You know you're "old school" when...

Poor Len `ere. Hed. asked if I could write a column and give Walt a break, since Walt is feeling under the weather. So here it is. But this is not about hockey. This is about getting old, which, to be honest, sucks.

Walt and I have been discussing we are really old (we have the same birthday) or just "old-school", meaning old(er) in our likes and habits, if not our bodies. [How about "both"? Ed.] We made a list of how to tell if you're "old school". Here it is. You know you're old school when...

You get your change back in bills and you put them all going the same direction.

You use the word "secretary" and not the phrase "administrative assistant".

You don't mind eating leftovers or wearing the same clothes for years.

You don't have any tattoos.

A "cents-off" coupon still motivates you to buy.

You still enjoy getting the paper off the driveway or porch and reading it.

You hand a child your phone and say "Would you fix this thing?"

You see value in food and items thrown away and remember your family's stories of the Great Depression.

"Budget" wasn't a bad word and "credit" was.

Duct tape was the handyman's secret weapon -- a fix for anything.

You squeeze every little bit out of the tube or keep the bottle upside down until it's empty.

You would rather go the office and drop off your résumé than post it online.

You thought a mouse was a rodent, a cloud was white and up in the sky, and Amazon was a river.

"Illegal" meant against the law, not an alien you're supposed to welcome as your neighbour.

It saddens you to keep seeing misspelled words, grammatical howlers and (especially) apostrophe errors in newspapers and magazines. (That one was for Ed.!)

You remember when real men played hockey without helmets and a hundred pounds of body armour. (That one's for me!)

You're browsing through the antique section of a resale shop and remember the days of LPs, 8-tracks, Coke bottles, and all those wonderful things that no-one makes any more.

Don't let anyone "age shame" you! There's nothing wrong with being "old school" or even just plain OLD! Everyone gets that way, sooner or later. Next time one of your kids makes fun of you for clinging to your old school ways [and values! Ed.], just smile and say "Just you wait..."