Monte

Whenever I get sick, I like to pretend that my body is like a military base that’s being invaded by an unknown enemy. When I start to feel the first sign of a cold, a sore throat, I imagine that somewhere within the damp, dark caverns of my body, little red strobe lights begin to flicker and an alarm goes off and echoes throughout my body, and a booming voice comes over a PA and announces to all of my internal organs that code red has been initiated.

I’m writing this entry on my brand new computer—well, not exactly a brand new one, but it’s new to me. It’s actually a blueberry iMac complete with mouse and keyboard that I found at a computer flee market in Arlington. I ran across the store by accident on my way to lunch, and since I had an hour to kill, I thought I’d just take a quick look around. My jaw dropped when I first walked in and saw a tiny makeshift museum of old computers at the front of the store, everything from an original Altair to the Apple II. Unfortunately, these beauties weren’t for sale. But then I noticed a poster at the back of the store which read, “Macintosh.” I walked towards the poster with my hands outstretched like a zombie. I couldn’t believe it. There in front of me were over 50 Macs dating all the way back to the very first Macintosh sitting on shelves.

There are three Apple computers I’ve always wanted to own: an original Macintosh, an original iMac, and the G4 Cube. Unfortunately, there were no cubes, and the three original Macintoshes they had were no longer working, so I decided to buy a blueberry iMac for $100.

Not even knowing if the machine worked or not, I brought my little baby home and nervously plugged it in and pushed the power button. The familiar startup chime sounded, and after a short delay, the Happy Mac icon came up. I was so thrilled I leapt up and squealed like a little girl.

My baby is a 333 MHz PowerPC G3 blueberry iMac with 32 MB of RAM and a 6 GB hard drive. I’ve upgrade its original operating system, OS 8.5.1, to OS 9.2.2.

It’s the love of my life—right next to James.