Semisagacious Meditations
of an Autodidactic Polymath

As I'm trying to decide exactly what I'll write my memoir about, I've remembered a few things we never mentioned in class. Because I'm still digesting the subject matter, and because I love feedback, I thought I'd share my brainstorms here.

VHS cassettes

As a kid, I had a full library of bubbly, oversized plastic cases of these as well as a number of paper sleeved cassettes labeled with my mother's ornate calligraphy. I wore the ribbon down on a few of my favorites, and we had to rerecord them.

I remember hearing about DVDs when they first came out and being less than enthused about them. It would be great to have a permanent copy of my movies and specials, but the price was just too high for anyone middle class to afford the players. 

Now, a decade and a half later, I not only keep a DVD player exclusively, I also record and edit my own movies on my laptop. My only lament in losing a VHS player is losing some of the movies I loved back then. Although many classic movies and television shows have been reproduced on DVD, most of the ones I watched did not.

Fisher Price plastic turntable

I'll let this video explain that one to you. :)

Game & Watch: Mario's Cement Factory 

My first handheld game. It was a single screen LCD with a few simple buttons that allowed you to reposition an inksplatter version of Mario (I would hardly call it "move") to each side of the screen to release the cement to the lower level before the stacks got too full. I don't remember exactly what happened if the containers did get too full—aside from losing—but the game itself did teach me time management under pressure. Maybe this is one reason I tend to wait until the last minute to do everything: stress under a clock. Who would have thought that gaming taught me to be so self-destructive?

flow chart stencil

When I was younger, my dad was a programmer who always began his work with pencil and paper. Before he'd even type line zero, he'd draw elaborate diagrams of processes: input, decisions, executions. He'd label everything in the rigid, legible print that carried over into his everyday handwriting, and then he'd explain to me, even as I could not understand then, what each geometric shape meant and how to follow the line that connected them all. When he bought a new stencil for himself, he gave me his old one.

The type of flow chart this tool was designed to create is considered out of date now, replaced by a nesting box design; however, I find the latter more confusing.  The uncluttered structure of my father's practice seems comforting in its clarity.