A Bookish Aside

So, it's later in the evening (obviously), and and I've started the great .iso burnings.  (Well, one burning, anyway.)  Just doing some testing on a liveboot of Crunchbang 11.  And I have to say it's striking.  The default, "stealth" desktop is impressive.  And a bit unnerving.

I'll probably burn ZorinOS in a bit.  Don't know if I'll do any more this evening.  And I doubt I'll do any installs.  Think I'll just do some livebooting.

While wasting some time earlier on, I pulled out an odd little collectible of mine.

A long, long time ago, when I was a starving grad student hiding in an oddball apartment on the main drag of our local U. town, I tripped across a book entitled The Cuckoo's Egg, by Clifford Stoll.  I'm sure everyone who knows a bit about Internet history knows Stoll's book, which details his discovery and pursuit of a hacker who turns out to be in the employ of the old Soviet intelligence service, the KGB.  It's a great read, a good introduction to the subject for the casual reader.  Not too technical, not too dry.

I still have my cheap paperback copy, which is now quite battered and dog-eared.  Occasionally still get it out and flip through it.

For whatever reason, a few months back, I was somewhat bored, and pulled he old paperback out.  That launched me off on one of those pointless bouts of activity.  I went from book to computer to the web.

And I found myself on Cliff Stoll's website ACME KLEIN BOTTLE.  It's a cool site, fun to read in marvelously droll way.  And, somewhere n that site, there's a link that references The Cuckoo's Egg.  In fact, it offers copies for sale.

Whoa.  New old stock copies.  with a nice autograph from the author himself.

On one of those silly whims, I placed an order for a copy.  And in the comments field, I wrote a silly little note about how much I'd enjoyed the book, way back when, etc., etc.

The next day, I found the order confirmation in my inbox.  And, attached was the nicest note from Cliff Stoll himself.  Not long after, the book arrived, and I was really charmed at the nice notes that Cliff had added to the book, personalizing the copy for me.

A couple days ago, being in one of those moods, I pulled my "Stoll copy" out and started reading.  Just finished it this evening.  I'm not sure how many times this makes for me reading it.  But it was fun.  It took me back to that.  It took me back down nostalgia lane.  I liked that.

I doubt Cliff will make it into this neck of the 'Net, but I still want to say "Thanks!"  At times, a little nostalgia is a very comforting thing.