Flashbacks: Geekdom and what’s important
December 2nd, 2009
Computers were always a hobby of mine, more of an infatuation that seemed unhealthy to others in my family. Back then the internet wasn’t available and knowledge came through trickles while living in rural upstate New York. With a local town six miles away of a population around 10,000, not many of the locals were interested.
Anything I could get my hands on was of value, even a BASIC program to compute optimal dimensions of a HAM radio antennae. It wouldn’t be fifteen years until I owned my own computer, donated by someone: an AT&T 286 when Pentiums were the rage.
I’d just been accepted for my dream job I held for the last decade since seeing Quantum Link on a Commodore 64 and knowing ‘that’ was where I wanted to be. America Online. Steve Case. While many dreamed it in the 80s, I made it happen in the 90s.
It was during the time AOL still used floppy disks and was migrating to CDs. Before the storm. When young kids wet behind the ears suckled on Windows had never relied on manual typewriters…they’d mastered tools, not the essence of the art to use them on.
Some floundered on telephony and connectivity. Others masqueraded knowledge, and ultimately hosed many people in the process. Only a handful had the experience of dialup, let alone delving into manipulation and controlling modems as an art. Those that had were usually looking to advance.
Opportunity by attrition.
Superheros in the oddest forms
Amazing how stupid people can be when they try being smart. Sometimes when I walk into a computer store a sales associate walks up to me, either well intentioned to help or looking for a sale for commission. Usually the latter identified by techno babble, marketing blurbs that have no meaning. The spin that bastardizes the zen of geek.
It’s in those simple moments I relish one thing: telling them if they want to sell me something, they have to first tell me the difference between LAPM and MNP5.
If they can, I simply ask them to tell me what commands “aren’t” accepted by specific modems…and why.
If they can’t, I’ll still buy something for their trouble. I always need an extra set of rechargeable batteries.
I’ve lived long enough to know…you can have my home…you can have my wife…but touch my data or hard drives…
…no mercy.
Posted in .: Self Reflections
Hi JC!That was a nice image,each one of us on the shore of the ocean touching the sea!:))
I liked this post.I do not now much about computers.When I had my PC I even dare to look inside of it!Now I just have a laptop and sometimes it has not memory enough and I wish I had the other one so I could add some more.This one I can’t touch.
I was maybe 27 years old when I started to learn how use a PC.I learned MS-DOS!!!Everything changed so quickly!
It’s a bore when we go to a shop and we ask for information and get stupid answers.In the summer I bought just a simple MP3 reader and the seller could not explain some details of several readers available.And he also was stupid enough not to admit he did not know the answer.Fortunately I was going just for the cheaper one as possible and so I had no difficult to pick the right one!
Hi Belinha! You should see some of my self expression using gender specific dolls.
I remember when my cousin was visiting me nine years ago. We had dinner plans with my best friend at his home, and stopped on the way so I could pick up some breath mints.
Walking past the ‘family planning’ section, I saw the diverse selection of pregnancy prevention items as well as products for stimulation and arousal. There was one item in particular I didn’t spot, so I made a trip to the pharmacy in the back.
The technician being in her 20s wasn’t any help, ignorant for whatever reasons to my question. My cousin turned immediately storming off. When the pharmacist came forward, she too wasn’t able to help.
My question: “Why are the female condoms appearing to come in ‘one size fits all’? You can appreciate by simply looking at her that my cousin…certainly isn’t that big!”
They didn’t make a sale that night. Don’t think they would have if they could after that.
It’s people like you that have made it possible for people like me to do ‘stuff’ on the Interweave ……. I’m not necessarily saying that’s a good thing of course …… tee hee
And it’s people like you procreating people like you have that make people like me look good helping people like you when you stop procreating…or not.
Isn’t procreate another word for ………. oh, never mind ………
I am SO not goin’ there out of respect to Lo, TG!
John. I’m willing to forgive you for making it possible for DP to be all interwebby, but only if you promise to go shopping with me next time I have to buy a new PC.
It’s only a short drive up here… really…
DP’s a techninjaspy, he’s just holding out until he gets his memoirs done and in print.
I used to think how great an opportunity it’d be to have him as a mentor, in many things besides life, parenting, geekness.
Then I blew it off and realized it’d be just cooler living on his property without getting caught and following him around with a camera.
Then again…would it be me doing it proactively…or him merely controlling me making me think I was doing what I wanted, when it was what he wanted me to do all along.
….. and now you’re reading my mind – I am considering getting a real book together [the title "Thanks for the Mammaries" must have been taken I suppose] ….. my work is nearly done …….
Is the book dedicated to the fracas blog? I doubt you’d find another place that has provided you with as many good mammaries as fracas.
I’m too big a John to be a bookmark, so I can’t be in it.
Ok, I’ll take that as a no. :sniff:
No to shopping or no to the book DP’s puttin’ together?
Of course I’d go shopping with you! I’ll play the straight man and you be the dyke!
Oh come on. I live in Fracskatchewan. Our stores don’t allow dykes.
Flannel. Big belt buckles. Lumberjacks with boobs. Come on, you’ve got your national treasures.
You must be confusing Fracskatchewan with British Columbia. They aren’t our national treasures… we just tolerate them because that’s the only place where the warm is here. And by the looks of it, they’ll be losing that distinction soon anyway. Without the warm, we have no reason to keep them.
Didn’t they do that in some of those Sara videos?
I haven’t seen any Sara videos, but now I know what you do when you’re not visiting my blog for days on end…
I’m getting images of Stephen Hawkings rotating his chair and his speaker enunciating “Who’s the man, who’s the man”.
@Fraccarse – Forget your inner geek and get a Mac ……. they’re very pretty …….
If I could afford or find a Mac in the garbage, I’d have one in my network. Tons of people throw out WinPCs and components.
The G3 my son proudly brought to me last year from the dumpster…it made me cry I couldn’t do anything with it.
…and…(sniff)…he was so PROUD! WAHHHH!
Sorry DP, can’t do it. I have to rebel against those who rebel… and be different by refusing to be different.
It’s my thing.
…she said ‘thang’!
Is that a ‘thing’ in a ‘thong’?
Never saw a Mac in a thong, but I guess it ‘would’ be some’thing’.
The only time I heard of a thing thong was that time at school when Heather’s two dads volunteered to supervise the class trip. Nearly sent the bus driver into a ditch. I guess the driver had never heard ‘The wheels on the bus’ done with a lisp.
Is that what you meant? I’m not familiar with any other thongs.
I still think bikini’s are a bad word. If the bottoms are worn, it’s a bikini. If the top’s worn with, it’s still a bikini.
What would wearing a bikini top be without the bottoms. ‘Bikini’?
…I don’t think so.
I’d call it ‘good’.
I think we’d confuse the clerks if we went shopping for a ‘good’.
They’re confused when people are clearly shopping for female condoms.