Kent Paul's 80's Nostalgia Zone! was a promotional website for Grand Theft Auto: Vice City curated by Kent Paul in 2002, looking back at the era the game was set.
The website's content is quasi-fictional, referencing real-world events and those that happen in the game. The website was shut down on December 20, 2020, along with several other promotional websites, due to end of support for the Adobe Flash Player on December 31, 2020.
Website[]
WELCOME
I used to have a mullet, but I'm okay now.
October 1, 2002
Hello, everybody. How are we all? Having a wonderful time of it?
Enjoying an amusing sojourn on the world-wide information super-highway web? I do hope so. You've stumbled across Kent Paul's 80's Nostalgia Zone, possibly the best site on the internet.
Just to clarify, like the banner says, the name is Paul, but I'm from Kent. Rather than being called Kent, like some idiot septic with a brother named Troy or whatever. Currently, I am spending time at an after care programme, having recently left primary, but I will VERY soon be back on my feet and out in the big bad world causing some serious trouble once more. I know I appear to be unfeasibly cheerful this month - this is because my doctor, a certain Dr. Perkins, has said if I can manage to be cheerful and not create what he calls an aura of insecurity and rage and inadequacy about myself and not insult anyone at all or lie for a whole month, then I can walk. I ain't turning soft or nothing, but I got to get back on the streets. The thing about Perkins is he's not bad for a screw, but I've done a lot of bird, because I'm very dangerous, and I once beat up a blind man in Dungeness High Street in Kent (still, he deserved it, 'cause he was staring at my bird's chest and anyway, I imagine he ain't reading this.). The other thing about Perkins is he is an absolute wanker and a little bit of a perv. Keeps asking me if I have feelings for my mum! I love my mum, but not like that. The other thing about Perkins is his wife looks like a moose having a bad hair day.
Anyways, I've done a lot of work on the memory banks this month.
Thinking about things. After all nostalgia's not what is was (I said this first) apart from where I'm concerned. But the 80's were definitely better than today. Look at the facts - I was on the top of my game. Now, I'm in a half way house. People knew how to dress - now they think wearing green smocks and straight jackets is the way to go, at least round my way. Back then, you knew what people was all about - money. Now, all people talk about is feelings and rubbish like that. All gets very confusing, whichever way you look at it.
When I left Kent for Vice City, I was a nobody.
A snotty little kid with a cheeky grin and a nasty line in tracksuits. By the time I left, I'd made it real big. I was a player. How did this happen? It was inevitable. You take an acne ridden compulsive liar from the Medway towns and drop him anywhere in America and he will come up smelling of roses. I knew everyone. I discovered most of the bands popular in the 1980's, but never got the credit. You see, I wasn't too interested in contracts. I was all about the music. It was like a passion for me. That and birds and drugs. They was my passions. Very original I was, I invented all of that crap.
What's more, is I just got sent THIS LINK by some moron because I mentioned the Degenatron thing last month. The bloke who wrote me is a right mug, clearly, and looks like he hasn't had so much as a hand shandy since 1987, so we've got that it common, I guess. But, please, bear in mind, now I spend all my time on computers, 'cause there ain't nothing else to do apart from try to watch the nurses getting changed, but in the 80's, I was a bit more interested with giving it very large portions.
Two new cards
Send Rollerskater Vice City Postcard
Send Shopper Vice City Postcard
September 4, 2002
My memories are priceless! Only I have to pay for them!
Popular from Dungeness to Missouri*
Quite a poetical introduction, and that's because I'm in quite a poetical mood. Well, I have to be honest, first up, I've got to apologise to Mrs. Perkins. She's not a dog at all. She's really quite attractive if you like the larger lady, and I also have to admit I was joking when I said that I had had her. I never had her. In fact, right, I think her husband, the esteemed and caring Dr. Perkins is right when he says his wife has never been unfaithful to him during a successful 30 year marriage and they have raised five lovely children and that is exactly the kind of thing you can get too, if you play by the rules.
