- 2006.01.18
About a month-and-a-half ago, I got a job at a movie theatre here in
Denver. I was shocked to find that there was nothing in the break room
for the employees, not even a clock!
I asked why they didn't put anything in there, and they said that
they just never got around to it. So I asked the General Manager if I
could bring in a few old compact Macs and set up a mini computer
lab.
She was ecstatic - apparently the room had been empty since the
theatre had opened about a year-and-a-half ago, and the crew had been
complaining about it.
So I went home that night and got to work setting up my old Mac SE with a bunch of old games,
including Brickles (Breakout), Hangman, Shufflepuck Café, Risk,
MacMan (Pac Man), and Missile Command. I even installed At Ease on it
so it would be easier for the crew to access the programs.
I went in the next day, and the General Manager had one of the other
managers (who has a new PowerBook G4) help me rearrange the break room
so the SE would fit.
Is Everybody Happy?
Most of the people
I work with liked the little SE, but a few were rude, basically telling
me that only a fool would ever want to use such a slow machine that
can't even go online. But the overall response to it was good. A few
people were actually fighting over who would use it, so I decided to
set up my old Classic
II the same way as the SE and take it in.
At this point almost everyone was really happy to have something to
do on break - but there were still a few people who would look at the
two machines and criticize them, without even trying them.
I explained to those people that I was just testing the waters,
seeing how good the reaction was before I brought in newer machines. I
went on to explain that even newer machines couldn't go online in that
room because there isn't an ethernet port or even a phone line.
For the next few weeks things seemed to be going fine.
Some people couldn't stop thanking me for bringing these old Macs
in, others couldn't seem to tear themselves from them, and some
complained that they were too slow and they couldn't play the game on
albinoblacksheep.com.
Vandalism
But then something bad happened. One day I went to sign in, and I
noticed that someone had signed in as "James Bond" on the lab sign in
sheet - and then went onto say, "This computer is very slow and has
less technology than a calculator."
At this point I was starting to get a bit frustrated. I thought I
had made it fairly clear that these machines are not the bleeding edge
of technology. Oh well, I'll just print out a new log sheet.
So I sat down at the SE (which has a StyleWriter II hooked up to
it). I moved the mouse, and it seemed like it was stuck.
I opened it up, and low and behold, someone put gum inside
it. I tried to clean it out, but it got in the rollers and just screwed
things up to the point that it couldn't be fixed.
At this point was mad, really mad. I went to my manager and told her
what I found, and she was shocked. Who would do a thing like this? she
asked.
I don't know, but I did know one thing: My computers were in danger,
and I couldn't let them spend a second longer in the break room than
they had to.
I explained to her that I knew that even if I brought in a new
mouse, either it or something else would get broken, and I just
couldn't afford to keep them there.
I called my dad and explained to him what happened. Then asked him
to come and get them. He understood and showed up to get them up 20
minutes after I called.
Some people think I jumped the gun by taking them out so quickly,
but I disagree. If I kept them in there, they would just get vandalized
more, and that's something I will not put up with.
It's too bad, because I was just about to bring in a Beige G3 for them to use - but
that isn't going to happen now. Someone ruined it for everyone by
breaking one of my mice, and I just won't risk anything else.
There is an ongoing investigation to find the person who did this,
but I doubt we'll find that person.
I think I'm going to look for some people who could really use a
computer. I'm sure there is someone out there who doesn't have a
computer and would appreciate getting one for free, be it a Mac SE or a
Power Mac G3.
Lisa Coming
It looks like I'm going to be getting a Lisa 2/10 as a birthday
present in the next few weeks, so stay tuned. My next article will be
about it. 
