Apple II Bits

A hallmark of the 1 MHz podcast are unboxings. The show’s host, Carrington Vanston, often gets his hands on new-in-box Apple II games and will record the audio of breaking the seal, horrifying collectors worldwide. His philosophy: games were meant to be played, and these classics aren’t doing anyone any good in the box.

Another self-described "anti-collector" is Clint, the host of Lazy Game Reviews, a retro computer and video game site founded this past February to collect the thoughts and media that he’d previously distributed via social media (Twitter, YouTube, etc.). The site got off to a great start, with a two-part series on getting an Apple IIGS with ADTPro up and running. He quickly followed up with a feature of similar interest to Apple II hobbyists: an unboxing video of side-scrolling shooter Moon Patrol.

Unfortunately, the video stops short of an actual review of the game as 1 MHz would do. But it’s still a fun look at the tangible aspects of a game that you don’t get with an ADTPro-reconstituted disk image. As we move more and more toward digital distribution, these "feelies" will become artifacts with no modern counterparts. How long before there are no more boxes to unbox?

KansasFest is by its nature attended by eclectic and fascinating people, without exception. But one of the most memorable people I’ve met in my years at the annual Apple II convention has been Jeri Ellsworth.

Jeri made her Apple II debut at KansasFest 2003, sufficiently impressing the then-editor of Juiced.GS enough with her homebrew hardware to earn her a cover story a few months later. She attended KFest again in 2004, when she and I were assigned to be roommates, inspiring her to decorate our door with the infamous Furbfish. (It was a pittance compared to the strangeness she brought into my home a week earlier, when we attended VCF East 2.0 with Ryan Suenaga, Andy Molloy, and Kelvin Sherlock.) At the last minute, she made her final KansasFest appearance in 2006, provoking a karaoke battle.

Jeri’s interests have always been diverse, from computer shops to roller derby and race cars. She had her own Web series, The Fat Man and Circuit Girl, for more than a year; nowadays, her passion is pinball. Running in so many circles has earned her plenty of attention; she is, aside from Bill Martens, the only currently active Apple II user I know to have her own Wikipedia page.

Most recently, Jeri appeared on an hour-long episode of Triangulation, a subsidiary of Leo Laporte’s This Week in Tech (TWiT) podcast. The show was recorded on Jan 20, published on Feb 2, and mentioned on the KansasFest list by Dean Nichols on Apr 1. Notable segments include how her youth shaped her aspirations and passions, and the C64 DTV computer-in-a-joystick.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t get in a word about her Apple II history — in fact, there’s nary a single reference to the computer in the entire episode. I’m hoping this is not indicative of her future involvement in the community. I have done my best to lure her back to KanasFest, including by promising a private tour of the Electric Theatre retro arcade, scheduled to open in nearby Independence, Missouri, later this year.

KansasFest is filled with colorful people, and I hope Jeri will again bring her distinctive hue to the event.