Only, let's be honest, playing by the rules was never Paulo's style. I was a player. Not a referee. Seriously, I'm sorry for any offence I caused and everything, but do me a favour? I mean, Paul, from Kent, aka Kent Paul. I was the main man back then and when I get back on my feet, I'll be the main man again, and not writing apologies to shrinks or their fat wives, who I definitely could have had. But, well, back to me.
Not the best month for Paulo. Not too good at all, in fact. Got a bit of a knock back on this night club I was going to run. The 80's are back. You don't need me to tell you that, and I was going to be running this very fashionable little exclusive discotheque down in the Isle of Thanet, but the funding fell through. Stupid pillock. So, I've decided to spend an extra month in the after care. Face up to a few things. That demon grandiosity, Perkins calls it. I call it ambition, mate. The thing that made this country great. Gave us an empire. After all, we invented football, but we never win the bloody world cup, do we?
So, anyway, back to memories. I had a right funny hair cut back then. Looked like a proper pillock. But what you going to do? I don't make the rules, I only break them! And it seems you people are loving Kent Paul's Nostalgia Zone.
A lot of people came here last month, and not just family. (Hi mum!) I even got a letter last week.
From a certain JeffJohnson234@hotmail.com
Dear Kent,
I'm a big 80s fan. Loved your website. I live in Missouri. Where is Kent? We have a lot of corn here and we all drive cars. Do they have cars in Kent? Will you be my friend? I'm very lonely. I've got a big knife and I want to cut myself. I love goth music. And old televsion shows. Anyways, I was watching cable all last week, and I noticed you made a couple of errors. First - the family was called the Chesterfields, not the Dawkins. And then, you say the little kid was 35, but in fact he was 42. That's why he kept saying "but I'm 42." Because he was. He didn't say "I'm 35." I mean, I think he might have, but only when he was. Also, he was an investment banker not a bond trader as you have it on your website, which is wrong. I don't think you can really call yourself a fan of Five of Us. I've been to lots of conventions. And I still have a lunchbox. Please write back.
Keep on trucking!
Jeff.
Well, thanks Jeff. You prat. First up, I'm called Paul. I'm from Kent, near London. Second's, I don't care. That show was crap. Third's, no, you can't be my friend. Fourth's I hope you are in prison or something. Am I making myself clear?
As you can see, I'm the talk of the internet! Wonder how many people went to see Darren's ponce site? Wonder how many debates he sparked up? Not many. For your information, Darren's doses have been upped and he's back in the padded cell. Revenge, I call it. Don't mess with the beast, as my old boy used to say.
So, anyway, I was remembering, right, how things was and stuff. And they were really pretty good. Had a lot of fun. I was in Vice City as a major player in the record business, working with all of the top acts as an uncredited executive producer and creative influence, but I fell in with the wrong crowd. Myself. Know what I mean?
In Vice City, we had the lot, nightclubs, muggers, psychos, lunatics, self help gurus, porno stars.
But maybe you know about that already. It was a fabulous place. Real smart and all that fancy architecture. But there was a nasty side. Some very dodgy characters. Villains I call them, although Perkins calls them sociopaths or people with low self-esteem and a lot of weaponry. Make your own mind up. Times were easier back then, because we all knew what was going on. Make a load of money. Use it to borrow a load more money. Buy a lot of really expensive stuff on the never never, then go bankrupt. A simple life, much better than this crap, Perkins.
This month's postcards.
2 more photos I found... If you're a real man, you only travel by helicopter.
Send Rollerskater Vice City Postcard
Send Rollerskater Vice City Postcard
August 1, 2002
More from the 80s as they really were
(officially rated the most popular site on the internet in East Kent and Dungeness)
Ha ha—stick that in your pipe and smoke it.
They said I had a five minute attention span, but they were wrong. Kent Paul is back with more of my exciting and amusing remin, remini, well, my memories of the 1980s. The decade of decadence. A time when entertainment wasn't watching a TV show or going to the movies*, but was manipulating a plastic cube until all of the colours were in the same place.
