While I was at it, I pulled out that old Tandy from 1986 and what do I find in pristine condition? A 760K 5.25 inch floppy. Seriously, it is in brand new condition, and it is now sitting in the Hewlett Packard. That was some wiring job, let me tell you. Took three hours and I was seriously considering turning one of the drives upside down before I figured out a way to hook up the harness before sliding the A: drive into the bay.
Well, almost perfect condition, I cannot get the controller to recognize the B: drive. It will have to wait until tomorrow. The point is, the HP will accept the drive, so it is only a matter of time until we get a blast from the past. In my case, that is real blasting because I’ve found disks on everything from the Reb’s song words to mini-diaries to old letters to RofR (that should prove most interesting). There is even an original copy of CP/M. I can just hear some of the guys in class laughing that I still have ‘old’ disks. They are too young to realize that I was fifteen years ahead of my time back then. Imagine, huge volumes of word processed material from 1982, a time when 99.99999% of all people had never touched a computer. When did the average person begin keeping blogs? Right, gotcha…
Further, Julie has said that there are six more boxes of material. She only picked out the ones labeled obviously, something I am not known for (calling computer disks in plain cipher, I usually code the titles, so there are probably far more letters and documents than she has counted) . I still have to figure out the way to read the Apple disks. I’ve heard there is software that does it on an IBM drive. Julie is back in school and I guiltily admit I can’t remember that she told me all this. Marti is off the air for a month or so, probably both the wedding and time to move to Seattle. All of this material is destined to go onto CDs shortly. I’ll be curious to know how much space my lifetime’s output will occupy. Maybe 1/10th of a CD? That is my guess. Still, that is 65 megabytes, and you know Shakespeare’s output was only 5 MB.
Later. It is now 12:59 AM and I think I’ve got the B: drive working. This makes a tremendous difference, because prior to that time, my diaries were hand-written. It would take months to enter those pages, where as, if I can read it from the B: drive, I will shortly have an actual sample of 1987 word processing for you inserted right here. If so, you saw it here first. I was studying the videos included with the textbook, and I see that Mr. David Groth (pronounced ‘growth’) seriously needs my help producing entertaining videos. Back to the B: drive. There was a long lapse in my diaries around that time because of evening school. Most of the records were kept as short notes on a company planning calendar. I still have those calendars but nothing takes the place of a real daily record.
Still later. I can’t get the drive to read the disks marked MW, which would seem to mean Microsoft Word. I see some incredible things, such as brochures for the El Colonial Hotel on the Orinoco River in Venezuela. That is in the early 90s, and I want something from the 80s for you. I’m going to reset the drive format to 360K, although I’m pretty sure it is 720K, that is not an option on the BIOS. Hmm, either the disk drive is not working or the BIOS cannot accommodate a DD legacy drive like this one. No matter, I am hot on the trail now. One thing I can tell you, is that the disk labels of the 1980s don’t stay stuck for 20 years. Meanwhile, here is the brochure. Cancel that, the brochure won’t save as a picture. Let me try another disk.
[Author's note 2022: finally, I found this nearly original descript of the failed trek to the HUMBOLT HOTEL, in Caracas, Venezuela. This took place years earlier, during a time there was no journal kept, so this was from memory at the time. But that memory was pretty good. You'll notice references to Canada because until recently, although I was in the USA, I worked for a Canadian company and knew the lay of the land.]
Still trying to get you something. I see I was a big consumer of databases as far back as 1988. The song words seem to be in that format. I found a document from 1992 that describes a hike I made on the mountains north of Caracas. Here are the first paragraphs, notice the differences in my writing style after 13 years. The forward, not included here, explains that the style is somewhat awkward because it was meant to be used on a then current Spanish translation software package. Notice the speed typing and lack of any spellchecker in Venezuela at that time. I believe the computer was a stripped down Tandy FD 1100, which cost at least a thousand dollars back then. (It was eventually stolen in Venezuela.)
I received much information and malinformacion about the Humbolt Hotel. This beautiful structure is situated on a mountain to the north or Caracas, Venezuala. It stands about 40 storeys tall. It cost millions and millions. And it is abandoned. The city of Caracas is on a flat valley about one mile wide and many miles long east to west. Whoever planned this was undoubtedly a real estate agent.
The mountain mentioned is part of a chain that forms the Carribean coast along the top edge of South America. The mountain passes are the only route to the coast from the towns and cities in the interior. There is no direct road to the seashore from Caracas, since visitors to the beach must travel around the mountain range. The nearest such place is about 15 miles away. A tunnel through the mountain is no likely to be constructed. The reason I've heard is because the mountains are volcanic. By the way, the mountain chain extends eastward, finally forming the island of Trinidad.
