A warm welcome to my today’s guest blogger Chicky Kadambari. She is the first friend from virtual world whom I had the pleasure of meeting in the real world. And she is also the first virtual friend whom I have met the mostest. Well, that’s because we stay in the same city and we meet up frequently for chai and lunch parties for just the two of us!
Kaddu, as she is fondly called, is a multi-talented and has diverse skills and interests. She is a Reiki healer, foodie, bibliophile, artist, amateur photographer and of course a versatile blogger. Her writings @ miss_teerious are fun and inspiring. I hope you enjoy her fun post today as much as I did.
Okay Chicky, the floor is all yours.
Do you remember those good old days when we used to chat on Yahoo Messenger? There was a phase in my life when I used to be online on Yahoo Chat all through my waking hours. I had even installed a Yahoo Pingbox on my blog’s sidebar, so that my readers could ping me on Yahoo while they were visiting my blog! Planned an entire bloggers’ meet in New Delhi via that Pingbox! But, you know what’s the one thing I miss most about Yahoo Messenger? It’s those smileys!
Yes, there are so many new smileys now, both on Facebook as well as my “smart”phone, but somehow, none of these new smileys have been able to replace some of my most used Yahoo smileys from those golden days!
Here’s my list of the 10 Yahoo smileys I miss the most:
Laughing :))
One of the most commonly used Yahoo smileys! Sometimes, used in succession… half-a-dozen :))s one after the other. For long laughs, you know! Take a look at the smiley though. See how the upper jaw moves to give the impression of actually laughing? Try to laugh that way now. Go on… try it. Hold your lower jaw still and try to laugh moving only your upper jaw. Can you do it? Hahahaha! :))
Tongue : P
Oh! That was such a cute tongue-face! It always reminded me of my cousin, Rishabh, who was a toddler back then, and often made this particular face, with quite astonishing similarity. In fact, there was a time when : P had actually become a part of my real-life vocabulary. I remember once telling someone on phone that – “Rishabh was doing a : P”! He he! : P
Blushing :”>
Look at those cheeks! Redder than the Grihshobha “sharam se laal huyi” column! This smiley was especially handy when flirting with someone. At times, it was used in conjunction with : P when, say you were chatting during your “drunk Kaddu” state (i.e. close to midnight), and you happened to make some really embarrassing typos and the other person went :)) on you! :”> : P
Devil >:)
The most I’ve used this smiley was during chats with Mahesh (a Reiki friend and ex-blogger). There was a special kind of fun in online leg-pulling of your chat partner, just so you could make this smiley at him/her. If we all hadn’t bid our farewells to Yahoo Messenger so long ago, I think I would have been using it the most on OB (the blog buddy I have bullied and ragged the most) in recent times!Nothing adds that final punch to your ragging better than this purple smiley with horns! What do you say? >:)
Angry X(
This was usually your chat partner’s reaction after you’d been pulling his/her leg for some time and had finally used that horny devil on him/her! I mostly used it just to create my “angry young woman” image. I think the only times I really meant this smiley was when Shreesh (an old Reiki teacher and friend) used to “put me on hold” during Yahoo chats, and then just… disappear! Hmmmmppphhh! X(
ROTFL =))
This was either used after a round of >:) and X( i.e. devil and anger, or just before a sequence of :”> and : P i.e. blushing and tongue-face. This is the one Yahoo smiley that I miss the most. Man! I think I’ve stopped laughing like that in real-life too now! I got to use it the most with Shreesh. He said the funniest things at times. While I happened to be in my “drunk Kaddu” state close to midnight, he used to be like that all the time! =))
Waiting :-w
I think I had to use this smiley only during chats with Shreesh! Didn’t I just mention how he used to put people on hold and then disappear? This is what us poor “people” did while we were on hold… we drummed our fingers against our monitor screen… while he attended his distraction and remembered (or not) to return on chat! :-w
Rolling Eyes 8-|
This one could represent one of several things… impatience, exasperation, disbelief. It was actually used quite commonly. I miss this one a lot too. Hasn’t anyone (Facebook or android) come up with a substitute for this? I actually have to write “[rolling eyes]” now, every time I want to use this smiley! [rolling eyes] See! 8-|
Confused :-/
Chats used to be (still are) very confusing at times, and not just because of the typos. That’s when this smiley came in handy back in the Yahoo Messenger days. It was so much easier to just type :-/ than ask “What do you mean?” I think this was another smiley I used the most during chats with Shreesh. He used to share some heavy stuff at times. Even after all these years, I still haven’t got a clue about some of that stuff! :-/
Wave :-h
And that’s how we used to end our chat conversations back in “those” days! All nice and proper… with a goodbye wave! 🙂 I miss this as much as I miss the ROTFL smiley! It’s been so long since we waved proper goodbyes to our chat partners, hasn’t it? At times, I still use the characters on gchat or whatsapp or Facebook, even though they don’t convert into the actual smiley. But, it’s so good to find a Yahoo chat pro occasionally, who remembers what these characters meant!
And that brings an end to my list of the 10 Yahoo smileys I miss the most! So, on this note, I must bid you goodbye! :-h
Which one of these do you miss the most?
