September 15, 2013

• I posted this elsewhere, but whattheheck... I have no surviving pictures, but in 1984, one of the 'wacky radio people' in L.A. who I wrote/performed stuff for staged "Trick or Treating for Adults Only". He got a little hand-held mobile unit (a big deal in '84), arranged for some of the residents near the radio station to have candy to give out at 8 in the morning and gave an open invitation to anyone OVER 21, but you had to be in some kind of costume. I was getting seriously into the early PCs of the time (Commodore 64, mostly) and one of my user-group friends was getting obsessed with unauthorized copies of software just when it started being called 'piracy'. So I came up with the idea of being a "Computer Pirate" by mixing accessories associated with computer geeks (pocket pen protector, white socks, tape on glasses) and pirates (eye patch, plastic sword, fake hand hook) and one hybrid item that makes me REALLY wish I had a picture. Instead of a parrot on my shoulder, I attacked a stuffed penguin (several years before Linux adopted the penguin mascot). So ahead of my time...
• In other awesome wheelchair news: Wheelchair hack lets two-year-old explore on his own