July 25, 2005
Memory Meme
Clayton tagged me with a meme, so here goes.
What I was doing 10 years ago -- In July of 1995, I was still a Navy Chief working in Norfolk, Va on a computer system (PDP-11) so old that Bill Gates had worked on the same model when he was originally cutting his teeth learning programming. I remember lamenting that the Navy should hire someone to rewrite the training applications and port them over to a PC, not knowing that I would be the one doing the work when I had retired and moved onto the civilian sector.
5 years ago -- Celebrated one year as part of the secular order of Discalced Carmelites on the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. I don't consider myself a third order Carmelite but a disordered one.
1 year ago -- Wrote the "Flip Flop Mysteries."
Yesterday -- Went to Mass where we had a priest I had not seen before. The third priest that we had helping out was a Redemptorist and finally got his wish to become a prison chaplain and has moved to work at the Staten Island prison. Fr. Mike was an excellent preacher it was only his voice that was disconcerting since it's timbre closely approximated Kermit the Frog. This new priest (or new for me since he is probably another retired priest helping out) prayed a beautiful and reverential Mass and his homily had me thinking long after we had left.
Now who should I inflict pass this Meme onto? How about some newer bloggers Catholic Pillow Fight, Holy Fool, and Dad29.
Thanks.
Regrettably, I don't do memes.
Been self-employed for 12+ years--same stuff, every day.
Posted by Dad29 email at July 25, 2005 2:54 PMTen years ago I was a Ship's Serviceman on the USS Ticonderoga(CG-47) working on a SNAP Computer that would make your Computer look top of the line. Relying to much on modern PCs is not a good policy. It is the people running them that makes it humm like a well oiled machine. If you do not believe me ask some of your pals on the USS Yorktown (CG-48) which almost sank while moored to its pier. Thankfully, they had people from our ship to assist them.
Posted by Jonathan Carpenter email at July 25, 2005 6:39 PMYou've sparked long dormant memories. I wish i could remember which computer we used on the Mk86. The SSR was the AN/SPQ9 and the ASR was the SPG-60, but for the life of me, I can't remember which computer!
But I do remember the display was teletype, or a bank of 32 LEDs if the TT was out. Input was Bernouli, with paper-tape backup. Programs could also be loaded manually via 32 switches, but it took forever (usually only used in test mode.)
But I also recall a PAC fire where my buddy, FC2 Truppi, was told his forward CWIS had taken damage to it's radar control array. He told the observer who broke the news that all he needed was a soldering iron, two SNFCs and 1,200 yards of wire.
Why?
To connect the aft array to the lines of the damaged one forward. The observer commended his quick thinking but insisted it wasn't workable. Never wanted to buy a beer for a 2nd Class so bad in my life!
Thanks for the stroll down amnesia lane!
Posted by Franklin Jennings email at July 25, 2005 7:10 PMYour welcome. FYI Franklin look at the Jane's Fighting Ship's website for info on the MK86. At least you did not have your 5 inch missfire, which were it not for the quick thinking and ability of our GMs would have blown Mount 51 to bits.
Posted by Jonathan Carpenter email at July 25, 2005 7:32 PM"Quick thinking" GMs! You slay me!!!
Posted by Franklin Jennings email at July 25, 2005 8:45 PMNothing like a pending gun mount explosion to spur the quickest thinking for anyone from SHS to GMs.
Posted by Jonathan Carpenter email at July 25, 2005 10:09 PMJeff,
16 years ago I was in operations and I was responsible for backing up a PDP-11. How we backed it up is that we had a backup machine, and we backed up disk to disk. The disks were in what we affectionately called "washing machines". We took the disk out, put in the next disk in the cycle and started the disk copy.
Those sound a little like the PCs we used on the TICO to do 3M. They were apart of the SNAP II system. Unfortunately, they looked and operated like the TRS-80s (AKA TRASH 80s), Texas Instruments put out.
Posted by Jonathan Carpenter email at July 25, 2005 10:34 PMuyk-7
Posted by tyler email at September 24, 2005 9:02 AM