Give your stories about growing up, a nerd obsessed with electronics, and your fondest memories of tinkering while the other men were at the dance...

 

"I am old but I am happy."

Another song lyric...this one from a Cat Stevens song. (Father and Son)

I'm beginning to suspect that the music plays in your head all the time (like it does in my head).

 

I am still alive, does that count? Old age is for survivors.

 

Give your stories about growing up, a nerd obsessed with electronics, and your fondest memories of tinkering while the other men were at the dance...

So.. 20 years old, on the road with a show band back when clubs and hotels had live entertainment 6 night's a week. Living in hotels for months on end.

Got bored (can only rehearse and mess around so much).

So I went to Radio Shack, picked up a digital clock kit - which I could actually use. Built it over the next few weeks a midst a lot of snickering and wise cracks. (I thought my buddies would be impressed - especially when I turned it on and it actually worked !)

Instead they just shook there heads and from then on treated me like I was just a bit crazy.

 

I used to make and sell chingers on dead tour back in the early 90's. Thats probably what sparked my interest in electronics. I always had a large computer background but that was my first attempt at embedded stuff. Worked great, made a crap load of money. Then in around 94-95 Bell changed the payment mechanism in their pay phones and they kinda died out. For those who don't remember Chingers were a small digital recording on the click a payphone makes when you put a quarter in it. So this was all before free longdistance. And when you touring the country in a new state every day, calling home can get expensive. So chingers sold like hot cakes. We'd sell em for $20-$40 each. Then when I wound down my corrupt band following hippy life I got into electronics and more computer stuff and kept progressing.