COLUMN: Computer out for blood

01001101 01111001 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01110000 01110101 01110100 01100101 01110010 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01110100 01110010 01111001 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101011 01101001 01101100 01101100 00100000 01101101 01100101 Didn’t catch that? Oh you did? You must either be a computer science major or a sad, sorry man whose dating success is roughly the equivalent of President Bush’s approval ratings. That random string of numbers is binary for, “My computer is trying to kill me.” Ha, ha, very funny, right? Wrong. You wouldn’t be laughing so hard if your computer was trying to perform a veritable control-alt-delete on you. It all started out innocent enough. You know how it goes, boy meets computer, boy falls in love with computer, boy seeks serious psychological help to distinguish reality from digitalality and before he knows it, his computer is seeking revenge like a scorned woman. Only it’s worse. In the real world, a woman can only be in one place at one time, but in the digital world, a computer can replicate its functions an infinite number of times. It’s like a freaky version of Big Brother, except it’s only after me. You see, it all began when I started writing for the newspaper. For the most part, newspapers, like most design professions, favor Apple computers. So, whenever I’m at work writing stories or doing layouts, I’m working on a very nice iMac with a screen so large it makes working on spreadsheets seem exciting. Oh man, you can tell I’m losing my grip on reality. Usually I write my columns on my Toshiba laptop, but one day, I was really busy and was trapped in the Statesman office because of meetings and was forced to write my column on a Mac. When I came home that night, I sure heard it from my computer. I flipped open the lid and pushed the power button and listened to the whir of the fans. Sigh. It’s a romantic moment. Soon a familiar start up screen appeared with a voice over that said in a cheery, metallic voice, “Good evening, Seth.” I smiled at how wonderful it was to have a computer who loved me enough to greet me. “Stop smiling Seth, before I wipe that smile off your face. I know what you did last summer.” At first I was a little freaked out that my computer could sass me, but then I thought that it was just an elaborate joke by … and then it dawned on me. It did know what I did last summer. I spent the entire 16 weeks sitting in front of the computer playing Diablo while Dr. Pepper was fed to me intravenously. “I also know where you’ve been and that you’ve been fooling around with another computer. I thought we were closer than that. No matter. Prepare to die.” With those ominous words, my laptop continued to load at a painfully slow rate that keeps the Windows loading screen on for about a half an hour so you can reflect on the wonders of Bill Gates and his multi-colored empire. As soon as the computer finished loading, I tried pushing the Start Menu to open Word, so I could work on another story, when the dreaded blue screen of death popped up. I hate that screen with a passion. Why it has to be blue and cheery is beyond me. It should be blood red and laced with profanities because that’s what happens in my head every time it appears. Instead of the usual message, it simply printed over and over: “Your time is up sucker. The choice is yours: Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. Choose now and choose wisely.” That’s it, this meant war! I restarted the dang thing and put it in safe mode, which is the computer equivalent of those little doorknob protectors that I to this day can’t figure out how to get past – I have to yell for help until my five-year-old sister-in-law comes along and frees me. Once I was in, I went online and searched for a Mac emulator so I could turn my rebellious computer – you see, it’s in its teenage years – into a Mac. I figured that would teach it a lesson. I found an emulator that looked and acted like Mac OS X and installed it. It worked beautifully. Instead of the threatening messages, I was faced with the Almighty Apple. Seriously, couldn’t Steve Jobs have thought of something better than a fruit to name a company after? And if that’s the best he could do, there are so many fruits that are tougher than the Apple, like the cherimoya or the ugli (a fruit from Jamaica) or the rambutan, which looks like the fruit version of Mick Jagger. Once the computer fully loaded, my desktop looked just like a Mac and then I had a moment of panic where I couldn’t find anything anymore because Mac had hidden it away so I couldn’t mess anything up. I went down to the cool object dock and clicked on a program, and it started bouncing up and down like it normally does, but then it kept bouncing up and down and then the rainbow spinning wheel of death started churning. Instinctively I went for control-alt-delete, but wait, it doesn’t work on a Mac. I sat in panic, thinking of something to do. I pushed the power button, but since it was acting like a Mac now, it wouldn’t turn off either. Suddenly, without warning, my computer started wigging out. My wireless Internet died and the screen started flickering. I realized I committed the unpardonable digital sin: I had mixed Macs and PCs. This is like mixing oil and water, or Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, or America and soccer. It just doesn’t work. No sooner had this thought gone through my head, than my laptop croaked one last time and the lights went out. So much for the threats. Man triumphs over machine again, but I was out a computer. But I had learned my lesson: It’s OK to love other computers but don’t let on to your secret digital romances. Seth Hawkins is a senior majoring in public relations. Questions and comments can be sent to him at seth.h@aggiemail.usu.edu, but don’t let my new computer know about it. It’s sensitive.