I randomly remembered my first encounter with computers today. My experiences were quite telling of things to come.

In preschool there were activity sessions which we could rotate between. I remember very clearly the first time I used the computer I was rather absorbed. We were provided these Macs (I think) that were loaded with educational computer games. It was some sort of alphabet learning game where the user would type in the right letter to advance the character.

Each activity session was around 20 minutes, so the computer session would come once a day. The computer session time was determined by a little cooking timer on top of every computer. Because I really liked using the computer, after 10 or so computer sessions, I stumbled upon the ever so brilliant idea of resetting the timer to increase my time.

I remember very vividly deciding whether I should do it. The first time I glanced behind my back to make sure nobody was looking and then turned the timer to the left about 5 minutes. After a while, all the timers went off at about the same time, and while the other kids left, my timer was still running. A staff member came and asked me why mine was still running or something, but the guy let me keep playing.

The next time I got a computer session, my intestinal fortitude improved, and I reset it about 10 minutes extra. This time the staff were talking and pointing my way, as I was the only one on the computer in a deserted activity center. But it paid off and they did not do anything about it. After about the third or fourth time they took action, and even though I reset the timer, which they probably saw, I was forced to leave to a different station.

So today while I am no master thief or master of deception, I am pretty interested in the computers. I also don’t need to reset timers to get more time.