From:    "Wayland Phillips" <wayland.phillips@duke.edu> 
Date:    Wed Jul 23, 2003 2:31 pm
Subject: The Computer God Rises Again


Once upon at time, I was considered the God of Computers here in the True
Religion. I seemed to have the magical touch. No matter what happened I
would just touch a computer and problems would seem to fix themselves. I
even had a cable modem allow two computers to connect with the net
simultaneously without subscribing to a second IP address, or using a
router or Internet Connection Sharing. Then Co-Ruler Brendan came to live
with me. First he bought a Compaq that never worked correctly. (Big
surprise there!) And then Jason and I built him a computer, that no matter
what would never seem to give up its crack rock. His computer curse
afflicted me and stripped me of my powers. Eventually, I stole the crack
rock from his computer once he moved out, but computers never responded to
my touch the way they once did. Now, Brendan has been at Fort Hood for
several months now. The last time Brendan visited, my hard drive had been
giving me signs it was about to give up the ghost. All of the errors have
since disappeared. A friend called me a few days ago, saying her computer
was giving her problems. I log into her computer via VNC, they disappeared
without me changing a single setting. I am back...at least until Brendan
is...


Wayland Phillips
Co-Ruler of the World