I got in a really interesting phone conversation with a young woman last night.

[LuckyCharms]

The landline rang, and I assumed it was a spam call because I didn't recognize the number.

I was working at my desk, and I always answer spam calls when I am sitting here, just so I can fuck with them.

Subsequently, when I answered the phone, I was kind of pissy to the person on the other end, until she asked "May I speak to LuckyCharms please"?

I could not understand her at all. She did not have an accent, but she was talking WAY too fast, so I said "Sweetheart, I'm very sorry, but I can't understand a word you are saying". She continued talking, and I kept telling her that I could not understand her, until I finally got used to her cadence.

Turns out she was a current student at the university I graduated from. The stated purpose of her call was to gather information about my opinion of the university, whether I enjoyed my classes, what I remember most about my time there, etc. I knew she would eventually be asking me for a donation...but I engaged with her anyway, and we talked for about 30 minutes.

She asked me what I would recommend to current students about life at the university.

I basically told her that this will likely be the most rewarding time of her life. Work very very hard. Push yourself to learn as much as you can. At your age, you are smarter than you realize. Recognize that fact, and jam as much knowledge in your head as you can. Be proud of yourself. Be kind to your fellow students, and learn from them, as well as your professors. Also, make as many contacts as you can, and keep in touch with them after you graduate.

I asked her what her major was, and she told me it was computer science.

I said, Oh Boy! let me tell you...

I'm 67 years old, and I took several "computer courses" while at university. I conveyed to her how much things have changed. A personal computer? They didn't exist back then, everything was mainframe. Smart phones? Forget about it, they didn't exist.

I then went on to explain that I took some FORTRAN and COBOL courses, as well as BASIC. She asked me what they were like. I said, well...

Here's a memory for you that you won't be able to relate to at all.

You would have to write your program out with pen to paper on some kind of coding form, trudge over to the keypunch center with that form, sit down at a keypunch machine and punch your program onto IBM cards, have the machine spit out the cards into a stack about two inches thick.

Then, you would have to walk those cards to ANOTHER building and run those cards through ANOTHER machine to have it print out the results of the program you wrote onto green bar paper, but you were so proud of yourself that you got all of your cards punched, that you would stop at the campus pub to swill down a pitcher of beer, but you got a little too tipsy and dropped your stack of IBM cards, and once they got out of order, even a little bit, you were fucked and your program would not run, so you had to go back to the keypunch building and re-punch them, only now, you're half drunk and it takes you forever, and it's 200AM...those were the days, those were the days...you have no idea how different it was back then...

Got her laughing real good!

[markodochartaigh]

1. Things have changed so much.

When I started in 1986 at the large teaching hospital from which I retired we didn't have wall suction. We had Gomco suction machines which were about the size of a coffee table. On the trauma ward our four bed rooms often had five patients. Most patients had an ng tube and at least one chest tube, each to suction. The first five minutes of a code was just getting everything out of the way.

[LuckyCharms]

3. Check this out! You used to be able to buy cigarettes...

sold by a candy striper at your hospital bed!

[markodochartaigh]

9. Sure,

I think that it was about 1990 when they finally said that staff couldn't smoke at the nurses' station. For a couple of years after that I hated going to the restroom because people would smoke in the restrooms.
One time I had a patient who was a real jerk. He was going to surgery in a couple of hours and he was smoking marijuana in the room. I really didn't know how the marijuana in his system would react with the anesthesia so I called security on him. Security was no help at all. I did let the anesthetist know.

[FakeNoose]

2. I'm a few years older and I did all that stuff too

I wasn't a computer science major, but I had several of those courses as a secondary core subject.

I can still remember those IBM punch cards, and I'm glad you mentioned them. My school had some kind of system where each card was sequentially numbered as they were punched. Inevitably students dropped their decks, I know I did - and I could still save it by putting the cards back into order.

Thanks for the walk down Memory Lane!

[LuckyCharms]

5. I remember dropping mine in the snow!

Walking from the campus pub to the card reader building.

OHHHHH NOOOOO!

[unblock]

4. You didn't have a sort machine?

Columns 72-80 on punch cards were reserved for a sequence number. Basically, you stamped the cards 1,2,3, etc.

If you managed to jumble up your cards, a sort machine could save you if you knew how to use it -- not obvious as it only sorted one digit at a time. So you sort *last* digit first, stack the results, then sort next to last digit, etc.

By the time you're through all the digits, if you restocked them properly, your entire program is correctly sorted!

[LuckyCharms]

6. I don't think so...

...can't remember. I do remember being told that if you dropped them, you would have to start over.

[FakeNoose]

13. Wow, what a memory!

I've blocked most of this stuff out for the last 50 years or so. Got my own PC and it was pre-Windows, but still awesome in every way. After that I forgot all of this old stuff with the punch cards.

[cachukis]

7. That you are able to share that story; priceless.

[Ocelot II]

8. OMG, I remember typing out those punch cards

Last edited Fri Feb 6, 2026, 09:48 PM - Edit history (1)

then waiting for my turn to run my program, which (if it ran properly) was printed out on big sheets of green and white striped paper. When personal computers first became available you could buy them in the same section of a department store as stereo equipment. They would have demo models out that you could play with, and I amused myself by typing in this:

10 PRINT "Help, I'm trapped in a program loop!"
20 GOTO 10
RUN

And walking away. The salespeople never knew how to make it stop.

[LuckyCharms]

12. LOL

[unblock]

15. Hahahahaha!!

You're a cruel one, but I like it!

[msongs]

10. so luckycharms is code for insert real name here?

[LuckyCharms]

11. Yes

[a kennedy]

14. SHE WAS A HUMAN RIGHT??? and she WILL remember all you said, ok, May-be half of what you told her...

and gawd love ya for even being polite to her. She’ll remember you. 🥰

[FakeNoose]

16. I'll bet that young lady put LuckyCharms in the front of her Rolodex

[LuckyCharms]

18. Yes! Definitely human! We had a long conversation...

She was very nice.

[True Dough]

17. "I got in a really interesting phone conversation with a young woman last night"

I clicked on this thread expecting to read that you dialed a 1-900 number.

[LuckyCharms]

19. What is a 1-900 number?

And how do you know about them, True Dough?

[True Dough]

20. I've seen

a late night commercial or two.

"Pick up the phone. We're all alone!"

[LuckyCharms]

21. Do you have these numbers...

on speed dial?

[True Dough]

22. I could check,

but my phone privileges have been taken away!

[Wicked Blue]

23. Things have changed so much and so fast

I'm afraid AI is going to take over a lot of computer tech jobs very soon.