Jack The Scribbler

(Original picture for my newspaper column, which was deleted after the editor in chief felt that it was “stepping” on the reader. Duh. Pic taken by Conchitina Cruz during a cold Pittsburgh winter.)

FOUR years ago, when I was laid off—the second time in my life, both of which happened in the US while living with my wife who was on a study grant—I decided to go against the grain, so to speak.
Instead of looking for a new, and perhaps even better job in the world’s largest economy, I did what any insane and recently unemployed Filipino living in Western Pennsylvania did: I bought myself a laptop, a PowerBook 2400C subnotebook, which I had been lusting for ever since a Macintosh fanatic showed me one six years earlier.

(Picture taken in a hotel in Lahore, Pakistan. Really.)

Heady from the freedom that can only be the result of joblessness—a feeling that quickly passed when I told my wife about it (but all that came later)—I logged into my eBay.com account as soon as I came home. I then placed a bid on a suitably priced 2400c, monitored the auction’s progress for a few hours, and paid for the item via PayPal shortly after I won the bidding.
It was a pleasant sensation.
Here I was, a Filipino in Pittsburgh at the height of winter, drinking coffee in a warm apartment, relishing the mundane wonders of the electronic transaction; how a few mouse clicks and keyboard strokes translated into cash transfers, payment settlements, and eventually, package deliveries via the very efficient US postal system.

(PowerBook resting comfortably in a hotel bed in Bali, Indonesia)

While I had been deprived of the right to earn my keep early in the day, I nevertheless had the means to indulge in one of life’s greater pleasures: that of buying a nearly obsolete piece of electronic equipment and paying for it in US dollars, which was going to be in short supply anytime soon.
I had the occasion to look back on my past circumstances just recently because my PowerBook—the very same clunker which I got from a certain Mike Blank of Colorado when I was down and out in Pittsburgh—has finally kicked the digital bucket.
Initially, it just failed to proceed to boot up.
After punching the correct password, the field indicated that the shift key was pressed, even though the only things that rested on the keyboard was warm, foul-smelling air caused by the grunts of its frustrated owner. Since the shift key is not part of the said PowerBook’s complex, nine-character password— a feature enabled by yours truly—the computer refused to give me access.
Like most Macintosh users mystified by the strange behavior of wayward Apple computers, I felt that the foul-up took place because—pardon me for saying this—I cleaned the unit. (When things don’t work, non-technical people get superstitious.)
A few minutes before it went haywire, I had given the PowerBook—called Macliing Dulag, after a tribal leader—some heavy duty scrubbing, the first time I had done so in nearly a year.
Apparently, while bringing the laptop to its original shine, I must have disturbed the fragile symbiosis that existed between dust and diode within its sensitive innards.

(In an apartment in Quezon City, with a slightly temperamental feline named Minggoy)

Although this particular kind of PowerBook had its own set of quirks—including the famous Green Light of Death (GLOD), a phenomenon too complicated to explain here—I had been previously able to make the damn thing run, despite the odds.
Unfortunately, those days are now over.
I have thrown in the towel after trying every single trick in the book.
Besides taking out its batteries and leaving it unplugged for more than a week, I also have pressed its special reset button more than once. I have also coaxed and whispered to it, treating it like it was a living entity.
But to no avail.
Thanks to this digital disaster, I will no longer be able to access, let alone secure copies of all my notes, unfinished fiction, column pieces, news and feature articles, and writing projects for the past three years; a great loss to my many fans, the biggest of whom is myself.
Besides rainy days and Mondays, add dead PowerBooks to the list of things that get me down. And oh, include that obsolete law which prohibits alcohol during elections. It’s just plain stupid. But then again, that’s another story. I’m just ranting. Stupid fracking* computers can do that to you. Fortunately, I’ve got another 2400C.

