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Packing/moving. We’re almost done, but discover another part of the attic around a corner. It opens up into a multi-level mall-like area (but with narrow stairs) full of dining room and bedroom furniture sets. It all needs to be out by morning.
These guys claim to want a degree, but really will take a warm body:
https://careers-tierpoint.icims.com/jobs/2572/operations-technician-i/job
The pay is still peanuts, though.
Hurin Thalion. Excellent choice. I like you.
1978? We had a commodore pet. “Open 1,8,15”. My father had some HP touchscreen thing.
Upgrade was the atari with the ms-basic cartridge and cassette storage. I coded up a database.
Then I had an Amiga 1000 with a real 2400 modem. And then later a beige box 486.
First cell was 1990. I owned a town car - ran airport service. Needed a phone for the execs to show off. Charged them $1/minute.
I was a lazy jerk that just bombed out of the local college in record time. I figured I’d try photography trade school. She was a natural artist with no plan and picked the same trade school. We were in the same 6-month program. She specialized in lab work, I went into product photography. Class started October 1984. We had several family deaths, financial ruin, and other calamities - but supported each other through it all. Lived with family and in the car. Got my life on track in my 30s. Bought a house in 2000, married in 2004, kid in 2009. Now a boring but desperate suburbanite staring down the next downsizing wave and big medical bills.
Does CC BY-NC-SA meet your intentions?
Slackware. About 1994 or so.
The Dispossessed, The Lathe of Heaven, and The Left Hand of Darkness - by LeGuinn
The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion
Dune
The Screwtape Letters - C.S. Lewis
Stranger in a Strange Land
I have two.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1981_Brink’s_robbery Summary: an armored car was robbed by desperate “most-wanted” types. Bug national new.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilchrest_Road,_New_York,_crossing_accident Summary: school bus full of kids hit by a train. The reason why “this vehicle stops at all rr crossings” is a thing.
“How to Win Friends and Influence People” was published in 1936 and is still useful.
A foot-in-the-door job is colo datacenter tech. I know a major national company that pays about $20/hr and will take what they can get at that price point. Not interesting, not promote-able, bad schedules. But a resume item. Exposure to enterprise-grade equipment. While there, get the advanced certs you realy want and work on networking with the customers and vendors.
VisiCalc
If you can find a new one. They are $45+ on ebay used. None of the usual US sellers has any.
My wife and i went to Tortola in '99. Everything went wrong, and we still had a good time. If things had gone right, we might have never left.
That said, the off-trail areas of the state parks of north NY, NJ, PA, up to Canada and into Vermont) are where I feel most at peace. A quiet cabin on a lake ten miles from a small town would be a perfect place to retire to.