When I was young, my family would weekend brunch near a mall. After brunch we’d visit the mall because the only place open in the mall on a Sunday was a model train store.
At home we had an Osborne 1. In the mall there was an Apple dealer with an Apple Mac on display in the window. It held no interest for me at all.
There was another shop that had an Atari 1040ST on display. It was gorgeous. It held such a mystique for me that I would ride my BMX after school over to the mall to get some hands on time with the ST. The shop owner just let me hang out and bang on the machine, like you can at an Apple store today. I really wanted one.
But my father was cheap and he anguished over purchases. We never got an Atari, and some years later my dad picked up a Sinclair QL instead. That was a sad turn of events.
alt Hacker News
When I was young, my family would weekend brunch near a mall. After brunch we’d visit the mall because the only place open in the mall on a Sunday was a model train store.
At home we had an Osborne 1. In the mall there was an Apple dealer with an Apple Mac on display in the window. It held no interest for me at all.
There was another shop that had an Atari 1040ST on display. It was gorgeous. It held such a mystique for me that I would ride my BMX after school over to the mall to get some hands on time with the ST. The shop owner just let me hang out and bang on the machine, like you can at an Apple store today. I really wanted one.
But my father was cheap and he anguished over purchases. We never got an Atari, and some years later my dad picked up a Sinclair QL instead. That was a sad turn of events.