Well, to those who enjoyed last month's website**, I can assure you it's only going to get a lot better. For starters, I'm getting the hang of this HTML lark, and for seconds, now that the tranquilizers have worn off, my memory is flooding back. Some of them ain't too happy, and all. But most of them are funny as anything. Especially for me.
But it's not just about me, it's also about the 1980s.
And that's what this site is all about. The 1980s and me. When I was in Vice City I showed the yanks a thing or two about being a geezer. A proper geezer from Kent, not some idiot from Essex. Down at the Malibu every night, I would hold court like a man with a court in his hand and I also knew lots of powerful people. Including some really nasty ones, because I'd be lying if I pretended I kept my nose entirely clean. That was never my style, I was too smart for that, even though it did all end up with me making a website for 13 people to enjoy while I do the loast of my time in my aftercare programme, which is great and everything and to be honest, all them times were about lies and the person I lied to most was myself and I really have to apologise to someone I care about a lot—me, for wasting everything and throwing it all away and looking for the easy way out and so on and so forth, but well, I promise you, I knew a few people and had a right laugh, I can promise you that.
Anyway, Vice City is still going strong, if you like beaches and inane half-wits and guys called Geraldo, but it ain't what it was. Centre of the known universe back then and a right laugh. From the Malibu to Prawn Island and back again. From fancy parties to even fancier hotels, I was everywhere and you tell me I'm making it up? You tell me I'm deceiving myself? You tell me I never amounted to nothing? I tell you to stick it, Doctor Perkins. I was a player. Not some pillock in a white coat handing out pills to a bunch of burnouts. You're a loser, mate. A loser and your wife is a dog. And I've had her.
* = Before you write in and complain, I'm speaking metaphorically. I know movies and TV were popular in the 1980s.
** = Last month, 13 people visited KentPaul.com, and I only knew 6 of you. So that means I didn't come bottom of the after care programme. That was that pillock Darren with his stupid drawing. To check out what a wally Darren is click here.
Here's 2 more postcards.
The lot of you people seemed to like the last one, so I made more.
Send Rollerskater Vice City Postcard
Send Rollerskater Vice City Postcard
July 1, 2002
"Remembering the time when a dollar was a dollar, a song was a song and foreign policy meant invade first, ask questions later."
I don't know about you, but I just love the 1980s.
I was maybe the worst fashion victim in town,
and I was in a town full of them. Probably the most hip, happening and certainly hot place in the whole of the 1980s. Vice City. Oh, I know Vice City is still around today and having something a revival as corruption and depravity come back into fashion, but in the 80s it was something else. The place was on fire. Sometimes literally. When I first arrived there it was a thriving metropolis, and despite my best efforts, it still stands. I don't think I could ever claim to have been king of the city, (my therapist complains a lot about my grandiosity, whatever that means) but certainly I was the crown prince and for a while, I was also the court jester.
Anyway, enough about me. And back to the 80s.
And tell all your friends about this site. If enough people visit, I'll win a prize from my guidance counselor.
Oh, and here's a little e-postcard that I just learned how to make.
Send it to your friends, if they're into this sort of thing.
Send Rollerskater Vice City Postcard
You are visitor number
ESRB PRIVACY ONLINE CERTIFIED PRIVACY STATEMENT
WHAT'S NEW
A whole lot, actually. Paulo has been working over time, and no mistake. Have a butchers and let me know what you think. In fact, on second thoughts, have a butchers and keep it to yourselves. I really don't care.
I'm just about done with this website bollocks. Ever since all the porno sites started charging, it's a mug's game.
MUSIC
Well, as Jezz Torrent once said, music is the food of love, or in my case a massively under-valued career as a record plugger. The 80s was the best period ever for music, at least in my life. I loved it. Great records. Hot girls. Me on every guest list from here to somewhere else (well, not from here, I wasn't in a frigging halfway house, and I can assure you the parties in here are rubbish, unless you like discussing childhood traumas with pillocks on tranquilisers, but from, well, Kent to Vice City, like me) and so on and so forth. I had the time of my life back then. Music, nightclubs, girls, so many flipping girls. More girls than I could count if I could only count to five. But above all music and that's what this section is all about: music.
