and started to sell them 5 bucks a piece. Sooner or later, all the teachers and our principal got suspicious when all the bad kids started turning these passes in."
"So we decided to end our scam by it's printing out 200 passes and handing them out randomly. We passed them around to so many people that we could never be traced. It was basically hyperinflation."
"The passes were being circulated around so much that the school ended up discontinuing the reward program."
-- bigboyyerrme
"There was a kid..."
There was a kid that that ran a whole server network and put it on a USB it auto deleted school files like block sites so you could do whatever you wanted on the computers but it also auto installed Minecraft and Roblox I just made USB copy's of it at one point I had like 800 of them but the kid shut it down cause he was expelled so I just asked him if I could bye one of the old servers he said yeah I sold the USBs for 50$ a piece I also upgraded the soft ware to auto create personal accounts.
"The school tried to crackdown..."
I really never had a black market but there was a free student led market for undercutting the school market. the market was and still is in operation, you could find candy, programs, supplies etc.
The way it worked is that the market was always active and lets say there was a fundraiser, we would by candy or whatever product we had to sell and flood the market by offering our products at lower prices.
Me in the market, I was the guy for graphing calculator programs and if you wanted some software that's fine come to me, want my text based operating system (I actually made a custom OS with directories and stuff believe it or not), you want a custom program, 5 bucks and you will have that. That and I was the lawyer for the vendors if the teachers tried to pull any maneuvers against us, and I was a market advisor. it was really complex with our hierarchical system and with me being in the group of people who controlled things I was in there.
The teachers tried to guilt us by saying that were making the school poorer, (we were a modest school with a computer lab and stuff), and we responded with, this is a capitalist nation, eat or be eaten, etc.
The school tried to crackdown but we could in a matter of days or hours sidestep the system.
"Someone got expelled from my school..."
Someone got expelled from my school for selling ecstasy to someone, and there was a specific place at the back of the school that all the "cool kids" would go to smoke what I'm assuming was weed. Other than that people would just pay others for stupid stuff like gum and sucky sweets like gobstoppers.
"She would sell..."
The school librarian was our class sponsor. She would sell movie theater sized candy that was, by her rules, the only snack you could eat in her library. Needless to say, she cleaned up and we actually got our deposits back and extra spending money for our Grad Nite at Disneyland.
"People would set up incredibly dumb deals..."
Lunch time. People would set up incredibly dumb deals for small things. I just watched as I saw one kid give away half their lunch for a pack of gummies.
"It worked wonders, but as humans are known to do..."
One time in 3rd grade, my teachers introduced a bead system where you earned different colored beads depending on your behavior in class and your grades and scores on tests and homework. They had numerical value like red=50pts, yellow=100pts, white=500pts, I can't recall the highest or lowest values but that's generally how it went.
It worked wonders, but as humans are known to do, we somehow formed an illegal trade considering teachers kept very loose track of who had how many points or beads. We were to keep them in our bags, so it made the "black market" very easy for us to manage and maintain.
There was an unspoken rule that snitching on someone who cheated you out was grounds to shun you from said market. Remarkably, no one let the teachers know what was really happening under their noses, though I have an inkling they might have suspected foul play.
The beads were used to buy prizes at the end of the week, like school supplies, banned snacks, small toys, and other donated things. There was a bin full of the stuff.
Some students started selling their lunches for the day. Some started bartering and borrowing and taking out loans with the goody two shoes. There was a mini market for notes, homework answers, outsourcing parts of a project kids didn't want to do to those who did (I often got art requests because I was the artsy one). There was also a high market for sugary things like candy and soda, which was banned in our school. Kids would sneak them in and sell them like drugs.
I, an autistic kid and therefore the "bad student" in the eyes of our crappy teachers, resorted to thievery, among other troublemakers in our class. The "rich" kids were careless so it made stealing very easy.
But yeah. Looking back on it, I'm baffled that we, a group of children, created like. This mini underground society. That the second they introduced this money system, the first thing we did as baby humans was go "how can I exploit this?"
Humans are incredible.
"Another was the glue book marks..."
I remember in second grade, a hot commodity were those really long & thin erasers from the book fair, but cut up in teeny tiny pieces. I remember getting some from a friend, and our student teacher spotting them in my desk & thinking I was the one doing it.
"A few weeks later..."
I had a science class that would take up two class periods, with a break in between periods. One time, rumor was going around that someone was hiding a can of chew tobacco above a ceiling tile in the boy's restroom right outside the science classroom, and people were accessing it during the breaks between periods. A few weeks later, administration was calling a whole bunch of kids out of the classroom, most likely because of that.
