Lore

The Beginning

I have been terminally online since the mainstream introduction of DSL/broadband; all starting from a Packard-Bell Machine with Windows 98 to the daily driver of a Dell Optiplex with Windows XP.

Earliest memories I have of the Internet had to be Y2K era. I can recall my grandmother telling me not to use the telephone, as it would interrupt my grandfather's session. I distinctly remember picking up the off-white telephone (probably a Cortelco) and hearing static gibberish. My grandfather paid for 10 hours of Internet a month. When my grandparents finally got DSL (shout-out Embarq), the chains were broken, I was going to be ONLINE (5th grade probably?). All thanks to that Dell Optiplex.

There are photos of me playing through endless sessions of Spider Solitaire, Pinball, Chip's Challenge, Rodent's Revenge, and SkiFree. Considering I did not have reliable connection online in my earlier years, I missed the era of Geocities. However, I did just fine playing Jumpstart, Freddie Fish, and Hotwheels on CD-ROM. My cousins would visit for the summer and we would all gather around the monitor and compete for the Pinball highscore, and jot down the cheat code phrases to skip ahead levels on Chip's Challenge.

I am extremely competent on the hardware side of computers, I have built countless machines for myself and others. I also have had my fair share of disassembling laptops never to be put back quite right again. lol I took networking courses through highschool and college, but it wasn't really that exciting to me, but I know plenty to get by. I do find it funny I have very limited knowledge of how to code considering my presence around anything with a power switch. It's strange being up to date with the newest CPUs and GPUs, and I am still scribing on rocks like a caveman.

So, I really don't seem to remember my passions. When people ask me what I enjoy, it's embarassing I can't give them a solid answer. I can instead take an indefinite time thinking what to say.

The biggest and most obvious touch grass hobby I have (at the moment) is my community's Pops band. It's consisted of mostly boomers who have been playing their instruments for years, or local high school band students. It's actually directed by my old band director from high school. The turning point to actually go back to playing an instrument was just a casual idea that was thrown about. Before I knew it, I had a Yamaha YEP-321 Euphonium, the same one I was borrowing back in middle school.

I played euphonium and tuba throughout my middle and high school years (2008-2014). I did marching band, concert band, honor band, jazz band, and now a community band. As I was going through an actual bandcamp, I hated a lot of my band career. It wasn't until 10 years later did I decide that I wanted to rejoin in an ensemble, playing my euphonium. It's truly one thing I feel decent enough at, but not godlike enough to not want to hone in skills.