Feb182009
Custom Kitchen Delivereeeeh!
Filed under History by Kim at 3:09 pm on Feb 18 2009
I was reminded this morning of the first realization I had that I would never, ever be a computer programmer.* Like many folks in the U.S. at the time, I was stunned to turn on my TV one day to see a totally computer-animated guy moving around appliances in a warehouse or something.
Holy shit! I thought. Or more likely, Wow! Since I was like 10. They did that without actually drawing! and then I thought Why do they keep showing that ugly guy playing guitar? because I was ignorant. Or 10, you pick.
This would be about the time that my elite private elementary school had installed a computer lab (with wood paneling) and hired a friendly guy with huuuuge 80s glasses and a thick stache to teach us BASIC programming. I was doubly blessed, in that my parents also saved up to get us a home computer. I am pretty sure I booted up the old Atari right then and there and set about writing a program to draw some shit.
10 GR.3 20 COLOR 1 30 PLOT 0,0 40 DRAWTO 10,10
I am also confident I got about 20 lines in before I realized how much of this tedious mess you’d have to do to draw some guys moving boxes in a warehouse. It never crossed my mind to consider computer programming again. (I suppose it also never crossed my mind that they did it with some other, fancier kind of computer or programming language, but nobody ever accused me of being a curious kid.)
I try to keep in touch with the mindset of the person to whom these guys with their microwave ovens were an astonishing and revelatory work of art. It keeps the wonder in the world, you know? I probably have an unhealthy level of reverence for the developers who work on the software I write requirements for in my job as a result of this.
* I had a blister on my little finger toe.
