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On the date

Thursday, August 27, 1981

From the day

Perspective: The Anxious Local · Sight

The store shelves are a blur of neon packaging and those new $1.19 gas signs, and I can't help but feel the squeeze even as I pass the glossy Sunday supplement featuring **ADIRONDACK SURVIVORS: RUSTIC 'GRAND CAMPS'**. I stare at those wealthy wood-beamed retreats in the photos, wondering how anyone breathes easy spending that kind of money when bread just hit fifty cents a loaf. Looming silhouettes of women in oversized shoulder pads brush past me, their hair stiff with spray, chasing that "greed is good" lifestyle while the rest of us just hope the new IBM machines don't make our jobs obsolete by winter. I pull my collar up, eyes fixed on the blinking arcade lights, trying to ignore the mounting tension of a world that feels like it’s getting more expensive by the second.

Memories from that day

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#1 on the Billboard Hot 100

Endless Love

Diana Ross and Lionel Richie

#1 at the box office

Raiders of the Lost Ark

$3,909,879

The must-have

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe

Slang

Slang of the decade

General

awesomebodaciouscheesychill

Valley Girl

as ifbarf me outgag me with a spoongrodytotally

Hip Hop

baddefdopeflyfreshword

Yuppie

greed is goodpower lunchnetworking

Catchphrases of 1981

  • Take a chill pill

Tech Check

IBM PC, MS-DOS & Space Shuttle.

Cost of Living (1980)

Loaf of Bread

$0.50

Gallon of Gas

$1.19

Average Home

$47,200

New Car

$7,200

Time Elapsed

16,353 days ago

(44 years, 293 days)