"Not exactly sure..."
There was one kid that somehow (I don't know how) managed to get dozens and dozens of those little ketchup packets every single lunch. Not exactly sure what he did with them, but I kept on seeing ketchup packets being passed around in classes. I think they were turned into currency or something.
"My best customer..."
I was known as the "art kid" in middle school and would trade my comics and drawings with other kids for snacks, homework answers or pens ( I never asked for money because our school was too strict on that). My best customer was this guy who was known for being a huge weeb, I drew hentai and stuff like that for him.
"The teachers never caught on..."
I went to the small, alternative/special education high school in my district. The students who attended were primarily those who were what adults refer to as "problem children," even though many of them were nice kids but life had dealt them the wrong cards. Most of them were in group homes or foster care, or had been in trouble with the law. Or, like me, had a learning/mental disability and couldn't be in a standard education classroom. I have high functioning autism, bipolar disorder, and BPD.
TL:DR; Sold mechanical pencils for a quarter in protest of the worn out wood pencils the teachers had kept in their classrooms for God knows how many years. Finally got busted after a year and a half and had to shut it down.
The long version:
Most of the students didn't have their own pencils to bring to school so they were stuck using crappy ancient wooden pencils the teachers had. I'm talking worn out pencils with no eraser and/or had the lead constantly breaking off. Some of them had teeth marks or had chunks of the wood missing. I truly felt for my classmates because they would get frustrated with the quality pencils and I have a strong sense of justice and I get upset when I see injustices happening. So I came up with a solution. I wanted to help others but I also wanted to make my own "fun money" since my mom couldn't afford to give me an allowance.
I convinced my mom to buy me a cheap bulk pack of standard mechanical pencils, nothing fancy but they were a major upgrade from what my classmates had been forced to use. I then turned around and sold the pencils for 25 cents each. Mostly I was paid in quarters but sometimes I'd get dimes and nickels.
I carried around an old dice bag (small enough so it wouldn't get confiscated but big enough to hold about 10-12 bucks worth of quarters) to carry my profits in and at the end of each week I'd take the coins to a coinstar machine and cash them in for bills. I didn't make a whole lot considering I only sold them for a quarter but it was enough for me to buy my own snacks and soda because people liked the ability to write without constantly getting up to sharpen the pencil and having a real eraser. Plus if they lost the pencil they bought, a replacement was only 25 cents.
The teachers never caught on because I was sneaky about it, they never knew everyone was getting their pencils from me. I started doing it the beginning of my junior year and got busted in the middle of my senior year because a jealous freshman narced on me. Had to shut the whole operation down and from then on I wasn't allowed to have more than one pencil case on me.
"In third grade..."
In third grade (around 8 years old) my boyfriend would sell his own art work. He would hang a sign on his locker door that said, "The Artist Is In,", and he'd sell his art for an quarter or so each. He continued to do this until the school told him he wasn't allowed to. One of his favorite things to draw then were dinosaurs.
"He'd somehow gotten access..."
My brother used to sell coffee at school. He'd somehow gotten access to an otherwise sealed off locker, had a coffeemaker and electric boiler for tea in there. At first his teachers thought it was cute, but then they had to tell him to stop because there had been a drastic decrease in sells at the canteen, so he was no longer allowed to sell food or drinks... He started selling napkins (the one the school gave out for free), where you'd get a free side of a cup of coffee or tea. The school disliked this, but he'd managed to get to a sealed off locker to store the things and had secured it with a lock of his own. They had to bring in a janitor to bust it up.
"In my elementary school..."
In my elementary school they had to ban silly bands because no one could focus on anything because Bobby had the dinosaur pack that everyone wanted.
"Eventually shut down..."
I led the black market. I used to sell cookies and cakes that I baked and sold them for a cheaper price than the cafeteria. The cafeteria cakes were also dry and not at all good. I actually made pretty decent money and became known as "the girl who bakes" in my entire school.
Eventually shut down due to my teachers saying that it's a "safety" issue. Turns out it was because the cafeteria was losing money. That's what I call business.
"There was this kid..."
There was this kid in 6th grade that got this super fluffy stuffed animal and all the girls in our classes just wanted to pet it so they would rent it with homework passes kid made massive amounts doubt he needed to do any homework but he liked to do that stuff so I don't know.
"I was one of those fellas..."