Well, not just any music, but my favourites, or as they say across the pond, favorites. Here's some of them.
What a record. What an intro. What a gang! Wonderful stuff. Reason I went into the music business, actually, and as a direct result, the reason the music business is where it is today.
And I tell you so did I, so far away, but that's another story and i can't be bothered to tell it. Flock of Seagulls were one of the first bands I took over to the States, when the new wave thing went really big. I never got the credit I deserved.
Rob and the boys knew a thing or two about rock music. People often used to say that to me as well, but they were usually wrong. A great track this one, and I was personally responsible for breaking Priest in America.
Well, thankfully, I didn't, but these guys did. You have to love the Cutting Crew. Great lads. Great music. A real tear jerker at the end of the disco. Another track that I discovered and helped to make huge around the world. Again, the cruel hand of fate meant I didn't get the recognition I deserved, but a magic record.
Possibly my favourite ever record about nuclear war. I used to know a woman sounded just like that Blondie bird. Of course, I like a lot of other records, too. But I liked these ones a lot, probably more than most.
TIMELINE & EVENTS
1979
- Margaret Thatcher is elected the first woman Prime Minister in Britain’s history. Although this is debatable.
- Mother Theresa receives the Nobel Peace Prize. A young school boy from Kent, Paul, gets an honourable mention after breaking up a fight. Bitter at his lack of achievement, he is forever turned towards the darkside.
- Iranian students storm the US embassy there, holding 66 people hostage for 444 days.
- Skylab falls into the Indian Ocean.
- Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols dies at age 22. Luckily, in Kent, a new kind of punk is born.
- The Soviets invade Afghanistan. Paul invades his sister’s bedroom while she is having it off with Martin, a local fireman.
- The mullet enters the fashion picture. Thank god.
- The Shah is exiled from Iran, and the Ayatollah Khomeini assumes power and introduces an Islamic law.
- Asteroids is invented, a videogame where you pilot your triangular spaceship and shoot at anything that moves.
- Cellular phones invented. Thankfully, it is twenty years before the wankers’ring tone becomes popular.
1980
- Ronald Reagan is elected President.
- Sony invents the Walkman.
- Rubik’s cube is invented. Let the party begin.
- Fame, Xanadu, and The Empire Strikes Back are big movies.
- John Lennon is assassinated. An attempt is made on Kent Paul’s life by Mark Cosgrove after Paul is caught staring at Mark Cosgrove’s mum while she is in the bath. Paul escape’s with his life.
- Alex Shrub elected to congress.
- CNN is introduced to the world. It has been boring me rigid ever since.
- Post-It Notes are invented. Thank god! People have been crying out for a combination of sticky tape and paper. Now, everyone can sleep easy.
- US representative Michael Myers is convicted with conspiracy and bribery and expelled from Congress on October 2, 1980.
- Mount St. Helens erupts in Washington State, killing 36. Paul’s skin erupts as well, as acne ravages his complexion and stops him scoring at all, apart from with a fat girl.
- Over 50 nations boycott the 22nd Olympic Games, held in Moscow. As a result, Alan Wells wins the 100m in a time of 23 minutes.
- Hostilities between US and Australia.
- War breaks out between Iraq and Iran.
- Hepatitis B vaccine invented.
1981
- Prince Charles and Lady Diana are married in a ceremony broadcast to 750 million people worldwide. In Kent, a street party goes hideously wrong when your hero sets fire to 10 miles of bunting and burns four houses down.
- Early Degenatron systems appear in arcade. It will be several years before they appear in the home.
- Pope John Paul is shot at four times in an attempted assassination. He lives.
- MTV is launched.
- Bob Marley dies of cancer.
