I've always been fascinated by computers. As far back as I can remember. The sole idea of a human invention that could solve problems and eventually become complex enough to perform actual human tasks has always amazed me. I remember myself as a kid, getting completely absorbed by movies like War Games, Superman 3, 2001 and many others I never knew the title and cartoons like Gobots, Robotech and Transformers.

Sadly enough, at that time, my country (Argentina) wasn't going through the best of it's economical moments (inflation was over the roofs) and to my family, belonging to an emerging middle-class, buying a computer wasn't a priority. Still, I took every chance I got to be in touch with computers every time I could: Visiting wealthier friends to play with (or at least watch) their Commodores, Texas, Spectrums, Colecos, pocket video games, game-watches and even calculators!

I remember this summer, I was like 7 or 8 years old, I was hanging out on my bike somewhere around my neighborhood (in the city of Buenos Aires) and I saw this pile of trash at some corner and moved by my curiosity I started checking it out to see if, maybe, I could find some toy or anything to entertain myself. To my surprise I found a bag, a very big bag, full of computer magazines and of course I took it home. Many of them had source code (in Basic) and a very detailed description of what it was meant to do. I got stunned. I had in my hands the information necessary to make a computer program! I was just lacking a computer...

I remember I searched my phone-book for friends I knew that had (or I deducted that may had) a computer and called each and everyone of them by phone. - It's my dad's computer, I'm not allowed to use it.- some said. -It doesn't matter - I replied. - It's for a good cause! When your dad come back and see you wrote a computer program by yourself he will be proud!.
I spent many weeks writing (actually "copy-dictating") Basic programs on Commodores by phone barely knowing what all that code meant and, believe it or not, I found it fun and exciting.

Some years later, with the arrival of the PC, everything became even more fun and interesting (I even got my own computer) but that's material for another entry. I'm kind of tired right now.

See ya!