[mathattack]

I recall climbing up our 2 story middle school's roof to look for tennis balls that we accidentally hit up there. I can't imagine that happening today. Same with climbing up our house's drain pipe to let ourselves in the 2nd floor window. And the list keeps growing.

[zhte415]

I love the memory of 'recalling' balls. Mainly footballs. Terraced by terraced houses, it was not unusual to scale a 10 foot brick wall (leg-up from friends) - getting back was the hard part.

Exiting the school gates to walk up the road (because the particular wall was unscalable, or there were dogs) was uncomfortable: "Ding-dong [at the front door of the neighbouring house]. Please Sir, may we have our ball back?" where a usually polite person would visit their back garden to return a football'.

And climbing on the roof of a Victorian structure where sand-brick was weathered sufficiently over a century of school children climbing up it to provide nice pockets and footholds.

Is this seriously not the case today? I'm only in my 30s...