Weekend Assignment: 30 Years Ago
Fresh when it gets here from
Julie Barrett
Monday, May 18, 2009
On Tuesday, John and I will have been married to 30 years. If you're old enough to remember the late 1970s, please tell us what you were up to way back then. If not, pretend I asked about the late 1980s. If you're too young to that, I'll be very surprised, but go ahead and tell me about your life in the late 1990s!
Allow me to not be the first to offer my belated early congratulations. Or something like that. I really should consult Douglas Adams' rules of time travel grammar before I attempt something like that next time!
30 years ago I'd just graduated from college. I'd worked my tail off to get out in four years, and now adult life stretched out ahead of me like ... some stretchy thing.
The 1970s era was sharply divided between high school and college. I've blocked out a lot of my high school years, though I still keep up with a few good folks from that era. College was much better, especially after I switched majors. My counselor at high school pretty much forced me into a business major in hopes that I'd find a nice fellow business major who would take care of me and lead me to a life of bland suburban bliss. I had other plans, and switched my major the first week of school.
I was dating a guy I'd known in high school. He was a Computer Science Major, and introduced me to the basement on the campus Computer Center. No, not for hanky-panky, but for old-fashioned nerd games. You seem this was the era when a kid couldn't touch a computer unless he (generally, it was guys) unless he'd had a year of Calculus. However, it was an open secret that this one computer in the basement was open to anyone who wanted to use it. It was a hulking IBM 1620 with disk drives the size of washing machines. It was programmed via punch cards. Here, I was shown the wonders of "Star Trek" and "Lunar Lander" as played on a printer teminal. Oh, it was painful, but fun.
The boyfriend and I broke up, but we're still friends to this day.
One day I went down to the 1620 for my morning game of "Star Trek," and there was a guy hunched over the console, typing away. We started talking. Conversation turned to video camera pickup tubes, which, come to think of it, may have been the nerdiest pickup line ever. (Pardon the geeky pun.)
That guy and I will celebrate our 30th anniversary in January.
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Bobb said:
Lets see the 70's, I barelt survived them.
In Jigh School I was a punk (Rock, if not as a kid.), saw Rocky Horror Picture Show a
450 times by the time 1980 rolled around. Saw the Sex Pistols once, the Ramones twice a year from 1977 on (All with a fake I.D. as I did not turn 18 till 1979., from 1977-1982 I set up as a dealer at the Larry Herndon Star Trek cons as well as AggieCon. Met my best friend Edd Vick, and became part of the "Loose Confederation of Fandom", a group who has no rules and we stilljust get together every month or more to review books, play D&D, and complain how we feel old wen we realizze how long we have known each other.
Walked the halls of my high school with a portable radio/cassete player with a pair of earphones before the walkman ever came out.Hmm, I am jusy randomizing my memory..
Oh, and I voted for "Howard the Duck" in my high school mock election in 1976.Oh one more thing, i started hanging out at a bar called "The Jersey Lilly" in 1977 after I went there a couple times with my friend, and since i had a beard at 16, I was never carded.
In the 1980's I met Debbie the woman who would become my wife, Was one of the organizers who puton the first Anime convention in the United States "Yamatocon" (We also put on two Sat trek cons, "Protocon" & "Star One" but the less said the better..Outsold all but one salesperson when I was a Computer Salesman in 1987. And became a host to the visitor called Multiple Sclerosis 1989 who just will not leave!
And if you want the earlt 90's I helped convince the fab group T.A.N,S,T.A.F.L., and got Tim Miller into conventions, for that alone I know there is a special place in hell just for me.
Was that enough and confusing to you?
Bobb
Date: 5/18/2009 4:36:42 PM
Date: 5/18/2009 4:36:42 PM
Julie said:
Thanks for stopping by, Bobb!
What you're saying, is that ultimately we have you to blame on some level for FenCon. ;-)
I'll sleep better knowing that, I think.
Date: 5/18/2009 6:58:39 PM
Date: 5/18/2009 6:58:39 PM
lisa said:
Hmm....In 1979 I would have been 9. I don't remember much about that time period, except that we had a blizzard with about 10 feet of snow. The drifts were so tall my grandmother would freak out if we went near them because she was scared we would get lost in them. I lived near the beach, so that was a big deal.
Nine years later I graduated high school, and after that it was just a blur of working, marriage, and babies. I wish I could remember more, but I need pictures to jog my memory and they are in storage.
Date: 5/22/2009 11:13:18 AM
Date: 5/22/2009 11:13:18 AM
Karen Funk Blocher said:
Aww, geeks in love! With a happy ending yet. Warms my heart, it does!
Date: 5/22/2009 11:23:10 PM
Date: 5/22/2009 11:23:10 PM
Bobb said:
Lets see the 70's, I barelt survived them.
In Jigh School I was a punk (Rock, if not as a kid.), saw Rocky Horror Picture Show a
450 times by the time 1980 rolled around. Saw the Sex Pistols once, the Ramones twice a year from 1977 on (All with a fake I.D. as I did not turn 18 till 1979., from 1977-1982 I set up as a dealer at the Larry Herndon Star Trek cons as well as AggieCon. Met my best friend Edd Vick, and became part of the "Loose Confederation of Fandom", a group who has no rules and we stilljust get together every month or more to review books, play D&D, and complain how we feel old wen we realizze how long we have known each other.
Walked the halls of my high school with a portable radio/cassete player with a pair of earphones before the walkman ever came out.Hmm, I am jusy randomizing my memory..
Oh, and I voted for "Howard the Duck" in my high school mock election in 1976.Oh one more thing, i started hanging out at a bar called "The Jersey Lilly" in 1977 after I went there a couple times with my friend, and since i had a beard at 16, I was never carded.
In the 1980's I met Debbie the woman who would become my wife, Was one of the organizers who puton the first Anime convention in the United States "Yamatocon" (We also put on two Sat trek cons, "Protocon" & "Star One" but the less said the better..Outsold all but one salesperson when I was a Computer Salesman in 1987. And became a host to the visitor called Multiple Sclerosis 1989 who just will not leave!
And if you want the earlt 90's I helped convince the fab group T.A.N,S,T.A.F.L., and got Tim Miller into conventions, for that alone I know there is a special place in hell just for me.
Was that enough and confusing to you?
Bobb
Date: 5/18/2009 4:36:42 PM
Date: 5/18/2009 4:36:42 PM
Julie said:
Thanks for stopping by, Bobb!
What you're saying, is that ultimately we have you to blame on some level for FenCon. ;-)
I'll sleep better knowing that, I think.
Date: 5/18/2009 6:58:39 PM
Date: 5/18/2009 6:58:39 PM
lisa said:
Hmm....In 1979 I would have been 9. I don't remember much about that time period, except that we had a blizzard with about 10 feet of snow. The drifts were so tall my grandmother would freak out if we went near them because she was scared we would get lost in them. I lived near the beach, so that was a big deal.
Nine years later I graduated high school, and after that it was just a blur of working, marriage, and babies. I wish I could remember more, but I need pictures to jog my memory and they are in storage.
Date: 5/22/2009 11:13:18 AM
Date: 5/22/2009 11:13:18 AM
Karen Funk Blocher said:
Aww, geeks in love! With a happy ending yet. Warms my heart, it does!
Date: 5/22/2009 11:23:10 PM
Date: 5/22/2009 11:23:10 PM
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