Letter to my Grandchildren

To who ever finds this letter,

My name is Ted Jones and I am 15 years old. 

I am writing to you to tell you what life is like in the 1990's so you can compare it to your life.  I am also writing because you may find it interesting to read about the past in the first hand.

I have three sisters, Lucy who is 18,Hannah who is 13 and Jodie who is 8.  Jeanette lives with her boyfriend and her daughter Nicole who is 5, so that makes me an uncle.  My two other sisters are still at school.  My parents' names are Mick and Christine.  My dad owns a Japanese car repair and spare parts business.  My mum works in Rooks Heath High School.  We have a dog, he is an English Springer Spaniel.  He needs a lot of exercise because his breed of dog is bred as a gun dog so they have very good endurance.  He goes for at least one run in the park every day.

  I remember when we first got him.  We knew as soon as we saw him looking out at us from his little kennel that we had to have him.

I like shooting, Clay Pigeon shooting and Air Rifle Shooting.  For Clay Pigeon Shooting I have a 12 bore shotgun.  To have a shotgun you need a shotgun license.  Just recently there has been an outcry for a ban on privately owned handguns after the Dunblain massacre, which was when a lunatic broke into a school and gunned down a class of children and their teacher.  It was tragic.  The shooting I do is just for sport and is well supervised., this handgun ban could also bring a tightening on getting a shotgun license so it would be harder to get one.  I shoot what is called Skeet mostly but I also shoot Compact Sporting.  I go Clay Pigeon Shooting every Saturday at West London Shooting Grounds in Ruislip.

I remember the first time I ever shot a shotgun, it was my uncles 12 bore semi automatic and it very nearly knocked me off of my feet, I was only 10 years old.  It shocked me so I didn't start shooting until I was 13 and a bit bigger and stronger.  For air Rifle shooting I have a Webley .177 air rifle, you don't need a license to own an air rifle.  I also like playing football, I have a lot of trophies but I gave up football a few years ago.  I enjoy playing Tennis.  I used to go Karting every Saturday and there was a race on the first Sunday of every month, but I had a crash and gave it up for a long time.  I still enjoy going indoor Karting with my friends and I am still quite good at it.

I support Arsenal FC and I go to Highbury (their home ground) to watch them play as much as I can.  My favourite players are David Seaman, Dennis Bergkamp, Paul Merson and Ian Wright.  At the moment David Seaman is the England Goalkeeper and I think he is the best goalkeeper in the world.

I have a small 50cc scrambler (which is a motorbike for racing on dirt tracks).  I got it when I was about 10.  I can remember coming down the stairs on Christmas day and seeing it, I was amazed.

I have a P.C. it is a Cyrix 6*86 P166+, 16Mb RAM and 1000Mb hard drive.  I know that probably sounds pathetic to you but at the moment it is not a bad computer.  I am hoping to get on the Internet in the next couple of weeks.  The Internet is quite new.  But it has only started to get more popular in the last year or so.

My favourite film is called Independence Day which I saw in the Cinema a couple of weeks ago, it is about a load of aliens who attack Earth and try to take it over.  My favourite T.V program is Match of the Day which is on every Saturday. It shows all of the goals scored on that day and shows highlights of a few matches.

I have lived through a few wars but none on British soil, thank God.  There are wars going on right now in the Far East.  There has been Nuclear Testing by the French under the sea near New Zealand and people who live in New Zealand were very unhappy about it.  It didn't really affect me because it is a very long way away from England and the tests are supposed to be safe anyway, but I do think they shouldn't happen any more just in case of an accident which could ruin many people's lives for generations, like the Nucleur bombing by the Americans on Hiroshima in Japan.

A few weeks ago the Americans attacked Iraq because they were trying to take over somewhere else.  They have been using cruise missiles but Nucleur weapons have been banned from all warfare.

Electric cars have been invented but they are still very slow although they are getting faster.  Solar panels are being used but they are still very expensive and you need a lot of them to make a decent amount of power, although they are getting better.

I hope that in the future I can get a really well paid job so I can buy a massive house and a very fast and expensive sports car.  My dream job would be to be a Formula 1 driver.  There is quite a big risk but you get paid huge wages, you get to go all around the world and I find racing brilliant fun.  I would like to get a pilots license and buy a small bi-plane so I could fly abroad whenever I wanted.

I am sure technology has moved on a long way since I wrote this letter, but this is how life is in 1996.

Yours sincerely

Ted Jones