(Same Quezon City apartment, same PowerBook, same feline, feigning a slightly different outlook in life)

———————
FROM THE THIS JUST IN DEPT. Romel Bagares, or should I say, Attorney Romel Bagares, who’s in Europe for a study grant, sent me an email message, asking advice for a PowerBook Pismo G3 that’s been acting up. Whenever he types something down, it freezes. I sent him a short reply: Get a replacement. Possible suggestions: another Pismo G3 or if he has the money—the new Palm Foleo.

*frack or fracking is a term used and popularized by the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica series. It’s not just the best sci-fi show on television, a review said, it’s the best show on television. Period. Take it from me, who prefers situation comedies to any of these sci-fi stuff. Boomer’s cute. Even though she’s a Cylon.

Keeping the Green  

NOTHING is more time-consuming than poring over a newly-acquired or otherwise newly-repaired gadget.

Or at least for a drunkard of my age, temperament, ability, and, for the lack of a better term, social status.

While your geeky, garden-variety, zit-faced, testosterone-infested male adolescent would rather surf the web endlessly for revealing pictures of say, Maureen Larrazabal and/or Aya Medel, deadline-beating drunken bums such as myself are simply content to fiddle with our equipment (Freudian references unintended). 

Which is what I have exactly done in my spare time in the last few days.

Early this month, my Apple eMate 300 was resurrected, after its heretofore dead rechargeable batteries were recelled, thanks to the experts at the Cubao branch of Battery Specialist.*

And as soon as the new set of batteries were installed and charged, I have not stopped from appreciating the beauty and simplicity of this pre-millennium gadget, the world’s first personal digital assistant (PDA) that came with a keyboard. Faintly resembling a proto-clamshell iBook, the Apple eMate 300 mostly came in green (even as there are sightings of black and pink eMates) and with software allowing the transfer of files to and from Mac and/or Windows-based computers. 

While it was made for American schoolchildren — Apple salespeople reportedly dropped the eMate from a building’s fourth floor to show its durability — it was deemed to expensive for the educational market at $800 apiece (circa 1997). Nevertheless, for its time, it was as good as a PDA can get.

Using additional third-party devices and applications, the eMate allowed email and wireless web surfing. Despite its unique form factor, the eMate remained the progeny of the Apple Newton, a handheld device with an operating system of the same name, and most importantly, the world’s first PDA. It featured handwriting recognition which, while criticized for its failures, has turned out to be one of the best in the industry. 

Unfortunately, in 2001, Apple pulled the plug on the platform, four years after it introduced the eMate and eight years after it launched the Newton.

Nevertheless, the so-called Newton faithful remain steadfast. To this day, in an age dominated by Treos, Palms, and Blackberries, Newton users — who encourage each other with slogans such as “Keep the Green,” — remain active in what may well be one of the oldest mailing lists in the world, http://www.newtontalk.net.

Besides featuring discussions of Newtons, eMates, their various issues and incarnations, the list proposes ideas for future third-party applications and latest rumors regarding Apple’s plans to relaunch the Newton, exchanges of which can be viewed online. Among those who belong to this mailing list include this drunken bum, perhaps one of the only two Newton users based in the
Philippines.

Like most members of the Newton faithful, I’m doing my best to keep the green in this part of the world.  

Which is why this blog entry was written on the eMate, the best little green gadget ever to come out of the world’s greatest computer company. Now if only Apple would think about launching the Newton once again… 

From the awards department. This space sends its congratulations to Fritz Dacpano, currently an understudy at the Manila office of the Agence France Press, whose work was chosen as one of the finalists of the Jaime V. Ongpin journalism awards. Dacpano, for some reason or other, remains one of the few readers of this blog.  

*As implied by its name, Battery Specialist not only recells old batteries, it also sells batteries of old gadgets, including obsolete cellphones such as Nokia 5110s. Service is quick and excellent especially after the staff agreed to follow battery recelling instructions indicated in Frank Gruendel’s website, http://www.pda-soft.de. Battery Specialist has branches all across Metro Manila.