Keywords: Mike's Madness #15

   Ever watch a TV show and someone'll say:

   "Take this, you son-of-a-[BEEP]!!"?

   And you, of course, fill in the missing word.

   "Son-of-a-Bitch," you say in your mind.

   And so does every human being who hears the beep, because the mind
naturally completes recognized patterns, no matter how fragmented they
are. We know that "bitch" follows "son of a" just like night follows
day or Pete Rose follows bookies.  Unless of course you're Russian.
Then, "son of" is usually followed by "Ivan" or "Mikhail" or somesuch
male Russian name that reminds you of various blackspots on the
otherwise clean and white tapestry of Russian history.

   But anyways, I was talking about how censors cover-up swear words
with bleeps and stupid sound effects. The whole reason they go through
all this bullshit and cut up decent movies into nonsequential nonsense
is so our children won't hear words usually only associated with the
description of Apple products.

   Now, I don't wanna get on anyone's case about this, but I am wholly
amazed by Apple's IIGS system. This is the most mazing case of reverse
technology in computer history! In the age of the 386/33 and the
486/25, Apple Computer comes out with a machine that runs at an
astounding 2 mHz!  AND, you can speed it up to a blinding 2.5 mHz.
HOLY SHIT! Two point five?  You know how they play THAT one off? The
salespeople tell ya "Yeah, and the high-speed mode speeds up the CPU
25 PERCENT!" What the HELL is this?!  Did some dude at Apple get Woz
really plastered and then say:

     "Hey Steve! I'll tell ya what -- if we can't beat 'em at making
the fastest machine, by God -- we'll beat 'em at making the SLOWEST!"? 

     Because they DID!

     This thing's like a slug in winter! And as if this Yugo CPU wasn't bad
enough, they get a disk drive straight out of computer Hell! You ever load a
program on a Commodore 64? I mean waiting 20 minutes for Zork to load might
have seemed like a long time then, but you load Zork on a IIGS, and boy, you
are in for a WAIT! Your grandkids'll be sittin' there waitin' for that
fucker to load. I'm not joking! If you have a monitoring program, you can
see the drive plinking off bits in a completely leisurely manner. Plodding
doesn't even BEGIN to describe it!  Plodding suggests MOVEMENT, and if you
can master the almost Zen Buddhist-like art of sitting still in front of a
II GS drive long enough to detect the motion of the disk, then you've got a
pretty good idea of what taking THORAZINE is like! If you can sit still that
long, you're qualified to be a National Monument!

     And when you pay for it, it's like you bought a C-64, BUT AT AN
IBM PRICE! A good (and that's a word not commonly used in conjuncture
with "GS") system will put you back close to $3,000! You can get a
decent (there's another one of those aforementioned words) 286 system
for that!  And a 286/12 kicks this thing's ass so many ways you can't
count 'em!  (at least not on a GS).

     They call it "GS", but they don't tell you it stands for "Goddamn SLOW"!

     Oh, it's got great graphics. Serious, this thing's got the
graphics.  But it's like having unlimited credit at a Goodwill shop!
You'll also wait MONTHS before their demo picture of the golden King
Tut finally gets to the screen. The whole time, at wholly random
intervals, you'll get messages like:

    "Now computing byte 53, bit 6, of 648,457 bytes. Next report in 20 mins."

     And just about the time you've gotten the .12 gauge outta the
closet with the computracide on your mind, the little fucker'll pop up
some Fable ROM program imbedded in its enfeebled memory and tell you a
little a story like:

    "Once upon a time, there was a sloth and a cheetah. The cheetah
was a very fast cat and the sloth a plodding oaf. Too many times was
the cheetah caught speeding by the CHP (oh hey, for those of you who
have the unfortunate fate of living outside California, CHP means
California Highway Patrol) and the CHP sawed the poor cheetah's legs
off.

    "Moral: People who buy fast machines often get their legs sawn off."
 
    You stand there, looking dumbfounded.

    "What?" you ask yourself.

    And the GS answers:

    "Now computing byte 53, bit 7, of 648,457 bytes. Next repot in 20mins."

     You'll blast that son of a -----  (y'all said 'bitch', dinja? See?...)
straight to computer Hell where some poor bastard'll hafta wait for it to
compute PI to 20 billion digits (NOW you know why you need PI calculated 20
billion digits!) before he can go to Heaven!

     THIS THING IS A TURD! It's a cattle-dropping of a computer! The
day Apple introduced this li'l gem was forever to be known as "The Day
Silicon Valley Smelled like BULLSHIT" because if you call a turd "a
rose", IT'S STILL A TURD! I don't care what PR says! If it's brown and
smells like shit, IT'S PROBABLY A TURD!

