On Getting a Computer
.....Finally.
As I have been using the computer at work to surf the web and write
stuff on my blog for a while now, I finally broke down and decided that I need one of my own, especially if I want to be able to continue doing this sort of thing when I no longer work here.
"What?!??!!? You don't own a computer?"
No, and I haven't for some time now. (since 2001, as far as I can recall)
It's not that I can't use one, it's just that I really couldn't get all that excited about the internet, or computers in general for that matter. Yeah, I've had computers before:
A Southwest Technical Products that Dad got surplus. It had two terminals, a game called "Lander", and a 10meg hard drive (That weighed 60 pounds) it also had floppy disks (ever seen an 8" floppy?). But it was a beast to reckon with and soon broke down.
That wonderful TRS80 with the monochrome monitor and attached keyboard (actually the computer WAS the keyboard) that Mom and Dad got me. I named it, learned its language and taught it tricks. That was fun.
The less wonderful, but interesting TI-99. This one had a speech synthesiser, and a cassette deck to store programs. Still interested.
My one and only Apple, a II at that, now that was fun. I programmed it to do physics problems and a few little games, but then High School ended, and I went on to college.
Then came my first encounters with IBM and its many clones, classes in Fortran and C programming under the unmerciful direction of foreign grad students that only spoke little English, demanded much, and seemed to take great zeal in sucking every bit of enjoyment out of life. "You read book! Go do!" "Make calcurate pa-ree-gone air-yah! Due Friday!","My office close... You do for self!" Lockup, compiler errors and waining interest set in.
Next was (insert fanfair and ballyhoo) the internet! Now this was interesting, for the moment. I could e-mail distant relatives, buy junk on ebay and send instant messages, then my languishing machine crashed as interest began to wain again, I went about a year without a computer at home and didn't even miss it.
My next machine was a tribute to minimalism, a 486DX2-66 with a 40 meg hard drive, modem and sound card that I scavenged from junk parts. It was all I needed, simple and bare-boned, an internet answering machine if you will, it did what it had to do and nothing more. I was satisfied for a while.
Got married, computer crashed, Me and X got a notebook so she could
"write her novel and poetry" (Uh hmmm....no novel, no poetry, just solitare, solitare in bed, solitare at breakfast.."Can I use the computer?", "No, I'm busy with it".) Brief uses proved the internet to be a slow, cumbersome thing, laden with pop-ups and other frustrations and I simply said "Fuggit" and gave up.
And so has gone my relationship with this strange device that I once found so fascinating.
I'm gonna give it another chance now, before I turn completely Amish.
As I have been using the computer at work to surf the web and write
stuff on my blog for a while now, I finally broke down and decided that I need one of my own, especially if I want to be able to continue doing this sort of thing when I no longer work here.
"What?!??!!? You don't own a computer?"
No, and I haven't for some time now. (since 2001, as far as I can recall)
It's not that I can't use one, it's just that I really couldn't get all that excited about the internet, or computers in general for that matter. Yeah, I've had computers before:
A Southwest Technical Products that Dad got surplus. It had two terminals, a game called "Lander", and a 10meg hard drive (That weighed 60 pounds) it also had floppy disks (ever seen an 8" floppy?). But it was a beast to reckon with and soon broke down.
That wonderful TRS80 with the monochrome monitor and attached keyboard (actually the computer WAS the keyboard) that Mom and Dad got me. I named it, learned its language and taught it tricks. That was fun.
The less wonderful, but interesting TI-99. This one had a speech synthesiser, and a cassette deck to store programs. Still interested.
My one and only Apple, a II at that, now that was fun. I programmed it to do physics problems and a few little games, but then High School ended, and I went on to college.
Then came my first encounters with IBM and its many clones, classes in Fortran and C programming under the unmerciful direction of foreign grad students that only spoke little English, demanded much, and seemed to take great zeal in sucking every bit of enjoyment out of life. "You read book! Go do!" "Make calcurate pa-ree-gone air-yah! Due Friday!","My office close... You do for self!" Lockup, compiler errors and waining interest set in.
Next was (insert fanfair and ballyhoo) the internet! Now this was interesting, for the moment. I could e-mail distant relatives, buy junk on ebay and send instant messages, then my languishing machine crashed as interest began to wain again, I went about a year without a computer at home and didn't even miss it.
My next machine was a tribute to minimalism, a 486DX2-66 with a 40 meg hard drive, modem and sound card that I scavenged from junk parts. It was all I needed, simple and bare-boned, an internet answering machine if you will, it did what it had to do and nothing more. I was satisfied for a while.
Got married, computer crashed, Me and X got a notebook so she could
"write her novel and poetry" (Uh hmmm....no novel, no poetry, just solitare, solitare in bed, solitare at breakfast.."Can I use the computer?", "No, I'm busy with it".) Brief uses proved the internet to be a slow, cumbersome thing, laden with pop-ups and other frustrations and I simply said "Fuggit" and gave up.
And so has gone my relationship with this strange device that I once found so fascinating.
I'm gonna give it another chance now, before I turn completely Amish.
posted by Solderjunkie | 8:50 PM
2 Comments:
I hope to be a part of making that dream a reality.
(Gleeful squeal)
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