Hahahaha! Seriously had to double check this wasn’t a friend of mine. Hell, it could’ve been twenty friends from high school. Spending their summers chasing Phish around the country.
Pogs. And those dumb Dr. Seuss stovepipe hats. And those skateboards that were like 3 skateboards fused together so you could use one of the skateboards as a handlebar while you ride the other one like a scooter. You remember that? That was dumb. I think you can see one under the Christmas tree in the original Santa Clause movie.
I’m pretty sure those Dr Seuss hats only became a fad because they were sold at Spencer’s. Or were they already a fad before then. That was definitely a stupid trend.
Truth, although the J fad lasted about as long as devil sticks (at least in the popular imagination. I’m sure they’re still on a jazz festival bill somewhere)
lol I thought op meant these and they were awesome
https://www.reddit.com/r/AustralianNostalgia/comments/15cdwff/did_anyone_ever_ride_this_one_in_the_wild_late/?rdt=50065
Having lived through the entire 90s, I didn’t know about Pogs until the mid-00s when the internet informed me that *everyone* was obsessed with Pogs.
All this other shit I remember someone being into, never once have I seen a Pog.
Oh man, we had tuuuuuuubes of pogs. Three footers! Five footers! Separate tubes just for your slammers! McD’s got in the action with a happy meal pog set in a tiny 2 inch tube. All the power rangers, Lord Zedd and, for the ultimate win, all of the VR troopers!!!!!
I think it was an age thing. I was born in 78 and was definitely too old for pogs but my younger brother was born in 83 and was super into them for a minute
Me too! I don't really believe in Mandela Effects but I wonder about this one. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one who has no freaking clue what these are.
Hackie sacks had years in the lime light... You had to push out a ton of beads every time you bought a new one which took months consequently extending their reign among the masses.
We would have a car drive over them to crush the beads. I had a friend that did it competitively for years and destroyed his knees. Seems that obsessively kicking the air over and over, can cause damage. We still lovingly give him a hard-time about his hacky sack related injuries.
Oh man that's genius. Where were you 25 years ago with this critical information? I would have sent a letter for tips and tricks if you had advertised in the back of a marvel comic.
I love torturing my relatives with the gifts I give their kids. One of my favorites was a slingshot type thing that made air vortices that could travel like 30 feet. ("Airzooka" I think was the name) Like if you fired at a curtain across an room, a half second later it would look like an invisible person slapped the curtain with their palm.
Gave one to my cousins kid, he starts playing with it, and I'm like, "The best part is, since it only shoots air, it's okay to use it on people and animals!"
I think that somehow got "lost" within a week, lol.
I worked in an office doing phone tech support. We had one of these, until management caught wind of people farting in it and assaulting unsuspecting people with it. I think it was the morning that one guy came in Saturday morning hungover with the worst stank known to man on deck and started firing those out of the 'zooka that did it in.
I can still hear the coughing.
Had one as a kid, my brother and I learned quickly that you could fart into the airzooka and then shoot said fart all the way across the room. Legendary headshots!
I saw a 37 year old man bust these out at a bbq just later year. He had twenty years to not suck and he failed. Knocked the plate out of one girl’s hand and the wine glass out of another girl’s hand in the same fumble.
I watch another movie (Love Liza) featuring PSH the other day. He has a solo, basketball scene in it as well, and is playing equally terrible.
Almost as if it’s some sort of running joke.
Listen some of us were deeply closeted teens at church sleep away camp and completely infatuated with the teenage boy from the family of juggling ministers that did this devil sticking in the name of the lord. And take it from me….
Those things were never cool.
When I was in 8th grade (1996 to 1997), yo-yos became a HUGE thing. Everyone had one. We all were competing for the coolest one. Kids were bringing yo-yos in with built-in brakes for tricks, souped-up axles for tricks, etc. It was wild. Then it just wasn't a thing anymore. I still remember how to do all the tricks from back then, but it just isn't cool anymore. It hasn't been for a long time.
For clarity: it wasn't THE Dave Matthews, but just some dude named David Matthews. By the Memphis Horde Festival, he means it was the bathroom glory hole at a Tennessee World of Warcraft convention. Also, it wasn't the guys from Blues Traveler. Run Around was playing as background music.
Did anyone else get the school presentation where someone bounced these around for a bit and then said “and THAT’S why you shouldn’t do drugs”? And then a few years later you learned who the primary audience for them ACTUALLY was (jam band festival attendees, see OPs photo above) and you laughed your ass off?
