Sunday, January 18, 2004

Dan Gilmartin Posts this

Ramblings of Yore:

Yeah, I remember Vermillion. Pat O'Day too. The only Rock on the air in those days. Pre-FM daze; pre-Mouse daze.
Remembering computers of old; I don't go back as far as you, but Bulletin Boards, DOS, Lynx browser all with CLI... Late 80's. Hell, that's over 15 years. Time flies.
The first 5 or 6 years the computer thing was fun for me. Then Win95 came out and made it boring and more GUI oriented. I liked the CLI. So now I've just given up --- I just USE the thing now. It reminds me of the shift in technology that I saw in the late 60's when my Radioman days ended and I left Uncle Sam's Canoe Club.
To tune the R-390 receiver, you had to have an EAR, a TOUCH. They went to R-1051 which enabled any moron to set the numbers and walk away. Morse Code too -- I actually MISS Morse Code. Satellites and teletypes took out the fun. No static, no frantically sent Morse messages, no straining to hear through static and Soviet
radio interference (oh yeah, the Soviets are gone too). Just boring.
I also hate artificial turf, the designated hitter and DOMES. Cookie cutter 70's stadiums that are symmetrical; I hate that boring symmetry. Give me Ebbets Field, Polo Grounds, Fenway and Wrigley
any time; and you'll get weird bounces and non-sprinters legging out a triple. Triples -- they're about gone too.
I'm looking forward to the Colts-Pats game today. SNOW... No DOME and nasty elements with Football; as Allah intended.
It was FTU then -- UCF name came in the early 80's I think. I went to West Florida anyway -- Go Argonauts! Argonauts ??? Sheesh! What a dork name.
Yeah -- I am still in the SCC-UCF loop. Instructing Freshmen and Sophs about the Land Before Time. Damn, do they have a shallow idea of the past or what? They're not dumb, they just don't read anything other than what they are forced to read. They write like
plumbers do art. Their prose reads like a horrid local newscaster sounds; shrill, cliche ridden and vapid. Only the very good ones can write at all. But, they all feel good about themselves.
As for me, Bob, I didn't think I'd get past 50 -- I am amazed. I want to see a few more World Series, say the next couple of dozen. What is NOT my goal is to be with the tedious, self-absorbed BOOMERS at the local Senility Gardens Shuffleboard Tourney, drooling on my Nikes and wondering where I am. That's not on my list. As Woody
Allen has said: "I'm not scared of dying, I just don't want to be there when it happens."
So much for this rant -- I can't wait to see if 47 Iowa
farmers are going to help the Democrats commit political suicide yet again. Ah, the Liberal wing of the Democratic Party; I wish they'd develop a taste for cool aid.

Cheers,

...Danno