• ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    8
    ·
    5 hours ago

    In the early '80s we used to hang out at my one friend’s house and play games on his TRS-80 which we affectionately called the “Trash 80”. We were all in high school except Monty who was 23 and enormously obese. Monty had a real job as a programmer somewhere and one afternoon he sat down at the Trash 80 and wrote a very plausible hi-res version of Space Invaders from scratch in about half an hour. At the time it meant nothing to me, but now after a 30 year career as a programmer myself I understand just how impressive that actually was.

    Monty wired up his car’s alternator to the ignition switch and he would leave his keys in the switch, hoping that somebody would attempt to steal his car and die. Not knowing about this, one of our friends ran out to his car after a D&D session, started it up and drove around the parking lot. Monty was so disappointed that nothing happened. I kinda miss the '80s.