There are dozens of wild explanations for the Humbolt. Some people say it was built in 1955. Others say 1965. Still others say the contruction took all ten years between. It depends on who you talk to. I am curious why it is closed. It is no good to ask around. Every version is different. Among the reasons I've heard are failed election promises, defective standards on the cable car (teleferico), and insufficient bribes paid to government officials.
The cable car (teleferico) problem appears at first to make the most sense. Yet, even that creates more questions than answers. How could a cable car no make money? Especially in this instance, because it would be a monopoly. My guess is the whole situation is a study of corruption on an unbelievable scale. Except for a helicopter, there is no other easy way to get to the hotel. My opinion is that only a totally corrupt system and a totally complacent population could allow such a monument to remain in plain view of one fifth of the residents in the country for thirty years, with the possible exception of Edmonton, Alberta. (I hate that town and I've only been there twice.)
There is no reliable source of information. If anyone knows the true story, they are no talking. Or no can talk, if you get my drift. The most recent rumor is that the state governor is fixing it up. (Any minor government official who has that amount of money must have fixed many things in his time.) I decided to climb the mountain and have a look for myself. It should be easy to see if there is any evidence of workmen or building material at the site, or near the top. I am not a mountaineer, so I must find a road.
What happens next will give you some insight into the Spanish character and language. I would bet money the service roads exist. Yet everyone we asked said there were no service roads. Remember that Spanish is a language that seems (to me) to fail when trying to describe exact details. This means there is some discrepancy whether we are being told the roads do no exist, or whether we are being told we no can walk up the roads, or whether they simply do no know if there is a road but no want to admit it. This sorry attitude alone will prevent Venezuala from ever being an efficient country. We have these kind of people in America. They are called liars.
The total number of people questioned is around a dozen or fifteen. Fourteen Spanish speakers say there is no road, one German says there is. Therefore, I conclude there is a road. Can you imagine having a medical emergency in such a city! The logical first task is to locate that road.
On March 2, 1996 I walked with a friend to the base of the mountain. The mountains are apparently named ""Avila"". We stopped accross from a deep canyon separating two mountains. There are no good maps, signs or people who know the names of the mountains, although the mountains can be seen from every major part of Caracas. The Humbolt is an easy sight and is situated on the west peak. We saw an old sign saying ""Pico Oriente"" and ""Pico Occidente"", so I will refer to the mountains as ""East Peak"" and ""West Peak"" if necessary.
From where we stopped, I was able to discern three or four unnatural ridges of tree lines angling upward at about 15 degrees. There are also transmission towers about 2/3 of the way up the mountain. Also, there are electricity lines. The vegetation covers the mountains completely to the top. The mountains are steep but not rugged. All these factors strongly indicate the presence of at least one service road. If the road exists, I estimate it should take about two hours to reach the top.
The rest of the record tells how I got around half the way up the mountain after being given the wrong directions by the local expert, a travel agent who thought I was going to rent a helicopter through him. “All you have to do is get eight people to share.” If I did that, I remember thinking, who needs him? They (him and his staff) actually, if I recall, gave me the directions to the wrong bloody mountain, something that would eventually not surprise me about Venezuela. The next day I politely inquired about these directions and he finally admitted that he had never actually been there or arranged any tours to the place. I never did get up there in the next four years. I may not be athletic, folks, but at forty-four I was still hiking up mountains in Venezuela.
That was also about the time I noticed that it became rare to meet people my own age [who were] travelling. Now, the reason is obvious, but back then I found it strange. Would not people turning forty give anything to get out of the routine and have an adventure? The common point was a mortgage. Anyone who signed a mortgage at 25 was at 50 a completely untravelled moronic nincompoop. They had a house, but wasted a life paying for it. Their one consolation seems to be knowledge that however wrong they have been, they are in the majority.
I noted that in 1996, passenger airliners cost $400 a pound and (this was only months before I left the company) that I challenged the ‘50/50’ rule for answering calls. This referred to the next department over who insisted that everything was equal if our department answered half the incoming calls. I maintained it was not equal, and they argued it was. They backed off quickly when I suggested a money test. I’ll pay you a dollar every time you answer a call that is for me, and vice versa. We should break even, correct? Even when faced with such facts, phone company people cannot admit they are wrong. I used to work beside men who would tell people to call back in an hour knowing they were off shift in thirty minutes.
Since I intend to get most of my writings on disk, I won’t duplicate much of it here. I see I predicted that good jobs “will be at a premium in 2005”. I was inside the pyramid at Chichen Itza in Mexico in 1986 when an earthquake occurred. I felt nothing, I had crawled up the passageway into the center of the pyramid and did not find out about the tremor until hours later when I crawled back out. At that point, I felt queasy because I somehow knew something was wrong while I was inside. There is mention that every major law concerning Human Rights in Canada was passed by judicial rather than parliamentary procedures. The real treat will be those 5.25 inch floppies. There just don’t seem to be enough of them.