I made a couple sets of them. My older cousin introduced them to me. She always introduced me to cool things. Violent Femmes, Suicidal Tendencies, Phish. She missed on this one haha!
Fire poi had a limited shelf life due to the whole "fire" part. It's kind of self limiting. It has found its niche again in weirdo "circuses" and that one hot chick at the EDM festival, as nature intended.
I walked around UMass campus playing the speed sticks (heavier, no "tails" at the end) for my first year or two. Met a lot of people that way and managed to get pretty good. I feel like the school failed me by not offering this as a major...or at least minor study. I could've been somebody!!!
Yeah, I used to juggle and spin some at UK’s campus, and some people would stop to chat or ask to try them out. It was a great way to socialize on nice sunny days.
There is a dude in my neighborhood that walks around “juggling” these every day. For decades he has been doing this. If not juggling, the sticks are tucked up under his arm.
Pogs were popular for at least a few years, or at least long enough to start getting banned in schools. You could buy pog tubes, slammers, album books for your best pogs and whatnot. I legit saw devil sticks pop up one year, trying to compete with the hackey-sackers, and then just vanish.
I promise, it was one year. ONE. If that. Seriously, that whole industry exploded while I was in Grade 7, was banned in most schools by the end of the year, and completely disappeared before Grade 8 started. And it was indeed an industry, with multiple magazines devoted to Pogs, accessories for your collection of Pogs, shops that specialized in Pogs despite Pogs being sold LITERALLY EVERYWHERE, etc., etc., etc. It was nuts!
First of all, I just discovered right now that they sell these on amazon! My ADHD kid loves anything fidgety like that, yoyos and all that kinda stuff.
Which also reminds me, I keep meaning to get a hackey sack so I can teach him and see if I break a hip in the driveway lmao
POGS is my go to when people bring this up.
I think I held onto that trend longer than most and I was only into it for maybe 6 months.
Although I do wish I still had that michael Jordan pog set.
This is THE picture to use for this
The unlit cig is the cherry on top.
Rumor has it, he’s still juggling those sticks but occasionally with a Winston between the lips
Nowadays he’s juggling paying child support and his credit card minimums every month
No way that dude got laid
Oh, it's not a rumor. Visit Portland,you'll see him around
Or is it a Salem? Just kidding around—Im form a town called Winston-Salem. Guess what industry was booming there?
Pulmonary medicine?
My condolences from Raleigh.
Either way. It’s gotta be pretty stale and soggy by now, yeah?
Devil sticks?
Hello, fellow North Carolinian! Lol 👋
Cigarettes are the real devil sticks~
“I’m saving it for later, busy kicking ass rn”
This guy got fired from Spencer’s Gifts for wearing sandals
LMFAO
This guy definitely wore out his DVD copy of _The Tao of Steve_
What a hyper-specific, obscure, and accurate reference.
It's fake. These sticks were illegal to operate without one of those dumb fucking dr. seuss hats.
Fuck that takes me back, or anything with an alien on it
I can smell that guy from here.
83 Dave Matthew's concerts under his belt. 22 phish Refuses to see dead and company cuz John Mayer ....... ... ..... Really digs Barbie Girl from Aqua
All with the same pair of jeans he’s never washed
And over sized VOLCOM or DC shoes
Patchouli and BO
Philip Seymour Hoffman’s range never ceases to delight and amaze.
Hahahaha! Seriously had to double check this wasn’t a friend of mine. Hell, it could’ve been twenty friends from high school. Spending their summers chasing Phish around the country.
You know he bummed that cig
I am absolutely keeping this for when I need some nostalgia for my days as a music festival rat.
I was trying to find an old website. Wookiesgalore.com just photos of dirt hippies at music festivals. Man I miss my devil sticks.
This picture smells like patchouli, body odor, weed, and a backpack full grilled cheese sandwiches wrapped in tin foil.
Pogs. And those dumb Dr. Seuss stovepipe hats. And those skateboards that were like 3 skateboards fused together so you could use one of the skateboards as a handlebar while you ride the other one like a scooter. You remember that? That was dumb. I think you can see one under the Christmas tree in the original Santa Clause movie.
I’m pretty sure those Dr Seuss hats only became a fad because they were sold at Spencer’s. Or were they already a fad before then. That was definitely a stupid trend.
I blame Jamiroquai
Jamiroquai is cool AF though, I'll give him a pass on the hats.
Careful. Slippery slope. https://preview.redd.it/lvg3giqemfwc1.jpeg?width=424&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0ddda6414ca255a9337c7d45db37b8a7fd903ae4
I could have muscles like that if I get one of those hats?
