2009-02-10

Random Rants

I'm feel a little green
RANDON 1: Back in 1996 I was listening to 95.1 WIIL (it's on the WIsconsin / ILlinois border) when, between the ads for Able Pawn Shop and the Cheap Trick playing at the Brat Stop, I heard this song. I linked to it over at Cowguy's the other day, but not sure if people click on links in comments, so here ya go. And yes, I've had the MP3 of this for YEARS!




RANDOM 2: Back in the early 90's I was a COBOL programmer. You would often print copies of your code on big sheets of continuous feed "green bar" paper, that people were paid to deliver to your chair. Sometimes you would have an error, and you would need to print ('dump') the contents of the memory. And sometimes the program would simply ABEND (ABnormal END).

Well, one day, I came back to my desk and there was a 3 foot stack of green bar sitting in my chair, which I promptly tossed. (Green bar? Not so "green" in those days. Anyway, I go home that night, and was talking to my roommate, T-Bone about my day, and said, "And when I came back from lunch, someone had left a big unformatted dump in my chair..." If I remember correctly, there was a spit-take.

Random 3: Helpful hint, when sitting at the airport playing with Sass on Facebook mobile, sit FACING the gate so that you're not the "Last call for..." person on the overhead. I'm just saying...

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow, COBOL... I actually learned COBOL back in the day but of course never used it.

That takes me back,

Cowguy said...

Yup Scope, that's a classic! Bravo on the re-post, I'm like you, I dunno how many people click on links in comments either.

Cora said...

Ha ha! A big unformatted dump! I would have done a spit take too.

Cora said...

And I don't think I'll ever see cows quite the same way from now on....

Sassy Britches said...

Scope! How do you make a link in a comment? I've tried to figure it out, but I'm a bit ignorant.

Candy's daily Dandy said...

Haha! Thems some badass bovines!

As for Random 3-ooops. heheheehee

Lisa said...

1. You're admitting you have the mp3? You're a very brave man.

2. I remember the paper but that's all I understand from that random fact... so you threw away the 3 foot stack... and?????? I just don't get it... lol

3. getting on last not so fun. did you get any overhead space for your carry-on?

SkylersDad said...

I posted that exact video a couple of months ago after finding it on an old computer. That song was stuck in my head for days!

MJenks said...

Oh, man, the Brat Stop. I've eaten there a handful of times. Last time I went, it was after a Brewers game, and my buddy and I decided to skip the brat stop and see the game, but eat on the way back to South Bend.

unfortunately, they had stopped serving brats. We had to go to Denny's instead. Fuckers.

Sass said...

I love that I distracted you to that extent. YAY ME!!!!

Imagine if I'd sent pictures.

Not that I'd do that...I'm just sayin'.

Anonymous said...

Oh God, I had almost forgotten all about using COBAL and all about the green bar. It's probably going to take a couple glasses of wine tonight to put that memory back where it belongs - in the dumper.

HA - this entire post totally made my day. Thanks for that!

J.J. in L.A. said...

Back in the late 80's, I was a COBOL-learning college student. I hated the line at those printers, waiting for our "green" sheets. I also hated having to juggle a crapload of it, while trying to walk on crutches at the same time.

Scope said...

Poo - If there was such a thing as Visual COBOL I would be a happy man. Very happy.

Cowguy - I felt a little bit cheaty redoing it as a post after it was a comment, but since nobody mentioned it in your comments later, I felt it okay to use as part of this randomness.

Cora - I was raised on a farm and we had beef cows, so this is particularly funny.

Sassy Britches - You have to code the HTML. I'll send it to you.

Candy - And for #3, I could have just of easily been emailing you.

Lisa - 1) The amount of carp in my music collection is STAGGERING and I find no shame in it. 2) Use the phrase, "an unformatted dump" in front of any teenage boy you happen to run across. Discuss results. :-) 3) The plane was so empty I had my choice of rows, so tossing my bad in the overhead was a snap. We were even 10 minutes early at the destination and had to wait on a gate.

Skyler's Dad - It's a great tune, isn't it.

mjenk - The Brat Stop is an institution, isn't it? Plus, there's a pretty good cheese outlet shop right there, too.

Sass - If you would have sent pictures, I would have had to have been loaded into an ambulance from my head exploding (not saying which one, mind you) not an airplane.

Giggle Pixie - If I have driven you to drink, then my work here is done.

JJ - Sound like the guys in your class were a bunch of ASS-BURGERS.