CHILDREN’S STORY ABOUT HELLO KITTY, WRITTEN ON EARLY MACINTOSH COMPUTER WITH RETRO 1980S CONTINUOUS FEED DOT MATRIX PRINTER PAPER.
(Imagine Carmina speaking in a cranky granny voice…) “You kids have it oh-so-easy these days! Did you know, back in the 1980s, we poor unfortunate souls had to print our Hello Kitty stories out on dot matrix paper?? That’s right! The ink printers took two minutes a PAGE and constantly jammed. And the paper was joined together and had holes along the sides — so we had to rip out each page separately!”
“And did you know that the earliest word processing programs for Macs had no auto-save? No recovery! One mistake and entire chapters of your Hello Kitty tooth fairy stories were forever lost!”
“Ding Dong, Ding Dong”… “Mr Beaver”… Why do all my childhood early works seem so dirty in retrospect??
Were you a child of the 1980s? What is your favorite retro gizmo or memory?
At least the adventure story in my kawaii recipe book Cute Yummy Time, is G-rated… I’m doing a cute food demo today on NBC’s Weekend Today, 7:45am ET. Tune in if you’re able to wake up early enough!
Song of the Day #219: Instead of a song, check out this 1980s computer commercial from Radio Shack. That was me, back in the day!
This entry was posted on Friday, October 16th, 2009 at 13:11 and is filed under Art + Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
October 17th, 2009 at 23:53
Fiona Rawrhhs says:I enjoyed playing with dot matrix paper when I was little! Actually, I only liked ripping out the the holes in the sides. It was pretty fun…
(ps. I wasn't born in the 1980s. I was actually born in the mid 90s)
October 18th, 2009 at 05:38
lacarmina says:Hahah it's so much fun! I wonder if I still have some lying around…
October 18th, 2009 at 05:41
Lee says:When I was a kid, before we got a real computer we had one of those machines that was a dedicated word possessor. Couldn't save, or do anything but type. But hey, built in printer.
Then we got an Apple 2 and I played oregon trail and bubble bobble all the time
October 18th, 2009 at 06:03
gschan says:Oh wow, that brought back memories of our old Apple ImageWriter printer. That was a workhorse!
October 18th, 2009 at 06:16
Lauren says:I think you should sell this stuff to Sanrio. It somehow fits their product image so perfectly.
I remember I had some kind of portable Ms. Pacman game, kind of like a gameboy but much bigger and with only one game.
October 18th, 2009 at 06:16
Lisa says:I recall using the dot matrix printer at work. Ugh! the paper jams (; ;)
October 18th, 2009 at 06:20
lacarmina says:Ahh Oregon Trail! You can play these games online now; blast from the past.
October 18th, 2009 at 06:21
lacarmina says:The printers were alway so loud too!
October 18th, 2009 at 06:21
lacarmina says:Lauren, I need to take you to Wonderland in Hong Kong… it's where I got Kojin the kitchen god and other horribly disturbing cute things!
October 18th, 2009 at 11:26
NuGoth says:Very clever reminiscence – LMAO
October 18th, 2009 at 13:15
photographerleia says:Ah! dot matrix printers …
I myself have very fond memories of my Speak-n-Spell
October 18th, 2009 at 14:53
lacarmina says:Oh. Mein. GOTT. I had a Speak-n-Spell too! I think it's still in my parents' basement. I still remember the creaky glitchy noises!
October 18th, 2009 at 17:57
ceruleanthought says:Whoa, dot matrix paper! I've heard of it but never seen ^^. That's so cool XD.
October 19th, 2009 at 01:29
Ayame says:I actually have one of those printers back home in Malaysia, belongs to my uncle. I played with it when i was about 7? it was so loud it nearly blasted my ear off xD though im born in '93 hahaha :)
October 19th, 2009 at 06:10
Seb says:My dad used to have one of those ;) Where are the days!
October 19th, 2009 at 06:13
lacarmina says:Hahah they don't make computer gizmos like they used too! I remember using the very first floppy disks, which were actually FLOPPY and huge.
October 19th, 2009 at 06:15
lacarmina says:Do you remember those big floppy disks that really were floppy? hee hee!
October 19th, 2009 at 12:52
Ayame says:Thats probably why they named it Floppy Disk. xDDDDD
October 19th, 2009 at 16:43
[[pr!nc355 m0r6]] says:my most favorite retro gizmo next to the nintendo was the commodore 64, it took the 5 inch floppies!
October 19th, 2009 at 16:45
lacarmina says:Ahahaah I had an original Nintendo too… with Duck Hunt!
October 19th, 2009 at 19:52
Ayame says:Thats probably why they named it Floppy Disk. xDDDDD
October 19th, 2009 at 23:43
[[pr!nc355 m0r6]] says:my most favorite retro gizmo next to the nintendo was the commodore 64, it took the 5 inch floppies!
October 19th, 2009 at 23:45
lacarmina says:Ahahaah I had an original Nintendo too… with Duck Hunt!