Abort, Retry, Ignore

demetriosdemetrios Posts: 92,640
edited September 2008 in Poetry, Prose, Music & Art
Abort, Retry, Ignore
by Lucy Blades


Once upon a midnight dreary,
Fingers cramped and vision bleary,
System manuals piled high
and wasted paper on the floor,
Longing for the warmth of bedsheets,
Still I sat here doing spreadsheets:
Having reached the bottom line,
I took a floppy from the drawer.

Typing with a steady hand,
I then invoked the "save" command
But got instead a reprimand:
It read, "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
Was this some occult illusion?
Some maniacal type intrusion?
These were choices Solomon himself,
Had never faced before.

Carefully I weighed my options...
These three seemed to be the top ones.
Clearly I must now adopt one;
choose: Abort, Retry, Ignore?
With my fingers pale and trembling
Slowly toward the keyboard bending,
Longing for a happy ending,
Hoping all would be restored

Praying for some guarantee,
Finally I pressed a key.
But what on the screen did I see?
Again "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
I tried to catch the chips off guard -
I pressed again, but twice as hard,
But luck was just not on the cards,
I saw what I had seen before.

Now I typed in desperation
Trying random combinations.
Still there came the incantation
"Abort, Retry, Ignore."
There I sat, distraught, exhausted,
By my own machine accosted
Getting up, I turned away
And paced across the office floor.

And then I saw an awful sight
A bold and blinding flash of light
A lightening bolt that cut the night,
And shook me to my very core.
The PC screen collapsed and died.
"OH NO! MY DATABASE!" I cried.
I heard a distant voice reply,
"You'll see your spreadsheets...nevermore!"

To this day I do not know
The place to which our data goes.
Perhaps it goes to heaven,
Where the angels have it stored.
But as for Productivity, well,
I fear this has gone straight to Hell.
And that's the tale I have to tell -
Your choice: Abort, Retry, Ignore.
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • demetriosdemetrios Posts: 92,640
    really like this one. happened to me back in university, doing a term paper for mythology. that hard drive felt good all smashed up on that street corner. ha.
  • JP2026766JP2026766 Posts: 1,125
    That's really awesome. I'm in college right now...good thing is, laptops are under warranty through the school, so if anything goes wrong with it (like, if I get so angry that I throw it against a wall and it shatters) I get a new one in days without paying a dime :)

    Mansfield II '08

    EV Solo Shows:

    NYC I
    NJPAC

    I. LOVE. YIELD.
  • demetriosdemetrios Posts: 92,640
    didn't have a laptop those day's. wished i did for high school & university. life would of been much easier. my first personal cpu i bought was back in '98. stories of it not working on me, how many times i slap that monitor when ever i got those window's '98 blue screen of death errors. how many times i would just throw the keyboard to the ground. ah .. the memories ...
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