- Assasination attempt on Ronald Reagan by John Hinckley. Reagan survives.
- Raiders of the Lost Ark introduces the world to Indiana Jones.
- The Smurfs cartoon makes its debut. People have been crying out for a series about blue dwarfs sharing one communal wife, so it is a runaway success, especially at petrol stations.
- Member’s Only jackets rule fashion scene. Did anyone say “wanker?”
- Bill Gates announces that “640K ought to be enough for anybody.” What on earth is he talking about? The man is worth billions.
- Janet Cooke wins a Pulitzer Prize for a story about “Jimmy,” an 8-year-old heroin addict. The story is a lie, the Pulitzer prize revoked. And Perkins reckons I’m the only liar?
- New immune deficiency disease is called “GRID.” (“Gay-related immune deficiency.”)
- Iran releases American hostages after being held for 444 days.
- MS-Dos invented, apparently by someone who couldn’t spell.
- Wave 103 appears on the radio.
- Paul gets arrested for smashing up Mark Cosgrove’s car after Mark Cosgrove steals Paul’s first proper girlfriend, May. From now on, Paul will be a hard hearted bastard and never let a bird get him down.
- First IBM- PC invented.
- President of Egypt, Anwar al-Sadat assassinated.
- “Yorkshire Ripper,” who murdered 13 women in England, is caught and arrested.
- Ten prisoners die in Belfast after a 65 day hunger strike. Similar attempts at hunger strikes in the Kent region are met with a swift clip round the ear.
1982
- The compact disc is released. Vinyl sales go to an all time low. I’m still big into the mix tape.
- Florida secessionist movement starts. It never gets very far.
- Princess Diana gives birth to Prince William. One day, he will be king, but I won’t be. Life ain’t fair.
- Falklands War begins and ends. I am cruelly denied the Victoria Cross.
- Mass. Representative Gerry Studds admits to having sex with a 17 year old boy, and announces he’s gay. He continues to win elections until retiring in1996.
- Pole Position becomes the first successful driving videogame.
- Jack Howitzer picture “Evacuator” reinvents the cinema.
- Checkered Vans are the most popular shoes all over.
- Kent Paul is born. Me, Paulo, leaves East Kent for Florida and a crack at the big time. I’m a wide eyed little bleeder of 17. People begin to call me Kent Paul.
- Moon Boots and ear cuffs are the rage. Pink and Green are the coolest colors, best if worn together. It is a dark time for fashion.
- Yuppies start to “Do lunch.” I start to “Do trumpet.”
- The Term AIDS is used for the first time.
- USA Today newspaper is born.
- Princess Grace of Monaco killed in a car crash.
- Human growth hormone genetically engineered.
1983
- President Reagan proposes a space laser weapons system, called the Strategic Defensive Initiative. Otherwise known as “Star Wars.”
- Margaret Thatcher is reelected as Prime Minister of Britain.
- Korean airlines boeing 747 is shot down over the USSR by a Soviet fighter jet.
- Karen Carpenter dies from an eating disorder.
- Australia win America’s cup, breaking a 132 year victory run for the US. Ha bleeding ha.
- The US invades Grenada to eliminate Cuban military presence. They soon occupy the country.
- Sally K. Ride is the first woman ever to go into space.
- There are five thousand confirmed cases of AIDS in the United States, but Ronald Reagan still won’t mention the words AIDS in public.
- Soft bifocal contact lenses invented. From now on, glasses are a choice.
- Swatch watches hit the market.
1984
- Beef Shot exposed for using too many chemicals and no beef in their hamburgers.
- Marvin Gaye is shot dead by his father after an argument.
- Ronald Reagan is reelected.
- American scientists announce global warming, or the “Greenhouse Effect.” Now everybody denies it.
- Indira Ghandi is assassinated by one of her own bodyguards. Her son, Rajiv, succeeds her.
- Frankie says “Relax!” Kent Paul says “Get bang on one!”
- "Just the Five of Us" is a big hit. So am I.