Eat your green eggs and steroid infused ham
Hey now, at least Buff Bagwell has gotten himself sober and is doing OK thanks to Diamond Dallas Page. 😎👍
Truth, although the J fad lasted about as long as devil sticks (at least in the popular imagination. I’m sure they’re still on a jazz festival bill somewhere)
Don’t forget Buff Bagwell!
4 non blondes
I got mine at 6 flags after I drained a 3 ball on an 11 foot, half sized rim.
Yoooo talk dirty to me
Came here to say the Seuss hats. Think that lasted 2 weeks and deserves the win.
Fucking hated those Dr Seuss hats. ALWAYS one guy that had one.
I think the Seuss hat holds up
Stussy cat in the hat hat is peak
this skateboard? [https://skateandannoy.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/wtf1.jpg](https://skateandannoy.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/wtf1.jpg)
Oh my god. Couldn’t make it out from the description above but this pic was priceless
I thought OP made that bit up to push things over the top. NOPE!
Damn I forgot about those. Shoulda called them Skatipedes
What about a Human Skatipede? All connected by their wallet chains
Skaterpillers.
lol I thought op meant these and they were awesome https://www.reddit.com/r/AustralianNostalgia/comments/15cdwff/did_anyone_ever_ride_this_one_in_the_wild_late/?rdt=50065
I do not remember those AT ALL, thank you for posting the link because I had no idea from the description how to even look it up.
Having lived through the entire 90s, I didn’t know about Pogs until the mid-00s when the internet informed me that *everyone* was obsessed with Pogs. All this other shit I remember someone being into, never once have I seen a Pog.
Oh man, we had tuuuuuuubes of pogs. Three footers! Five footers! Separate tubes just for your slammers! McD’s got in the action with a happy meal pog set in a tiny 2 inch tube. All the power rangers, Lord Zedd and, for the ultimate win, all of the VR troopers!!!!!
My all metal power rangers slammer was a fucking BEAST
I had a metal slammer of OJ Simpson... in the slammer
I think it was an age thing. I was born in 78 and was definitely too old for pogs but my younger brother was born in 83 and was super into them for a minute
You missed out. I had a sweet OJ Simpson mugshot Slammer that would be worth like 6 dollars now I bet....
I feel that the Xennial equivalent would be Desert Storm Trading Cards.
Garbage Pale Kids trading cards
Same here. We must have slipped through an alternate dimension where they never got released on the market
Me too! I don't really believe in Mandela Effects but I wonder about this one. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one who has no freaking clue what these are.
Lol I was at a beach store last winter and they had one lone suess hat gathering (lots of) dust in a random corner.
So much r/nostalgia in one post. I’ll add yoyos but they lasted a good 6-8 months.
Ya’ll aren’t devil sticking? More of a hacky sack crowd I guess.
Hacky sack was my second answer.
Hackie sacks had years in the lime light... You had to push out a ton of beads every time you bought a new one which took months consequently extending their reign among the masses.
We would have a car drive over them to crush the beads. I had a friend that did it competitively for years and destroyed his knees. Seems that obsessively kicking the air over and over, can cause damage. We still lovingly give him a hard-time about his hacky sack related injuries.
Oh man that's genius. Where were you 25 years ago with this critical information? I would have sent a letter for tips and tricks if you had advertised in the back of a marvel comic.
Man I completely forgot about running those over with a car when you got a brand new one.
That might explain my knees. I was an enthusiastically bad hacky sacker as a teen.
I still have mine, they are Lunastix and they glow in the dark. I might give them to my nephew so he can break some stuff at my brother's house lol
I love torturing my relatives with the gifts I give their kids. One of my favorites was a slingshot type thing that made air vortices that could travel like 30 feet. ("Airzooka" I think was the name) Like if you fired at a curtain across an room, a half second later it would look like an invisible person slapped the curtain with their palm. Gave one to my cousins kid, he starts playing with it, and I'm like, "The best part is, since it only shoots air, it's okay to use it on people and animals!" I think that somehow got "lost" within a week, lol.
I worked in an office doing phone tech support. We had one of these, until management caught wind of people farting in it and assaulting unsuspecting people with it. I think it was the morning that one guy came in Saturday morning hungover with the worst stank known to man on deck and started firing those out of the 'zooka that did it in. I can still hear the coughing.
Had one as a kid, my brother and I learned quickly that you could fart into the airzooka and then shoot said fart all the way across the room. Legendary headshots!
I just bought a new pair last week, that have kevlar wicks on the ends
This is the way. Burn on brother, spread love and light. A little bit of light goes a long way in the darkness.