I was one of those fellas who could get you anything. I honestly have no dea how I got these things though. People asked and it just magically showed up in my pockets. I miss that ability.
"There was an illegal buffet..."
There was an illegal buffet in the lockers of one of the 12th graders, you could buy sandwiches, drinks and things like that cheaper than in the normal school buffet. Also my class is thinking about opening a "black market" just with books when we become 12th graders, so we can give out our used books (and maybe notes) to students below our grade for money when they haven't brought their own.
"One friend of mine..."
One friend of mine used to sell pirated DVDs out of his locker for like, $10.00 each.
Considering how goddamn expensive DVDs were in those days, $10.00 was a good price.
Another friend would sell you cans of soft-drinks for $2.00 each out of his locker.
"That's how we graduated..."
It was a pretty nerdy school, so we traded exams (doing exams for each other) and buying finished projects from each other. That's how we graduated with everyone doing their specialty for everyone else.
"My operations got busted..."
Supreme stickers. I was the main supreme sticker dealer at my middle school. My operations got busted by the guidance counselor and they took my stickers.
"The only kid in the entire school..."
I sold games for the TI-83 graphing calculator in middle school.
The only kid in the entire school with the data cable and know-how to use it.
"I still wonder..."
Someone sold huge candy bars for money which he used to get one huge candy bar. I still wonder why he didn't just have the candy bars he bought.
"He'd take your order..."
When my older brother was in high school, a kid use to sell really nice pancakes. He'd take your order the day before and you could get whatever fillings you want like candy bars. He'd get up at like 5 AM to make them all. School found out and shut him down. He also may have been baking drugs into them.
"In middle school..."
In middle school, I managed to make around $5 a week by selling Welch's Fruit Snacks for $1 per bag. There were around 10 people that would actually bring money to school and buy them off of me. This sadly stopped when one of my customers attempted to advertise, which resulted in one of the more annoying/strict teachers shutting down my business.
"After a month..."
There was a kid in 8th grade I think who would give out bags of ketchup chips (welcome to Canada) for $2 and if you bought 5, you would get a discount on your next one
After a month, he was caught though I'm not sure what his punishment was.
"My friends made hundreds..."
My friends made hundreds over a year selling sodas/chips until the office heard about it and they had to stop.
"Especially rare were copies of games..."
This was in the mid 90s at our magnet middle school. We all had accounts on the school's VAX server, and the game was to hoard icons.
The proper way to store them was to create a folder to display each icon and arrange them into appropriate categories. Set sharing to public visibility without write access so you could show off.
We were always trawling for new users who didn't set permissions appropriately so we could steal all of their collection, deleting or defacing what remains if feeling mean.
These were the days when access to a scanner or quality images was nontrivial. We all had some second tier stash from when we stole a moment on the school's black and white scanners to load up some greyscale trash.
Nobody paid money for icons. Access was more of a social status thing. If you had lots friends willing to share you would have a good collection.
Especially rare were copies of games people had loaded on their accounts. These were more heavily policed by the admin, as they took up a lot of precious storage. Moonbase was a favorite.
"They had police search my locker..."
I made $1K in profit from selling candy during my senior year of high school. They had police search my locker, and the same cop questioned a friend after seeing him give me a dollar.
"I don't know if this counts..."
I don't know if this counts but it was pizza. During lunch time we weren't allowed to leave school grounds but eating in the canteen was awful (typical school stuff, noodles with tomato sauce every day, long queues no dessert and so on). It stared one day when one kid of our class, who's mom owned a local pizza restaurant, offered to order at said restaurant and let his mom deliver the food to the school. Which wasn't technically forbidden. Soon enough around 15/24 kids of our class regularly ordered pizza from him (his mom); this developed into roughly 60 people from other classes ordering food, he himself always taking a 50c "delivery fee".
Man he made a lot of money.
Soon enough the restaurant had to dive multiple times to get out all the orders, and 60 kids waiting near the entrance of the school grounds wasn't really what I would call "unsuspicious,"let alone all the garbage that was produced.
Since it wasn't technically forbidden to deliver or bring food, the school council needed to change the rules, which took 2 months... they took two months to finally put a halt to this.
The dude who started it surely got some good money out of his business, let alone his mom. They didn't offer delivery regularly.
"And that's how the underground..."
Silly bands. They literally got banned by the administration and if you had them in school you got in trouble and got them taken away. And that's how the underground silly band selling business got started at my school. People would like trade them in the bathrooms and playground. It was intense.
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We may not like it, but getting older is pretty inevitable.