- During a radio microphone test, Ronald Reagan says “My fellow Americans, I am pleased to tell you I just signed legislation which outlaws Russia forever. The bombing begins in five minutes.” It is accidentally aired. Bloody genius.
- The Olympics take place in Los Angeles, and are boycotted by the Soviet Union.
- The UK and China agree that Hong Kong will go back to China in 1997.
- Toxic gas leaks in India, killing 2,000. Toxic gas leaks in my house, causing an attractive girl to leave and never call me again.
- Apple Macintosh is invented.
1985
- Mikhail Gorbachev is named the new Soviet leader.
- Home Degenatron system appears.
- Giggle Cream is released with famous slogan “Make desserts funny” - three million dead brain cells later, you’ll laugh at anything.
- Live Aid - Sixty of the world’s top stars get together and sing together in harmony to raise money for starving Alaskans. It raises $60 million.
- The French sink the Greenpeace flagship “Rainbow Warrior” in Aukland. French defense minister is forced to resign. Nice one. Shooting a load of peace protestors.
- Youngest girl genius ever graduates from Oxford University. She is 13. I went there too. Five times.
- 153 hostages held on a hijacked TWA plane by Shi’ite terrorists are released. One person is dead.
- Jack Howitzer is cruelly denied an Oscar for his performance as an American with a desire to kill lots of foreigners in their own country.
- Nancy Reagan lets the world know her strong beliefs about the death penalty: “I believe that people would be alive today if there were a death penalty.”
- UK starts screening blood donations for AIDS.
- Cash machines go nationwide.
- Windows program invented for Macintosh. Fascinating, or what?
1986
- The US space shuttle Challenger blows up seconds after liftoff, killing everyone on board.
- Halley’s Comet comes back after 76 years. And very boring it is too.
- 20 year old Mike Tyson becomes the youngest heavyweight champion in boxing history. Lucky for him, he never called me out.
- "Yuppie and the Alien" is the biggest thing on the box.
- USSR has a nuclear disaster when a power plant in Chernobyl releases dangerous levels of radioactivity into the atmosphere.
- Prince Andrew and Fergie get married. Sailor and a ginger - I don’t need to tell you the rest.
- "Exploder" is film of the year. (excluding the dodgy Steve Scott ones)
- People wear banana clips… it was a very dark time.
- Ronald Reagan still hasn’t mentioned the word AIDS in public even though 42,000 cases have been diagnosed, and 25,000 people are dead from the disease.
- Spain and Portugal join Europe. Where was they before? Australia?
- Sweden’s Prime Minister is killed by a lone gunman on the streets.
- The Iran-Contra Scandal blows up. Corrupt politician! Stop the bleeding press!
- John McCarthy, a British journalist is kidnapped and remains in captivity for five and a half years.
- Kurt Waldheim’s nazi past is revealed as he runs for president of Austria.
- Synthetic skin invented.
- Statue of Liberty celebrates 100th anniversary. Plans to replace it with a statue of me are put on temporary hold.
- Summit at Reykjavik, between Gorbachev and Reagan. They both decide it’s a hard place to spell.
1987
- Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is reelected for the third time. Doubts persist in my family.
- 200 people are killed during the Herald of Free Enterprise ferry disaster, which capsized in the English Channel.
- Techno music triumphs. The price of synthesizers and sequencers drop. Great times.
- Condom commercial appears on TV for first time. Strangely, super stud Kent Paul is not selected to show them off.
- The first 3-D videogame is released. Degenatron begins to look a little old hat.
- Reagan and Gorbechev meet in Washington and sign the INF, marking the beginning of the end of the cold war.
- Giggle cream is withdrawn after people had too much fun.
- Blox is found to be too toxic for domestic usage and becomes part of US defense strategy instead.
- The USS Stark is attacked by an Iraqi missile. The attack is apparently accidental.
- An Int’l agreement is signed to protect the ozone layer by not increasing use of CFCs.
- Disposable contact lenses are invented.
