Back in my day....

.... when I was a uni student studying engineering in 1992, my best friend from high school showed me his new HP48 scientific graphing calculator. These were the flagship models of the HP calculator line and they were ridiculously expensive. I can't remember the exact figures, but I think they were almost a thousand dollars expensive... However, he reasoned, they were the types of tools that engineers used and it made sense to learn how to use them  as a student. It made sense to me at the time and I mentioned it to my parents who bought me one for christmas and my birthday one year. Woohoo!


As it turns out, the university I went to was very theoretical and we learnt all things from first principles and so I didn't really need most of the functions of the calculator. I also discovered that I really sucked at a lot of the first principles of electronics engineering (although I did really well at the digital stuff and I liked the applied side) and I ended up focusing on software engineering which became my career for many years after I left uni. My friend also ended up in the IT industry and quickly found his way into (shock, horror)... management...  I don't know what ever happened to his calculator and I doubt he got value from it. I almost got into trouble in one exam because it was too advanced and they were almost going to confiscate it from me. It was a cryptography exam and some heavy duty number crunching was required and I fortunately managed to show them how to do a hard reset on the calculator to prove that I hadn't stored anything in there in an attempt to cheat.


Twenty years later and I'm doing statistics in psychology. I enjoyed statistics when I did it in engineering, mainly because I understood it and found it easy, especially compared to things like electromagnetic theory and quantum physics... I've just moved house and all my things are in boxes and I have no idea where my calculator is. My iPhone has a rather nice and satisfactory scientific calculator but it isn't allowed in exams. I thought I'd go have a look and see how much calculators go for nowadays, totally expecting them to be only available as oddities in specialist stores; much like a slide rule might be. I discover that something that cost me $70 in high school would now be worth about $15. Actually, my high school calculator wouldn't have been too bad if all the print on the buttons hadn't been worn off due to so much use.. Yes, I used it that much... I'm a nerd... 


Suddenly, I see advertised an HP48gII which was one of the successors to my calculator from uni. It was selling for a princely sum of $200 which is more than any other calculator on that site but lot less than what mine cost. I don't know what I expected really and this whole trip down memory lane suddenly made me feel so old.


I mean, back in my day, I used to go to the milk bar and buy chocolate drops for one cent each and I used to love the dixie cup ice creams for twenty cents!!!

Filly's Frolic #21

I'm not sure how long it's been since I'd taken my car to this particular workshop for a service, but it had obviously been a while. I had made a booking the previous night and dutifully drove there the next morning to drop the car off. Walking into the workshop office, I thought to myself that it looked different. I pressed the bell and waited for someone to come out. Looking around I remembered that there had been a picture of Brocky's Torana hanging on the wall which didn't appear to be there any more. I looked around wondering if it had been moved and sure enough there was a picture on the wall behind me.Yet, something still seemed odd about it.

Some time, several presses of the bell and a gentle shout of "Hello?" later, someone came out of the workshop.

"How can I help you darl?", he asked.

"I'm here to drop my car off for a service", I replied dangling my key in the air.

"That'd be next door", he replied gesturing to his right.

"Oops, sorry!" I suddenly realised my mistake as the service workshop and this workshop both had the same name and were part of the same building but had different office entrances. I smiled and backed out of the office.

"No worries darl", he replied with a grin, probably thinking how ditsy I was....

I scurried next door as another gentleman saw me coming as he was walking towards the office.

"I'm here to drop my car off for a service?", I asked a little hesitantly dangling my key in the  air.

"No problem. Come in.", he replied as we walked into the office. This looked more familiar and there was the picture of the Torana on the wall! 

"I went next door by mistake. Oops!", I smiled in embarrassment. He laughed.

"You were probably standing there for ten minutes waiting for someone to come out."

"Actually, I was!" It probably wasn't an unusual occurrence. "The silly thing is, I've been here before too."

He smiled again. 

"I had trouble finding your record because it was under Ex Why".

"Oh!" Suddenly I realised that the last time I had been here, I hadn't changed the name on my driver's license yet.

"Is that your hubby?", he asked by way of an explanation. I didn't offer one.

"It's under Filly now", I replied chirpily. He looked at me hesitantly as I returned his gaze. I'm not sure what he was thinking, maybe he thought he might have put his foot in his mouth by asking the question to a lady that had been divorced. I don't know, but it didn't matter. We changed the details and confirmed that the rest of the contact details were correct. As I left, I couldn't help but giggle at the hilarity of the situation. Not only had I gone into the wrong place at first, I had also forgotten that I was listed there under a previous name. In the end though, everything was sorted and there wasn't the slightest problem. I can't complain about that.

Thailand Day T+14

Mum came to visit me in my room today which I guess is kinda nice. One of Dad's old classmates is in the hotel industry and so we generally get really good rooms from him whenever we travel. This time, he knew one of the big wigs in the hotel chain in Thailand that was coincidently the same hotel that I was at so Mum ended up with a really good rate on a pretty swish room. She came down today and had a third go at trying to convince me to move up to her room with her. 

