Discussion of USENET on IRC #oldcomputerchallenge got me to thinking about my state of mind circa millennium, say '95-05.
I was spending a LOT of time on USENET, on a couple accounts. ICB, IRC, AOL, ICQ all scroll & beep.
I'd hacked my Linux desktop into something really peculiar, was running mostly Enlightenment (previously IceWM, WindowMaker, briefly KDE but ha ha that shit could go in a dumpster). Everything was automated, floating windows around me.
Warm cozy shell.
#cyberpunk #gits
The problem was when I disconnected to go out and service my merely meat body. I'd have a hard time focusing on *anything*, being present without tick-tick-tick windows moving.
Usually took me 15-30 minutes to decompress enough to be around Humans. Which explains some of my bad relationships and odd personal habits.
When I switched to Mac (just to get working audio!), I coincidentally dumped USENET, and disconnected a bit from everything else online, and got a little life awareness back.
I had a partial relapse with the service that became shitbird, and Second Life, and a few other things where I just went in and didn't bother coming out except for raw physical needs.
So I try to watch myself now on fedi and other systems. But if I had a brain in a jar tank or Lawnmower Man hotsuit rig, it's entirely likely the outside world wouldn't see me again.
@dougmerritt I had a pretty good business for a while making security systems, databases, and other gadgets in world, was making as much as my day job.
Social drama finally made me pull back and cut down time.
@mdhughes I did WindowMaker, BlackBox, FluxBox, i3... With Fluxbox I used to have dozens of abandoned terminals hanging around in the background... i3 made me ridiculously more efficient.
Not to preach. But... Come to the dark side. Muahahahahhaa or ... uh... something? I dunno, do what works best for you. It took me like 3 months to move from fluxbox to i3, and i didn't have a job to deal with and all that... so... kinda annoying... but... so worth it though, at least for me.
had to rewrite a bunch of scripts and all that for various hotkeys.
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DougMerritt (log馃槄 = 馃挧log馃槃)
Pope Bob the Unsane