Anyone else "catching up" on their childhoods now?

Yeah I sadly continued to miss out on a lot of gaming stuff since I got stuck at home for longer due to further education, the 2008 recession, only having part time gigs, the pandemic, a garbage ex husband, NO MONEY, relatives' health, etc. I've been trying to play catch up with games, but whatwith work, studying, class, more studying, and organizational demands, it hasn't been easy. 
PLUS they would often rope together gaming, TV time, movie time, and computer time all into one "screen time" set where I basically HAD to choose whether to game, surf the web, watch a movie, or watch TV. Computer started winning out after a while especially once I discovered Youtube and emulators XD

My sibling did get to game longer than I did, so I would sneak their DS at night and play Kirby and Pokemon haha. My parent DID get on another anti-game kick at some point, and started heavily limiting their game time too (similar to your parents, gaming time became "earned") but the second that parent was out the door for whatever reason, I let my sibling hop on Roblox or a gaming console (while I read fanfiction or window shopped online, and/or listened to music on Youtube) because I felt bad for them too. We would hear the garage door noise and quickly rush back to whatever we were doing prior to said parent leaving XD My parent did the guilt trip thing a lot too. 

My sibling was allowed to play graphic war games and watch graphic war movies, because one parent was a MAJOR history buff and at least didn't buy into the idea that "media violence causes violence." When that line of thinking was ALL the rage, which was cool. That said, I'm pretty sure GTA was 100% banned because of THAT news story. Along with any R rated comedies or gorey slasher films XD 
M rated games were mostly a nonstarter for me, because I mostly just wanted to play cuddly platformers. WHICH my parent ALSO hated because "those games are for BABIES."
I REALLY couldn't win. 

darkrage6, unfortunately I never fully recovered from it. But I try to not be bitter, though it's hard sometimes ：/ I'm actually Aromantic myself. I do have a partner but I don't consider us particularly serious. I don't tell him that I love him, because that would be LYING and I'm a precious CHILD OF GOD (snort). Looking back, being Aro explained so much about my sheer disconnection with guys haha

I did religious school and education myself for a fair bit, so I feel you. Got a bizarrely decent education though, considering I did super well at college. Thankfully I got "too busy" for most church related activities in my middle school years, so it wasn't pushed as hard, though my parent STILL pushed for me to "be like those other girls.“ HENCE no cuddly platformer games past like age 14. (even then 14 was STILL too old, they just tolerated it)

Haha, I have major nostalgia for that weird craze, I remember all the 2004 Passion of the Christ hysteria and while some groups wouldn't take their children (according to a local radio show) others practically WORSHIPPED the movie and considered it a rite of passage to take their children. It did tickle me pink to see religious conservatives hurridley DRAGGING their kids to an extremely graphic R rated movie. How often do you see that? Weirdly enough, my parents...just refused to take sides there and ultimately never took me or my sibling, heck, I don't know if they bothered to see it. I've never actually seen it myself because it feels like glorification and sensationalism of torture. I get the torture IS the point, and good on them for going full FORWARD with it no matter what Hollywood said, but it's not my thing. I think post 9/11 hysteria and the war in the Middle East (which I remember being scared of then and now I cringe at now) definitely contributed to that time too. People were just in a mood, and religion was on the upswing, which we would see again in 2008-09 with the recession.

I sadly only caught a little bit of The Emperor's New School show at my relatives' house. I've heard it's actually worth watching! I have a LOT of Disney shows to catch up on TBH. I watched a fair bit of Recess/Pepper Ann/Doug/101 Dalmations as part of the ABC Saturday morning, but missed out on almost all the Disney afternoon, Kim Possible, Phineas and Ferb, etc. 

I never understood the appeal of watching TV on a treadmill personally, i'd find it way too distracting and be too worried about falling down and getting hurt due to being distracted by the TV.

Not gonna lie, this makes me wonder how watermill-powered TV would've been like.

Yeah I would just "walk" but it could be a pain still. I actually do not like treadmills even now! I'd rather run outside. 

Wait, there was an episode of Even Stevens that premiered first on ABC??? That's cool. 
I had moved away from Saturday morning TV by the time 2004-05ish rolled around, and preferred watching cartoons on cable (which we basically didn't have), so I missed out on a number of shows then. Especially Disney ones, when we went to the relatives, the TV was always on Nick or Cartoon Network, and TBH mostly Cartoon Network. I didn't really like Saturday mornings just being cable lite, because it just made me want cable! Kind of like how that Nick on CBS thing didn't catch me. No Spongebob or Fairly Oddparents? Rugrats for only a brief time? No thank you. 
EDIT: Oh yeah, not to disparage anyone who liked these blocks. If you had great youngster memories from these blocks, that's great!^_^