My First Computer

I was tagged again, this time by Mr Denny who wants me to try to remember my first computer.

My brain went back to my first computer as an adult. I recall having to get a loan from mom and dad to pay for it, as it cost me $3800. I recall that each computer after that purchase dropped half in price. We seemed to get a new computer each time we had a kid too. It just worked out that way. For the kid's first birthday, they would be surrounded by computer parts, and photos were taken. They had no idea, and the family needed a computer. So, we've had 3 kids, and had 4 computers as they were raised. Each kid was about 3 years apart from their siblings, so were our computer upgrades. We finally had to start simply buying new computers, and stop having kids for the last few upgrades.

But that wasnt the point of the blog requested. What was my first computer?

In college, i recall my loving parents sending me to BYU to study Computer Science, and shipping me off with a typewriter. It made an excellent foot rest. When my parents asked if I was using it, I would inevitably reply, 'Every day'. This was true. I often put my feet up on it. I do not think I ever used it. I did purchase an 8088 while in school. Monitor was 2 colors. Off=Black and Purple. We used to do all kinds of crazy things with that machine, like goto bbs's. Wow, we were insane with it... I remember upgrading my modem from a 2400 baud, to 9600, then 14.4. Wow, so fast, what would I do with all that speed.

Wait, that wasn't my first computer either.
Back in the day, I remember my mom, who was a budding romance novel writer, coming home with a computer. An Apple IIe. It lived on our dining room table for the longest time, as an office space did not exist in our home. She had set it up, and was trying to get it useful to writing her books. Later she moved to a Kaypro, as it was easier.

So, I wonder into the dining room one day, see the computer and manuals. I pick up the manual, and start reading. I come across a command 'init home' and attempt it. I figured that this would get the computer thing going and doing stuff. I entered the command, and nothing seemed to happen. The next thing I recall was that feeling i have grown to not be able to live without. That feeling of utter despair that I screwed something up. Nothing was happening on the machine. It just whirred and whirred. I hollered out to my Mom. What did I do? All I did was this command, 'Init Home'. What did that do? Well, it erased the disk that was in the drive. Making it new and shiny. So, my first action on my first computer was to wipe away all its storage.

From there, its been a downhill battle. I still love working with computers. I love using them to solve problems. I love the creative process that is involved with computing. I love to work with databases.
But, from time to time, I get that feeling in my stomach. I retrace my steps. Sure enough, I did another 'Init Home' command.



I’m going to tag Pat Wright, Tim Ford, Louis Davidson
To ensure that this keeps moving, I will contact the above via twitter, so that they can read my blog, and move it along.