With age may come wisdom, but it also comes with lots of responsibilities.
And some days, we're just over it.
Redditor brick_layer asked:
"What tasks are you tired of doing as an adult?"
Decisions, Decisions
"Deciding what to make for dinner."
- PortiaEss
"I would eat people kibble if it tasted good. Bachelor Chow (just add beer) needs to be a real thing."
- chaos8803
Hi, Ho, Hi, Ho
"Going to work and acting like a functional person."
- ovelanimimerkki
"Yep, I hate trying to work when I'm not emotionally stable or just exhausted. And you literally can't tell anyone or they tell you to go get a coffee which just makes the week go downhill over time."
- gg_ff_42069
Manners
"Being polite to other adults who don't deserve it."
- 25_-a
"Also known as the 'I am too old for this sh*t' phase of life."
- Zintao
Cleaning
"Cleaning the fridge. 🤢 when I find something way in the back that’s been forgotten."
- joydobson
"I finally cleaned out ours today because it was trash day, and the husband isn’t home to argue with me about how that sauce from 2015 is 'still good!!' 🤨 Now I have an empty fridge with just the bare essentials. Worth it."
- Grizelda_Gunderson
Circle of Life
"Working. Paying bills. Getting up early. Doing stuff."
- guyfromcroswell
"Agreed. Such a mundane cycle indeed."
- Emotional_Ratio_3251
Is Naked So Bad?
"Laundry grrrrr."
- FewPizza7880
"I tend to put the laundry in, hear it beep, forget about it for 6 hours then remember it needs to dry."
- marvel_is_wow
Traffic
"Anticipating the morons on the roads that change lanes without signaling."
"Or merging into 70mph traffic while doing 45..."
- haveyouseenthebridge
"Or being stuck behind those people as we're merging, I get pissed. Like speed up to the flow of traffic, being behind them merging puts me in danger too."
- Nigel_IncubatorJones
Maintenance
"Buying a house is an endless list of shit that needs fixing or improving."
- muffbiscuits
"This is one of the many reasons I bought a condo. The majority of the maintenance is somebody else’s problem. I haven’t cut grass, raked leaves or shoveled snow in almost a decade."
‐ yogaballcactus
Teeth
"Brushing my teeth. It's annoying."
- scottevil110"
"I feel this deep. It’s flossing for me."
- brick_layer
"Wait until you're in your 60s and all of a sudden the perfect teeth that never even had a cavity now all of a sudden have tiny cracks and need porcelain crowns and you have constant pain and Delta Dental only covers cleanings and x-rays and a single crown is like $1500 and they're telling you that you need four and you think, well, we don't really need two cars, I could sell my old Subaru."
- Nobody_Wins_13
Alarming
"Waking up to an alarm clock."
"I've been waking up to an alarm clock almost every day since 1985, and I'm fucking tired of it."
"I want to wake up when I'm done sleeping."
"I don't want to wake up and find that I've slept through/turned off my alarm(s) yet again, and have to choose between packing a lunch and taking a shower."
- thisbuttonsucks
What part of adulthood are you tired of?
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I would love to know how people don't fear death.
I mean, it's the end. Life will be over. That kind of sucks.
Yet there are people who find tranquility in it.
Can you teach the rest of us?
Redditor deensuk wanted to hear from everyone who has a calmness about the heading to the afterlife. They asked:
"People who are not scared of death, why?"
I have a constant fear of death. I wanna perfect the ending of "Death Becomes Her" so I can live forever.
Before
"I'm not scared of death because of working in health care I was around it so much. I AM scared of what leads to death, however."
Full-Mulberry5020
Why now?
"Why should I be scared now of something that's only going to happen at the end of my life?"
User Deleted
"I did this cult thing called the landmark forum and I actually did like their “meaning of life”: the meaning of life is that there is no meaning. Life is empty and meaningless. There is no answer."
"Life is what you make of it and every persons answer is equally valid because there is no meaning to life. Life exists as, basically, an accident, we are all here by complete accident, there’s no great mystery, it’s all biology and you are 100% free to make life about whatever it is you want."
Conservative_HalfWit
Death and I are good friends...
"I was very sick as a child. Spent ages 7-20 in and out of hospital due to kidney issues. Lost a kidney at 28. Almost died during the surgery to removed the dead kidney due to blood loss. Had 5 surgeries back to back during the next 2 years. Twice they had difficulties bringing me out of anesthesia."
