The New Millenium

Yeah, I know, the new millenium doesn't officially start until next year. Get over it -- the calendar says 2000, that's close enough for me. We spent parts of the day Jan. 31 watching news reports from different parts of the world where absolutely no Y2K bugs shut down civilization. Here at Willie's house, almost everything is peachy keen. My main machine rolled over just fine, as did my antique 486SL33 notebook. My wife's machine temporarily visited 1900, but readily responded to manual correction. Out in the garage, my music studio computer went to 1984 (aparently the bios rejected any earlier dates), but it too is behaving fine now. A machine built for my daughter crossed over fine, my server and another machine never do keep good time -- one was 3 days behind, my server is about a year off -- I don't care. An ancient 382SX20 is holding 2000, as is an even older Compaq portable III (286-12). There is one really odd ball machine though -- it's an old Aquarius Systems Inc. board (ASI is gone, as you probably suspected) that insists the year is 2094! Set it to 2000 and on the next reboot, you're launched far into the future again. Oh well.

I'm assuming that my Data Bank watch and one of the VCR's made it ok -- they both say 00 for the year, but have the correct day of the week listed. Of the other VCR's, one doesn't have a date function, and the other needs a new part before it's capable of playing tapes again, much less being used to record programs. I did realize the other day that my check book isn't Y2K compliant -- the 19 is printed on the check. Again, oh well.

I rediscovered one of my best friends from my youth this week. Maybe that's a sign that this year will be better. Here's hoping.