Hind sight is 20/20
by Ms. Babble on November 19, 2008
in My Life in General
Last night I spent most of my evening transfering files to an external hard drive from my laptop. Recently I started to notice the hard drive of my laptop making a clicking noise occasionally. It’s been happening for at least a week now so I checked my warranty information and saw that I was covered on all parts through the end of December.
I gave Dell a call (or, a chat since I spoke with one of their techs via instant messenger). After an hour of troubleshooting, they determined that they would simply replace the hard drive for fear that it’s showing signs of the “click of death“. (Which apparently is not curable and has been a scourge on the hard drive community since it’s birth. Jerry Lewis should really get on that one. “The Jerry Lewis Telethon to Support a Cure for Hard Drive Clicking Death” has a nice ring to it.)
Five hours later, I had transferred a bulk of my dying hard drive to an external 500 GB drive in preparation for the replacement en route by Dell. (Nearly 80 GB worth of personal files NOT including the O/S or Adobe programs.)
During this process my Dad said to me, “Remember the first computer I got years ago? Things have really changed since them.”
I do remember our families first computer for Christmas many years ago. I must have been only 10 or 11 years old at the time. Maybe even younger. That would put the year around 1990 or 1991. The computer ran on DOS and had only one five and a quarter inch floppy drive. My Dad reminded me of the excitement we all felt when he “upgraded” to TWO five and a quarter inch floppy drives so that we could copy files to another disc. And the hard drive on that bad boy? It was HUGE (cough…at the time). Only 20 Megs. Ouch. That’s less memory than most standard digital cameras have internally WITHOUT a memory card!
That conversation sparked a memory of typing lines of BASIC code that was given to me by my Uncle S. with the promise of a new cool DOS game. The only problem was that I didn’t have enough attention to detail and inevitably mistyped one of the thousands of characters from the 20-page BASIC code print out.
But it was an exciting prospect having the power to type in random letters and numbers with the promise of playing “Lemmings” on DOS.
Later in high school, I enrolled in a True BASIC programming course. It was an experimental class at the time since computers still hadn’t become the social phenomenon they are today. The Windows O/S had already taken over personal computers but we were still only surfing the net via dial-up on AOL (and being charged by the hour for it too). My final project was coding a tic-tac-toe game in True BASIC. It was the most amazing accomplishment of my life at the time. I was 17.
Computers then seemed like a fun hobby. I was in love with the internet, just like everyone else. I enjoyed computers games (Wolfenstein, anyone?), just like everyone else. But I never considered it something to make a living from. While I enjoyed my programming class in High School, I didn’t have enough confidence to continue learning in college. Plus, it required WAY too many math courses for my comfort.
Thus the Liberal Arts degree in English.
Today, everything just clicked with me. Even though I have a degree in English and Creative Writing, I am constantly going back to the computer. I’m learning to scratch an income out of Website Publishing and teaching myself enough to get by on CSS website design. After all these years of the computer being “just a hobby”, I’m realizing that maybe it’s more than that and it should have always been more than that. From the moment we got that old DOS PC on Christmas 18 odd years ago, I’ve been in love with computers.
Maybe it’s supposed to be this way. Maybe I was supposed to learn how to write and think analytically on the liberal arts side before I could couple that with learning how to write and think analytically on the technical side. Perhaps putting those two pieces together are where I’ll finally find that success I’ve been searching for the last decade.
Just as I said, hindsite really is 20/20.
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I remember that game! But luckily I didn’t have to type in the code.
Your Uncle S and I got our first computer the fall after we got married in 1987. Your Uncle wrote a program for me to calculate my first graders’ grades, which made other teachers pretty envious. I seem to remember having 2 floppies from the start, but I could be wrong. But then again, your uncle liked to have the best computer available since he was studying them at NIU.
My favorite games were ones where you had to map out rooms, and type in commands in order to solve puzzles, etc. They were text based totally, no graphics. We always had a stack of graph paper nearby to map things. But I loved the process of figuring out the puzzles and solving the mysteries. I can remember your uncle and I staying up all night trying to solve a puzzle in order to advance in a game. When we got our first game with graphics, I actually missed the text based ones! Those graphics took away some of the challenge!
Thanks to your uncle, I am able to sit down and figure out most things I need to on the computer. His advice was always to use logic to figure it out. It was good advice.
I loved those games too!! Like Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and Lesiure Suit Larry. (Although I was banned from playing LSL after I asked Dad what a ‘prophylactic’ was. Ha!)
My dad was a programmer so I grew up with a computer (DOS) before anyone else had one. It was so huge we kept it in the basement. My favorite program was one that ran for months, making calculations in order to create fractals. But you had me rolling on the floor remembering Leisure Suit Larry!
I have found that what led me to graphic design was a marrying of my artistic ability with my more technical attention to detail. So you may be on to something if you’re discovering how your personal strengths might be suitable for a particular path.
LSL was considered so “adult” back then. Now it is nothing compared to what is out there and in games nowadays! I still have fond memories of that game as well as Hitchhikers Guide.
I still like video games where the need to solve puzzles and things in the correct order takes priority over killing and racing through things. I think I have replayed some of the Legend of Zelda games on our Super Nintendo and my DS a few times over the years.
You should look into a few classes to explore some of this further. It would probably be worth it at least to help you decide if there is more of a future in that field or whether independent tinkering is more your style: figure out if it is something you actually want to spend your life doing as a career.
I remember when a computer was delivered to my office and my boss said USE IT!! I resisted vehemently. That was 20 some odd years ago and now I check my email before I make coffee!! Hmmm
Oh yes…the click of death….I know it well. My advice to all…do not ignore this sound. I had to send a hard drive out to have data retrieved.