Nostalgia Nonsense #1 – HBO in the 80’s

This is a new feature that I’ve decided to do just because the idea came to me to do it.

I have no idea when and if I’ll do another one, but for now I’ll leave it open for the possibility.

As a kid growing up in the Midwestern US in the 80’s, I was even then (obviously) a HUGE movie fan.

Before my parents would allow me to ride my bike with friends to the multiplex a mile and a half away, I had to make do with what I could find on TV to watch.

In 1982, when I was 8, we got cable TV and for some reason, the only two pay channels that my parents were willing to get were The Disney Channel and HBO.

I still recall how I would eagerly await the monthly cable guy days before the new month would begin in order to see the schedule of the movies that would be on these channels during the next 30 days. I’d mark the “guide” and also mark my calendar whenever there was a movie that I wanted to watch.  Since we didn’t yet have a VCR (that only would happen in 1987), I had to watch anything that I was interested in live which became quite a task.

The majority of those movies that I watched over those years were on HBO and I recall how excited I would get when the HBO intro would begin before the movie itself began.

Last week, I watched the movie Flashpoint (1984) which was HBO’s first theatrically released movie and in the very beginning of the copy that I watched, there was a glimpse of that HBO intro.  This reminded me of that nostalgic time oif yesteryear when I would get excited by this intro, so I scoured YouTube to find it so I can share this Nostalgic Nonsense of mine with you.

Does anyone else besides me have memories of this?  I’d love to hear about it.