I saw a magazine article the other day titled something like, “How to dress 90s”. This means I’m old. The 90s were my decade. I spent middle school, high school and a few years of college within this quickly changing decade. We started with Walkmans and ended with Napster. In the early 90s I had pen pals who sent me real letters with stamps and at the end I had an email address. I think it would be completely fun if we talked about what should return in the comeback of the 90s and what should not. Shall we?
Should Return: Twisted Hair Buns
Gwen Stafani did these well. They were so easy, and supposed to look messy, so if you had to pull a sweatshirt over your head the results worked for you. I would gladly accept this trend back into my life.
Should Not Return: Heroin Chic
The desire to look unhealthy and addicted to a terrible all-consuming drug is easily scoffed, but it was a fad. Please stay in our history silly trend.
Should Return: Oasis Songs
I don’t really care if Oasis comes out with any new music. I do feel their songs were intelligent for top 40 music. I’d like to have those old songs invade current radio as though they were new. But I won’t listen to any MTV news stories about the brothers’ fights. Get along boys or go to your room.
Should Not Return: Pacifier Necklaces
Apparently you were supposed to wear these to gnaw on when you were taking some drug that might make you chew up your tongue. Can someone confirm this for me? Either way, I never thought it was cute, just annoying.
Should Return: Platform Shoes of all Kinds
Sporty is too active for the style, but the rest of those Spic Girls are rocking unnecessarily tall platforms. I liked this concept. I’m also short, so…
Should Not Return: Shiny Metallic Clothes
So, the internet was new to most of us. Cyber fashion soon followed. Were we trying to look like the inside of our Compaq Presarios? I was a serious offender. If a metallic purse or shiny pair of pants came into my vision while at the mall, I often bought it.
Should Return: Dresses and Boots
Looks at me! I have a pretty, sweet and flowered dress. I’m also going to kick you with these combat boots!
Should Not Return: Beanie Babies
I once saw a kiosk at the mall with beanie babies priced as high as 795 dollars. This is plain dumb. I don’t blame anyone for liking them, they were cute and all. But the price people paid for them is and was absolutely insane. Especially considering the prices skyrocketed a couple years after they came out, as though they were rare and old antiques.
Should Return: Grunge
It was music as well as clothing. And it was easy. T-shirts, flannels, comfy shoes? Yes please. The whole grunge era really took up only a few years in the 90s, but it seems to be what many think of when the decade is mentioned. It was a great relief from the skin tight jeans and florescent shirts of the previous years.
Should Not return: JNCO jeans
Sadly, I had many outfits that looked just like this. I have no excuse.
Should Return: Better SNL
Many who enjoys Saturday Night Live have their favorite cast or season. Some of you like other eras over this. But you are wrong. I’m gonna say roughly mid 80’s to mid 90’s were the best years. But the last half of that ten year period has never been topped.
Should Not Return: Snow
I have no idea what he’s saying, turn that noise down and GET OFF MY LAWN!
Should Return: OK Soda
I’ll never stop dreaming.
Should Not Return: OJ Simpson
For years, we had the privilege of hearing how the murder trial was going for OJ. We watched and re-watched the car chase. We saw him try on a glove over and over. We learned who Johnnie Cochran was. Everyone formed an opinion on the trial. When they read the verdict live on TV my teacher stopped class to let us watch. So many hours of so many lives wasted worrying about this man and his life.
Should Return: Chat Rooms
There’s still chat rooms out there. They are not used as they once were. So many sites had a chat room attached to them in the late 90s. A/S/L? Remember that? Remember talking to one or two people in a room where thirty or forty people were also having conversations? That was funny. Let’s do that again.
Should Not Return: Dial-up Internet
Never again.
The Pilver 
I never stopped wearing dresses with boots, and I never, ever will. My boots are stompy and huge, and if someone has a problem with them they will feel the wrath of my magnificent footwear.
I miss my Jnco jeans. mx magazine. Gadzooks.
I googled for a lime jello salad image and clicked on what happened to be yours which lead me to your blog about your thanksgiving. even though I realized there wasn’t a recipe posted I still read your post out of curiosity. I was about to leave when i saw a link to your nostalgia post and the same thing got me to this post which got me here. I’m not a creep I promise haha I’m just a sucker for nostalgia and 90’s posts and love reading them. so, hi there!
I’m actually commenting to confirm your theory about the pacifiers! the trend started in the late 80’s/early 90’s along with the growth of groups like “the club kids” in new york city and london. I don’t know if you knew of them, perhaps the name james st. james rings a bell? he wrote a memoir called “disco bloodbath” the book was followed by a film that was renamed to “party monster”. anyway, they were just a bunch of kids that lived to run new york’s nightlife, dressing up in crazy intense costumes and doing ecstasy around the clock. they were pretty much a very, very amped up version of this generations ravers. I’m assuming you know what a rave(r) is? I’m actually pretty certain that pacifiers are still used at raves or clubs that cater to that crowd today, sorry to say hah. they became popular with the kids doing ecstasy because doing e can cause your jaws to shake and convulse, those movements a lot of the time are strong enough to break teeth. so somewhere, some smart addict realized that pacifiers were the perfect solution to their problems. they came in all different colors and designs etc. etc. plus they could sit on a necklace so they didn’t have to worry about dropping or losing them while they were dancing. the necklace part really became important when they realized that they could also start coating and even filling the pacifiers with ecstasy and other drugs of choice. there’s your confirmation and extended explanation about the adult pacifier. that’s also probably more than you ever cared to know about the topic. that’s my bad, I got into it and then I just kept going…like I am right now haha.
before I end this though, I’ve got to say that 1) dresses with boots are totally back in style! and if they ever go out of it again? well pfffft screw style. 2) I got into snl more towards the 00’s but that’s due to my age for the most part. so I don’t know and haven’t seen any of the “greats” that everyone always talks about although I do plan to one day start gojng backwards. I was the tina fey, amy poehler, jimmy fallon generation and I thought they were fantastic and still are now away from it. also, I just have to say because I think you’ll appreciate it…isn’t it kind of for-seeing and kind of amazing how current castmate kenan started out on all that (which should come back!) and out of all the places he could have landed he lands on snl? there’s just something about that that i love!
okay, wow. if you’re still reading this, great posts! and I hope you and your family have an absolutely amazing holiday season!!
I hated chatrooms. I don’t ever want those to come back. So many trolls during the early days of the internet. The internet of the 90s was a scary and weird place.
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Okay. Never heard of ok soda. But the pacifier (I never did) was part of the rave experience, but I think it was used more to say that you were naive but sexually adventurous. I loved the baby doll dress with doc Martin look. I was punk, grungy and rave-y. I guess I just liked music. Never liked boys band, so the shiny outfit was new to me. Awesome read, thanks.
I miss Mad River sodas.