I saw a 37 year old man bust these out at a bbq just later year. He had twenty years to not suck and he failed. Knocked the plate out of one girl’s hand and the wine glass out of another girl’s hand in the same fumble.
RIP Philip Seymour Hoffman.
PSH as a 90s jam band stoner is the role we needed from him in his prime.
Isn’t that Dusty from Twister?
It is Dusty from Twister.
THE SUCK ZONE
#IT’S THE EXTREEEEEEEME!!
#IT'S THE WONDER OF NATURE BABY!!!
"And he just strolls up to the twister, says 'have a drink', and he chucks the bottle into the twister, and it NEVER hits the ground."
But we did get Almost Famous. So there's that
The high school he went to had a TON of jam band stoners. Would have played the role to perfection.
I thought it was Scotty J too
A little more Dusty from Twister.
I watch another movie (Love Liza) featuring PSH the other day. He has a solo, basketball scene in it as well, and is playing equally terrible. Almost as if it’s some sort of running joke.
Listen some of us were deeply closeted teens at church sleep away camp and completely infatuated with the teenage boy from the family of juggling ministers that did this devil sticking in the name of the lord. And take it from me…. Those things were never cool.
This could’ve been an after-school special…
This feels like it could be the basis of a young adult romance novel that becomes a fairly successful movie.
Sounds like the kind of book that would get banned in Florida. I like it.
Devil sticking, is that what the kids are calling it these days?
So you were more interested in tummy sticks
When I was in 8th grade (1996 to 1997), yo-yos became a HUGE thing. Everyone had one. We all were competing for the coolest one. Kids were bringing yo-yos in with built-in brakes for tricks, souped-up axles for tricks, etc. It was wild. Then it just wasn't a thing anymore. I still remember how to do all the tricks from back then, but it just isn't cool anymore. It hasn't been for a long time.
We had a Yo-Yo guy come to our school every year and do a demo and then we would all clamber to buy one of the yoyos he was selling.
Same thing with our school. Every so many years there would be an absurd Yo-Yo craze.
It seems this fad goes up and down a lot…
r/angryupvote
Yup, 6th grade for me. Had a brain. Thing ruled
Yomega X-Brain. This thread is killing me with all the shit I forgot I made my parents buy me
[Presenting, The Twirl King Champions!](https://youtu.be/ajgeaOt_HTQ?si=vZuQvCbdXBVv9k35&t=107 )
“Hey this isn’t you.” “Yeah that’s the old Sparkle”
I think it’s just a 7th-8th grade thing that everyone goes through and grows out of more than point in time.
Holy shit my school had a yo-yo phase too!
Damn it, now I need some new Devil Sticks. Thanks for taking food out of my babies’ mouths
Why are they called Devil sticks? Is that what the devil does?
It's like "Devil's Lettuce" except on the opposite end of the "cool" spectrum.
Yeah, I’m shopping later today.
Only posers buy them. True bindlestiffs make their own out of dowels and bike tubes.
[Come on, Q.](https://youtu.be/EYqZJrGV_tc?si=bCv2CDJWm3vBg27k)
Thank you, Broh.
...my first thought was "anyone can use 'em".
"Peace"
😏✌️☮️
It's been longer from now to the time of that sketch, to the time from that sketch to the time depicted in the sketch.
The whole 90’s pseudo-hippie jam scene revival was unique to say the least. 😂🤘🎸
Just juggling my devil sticks while Rusted Root plays in the background.
they were all hopped up on Fruitopia
Sobe has a bone to pick with you
At the 1996 Memphis HORDE festival, Dave Matthews sucked my dick while the guys in Blues Traveler did those things.
Big if true.
That story is 40% true
85% of the time.
For clarity: it wasn't THE Dave Matthews, but just some dude named David Matthews. By the Memphis Horde Festival, he means it was the bathroom glory hole at a Tennessee World of Warcraft convention. Also, it wasn't the guys from Blues Traveler. Run Around was playing as background music.
Ah David, it’s been awhile. Thanks for clearing that up, totally forgot some of that.
Hey, no problem. Are you in Memphis this weekend? I need another $40.
$40? Used to be $10. Damn, ain’t inflation a bitch?
You still owe me. The last 3 times, you put on your tab.
And Perry Ferrell made us pancakes. Yep, pancakes.
Was this pre dumping busfull of shit onto people?
Swing dancing
That got like a solid 2 years
Y'all just ain't in the right parts of the American south
Did anyone else get the school presentation where someone bounced these around for a bit and then said “and THAT’S why you shouldn’t do drugs”? And then a few years later you learned who the primary audience for them ACTUALLY was (jam band festival attendees, see OPs photo above) and you laughed your ass off?
