One of my first email passwords was just a space.
I do feel a bit cheated that my Join Date is in Ought-Two, but that’s because I spent my first few years here just lurking.
(I coulda been a turn-o’-da-century contendah…)
.
I’m glad i lurked so long, though. I learned so much, and also learned the board culture (i.e., How To Act When You’re Around Smartypantses).
.
(And maybe I knew that if I could post and start threads, that would be where all my free time would go for the next two decades…)
March 11, 1999. Number 47. I came over from AOL, and remember checking the web version several times that day to see if the site has gone live. A lot of the profiles lower than mine were beta testing and dummy names, I think the legit ones started in the 30s. TubaDiva was like 15 or something, Ed Zotti was 1 or 2. He even got there before Cecil as I recall.
25 years. Good grief. Married, a kid, two apartments, two houses, a master’s, one career completed and another started. Amazing that the one constant through all of that has been this place.
Someone (probably Lynn Bodoni) blew the whistle over at the AOL SDBM and said we could hop into the pool, so I did. User# 66. I’ve been on this board longer than I’ve ever lived at any single physical address.
as a kid I first heard about Cecil through a Reader Digest article which was a reprint of another article … then when my insomnia had me awake at 4 am and on AOL I discovered they had a “random” keyword that would take you to some weird corners of aol (in fact a little graphic of a roulette wheel would pop up)
the straight dope came up and I remembered the article and read all the columns
I didn’t join the message boards because i hated AOL’S MB system and i didn’t need the drama … then i found out AOL had a big purge of all its cool stuff on the hub and the dope was leaving AOL but it took forever to make the new site and i moved so i didnt join until 00 or 01 i was on so much opal of all people would tell me to go to bed becuase id get incoherent …them i moved into aunts house then I took a long time off but came back
In my case, 24 years. But still, married, no kids, divorced, got a law degree, passed the bar, one rental place, a cross-country move, two houses, seven cats (my ex collected them), no cats now (they were all humanely put down in their late teens, and one actually made it to 20). Worked in a factory, drove a truck, operated a forklift. Now, I’m a fully-accredited lawyer, with a great reputation.
But still, if someone had told me what I would encounter in the years since my signup and now, I would have said, “No way!” Well, way. Life is indeed what happens when you’re busy making other plans.
(Thanks, John Lennon.)
I started posting here not long after I got married, got my Bachelor’s degree soon after, then we moved to Jersey and got our respective graduate degrees (his took way, way too long.) I’ve lived in Michigan, Jersey, Florida, Illinois, and back to Michigan again. Now I’ve got an almost four year old. I feel like I’ve been through every phase of my adult life with this board.
Oh, maaaaaan… a quarter-century of being distracted…
If you folks could stop being so interesting, that’d help me with Getting The Stuff Done That I Really Should Be Working On. Thanks in advance.
I’m from September 1999, and I still feel like an imposter next to the cohort that migrated from AOL.
Joyce_K? From Baltimore? Is that you?
Nope, not me.
I joined in 1999 and hadn’t realized it was all that new. I’d read Cecil’s books and looked for the website. Once I saw the message board, I joined in.
Lately it seems the Board is obliging …
I may start reading books more again!