Computer Interests

     Many people whom I know have often asked me where I learned so much about computers. Well, it’s a long story, but I’ll try to shorten it for you.

     I’ve had an interest in computers for many years now.  In fact my first experience with computers dates back to when I was only 18 years old. Working in the military I met a man who worked with computers and eventually bought his own.  He taught me a lot about computers in those days; taught me the basics of how they worked, and taught me how they could be used to make a persons life easier in general.

     This man and I became very good friends, and when he eventually bought his own “home computer” (as they were called in those days), the two of us would sit in front of it for hours on end.  We would write programs together in BASIC and save them to the state of the art cassette recorder/player that was built in to his home computer.  We would often come up with program ideas of our own and jot them down on paper.   Then, the first chance either on of us would get, we would type our program in to his computer, save it on a tape, and then run it.  Of course, nothing ever ran correctly the first time, and we would have to “debug” the program.  It was intriguing, and always held my interest as it still does today.

     I had found computers so interesting that I wanted to buy my own.  Of course, they were very expensive.  We’re talking about the 70’s here, and even then a decent home computer ran you $800.00.  For your hard earned money you got the computer, a monitor, a cassette player to record your programs on, and anywhere from 4K to 8K of memory.  Yes I said “K” for Kilobytes.  For those who are not so computer literate, the computer’s memory would hold from 4000 to 8000 characters of information.  Less expensive computers gave you everything except a monitor, and were designed to hook up to your television like a video game.  Popular computers at this time were Apple, Atari, Adam, Commodore, and Tandy Radio Shack's Model I and Model II.

     As time when on, my friend and I had gone separate ways.  With both of us being in the military it was only a matter of time before we were sent different places.  And although we have been separated, my interest in computers has remained dominant in my life.

     After about a year or so I had finished my obligation with the military and became a civilian once again.  Still having a major interest in computers and not enough money to buy one, I simply by chance came across someone who was looking for help programming his home computer.  He had a Tandy Radio Shack Model III with two 5 1/4 inch disk drives, and an old Centronics dot matrix printer.  He explained to me what he wanted his computer to do, and I began writing programs for it.  Of course this wasn’t easy for me at first, since I had learned to program BASIC on a Commodore computer.  The language was slightly different from what I was a custom to.  In addition to this, he had floppy disk drives, and I had only worked with cassette recorders for storing programs and information.

     With a little help from a local computer club we managed to successfully write and retrieve data from the disks and I was on my way to writing some good programs for him.  I even managed to purchase myself a small Radio Shack pocket computer with 4K of memory.  I wrote programs for it that helped me write larger programs.  Programs that would allow me to enter a list of string variables and then allow me to add them together in to one record, and then give me the BASIC program instruction to extract the information.

     Over the years I eventually got my own computer.  In fact I’ve had several.  Everything from my pocket computer, a Tandy 600 (one of the first portable computers), and Tandy 1000 HX computer, all the way to the Pentium class computer I have today.

     My interests in computers have continued to expand.  Today, although I no longer write programs, I enjoy writing HTML and JAVA.  I like working with graphic software, productivity software and much more.  I also enjoy repairing and building computers, and have become a valuable source of help for many of my friends.  I even do volunteer work for the Lenni Lenape Historical Society/Museum of Indian Culture.  I currently author their web site, and I am working on a new database for them.  If you would like to visit their web site go to www.lenape.org.

     Well, that’s about it in a nutshell.  I could go on for hours here, but this is the just of it.  After 25 years of working with computers, I have a lot I could talk about.

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Geographical Information

     I currently live in in what is known as the Lehigh Valley.  In fact I have lived in the Lehigh Valley for about 30 years now.

     The three main cities in my local area are Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton.  According to the 2000 Census report, Allentown ranks as the 3rd largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the city of Bethlehem ranks as the 8th largest city.  The city of Easton however does not rank in the top 15 largest cities.

     The countryside in this area of Pennsylvania is a beautiful one, consisting of mountains and farming fields.  Although many farming fields are being bought up by developers and turned into housing communities, much of the countryside remains intact.  Further West is Berks County, which has taken steps to prevent over development by imposing strict zoning laws, and subsequently has a far greater amount of countryside left intact.

     Although the Lehigh Valley has become highly developed over the past 30 years, it still has many attractions, both historical and otherwise.  Allentown, for example, was one of the stopping places for the famous "Liberty Bell" which is now kept in Philadelphia.  The city of Allentown maintains a shrine where the liberty bell had remained overnight, and is home to a replica of the actual Liberty Bell.

     If you are visiting, or planning to visit this area of Pennsylvania, please visit my links page for a list of links to Lehigh Valley attractions.

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Musical Interests

     My musical interests are fairly simple.  I just love music.  Unfortunately my job and computer work both keep me from devoting what I feel is an adequate amount of time to practice both my guitar and my keyboard.

     I currently have two guitars.  My favorite guitar is my Southern Jumbo, made by Crafter.  It has a deep rich sound, and I love to play it.  My second guitar is actually my very first guitar.  It's a Kent, which I purchased about 30 years ago when I was in the Navy and stationed in Scotland.  At the time, I was told that it was really really an imitation of a Yamaha guitar.  It's old, and needs some work done to it, but I still play it.  Even in it's worn and well used condition, I can't seem to part with it.

     That about covers my musical interests for now. But then, I'm sure they will continue to expand.

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