💾 Archived View for midnight.pub › posts › 2109 captured on 2024-08-31 at 14:51:26. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content
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:sparks non-filter at corner of bar:
The smoke rising, I look up, eyebrows furrowed and fixating on what is in front of me. A cat staring (knowingly?) at the other edge of the bar. It wants pets, or it wants my soul. It can have either.
Puffing the smoke cloud away from my face, I gesture timidly on the bar, indicating it can come over to where I am poisoning the air, sipping coffee
The sun risen, the cigs bought, new patrons in the bar, to the left, to the right, I see pubbers detoxing and others waxing (lamenting) nostalgic. To the former, I too, spent a good deal of time at a bar, a physical bar, just after getting sober. I went to Chilis on Tuesdays/Thursdays, and would get a cheeseburger while barside, reading USA Today, trying to care about golf on TV. It was 2006, so they didn't mind my smoking back then, and I didn't (we didn't) have smartphones otherwise, so...
To the latter, I fall short of nostalgia. I got into retro computing in 2020, always loving/was wanting to be a computer hobbyist. A small flickering CRT with amber burn-in, crickets ou th window, tapping on the keyboard for a small program or CLI task: very enjoyable (in theory then, in reality now). But the retrocomputing world revolves round nostalgia. I have none of. I didn't grow up with computers. So things stay consistent, fun/new skills and processes learned, others there to show me info/tips from years of experience. When things sway nostalgic I turn a deaf eye and a blind ear to it.
Smudge, accepting the offer for pets, putting a rain check on claiming my soul, purrs calmly in the smoke-filled sun rays now. I puff, and think, and finish my coffee for the day.
I'm aware of a bar and a (separate) casino in Indiana where smoking indoors is still a thing. Apparently, one simply need move to a locale where personal freedom hasn't been circumcised down to zero options....
Of _course_ you may smoke. As your neighbor, I'd prefer the smell of pipe tobacco, though...
I love the idea of retrocomputing, but must admit that nowadays I view general-purpose computation as a highly problematic but sadly necessary tool. If the Butlerian Jihad ever kicks off, sign me up!
The TUI *aesthetic* is unbeatable, however, and I will always select a tool that can run without a WM if it does what I require.