Beagles frequently ends his posts with the expression that a certain amount of memory loss is to be expected after a certain age, and I think this may be the case with the machine chickening out just as young Beagles was about to win. I do remember that machine in the museum but I also remember chickens who could not be beaten at the game.
Possibly the attendants, noticing young Beagles's grin when he thought he was on the brink of victory, decided to have a bit of a jape and cut the machine off and told young Beagles that story. Afterwards when they were all chuckling over the incident one of them may have said to the others that that bright kid was headed for an Institution, and as we all know that is how it turned out.
I wonder why Chatz didn't mention that thing about chickens, but then he is a flagrant flatterer. That’s a great story—charming, vivid, and also a meaningful snapshot of early public encounters with computing. Spread it on thick much?
I do remember close to fifty years ago when I was getting my little certificate in data processing. Back then we had to punch in the cards and give them to the guy running the machine and wait for it to spew out several pages on that cool green and white perforated paper, but every now and then it would just churn and churn and not print out any paper. If it was on my cards I would feel like it was my fault and would want to apologize to the guy for my crumby program busting the computer.
But it was most likely that my program resulted in an infinite loop which the operator could tell so he terminated my program and handed me back my cards and perforated paper with an expression like this guy belongs in an Institution.
Which is how I got here. I wonder what Old Dog's excuse is.
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