     You want to have some fun with an Apple Dealer? Get dressed in
your best business suit and walk into AppleLand or any store that only
sells Apple and go up to a dealer. Look for the slimiest one. Tell him
you've been thinking about getting a II GS for your family for months
and have finally decided to buy the best II GS system available. Now
if you could only see a demo, you would be convinced that you were
spending your money wisely.  They'll put on the dog and pony show for
ya and show you some cute program.

     Then tell the dealer you use "Harvard Graphics" a lot at work (or
any other HUGE program they have II GS versions of) and seeing how it
looks on the II GS would close the deal. And the whole time, talk
about hard drives, expensive monitors, and lots of software. But don't
mover-do it or they'll figure you out.

     But anyway, when he plops in the full 1.8 meg floppy to be read
at 300 baud by the disk drive, you start a conversation, and casually
introduce how speed in a computer is important to you. Mention the
fact that you work with a 386/33 at your office and tell him that the
baby really flies!  Keep talking about how impressed you are with the
22 millisecond access time on a Compaq 110 megabyte hard drive. Tell
'em how you load MS Windows in 3 seconds. 2 seconds for Harvard
Graphics.  Then, VERY casually look at the II GS drive, then look at
your watch.  Frown.  Do it again with a very slight look of disbelief.
Ask, "Is it done yet?" quizzically . . .

     Watch the little weasel SWEAT!

     Oh, it will do you a WORLD of good!

     Caution! If you start busting up now, it's OVER! You won't EVEN
stop! But if he recovers and gets the conversation going again, just
look over towards the drive every so often and sound slightly more
irritated each time you reply to the dealer. THEN: Look at the drive
and then at your watch again.  Look the dealer right in the eye and
ask, "Is it done loading yet?" with a little more irritation.

     Just see how many times you can repeat the cycle. When the Dealer
starts getting really pissed about being asked "Is it done loading
yet?" a million times and gets rude, or the program actually loads,
you close the deal. But then look at the computer, then at your watch
and tell him "I need to reconsider this.  I'll come by again if I
decide to stay with this machine." Look at the machine and shake your
head while saying "But it's doubtful," and walk out.

     You will have fucked that guy's day!

     If you wanna really dangle the dude on the hook, get him to admit
Compaq is superior to Apple. Just mention the 386/33 in your "office"
again and then ask:

     "What does this machine run at? 10 megahertz? 8?"

     "2" the Dealer will admit.

     Look him right in the eye and ask in the your most astounded voice:

     "2?"

     The dealer will shrivel up like a snail with salt poured on it!

     If you have enough Apple-only dealers in your town, you and a friend
can make an afternoon of it! And every time you walk out of one of those
places, after rightfully humbling those toadies, you feel at one with 
nature, and animals will cross the street to be near you.

     Heh heh heh.

     I'm sorry, before I got off on all the Apple stuff, (by the way,
I don't want everyone thinking I hate Apple computers. That was just a
little good-natured prod to remind the folks at Apple which half of
the 80's we are in.) I wuz talkin' about censoring TV programs for
the sake of our chidrens' language.  Okay, do this:

     Tonight when you go home, walk up to your kid and ask him/her to
complete this sentence:

     "Mike Tyson is one bad mother _______!"

     Your kid'll look you straight in the eye and say:

     "Fuhka."

     This is the exact and true nature of what censoring TV movies
accomplishes.

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+                     *   Mike's Madness Disclaimer   *                     +
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     Dis claim is to disclaim da claim dat I claim to have represented
Apple fairly in the above file. In all honesty, the IIGS is a good,
but slow, graphics and family machine.

     The only reason I'm writing this is so Herb, my jew lawyer (hey,
don' take that wrong! I love Herb and his family and I even give their
kids Barmitzva presents. But dude, gargle after the lox -- please.)
can rest easy. Chill, Herb. Ever hear of "fair criticism"? I'm sure
their lawyers have. How much do I pay you, again? . . . . Oh.
Hey Herb, uh . . . you know how much Jacoby & Myers charges? Just curious.
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I__________________I___________________I___________________I_________________I

     Keep dem cards an' lettas comin'! Even those of you who are
writing to bitch and moan. Nah, I'm kidding. If you've got a
complaint, keep it to yourself. Heh Heh. Anyway, I wholly appreciate
many mail I get. Try to keep criticism in the arena of good taste and
attacks against the writing, not the writer.

     . . . So then there was Modest Moussorgsky's symphony about a
flasher with a Polaroid. It was called "Pictures from an Exhibitionist"

     Nyuck Nyuck Nyuck! [POP!] Oooooooh, a wise guy!

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(C) 1989 Yucks For You

