My Second Love
The other day we were talking about DVDs and tapes and home theaters, and I was telling my kids about when video tape first came out for the consumer.
We had just gotten married and it was all brand new to me. In the middle of 1983 we bought our first VHS VCR as a wedding present to ourselves. I thought the whole thing sounded kind of interesting, but I had no real concept of what it could do. It was a Panasonic, one where you put the tape into the cartridge-thing that popped up from the middle of the machine, and you'd slam it down like you'd slam a car door. I was told VHS was the way to go over Beta (he was right!) and it cost me over $500. Along with the VCR we bought a color TV that was over $600, so when he asked if I wanted to buy "Star Trek: The Wrath of Kahn" for only $40 I thought what the hell.
From the very first moment I put that tape in, pressed PLAY, and I saw those first words as they floated up on my very own TV set, and this MOVIE started playing JUST for ME while I was sitting in my very own living room instead of some public movie house, well, my eyes lit up, an evil smile creeped across my face, and I was HOOKED baby!
Michelle's Video had just opened near my apartment. It was a little storefront, and seemed like it had maybe 200 tapes all together. The shelves were arranged around the outside walls, and there was one desk in the middle of the place. It was a rather plain store, looking into the store from the outside and you'd have passed them right by. There was no restroom, and this was way before they sold candy, popcorn, magazines, tapes, phone cards, or any of the other piles of crap every store in existence is clogged with today.
They rented tapes and that was it. I do remember a few posters along the walls. One I especially remember was one for “Revenge of the Jedi" which I'm sure would be worth a small fortune today!
This was the store where I found "Night of the Living Dead", a movie legend that I had heard about my entire life, but never thought I’d ever see...until I held it in my HAND!
More later...
We had just gotten married and it was all brand new to me. In the middle of 1983 we bought our first VHS VCR as a wedding present to ourselves. I thought the whole thing sounded kind of interesting, but I had no real concept of what it could do. It was a Panasonic, one where you put the tape into the cartridge-thing that popped up from the middle of the machine, and you'd slam it down like you'd slam a car door. I was told VHS was the way to go over Beta (he was right!) and it cost me over $500. Along with the VCR we bought a color TV that was over $600, so when he asked if I wanted to buy "Star Trek: The Wrath of Kahn" for only $40 I thought what the hell.
From the very first moment I put that tape in, pressed PLAY, and I saw those first words as they floated up on my very own TV set, and this MOVIE started playing JUST for ME while I was sitting in my very own living room instead of some public movie house, well, my eyes lit up, an evil smile creeped across my face, and I was HOOKED baby!
Michelle's Video had just opened near my apartment. It was a little storefront, and seemed like it had maybe 200 tapes all together. The shelves were arranged around the outside walls, and there was one desk in the middle of the place. It was a rather plain store, looking into the store from the outside and you'd have passed them right by. There was no restroom, and this was way before they sold candy, popcorn, magazines, tapes, phone cards, or any of the other piles of crap every store in existence is clogged with today.
They rented tapes and that was it. I do remember a few posters along the walls. One I especially remember was one for “Revenge of the Jedi" which I'm sure would be worth a small fortune today!
This was the store where I found "Night of the Living Dead", a movie legend that I had heard about my entire life, but never thought I’d ever see...until I held it in my HAND!
More later...
posted by David at
2:27 PM
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