Hrmm.. three dilation sessions lasting half an each and four breast massage sessions at twenty minutes each? Sorry, but I think I prefer my privacy and I'm kinda comfy in this little room of mine. Even if she does go for a walk each time, I still much rather prefer my privacy but I got the feeling she wasn't happy with my stance.

Perusing and shuffling through my things as she is prone to do, that's when she picked up my dilator (and not gently by the end either).

"What's this?", she asked inquisitively, turning it over and around in her fingers and inspecting it from every angle. Yes, I do wash it clean after every session... 

"Uhm, it's a dilator", I replied shyly since I knew where this was going.

"What do you do with it?", she asked rather forwardly. 

I was in bed under the covers since I was tired and in pain and discomfort. At this point however, I was trying not to giggle although I may have smirked.

"Uhm... you kinda have to stick it inside you", I replied. In slow motion, I could see the cogs ticking in her brain as at least part of the information started sinking in.

"Urrgghh! Oh God!", she exclaimed putting down the dilator as quickly as she could without dropping it like a dead rat. 

Maybe I am evil, but it was really, really hard not to laugh.

Fillys Frolic #20

It was one of those things that I've been meaning to do for a while. Now that the padding had disintegrated from the inside of my bicycle helmet, it was definitely time to buy a new one. I wandered into the bicycle shop and after a quick scan of the store to figure out where the helmets were, I headed straight towards them and stared at the myriad of helmets on the wall. Before too long, a salesman came over to ask if I needed assistance. 
"What's you budget?", he asked and it was a fair enough question.
"I don't really have one 'coz I wasn't sure how much they cost.", I replied a little sheepishly. Most of the helmets looked remarkably similar to me and I wasn't sure what the differences were. He picked up a helmet up with baby blue graphics and flipped it over, explaining the sizing mechanism then handed it to me to try on. I flipped it onto my head and as I tried to strap it up, my hair covered my face and entangled all the straps.
"Sorry", I mumbled, "I would normally do this with a ponytail."
He chuckled as I took the helmet off, flicked back my hair as best I could and put it on again while he helped do up the chin strap. It seemed to be ok, after all, it was just a helmet. Pointing along the wall, he briefly highlighted the other options. 
"What's the difference between this and that one?", I asked, pointing to a similar looking helmet with purple graphics.
"Well", he paused, "The one you have is a women's helmet, and this one here is a mens helmet. But guys tend not to wear purple.", he joked. He paused before adding, " Actually, they're exactly the same except for the colour so they gave them different names. I don't know why they do that, but they distinguish between the mens and womens helmets even though they are really the same."
"I was going to ask you that", I interrupted, "Do men and women have different shaped heads?"
He shook his head and smiled. 
"I actually like the purple", I said pointing to the helmet he was holding. 
"Oh, ok", he shrugged, handing the helmet to me to try on. I flipped it over in preparation for putting it on and wondered if I really needed to. 
"Not that it really matters", I though aloud, "They are both the same anyway."
"Oh, but that one might fit different because it has a different label.", he said with a chuckle. I giggled as I put it on. It fit as well as I expected, there were no surprises.
"Do I look more manly?", I asked him. He chuckled again. I giggled too and I guess this helmet didn't make me look manly at all so it's safe for me to wear as I attempt to cycle my fat away. Time to throw my old one in the bin.

Pretty Sugar

My ex never liked sugar in her scrambled eggs; she didn't have a sweet tooth and just didn't like sweet eggs. Not that I put an exorbitant amount of sugar in my scrambled eggs. On the bench I had five eggs whisked together with the most useful of utensils, a fork, and I now wanted to add just a mere teaspoon of sugar. My current man wouldn't have any objections to that since his taste buds were attuned to high levels of sugar. 


I went to the cupboard where the sugar was stored and moved aside the jar containing the brown sugar. Looking for the container with the white sugar, I stared incredulously at what I found. I yelled out to my man, my voice filled with annoyance and possibly a bit of anger. 
"What's up, love?", he replied as he walked down the corridor towards the kitchen. His voice wavered slightly with the fear of someone who knows he's in trouble with his girl.
"Why", I paused, holding up in disbelief the container containing a layer of white sugar topped with a layer of brown sugar. "...did you put the brown sugar on top of the white sugar in this container??"
I saw on his face that he knew he was in trouble. As the cogs ticked in his brain, I stared and waited, wondering how he would talk his way out of this one. He pulled his cheeks and lips back into a cheeky smile, his face channelling back to his youth as a sassy young schoolboy who probably got away with a lot more than has been let known. 
"I thought it looked pretty", he replied with that cheeky smile. I couldn't help but laugh. Even as I pushed aside a corner of the brown sugar so that I could get to the white sugar underneath, I couldn't help but giggle. It was such a ridiculous answer that I just had to laugh.
Add one to the count of things he's gotten away with.