"Found my favorite aunt dead in her bed when I was 22. Watched my best friend die from a brain tumor at 30. Death has been a constant force in my life. Sometimes just on the edges waiting, sometimes unexpected staring me in the face. I'm not afraid because it's always been there. I now work in healthcare. Death and I are good friends."
Tiny_Teach_5466
No Worries
"Because it's coming for us all, sooner or later. So there's no point in worrying about it. I am much more concerned about day to day minutiae. The Lars von Trier film Melancholia starring Kirstin Dunst portrayed this perfectly. If there was an asteroid hurtling towards the earth, I'd probably be more preoccupied with worrying about whether I left the back light on or not."
Giallo_submarine
It's Over
"Because no one has ever made it out alive, and I was dead for an eternity before I was alive, and didn't suffer the slightest inconvenience because of it."
MarshallApplewhiteDo
I never thought about the before much. I hope the before is quick.
The Effects
"I hope that when my times comes it will be merciful. My uncle had a stroke, he is paralyzed. My grandmother is 91, but is losing all her memories of her life. Death does not scare me, what could be left of me before I die is what terrifies me."
M1ssy_M3
No Terror
"It’s like when the writer Nabokov said that he saw a picture one time, a picture of before he was born. It was a picture of his mother, his brother and sister that were older than him, but he had not been born yet. He said that when he saw that picture there was no terror in him, even though he was looking at a picture where he didn’t exist."
im_on-the_can
state of nonexistence...
"I'm not afraid of death, I'm afraid of dying. Death is just the state of nonexistence I experienced before I was born. I don't remember it because I didn't exist yet. Death will be the same way. I just don't want the transition to be marked by pain and sorrow at things left unfinished. I want it to be quick, painless, and with me surrounded by love."
Wazula42
I'm Gone...
"Because once I die, I won't know it. I won't miss people or regret things or feel pain or sadness about anything. I might fear being sick and slowly dying, just having to live with the knowledge that it's all going to end and this is the last time I'll ever see the people I love or taste good food or hear good music. That sounds almost unbearable. But death isn't even a thing, it's just having done something (died)."
"It's like virginity, it's a made-up state of being that just says whether or not you've experienced a specific occurrence. Once I die, I'm gone. My corpse will be the empty wrapper I used to be in, just garbage to be disposed of in whatever way makes my survivors feel better. I'll be switched off. If I don't worry about what the light feels after the bulb burns out, why would I be afraid of being dead?"
SallyHeap
At Peace
"I’m scared now because I have young kids. Once my kids are old enough to be on their own I imagine the fear will subside and I’ll have a more relaxed approach."
User Deleted
Some very interesting perspectives. May it all calm peacefully and with great mercy for us all.
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Dating and the search for love and companionship... What a nightmare.
This journey plays out nothing like in the movies.
Every Prince or Princess (or everything in BTW) seems to have a touch of the psycho.
The things people say during what should be simple dinner conversation can leave a dining partner aghast.
Like... do you hear you?
Redditor detroit_michigldan wanted to discuss all the best ways to crash and burn when trying to make a romantic connection. They asked:
"You're on a date and it's going really great. What can another person say to ruin it completely?"
I once had a guy ask me if I was willing to follow him into the woods, depending on the price of the meal.
Yeah. No steak is worth that.
Plans After...
"Thanks for the ride but I have a date with someone else, I figured you wouldn't drive me if you knew I was going on a date with someone else and I really needed a ride."
"Online dating, talked to her for a while, finally got the courage to ask her out and then she said that as we got there."
iareyours
Mirror Image
“'You look just like my wife!'”
catalinachild
"I did have a guy tell me I reminded him of his son. I don’t believe English has a word to adequately describe my feelings at that time."
UnicornMagicRainbow
"That would definitely do it."
chaotica78
Third Wheel
"'Hope you don't mind if my mother joins us.'"
ofsquire
"Actually had a girl do this on a first date because she had anxiety issues. Honestly wasn’t bad except that 90% of the time she was silent and her mom talked over her."
"I didn’t mind that much and wouldn’t have minded trying again when she was more comfortable except that she was let go at the company we worked at and she deleted her social media profiles and she never responded on her number. Ah well."
Seightx
Liar
"'Hey bro aren't you gay? I made out with you last night.'"
"Random dude I've never seen before in front of my (f) date."
JHXC16
Was he lying though?
