Friday, June 01, 2007

Tech Support Scale

When I was in middle school, I used to write papers on our typewriter. Yeah... I'm that old. When I hit the wrong key, I had to go back and re-type the accidental letter a dozen times with the white tape to cover up the mistake, leaving a grayish smudge where the faulty letter once was. Typing a paper took forever. And the second draft took forever again, because the whole paper had to be re-typed. Freaking nightmare!

In high school I would go to my aunt's house to type papers because she had a computer... a really nice one with a six-inch, black-and-white monitor. Correcting typing mistakes was a lot easier... the challenge was getting the words from the screen to the paper. After sending the document to print, I generally had a copy of it in my hand in six to eight weeks.

Then computers suddenly got cool. I can't even imagine a world without email now. No email? Without email, how would I communicate with people I don't want to talk to? I used to have to buy film and have it developed... meaning I even had to pay for the pictures that sucked. What? And I actually had to get up and leave my house to go Christmas shopping? What was I... a caveman? And don't even get me started on having to go to the library to learn things, or needing to find a newspaper to see if the Lakers won. How did I not realize at the time how miserable life was? Luckily I see it now so I can complain about it retrospectively... retroactively? I don't know... retro-somethingly.

As great as computers are, I know very little about them. If something goes wrong, I fall back on the old "control-alt-delete" combo. If that doesn't fix it, I'm out of ideas. For someone who uses the computer for everything, I certainly am a computery idiot.

I haven't had a lot of time to draw lately... Wii got a we. I'm an incredible tennis player when I don't have to run.

28 comments:

Anonymous said...

Give yourself some credit. You know computers pretty well. Don't be a card.

It's about time you got a Wii. We need to exchange wii numbers to show off our miis.

Andy Latham said...

Don't you just wish we all had Ctrl, Alt and Delete buttons on us?

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John Nunnemacher said...

"I'm an incredible tennis player when I don't have to run."

That ... is the best ... Wii quote ... ever. :)

Jarrett said...

Haha, I can deffinately relate to this. It reminds me of an article I read yesterday about how the traditional illustration showing a monkey on all fours gradually turning into a walking man needs to change.. because apparently even our monkey ancestors were bi-pedal. JEEZ! Can we not rest assured on anything?!

Anyway, that's my rant. Point is, maybe you're not as "on all fours" as you think.

Great piece! Sorry I haven't been by in a while. I was going to mention that I popped you an email to your blog hotmail, just in case you don't check it often.

I should be posting more soon. Till then, talk to you later, Shane.

Laters!

Ken Chandler said...

We used to burn sticks and write on chunks of slate. Our brontosaurus would walk the 12 miles to neighboring tribal village to deliver our messages. You were lucky to have typewriters Shane, count your blessings. Whiner!
Awesome illustration my friend! You rock!

aintshakespeare said...

I can't even figure out how to post links to my blog! My computer-smart friend showed me, but when I tried it I killed the blog. I had to quickly undo everything.

Your illitaracy doesn't show on your blog.

Do you remember when a Word Processor was a machine, not a program? We had a word processor that was basically a typewriter that could store a single paper's worth of information. And instead of a monitor it had a slit for a display that was litterally about twelve characters wide. Reading over your paper was a huge pain. And when you hit the print button it took forever to print and the whole house shook. Good times. I never want to go back.

Oh yeah, great comic.

Unknown said...

love that your readin "how to use a mouse." Hilarious!

Another entertaining read. Always brings a lil sunshine to my world

flipstudios said...

oh man, i just spent the whole morning reading and admiring your earlier posts. please write a book and then illustarate it as well. i will buy, buy, buy. you're friggin hilarious and and insane artist to boot. cheers

Sam Nielson said...

Monkey with a hammer! Funny, because that's what I use for my IT support.

Anonymous said...

Oh my crap Shane. Is it too weird to say that I have missed you? I seriously laugh so hard when I read your blog that I very nearly wet my pants. This is hilarious. I have to share your drawing on my blog.....do you mind? LOVE IT! Your writing is so funny. You should have a newspaper column. LOL! As for the Wii....I agree with your friend John....your "I'm an incredible tennis player" quote is PRICELESS. It should be on the Wii commercial! Thanks for making me laugh today! LOVE THIS!

Anonymous said...

ROFLOL!!!! I didn't see what was written on the book you're reading until I just clicked on the picture. SO FUNNY! :-)

S.T. Lewis said...

Thanks for the comments, everyone. For any of you who are wondering, my blog's title banner will be back soon... a new version of it. I tried to change the banner myself, and I screwed something up in the code. As soon as my monkey finds his hammer, I'm hoping to get the new banner up.

Lindy Rae said...

The IT guys at my office said the child should be one step ahead of the "average person."
And on a side note - I don't think you give yourself enough credit. Most of the time the Ctrl-Alt-Delete method fixes everything. Just like with the original Nintendo, if you smacked it really hard on top and blew inside for a second, it was good as new.

Rori Smith-Koch said...

I was directed to your blog from Heather's blog...she is right. This is way too funny! TFS Have a great day!

David Malan said...

Nice, although what in your long life experience would ever lead you to draw a IT guy who looked like that.

Anonymous said...

Monkey with a hammer.

Brilliant.

Michelle Lana said...

Hehehe....this is great!

kdhamel said...

This is so hilarious and the illustration is just perfect!
Reminds me that I used to be an expert on the Commodore 64! Amazing how far we've come...

Anonymous said...

ahahhahaahahah
love it

Natura said...

Super fun! :) :)

knottydon said...

Hi, Shane!

Thanks to Illo Friday, I stumbled upon your site. I love your banner! I like the facial expressions of the creatures you've drawn.

I haven't done illos in a long time. I got inspired to do one now. Thanks to you! ;oP

murphy girl said...

yup, i know how you feel, luckily, my sister is a computer pro!

Digital Scott's Illustrationblog said...

Your characters are the awesomest!!! Excellent.

Deb Johnson said...

I love your characters! nice storyboard style...awesome! My personal character is the monkey with the hammer...some days...

inkyscript said...

Love it... but I think the child goes before the average person these days... at least, that's my experience with computers, children and the average Joe!

Mette said...

lol.. love the drawing, love the rant. (; you're so right about the new computer world. Although I'm so young I can hardly remember a time without internet. I do rememeber waiting 10 minutes for a page to load, though.

Internet - where even ugly people can be cool. :P

Brine Blank said...

Great draw and idea...in our neck of the woods the monkey would be an improvement over the IT most days...

Kevin Spear said...

It's like you're telling my story. Yes, I'm that old too.

You have some great characters in this illustration.