- Stock markets around the world crash on “Black Monday.”
- Kent Paul crashes on Black Thursday after a three month bender.
- Bill Gates becomes microcomputing’s first billionaire.
- The worlds five billionth inhabitant is born in Yugolsavia. Poor bastard.
- Max Headroom is new TV star. He doesn’t exist. You work it out.
MOVIES
I loved movies back then.
Films was films and they was easy to understand. There was a good guy, an American or something, and a lot of bad guys, often from Eastern Europe or Vietnam or whatnot, and the good guy would go and kill loads of bad guys, and bring about peace using lots of weapons and killing anyone who didn't understand or couldn't sing the American anthem. How things change, hey?
Howitzer played Tim, a vet with nothing left to prove who gets called into action and kills loads of foreigners for no apparent reason in Cambodia or Camden or somewhere. I remember there was loads of body bags and a big knife with a toothpick. Can't remember much else.
TV SHOWS
I didn't watch much TV in the 80s. I was too busy chasing skirt. But maybe you did. Square! Anyway, there were a few shows I loved. And these ones were on television too.
FADS & FASHIONS
Well, there were loads of stupid things in the 80s, like having big hair or really narrow ties, but I wasn't going to talk about clothes. One thing that isn't so popular now is roller skating. But it was in Vice City. I always thought it was a 70s thing, and besides which, no self respecting man would ever go on roller skates, but this bird did and lots of men who thought they was birds did and all, but I've never been a fan of roller skating or whatever that stupid thing they do now is, as I'm not a pillock. Anyway, she's a pretty girl, and I should know. I had her. Probably.
GREAT 80S QUOTES
The lines that set the tone for the decade from the great and the not so great...and remember, these change every month or whenever I remember.
Margaret Thatcher
"We're not building missiles to fight a war. We're building missiles to preserve the peace."
Ronald Reagan
"Give them what they want. Only build it cheap, so it falls down after five years." Avery Carrington
"In those days, I didn't know my ass from my elbow. Luckily, a lot of other people did." Educator and philanthropist, Candice Shand, formerly exotic dancer and adult star Candy Suxx
"At the end of the day, we promise only one thing, and one thing only, that as it pertains to conditions in this state and in this great city, nothing will ever be precisely the way it seemed before, in so far as I think we are all aware that government is not and can never be an institution we respect, more that it is the most effective repository of your tax dollars." Vice City Congressman, Alex Shrub
Ronald Reagan
FOOD
One thing that hasn't changed since the 80s is the fact that people need to eat to survive. And they still do. And in the 80s it was all about two things - nouvelle cuisine (tiny portions for rich people who spoke French) and absolute poisonous crap for the rest of us. How things change!
Anyway, right, I never was a ponce, whatever my brother might say, so I always liked to eat basic sort of stuff. No endangered species on toast for me, unlike certain morons I could mention, so there are my two favourite eateries in the whole bleeding world. Food fit for a king, and much better than the crap we get in here. Healthy, nutrituous and never did me no harm.
Mall Food Court - absolutely top idea. Loads of different kinds of processed, deep fried, highly carcinogenic food under one roof. Bloody marvelous. I went mental first time I came into one of these.
Candy Suxx, Avery Carrington, BJ Jones, Alex Shrub, Pastor Richards, Jack Howitzer, MANY MORE...
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
COMPUTER GAMES
Nerd central this one. Squares with milk bottle glasses. But lots more fun than that crap they play today. Real games, you could play for hours on end until you were hallucinating and had burnt your retinas doing the same thing over and over again. Remember the Degenatron? I picked one of these up when it fell off the back of a lorry and I bloody loved it. My cousin now makes a fortune selling pirated PlayStation games down at Ramsgate Saturday market, so it's funny how things turn out, isn't it? Still, in case you were wondering, my cousin is a right wanker.
CARS
Here's a few pictures of cars I found. Basically, cars haven't changed much, although they have in a way. What I mean is, good luck finding a people carrier or a sports utility vehicle back then. Station wagons, sports cars and that sort of thing. I also found a picture of a speedboat, which is very nice indeed...
