Articles

0011 0010

Today I find myself turning 50.

My first reaction to this is “thank God I finished Issue 36 before this happened” because, as unreasonable and irrational as it may sound, I’m pretty sure that if I hadn’t been able to do there would be some psychic damage. As it is, the only psychic damage I’ve suffered so far is that when we checked the mail this morning we discovered that the American Association of Retired Persons had mailed me membership card.

The weirdest thing about turning 50 is that it means I’ve been doing internet-focused entertainment things for half my life. I started Help Desk in 1996, when I was 25. I stopped doing Help Desk when I turned 45, but I’d started writing web serials at 40, and I’m still doing that. (Even in the two and a half years of struggling through Issue 36, I was still working on web serials. I was just working

verrrrryyyyyyyyyyyy

sloooooooooowwwwwwlllllllyyyyyyyy…)

So as of today, for half my life I’ve been an Internet Busker.

Related posts

Whom The Gods Would Destroy, They First Give Computers

C. B. Wright

An Apology For Irresponsible Social Media Behavior

C. B. Wright

Wherein I Curse Ubuntu For Needlessly Breaking Something Useful

C. B. Wright

12 comments

M. S. Patterson 2 July 2021 at 1:07 PM

Happy birthday, old timer!
Congrats on 2.5 decades of internet shenanigans.

Reply
C. B. Wright 2 July 2021 at 2:25 PM

That’s 91.25 Scaramucci’s!

… wait, that’s wrong and my math is bad.

A Scaramucci is 10 days. 25 years is 9,125 days. So 25 years is 912.5 Scaramucci’s.

STUPID DECIMALS

Reply
minrich 2 July 2021 at 8:41 PM

you lost me … Scaramucci lasted 11 days in office according to Wikipedia, and the average year has 365.25 days so … I am assuming that you are, or have been, celebrating Independence Day and your birthday (many happy returns) and may be innumerate for two or three more.
Don’t they got calculators in your neck of the woods?

Reply
C. B. Wright 2 July 2021 at 9:17 PM

Well… when news of his departure first hit the press they all reported his tenure as lasting 10 days. He posted some article claiming that actually, it was 11, but I don’t know that anyone backed him up on it at the time, and he strikes me as the kind of guy who would police his own wikipedia page, so… 🙂

Reply
ysth 7 July 2021 at 9:56 PM

365.2425 days

Reply
C. B. Wright 7 July 2021 at 10:27 PM

I’m too old to punch all those calculator numbers. 😀

Reply
Kai 8 July 2021 at 1:04 PM

Wow, AARP waited until you were 50 before mailing you a membership offer? I started getting them when I was 40 (decimal).

Reply
cuatroojos 9 July 2021 at 12:38 AM

AARP *really* jumped the gun with me. I was 29 or 30 (yes, base 10) when they sent me my first application for membership. It was funny enough that I kept it. A few months later, one of the tech managers in my department was about to turn 30. With the assistance of the department clerk (lovely lady!) who provided appropriate address labels, I sent him the application via company mail, timed to arrive on his birthday. His office was close enough to mine that I heard his consternation when he opened it. #evilgrin

Reply
C. B. Wright 10 July 2021 at 2:08 AM

Ha! Well, you definitely get points for that level of epic trolling…

Reply
Opus the Poet 15 July 2021 at 2:57 PM

I was killed August 31 2001 (I got better) so this has been going on 5 years (more or less) longer than I’ve been dead, but the ratios are converging.

Reply
C. B. Wright 16 July 2021 at 5:42 PM

… you… got better? Have you told this story?

Reply
Opus the Poet 10 August 2021 at 11:08 AM

Yes, I told it a number of times in several places. Long form in my blog, short form in comments sections all over the net. I have to explain to massage techs how I got the large scar on my leg opposite from where the truck hit me, and how being dead prevented me from bleeding out before the EMTs got there, and why the scars are so big and so many.

Reply

Leave a Reply to C. B. Wright