Welcome to the Eric Erickson Show podcast, Our Three.

Hello, America, welcome. How are you? I sure hope you are doing terrific. The full number is 8779793725. If you would like to be on the program, I am delighted to have you. I'm going to go off. Can you even say go off the reservation anymore? I'm going to go off the beat in Bath here for a moment. But there are two completely different stories. And I want to just weave them together into a larger point. I am a professional. Occasionally this works. So just bear with me here. I grew up, yes, in Dubai, Charlie. So when I was growing up in the Middle East,

we were the only family in our school that did not have a computer. My mom had an electric

typewriter with a little screen on it and that was the closest we came to having a computer.

And I always, I wanted a computer.

One of my friends James had a cutting edge, top of the line Mac.

And it was the original Macintosh.

He eventually, his parents upgraded him to a SE 30.

I had no concept of money as a seventh and eighth grader and didn't realize, I mean,

these things are thousands of dollars at the time.

I mean, like you're talking $8,000, $9,000 at the time, which was a lot of money,

even more money then than it is now.

And I wanted a computer.

And instead, I ran the computer lab.

So the school I went to, it would blow your mind if you saw it. I mean, this is the 1980s.

And it had this incredible computer lab. I started on a computer when I was in first grade in 1981, an Apple 2.

And by the 7th, 8th, the 9th grade, we had a fully loaded computer lab with Apple 2E's and 2Gs

and we were starting to get in Macintoshes and those were kind of my computers.

The head of the computer lab, Mr. Ackerman was also my advisor and he let me run them.

And I subscribed when I moved back to the States after ninth grade, got back and started

subscribing to Mac user and Mac World magazines because I one day wanted a Mac.

And I'll never forget, had the goal.

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