My brother has been on hard times for quite a while now, but he decided that it was time he learned to use a computer. He has no money for a computer, and the classes that he might be able to take are held at times when he can work, on days when he finds work to do.
But he decided that he needed a computer at home to learn on. He talked to his friends and family, and this week, he found a computer that had been thrown away, put out on the side of the road with a monitor and a printer. He brought it over to our mom’s house on Mother’s Day, and I, being the family geek, took a look to see what he had.
The folks who threw it away kept the mouse, even though it was an old-style serial type, and the power cords. But we snitched the cords from my mom’s computer and cranked her up.
She is a natural operating Pentium 133 with 16 MB of RAM. I remember when she would have been a hot property, but that’s been a long time ago–back when 16 MB costs half a month’s salary. Still, she runs like a two-dollar watch on Windows 98. The CD drive works, but the floppy had flopped, and there was no power supply for the old HP printer, though it had an 8′ parallel printer cable.
So today, I called up the IT department, sweet-talked the admin up there, and she said that she thought they could let go of a couple of power cables out of the five or so boxes of them that they have. I asked the young gun technician if he might have an old serial mouse, but he just grinned–I was surprised that he was old enough to remember serial mice. He said he always threw away anything that old.
While there, I stopped to visit a buddy of mine, and was telling him the story with as much harmony and back beat as possible, when I thought to ask if, being the alphageek, he might have such a thing as a serial mouse lying about. He is a bit of a pack rat, and it seemed possible, if unlikely. They’ve only been in the new offices for a couple of years.
He thought for a moment, waggled his finger in the air to indicate that I should wait for a moment, and unlocked his file cabinet. He reached in about elbow deep, almost like reaching back through time, and brought out a box. He popped it open and there, still in the plastic, never opened, was a three-button serial mouse, with turquoise color-coded connector.
Now I just have to mail it up to him. My brother knows the secret to manifesting.
Ask and you shall receive. Seek and you shall find. It works best when you plug it in.
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