Ink and Paper

Well, Condon’s master plan to celebrate YABDay has already hit a roadblock. But fear not, good readers, roadblocks are no match for him (After all, he used to drive a 1990 Volvo tank.) You see, I planned to get a head start during the tail-end of my Managerial Accounting course, right around the time when my professor starts to sound like the teacher from the Peanuts comic strip. Taking notes on my pad to the left, blogging in a word document on the right, I’d figure to have pounded out a solid post by the time I get up to leave and attack the Beltway once again. However, we’ll have to pretend as if this was going really well.

In my typical Wednesday morning out-the-door rush, I left a crucial piece of my plan on the living room floor. But it wasn’t until 8:34 this evening, during Accounting, did I realize the gaffe. My trusty laptop, rather than quietly taking in my notes, threw the worst possible warning my way: LOW BATTERY. A quick shuffle through my bag rendered no AC plug. I was at the end of the juice, and before I could even start a blog, system shutdown. (You know the scene in Star Wars when the Imperial dude with the sleek black helmet pulls down the lever to prepare the Death Star weapon? I swear my computer made that sound.

Which leaves me here. Alone. No computer to make my job easier. Just a legal pad, a ballpoint pen, and a story to tell. I suppose this is how journals were composed in the past, yes? It lacks a certain degree of sophistication, but so far, it’s getting the job done.

But what if I had though of the YAB concept not back in July, but sometime before? Would I have had the tools to match the talent? After all, a blog written on a legal pad will only go as far as I can pass said pad. It’s time to find out, once and for all. So now, with a complete lack of computer, I give you the computers that have made up my past and present.

Name: Compy (1992-1997)
When I was 12, my dad brought home the first family computer, a Compudyne 386. This first machine sported a whopping 40MB of hard drive space, which roughly equals the current space it would tak to store about 12 Guster mp3s. It has a 5.25” floppy drive and a killer version of Windows: Three to the Point One. If I were using Compay today, rather than this legal pad, it probably would look like this:

“What is Neo had to go into the Dot Matrix to save Morpheus? He could follow the path of the line feed banner paper, swing from that helicopter on that awesome printing ribbon, and find Morpheus by using "dir/p." Neo: I know MS-DOS. Whoa."

Name: Mookie (1997-2000)
I bought this legendary machine with a summer's worth of wages at the Henderson Group. Once it joined me at WM, it was knighted Mookie by Spud. No one quite knows why, but this computer had more personality than most evening news anchors. A Mookieproducea blog would sound like this:

"I love blogging in the dark. Not because I like not seeing the keyboard, but because Mookie's monitor has grown increasingly dim in recent months. Ok, time to turn the lights off...spo tosdayu I woll be bloghghinhg abourt hoew Moojke alwasy knoiwas the riighrt sonhg to pl;ay...

Name: Cameron (2000-2003)
Cameron was computer assembled by Chris Smith, Aaron Boblitt, Justin Morea, and my belief that the sum of the parts would be financially cheaper than the whole. And except for an uncurable overheating problem (more fans!), it served quite well. Unfortunately, this machine was names after Cameron Frye from Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and the slacker mentality of that movie follow the name. Here's a Cameron blog:

"Hey everybody it phone call time here at YAB. Chris: Hey Chris Nordberg, you there? Nordberg: Yeah. Chris: Do you think I should? Nordberg: Yeah. Chris: OK, Bye. And folks, that's today's blog.

Name: Attica (2003-)
Despite having no current battery life, Attica has been a great Dell Laptop. Many, many blogs have been fed through him. He's mobile and intelligent, which is a great combination. If I were typing on Attica right now, a blog might look like this:

"Well, Condon’s master plan to celebrate YABDay has already hit a roadblock. But fear not, good readers..."