Filter Issues
"'You looked better on Tinder.'"
waqasnaseem07
"Isn’t it basic knowledge that everybody looks slightly worse than the worst picture you can find?"
no_user_ID_found
The Past
"'My ex used to do that too.'"
xxIvyOF
"Yep. I’ve definitely had two otherwise-decent-guy date-situations sour because the ex-comparisons just would not stop flowing. No woman wants to be seen as interchangeable—I’m not here to perfectly fill that ex-sized hole in your life. Focusing on the present moment and a future we could build together is a courtesy we need to grant each other in earliest dates of dating."
LarkScarlett
Powerless
"'I'm an alpha, you cant handle my top energy.'"
Midnightgay28
"I actually left a dude in the middle of dinner, in part, for saying this. I ordered an Uber under the table while pretending to listen to him. Went to the bathroom, and never came back. That was when I was young. Now I’d just say, 'How about we enjoy this meal in silence, before we head our separate ways.'”
UnicornMagicRainbow
Mommy...
"'Mother says I should be back by 9.'"
"Saying 'mother says' just feels weird."
bunnyrut
"That gives me Norman Bates vibes."
Werewolf_lover20
"'Mother says alligators are aggressive because they have an overabundance of teeth, but lack a toothbrush.'"
sodaextraiceplease
Obvs...
"'If you were going to be murdered, what method would you prefer. Purely hypothetical. Obvs.'"
Specific_Tap7296
If it looks anything like a Dateline NBC episode... RUN!
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Despite the advancement of technology rendering people left to their own devices–literally–to entertain them, there are some leisurely activities that will never go out of style.
Or so you would think.
Do people still knit to pass the time? Are people actively collecting stamps?
It depends on who's asking.
Curious to hear about hobby trends, Redditor gizehgizeh asked:
"What are once popular hobbies that are slowly dying these days?"

Before we've become conditioned to living on our phones, these activities used to keep people occupied.
Before Texting, There Was This
"Letter writing."
– littlekingMT
Literal And Tangible Joy
"Well the internet killed pen pals for sure. I do remember I had a Japanese girl for a penpal maybe back in 2007 or so. I honestly don't remember how it started, pretty sure some website, but that was a fun experience. But now I can just straight up talk to foreign people real time, lol. But yea getting a physical letter that someone took the time to write and mail still is hard to beat feelings wise."
– skyburnsred
Model Trains
"When I was growing up, every town had a model train store in it. Now I have one in region and everything else has to be bought online."
– Hairy_Effective1172
Pretty Rocks
"Don’t see anyone playing marbles anymore, I had an awesome collection in school."
– sheeple85
"I had some marbles as a kid in the 90s. My grandma got them for me and I had no idea what I was supposed to do with them. I always imagined them as a thing kids in the 40s played with."
– Ryoukugan
People Were Moving Canvases
"Paintball has been dying a slow death since 2006. Sad, really."
– hobo_recycler
Before the general population began hating clutter, collecting was once a "thing."
Precious Coins
"Coin collecting... I'm a silver/gold nut and I'm always hunting for precious metal coins. whenever I go into a shop they get all excited because 'no one under 70 collects coins anymore.'"
– ThatFishySmell99
Post It
"Stamp collecting."
– spooky_scully_mulder
"Collecting in general, really. Of course there are still prominent collectors but it's slipped more into enthusiast and niche territory than being a popular hobby that you might expect anyone to have."
– iuytrefdgh436yujhe2
What A Gem
"Rockhounding was immensely popular back in the 1950's and 1960's. Personally, I think it's a fascinating and fulfilling hobby, but when I go to a meeting at a rock and gem club, I'm usually the youngest one in the room by several decades."
– filthy_lucre
People once enjoyed making things.
Admiring The View
"Stained glass. I learned how to make it from my old man, and my junior high art class teacher also taught it. Very few artisans are still around."
– brobeanzhitler
Metal Vocation
"Black smithing."
– kenworth117
"I bought a forge to try. It’s insanely hard work, and crazy expensive. I still haven’t finished a piece."
– DSentvalue
Scrapbooking
"Yeah. I'm watching the arts and crafts stores around me completely uninstalling their racks for specialty paper. Now the only thing they have is mega packs of repeating colors/images. To boot all the inclusions like papercraft/die-cut things, washi tape, scissors, stickers, etc have gotten so expensive I would rather go buy $5 bags at value village to get an assortment of things versus buying anything new. I really, really miss yard sales for the same reasons."
– Phantasmai
I envy people who have jobs that are basically their hobbies.
Not everyone gets paid doing what they actually enjoy and have a profound level of passion for.
If they do, kudos to them.
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