Car for suburban mothers.
Look at this ponce on a moped. Really fancies himself, doesn't he?
Beautiful little speedboat.
You know what they say about a bloke with an expensive sportscar... Trying to hide certain inadequacies?
last month's entry
Well, they had cars in the 80s, and lots of them were stupid, but I can't find any photos. Instead I found this funny photo. I'll grant you it isn't a car. It's a golf cart, but its more interesting than a car. Now, only idiots played golf, but driving the carts was quite fun, especially after a five day bender at the Malibu. But it was when the Yuppies got really into golf but they was too lazy to walk that it all got silly.
NOTE: Golf is a stupid game for people who like wearing silly trousers, but the golf club was a nice place to hang out, especially if you knew everybody in town, Perkins.
CLOTHES
Well the 80s was all about expressing yourself. About putting on a show to hide the fact you was an empty shell of a human being inside. Unfortunately, this was not always a good thing, as this line up of absolute plonkers will make all too clear to you. These are all shots taken by me of random passers by one afternoon in Vice City many years ago.
Look at this "man" - least said, soonest mended.
Contrary to what you might imagine, this bird is not blind. She just dresses like she is. Looks like she got run over by the road markings machine. What a stupid slag.
A right fox this bird. She's wearing sunglasses to hide the tears because I just broke her heart. Honest.
Aaah! The timeless charm of leopard skin! Another bird with real deficiencies in the taste department. A moose disguised as a leopard. Look at those bags. Bet she's going into the kind of debt it takes twenty years to pay off. Reckon her knockers are fake and all.
SOCIAL PROBLEMS
Paul's TOP TEN SOCIAL PROBLEMS OF THE 1980's
10. Rollerskaters
My feelings on rollerskaters are well known. Mugs. But real irritating. Try, the Aerobics instructor is heading down the pavement, dreaming of his dream date and smacks straight into you. What a pain. Just cause I'd had a skinful, you prat.
9. Self Help Programmes
These idiots were everywhere. You couldn't turn on the TV or the radio but you'd get some plonker trying to tell you how to make things better. First up, I remember some nutter who thought he was a Viking. Called himself Thor, as you do. Advised you to unleash the Viking within. Called birds wenches and warned you to beware of the frost giant. Frost giant? It was a hundred degrees every day, you mug! Then there was that thief Jeremy Robard. What was his thing? Think your way to success. That was his three step programme, although it turned out he was actually a drug dealer or something like that. Either way, he was a prat. But, if you need someone to tell you how to become successful and get on in this world, then you're no friend of mine.
8. Giggle Cream
Big scandal about this stuff. Was a spray cream with far too much propellant and far too little cream. Got banned in 1988 after someone laughed themselves to death or something like that.
7. Used Car Salesmen
Same the world over. Only in Vice City, they went one step further. They'd sell you a car they hadn't even bothered to change the number plates on after they nicked it. Bloody cheek. Particularly the ones with celebrity endorsements.
6. Stalkers
Right pain in the ass when you're in the music business. Some nutter gets on your case and starts hassling you every time you open your bleeding eyes, then they try and kill you. Nightmare.
5. Blox
Very unpleasant cleaning fluid. Not very funny if you threw it on someone, I can tell you. "Blox kills indiscriminately" went the advert. Certainly worked on my brain.
4. Gangs
Irritating little pillocks who think they can tell you what to do. Mug you. Be rude about your clothes. Sell you drugs. Sleep with your girlfriend. Very, very annoying. I moved with a better class of person myself.
3. Ammunation
This store would sell a gun to anyone, any time. Still do. Now, round my way, being tooled up does not mean having a weapon.
2. Bikers
They didn't wash. They didn't like anyone. They liked to beat people up and take their clothes.
1. Kent Paul
I changed my mind. I really was public enemy number one. And I CAN count to ten, so up yours, Perkins.