I'm glad I have a computer. As a matter of fact I can imagine
what ever it was I did before I had one, but you know what I mean. The
trouble is I live in fear of someone asking me how many rams I've got. And
another thing about this computer business: why do they put the serial number
on the bottom? Having said all that, I'm very lucky AT
MY AGE to have grasped the nettle, or at least the iMac. When
newspaper offices switched to what we called "new technology" it was
the 39-year-old something's who were first through the revolving door. I
remember the Editor of one Sunday paper confessing sheepishly that suddenly he
had found himself alone in the office one night and decided to have a play. He
turned on the previously unused monitor on his desk (he was still a proper newsman:
all braces and no belt), went for a walk around the room, ate a digestive biscuit
and promptly knocked a plastic coffee cup over the keyboard with a sweep of his
arm. He described the shrieking noises coming from both
the terminal and his own lips as he fled to the sanctity of the office pub. It
was that forty-something journalist's last flirtation with life in the Quark Express
fastlane. Some older reporters found they couldn't tell
how much they had written without seeing it all printed out. One hack once wrote
a feature about the face of Christ appearing on a tortilla and it was twenty feet
long. (The copy, not the Mexican pancake). Sit-up-and-beg
typewriters were great until the ribbon jammed when you had to stand up and throw
things. The General Manager at one newspaper office where I worked complained
that the cleaners kept finding them in waste bins. "I'll
guarantee they all had their ribbons jammed," the news editor said. A new
maintenance company was appointed that day. Nowadays you
get people telling you that you must have a zip drive to back up your system folder,
or something. But life pre-Zips didn't cause your right
index finger to start to curl, which is what seems to be happening to mine. Only
while I sleep though. It's repetitive strain injury, my
doctor says. I call it curly digit syndrome and it's either that or I'm turning
into an eagle. I'm going to invest in one of those new,
sleek, infrared Applemac mice. Then I'll be able to count
my rams in the dark.
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