32 Responses
Oh, I don’t remember using these smileys available in your comments section before, Shilpa. But now, this guest post has inspired me to use them 🙂
My experience with Yahoo Messenger has not been interesting enough to warrant the use of smileys! 😛
Destination Infinity
Hahaha! We used to try Yahoo emoticons like this! One after the other!
But really, Yahoo Messenger was an even bigger craze back then than FB is now! How come you never had interesting episodes on it to reminiscence about?
I miss Yahoo smileys the most. They were fantastic. Wish whatsapp starts something like that. I just feel like using whatsapp because of those smileys.
Harini, I think you were around at the time when I installed that pingbox. Do you remember?
I wish whatsapp would get these smileys in its list. That would be just awesome!
I have never used the Yahoo messenger to miss the smileys but I had such a fun time reading this post. Loved the smileys and more than that, loved the story behind each one of them as to why you like it 😀
Thank you, Swathi! I’m really so happy that you enjoyed reading through it! 🙂
Hi Kadambari. It’s a pleasure to see you here! 🙂 I loved Yahoo smileys, though I wasn’t much active on Yahoo Messenger then. ROTFL and Rolling eyes 🙄 are my absolute favorites.Have you seen the smileys on Skype? Some of them are so cute, especially the Yawn, Wink and Cheeky one, though Laugh one looks a bit rude 🙂
Thank you for having me here as a guest! No, I haven’t even logged into Skype for ages. I’m not sure I even remember my user name and password there!
What a fun post! I’d forgotten about some of those smilies!
Ah ha, so you used Yahoo Messenger too? Were you an addict? 😛
Hi Chicky. How nice to see you here. This was such a fun post. Brought back so many memories of the good old days. 🙂 I miss those smileys and you are right, none of the newer ones can really take the place of those classic ones. I mentally compare all the newer ones against the yahoo ones. Silly, no? 😛 I used most of the smileys you mentioned quite regularly for the same reasons as mentioned. There was one more that we used to start a conversation with. This one>’ :-?’ It took the place of ‘Hey, Are u there?/Online?’
Ohhhhh! I do that too, Shantala! Compare all the new smileys against the benchmark set by Yahoo, but they never meet the bar! (Not our group “BAR”!)
Yes, I remember that one… I didn’t use it that often, but, Shreesh used it a lot. 😀
This was a really fun post. I think I miss the ROFL the most. ☺
I know… they should come up with something for that soon. It is essential.
Wow! That was such a cute post and you are so right! Those Yahoo messenger smileys were the best thing ever. Until I read this mail, I had totally forgotten about them. Glad K wrote about them on your blog Shilpa. Such a fantabulous post 🙂 🙂
P.S. I read it twice! So you both know how much I enjoyed! 😀
Awwww! Thanks Parul! 😀 And you’re so right… they were the best thing ever to happen on the internet!
That ROTFL smiley!! I miss it every day!
I think of it all the time, and I dream of it at night…
Oh that ROTFL smiley….
(yes, I can be that emo about a smiley!)
I hear you, Sreesha! And I feel the same way about that smiley!
Oh that ROTFL smiley….
This makes me so nostalgic esp the blushing and waiting and rolf.. omg! they need to come back!
I know, Pooja! They do indeed!
Kaddu, I never have seen this, but I can see why you would miss them: how much fun they all are! I would have played with them tons! Is there an emoticon/image for that? 😉 I SO love ROTFL or =)) as well as Blushing :”> how cute is that?! 😉 And not to mention Rolling Eyes 8-| as I do that a lot in real life! 😉 However, as you probably noticed by now, I use simple smiles 🙂 (without a nose) and winks 😉 a lot to tease and denote a sense of fun. 😉 (ah, now that didn’t work…clicking on emoticon above!) Oh, and BTW, we have a lot in common as I studied Reiki, am a foodie (if that means I love food!) ;), bibliophile, artist at heart, amateur photographer, and versatile blogger – I know write some fiction! 😉 <3.
Elly, you won’t believe it! At times, our chats merely consisted of exchanging smileys for several minutes at a go! We were so addicted to them!
You have studied Reiki too? Which level? Do you practice regularly?
Oh the wink did work: cool! 🙂
All your winks worked, Elly! 😀
oooo you reminded me of good old days. I was always on messenger even though it used to kill my CPU performance. I loved the black eye smiley. You know the one it boxes and the eye becomes black 😀 Sometimes I would chat just using the smileys 😛 Loved reading Kaddu 😀
Black eye smiley… we didn’t use it much. Very occasionally with Shreesh. And yeah, we did that too… it was so much fun. And you remember audibles? There was a phase of chatting with audibles too! Thanks Raji! 😀
hehe I miss all of these! The waiting one, ahh I used to love that one!
What was your yahoo chat handle, Nabanita? Maybe we all should have a group chat on yahoo someday… to refresh memories!
This is such a fun post. Loved the ROTFL most. 🙂
Thanks Vinitha! It’s the one I love the most too!
awwww… I miss these small thumbnail animated smilies too… Especially the lol and Rofl ones- have always been my favourite because when I laugh I laugh just like that 😀 😆
Hahahaha! Exactly, Shesha! Or maybe rolling on the chair if not on the floor!