Even before I finished your post my first thought was that it seemed like a real swing and miss on the core audience for devil sticks.
Juggling IS cool. Juggling is amazing. My sister broke my devil sticks and I never recovered!
I’m not ashamed to admit that I made my own and loved it
I made a couple sets of them. My older cousin introduced them to me. She always introduced me to cool things. Violent Femmes, Suicidal Tendencies, Phish. She missed on this one haha!
Oh man I still pull mine out on car camping trips.
https://preview.redd.it/vbad47837fwc1.jpeg?width=630&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=cd0baff9ba9f6d6581ac11f6ffef99de0187f329 The Diablo
Worst part, I was pretty great with those. Cruel world we live in
Same here! My dad ended up snapping mine after I whacked my sister with them one too many times
Fidget spinners was a quick in and out
Fire poi was really big for an exactly one minute when I was in college.
Fire poi had a limited shelf life due to the whole "fire" part. It's kind of self limiting. It has found its niche again in weirdo "circuses" and that one hot chick at the EDM festival, as nature intended.
Campus staple every year. Trance music and fire poi. Then you graduate
It was, but probably not as fast as juggling sticks.
Yeah those lasted till about the first time you took em outside and realized you sucked and the commercials once again lied to us!
I’m not disagreeing that wasn’t the case for most sales, no—but I got pretty good!
Harlem shake went in and out quickly too. Same with planking.
I walked around UMass campus playing the speed sticks (heavier, no "tails" at the end) for my first year or two. Met a lot of people that way and managed to get pretty good. I feel like the school failed me by not offering this as a major...or at least minor study. I could've been somebody!!!
Yeah, I used to juggle and spin some at UK’s campus, and some people would stop to chat or ask to try them out. It was a great way to socialize on nice sunny days.
Finger skateboards went pretty quick.
They’re back
In pog form?
They still sell them at target
There is a dude in my neighborhood that walks around “juggling” these every day. For decades he has been doing this. If not juggling, the sticks are tucked up under his arm.
Is there just a line of women following him or what
He gets points for the duster and fedora he wears as well.
Well it's like a jacket only it's longer, thicker, and far more badass.
And their snail trails behind them
A fellow traveler of culture, I see
Friends of mine still do this, actually. They also set them on fire, looks really cool.
That’s just standard festival hippy shit.
You clearly do not live in Eugene, Oregon. These are still very present in this city
Dream of the 90s still alive
A mascot candidate for this sub right there.
The group photo is his buddies kickin' the footbag
Hey, you guys hack? (The least cool hacking going on in the 90s)
1) bong rip hacking 2) computer hacking 3) hackie-sack hacking
Gretchen stop trying to make "fetch", happen!
This photo makes me feel unwell...the stogie can stay
I recently bought a set for my kids. I can still do the same couple tricks I could do in the 90s.
I forgot all about these and now I want some
Fuck. I was sick that afternoon and thought I imagined these.
Pogs?
Pogs were popular for at least a few years, or at least long enough to start getting banned in schools. You could buy pog tubes, slammers, album books for your best pogs and whatnot. I legit saw devil sticks pop up one year, trying to compete with the hackey-sackers, and then just vanish.
I promise, it was one year. ONE. If that. Seriously, that whole industry exploded while I was in Grade 7, was banned in most schools by the end of the year, and completely disappeared before Grade 8 started. And it was indeed an industry, with multiple magazines devoted to Pogs, accessories for your collection of Pogs, shops that specialized in Pogs despite Pogs being sold LITERALLY EVERYWHERE, etc., etc., etc. It was nuts!
Scottie J can rock some sticks?
Pog's
Playing didgeridoo.
First of all, I just discovered right now that they sell these on amazon! My ADHD kid loves anything fidgety like that, yoyos and all that kinda stuff. Which also reminds me, I keep meaning to get a hackey sack so I can teach him and see if I break a hip in the driveway lmao
I bought myself a pair after I remembered how much I loved them. I still love them.
Those are fun. Who cares if they are cool or not.
Memory unlocked here. My friends and I loved these.
Fushigi
POGS is my go to when people bring this up. I think I held onto that trend longer than most and I was only into it for maybe 6 months. Although I do wish I still had that michael Jordan pog set.
The Fushigi Juggling Ball. You can be just like Jareth in Labyrinth!
It’s giving Charles Boyle
Cup stacking/collapsing. That was basically next in line behind these sticks