🎬 Prompt Response: Did Someone Say Pong? 😁
What was your first ever videogame?
Pong — not ping pong — was a digital form of table tennis that really took some practice to figure out. Moving your paddles quickly was difficult, but that erratic little digital tennis ball was not slow at all. Lol 😂 And I don’t know why I got so excited whenever I found out a friend had this game. Probably because we didn’t have it. I don’t think we had any kind of video games in our home. But I didn’t mind so much because I was not any good at them at all. Hand-eye coordination, depth perception, speediness: None of these were strong with me, and mostly still aren’t. Still, it was always so exciting to find out someone had the game, and everyone gathered around to watch until it was their turn.
But even without being good at them, there’s something so pleasant about remembering the amazing beginnings of technology in my young life. My sister and I had colored rocks that grew in a bowl of water with just the right mix of chemicals. (Not tech but science, so that’s its own techy/nerdy thing.) We had toy cars that ran on real gasoline. We had a doll that sat at a small desk that was attached to a larger desk, and when we would draw on our paper, she would draw the same thing in miniature on her side. Her arm and pen were connected to the pen holder on our side, so invention wins the techy vote here. Oh, and then there was Spirograph™! That was my most favorite! It’s probably the play thing that started my love of patterns and kaleidoscopes. Well, and my actual toy kaleidoscopes.
Of course, the item that looked like a TV screen with controllers that could make your “cursor” go where you wanted was Etch-A-Sketch™ and it was even portable. It didn’t even need batteries! And we could play it in the car or while the grown-ups were playing cards.
I didn’t plan on writing anything but Pong, but sometimes nostalgia takes over. Thanks for sharing my little jaunt down memory lane. I’ve posted a video of a real game of Pong below. The original game wouldn’t embed, so this one is using the double paddles, but you’ll still get the point.
Bonus: Here’s a screenshot from a closed eBay auction where someone sold a Katie Kopycat doll and her “Magic Desk.” This lets you see how the toy company took a real drafting tool called a pantograph and turned it into a child’s toy. Very cool. 🪆 🧸
Share this post on:
Prompt Response: When I Sold Flowers 💐
What are your favorite side-hustle ideas?
If it was still the late 1970s, and I was still an energetic teenager, I’d totally recommend selling flowers on the street corner.
This could qualify as my first side-hustle job besides watching kids for some friends or family. And back then, teen babysitters got very little—no matter how bratty their little charges turned out to be. (I don’t recall any real troublesome kids, though. Thankfully.) So a good weekend side hustle could be a great excuse to not be available as a cheap sitter.
I don’t recall how I found out about the job, but I recall they hired a whole bunch of teenagers for Mother’s Day weekend and picked us up in an old metal-floored work van. Each of us, with our buckets of flowers and water, got dropped off on various corners around the valley. And it was super hot that weekend!
Apparently, there was a contest with bonus pay. The fact that I looked like I was only about 11 years old and kept dipping in the flower water to cool myself off turned out to be a good thing. I sold a lot more flowers and got the 2nd-place bonus for the weekend. I took home about $165, which was a lot for a young teenager. Today, that would be over $750, so, yeah, it would be an excellent side hustle.
I had Gemini’s Nano Banana work on a picture to closely resemble that experience nearly five decades ago. Do you wanna buy some flowers?
With that I’ll say Welcome to October and Happy Fall Y’all! I plan to try and answer prompts for this whole month. This is the first prompt for October 2026, and when I come across anything I don’t feel I can write on, I’ll grab a dress draft I’ve saved from previous prompts I liked. I hope my readers find some enjoyable reading this month even without my usual teaching posts.
Share this post on:
My Latest Flickr Photos
Others’ Posts I’ve Liked
All That God Commands
The title for this post comes from the last verse of this reading from Genesis 6:9 through Genesis 6:22, “Noah did this; he did all that God commanded him.” (This verse from the Amplified Bible.)
I just spent an evening and a full day at a training seminar to learn about prayer and healing and ministering to others. I have about 25 pages of notes, and I saw some amazing things in the Power of God. Since I have walked as a follower of God, I can testify to multiple miracles, including one that is medically verified. And yet, I look at these chronicles of Noah, and I wonder, if it were me in his place, would I do ALL that God commanded me to do?
If we all told the truth, I’m sure we would all admit that it would be a struggle to exceed the boundaries of the natural things God wants us to do and take a jaunt into the supernatural. If we can’t see it or feel it, can it really be true? Then again, we can’t see love, but we somehow trust it is true. We can’t see salvation, but we know it is true, and often trust someone who says they’ve become saved just on their word. And salvation, the regeneration of the human soul, is the greatest miracle of all. Of course salvation wasn’t even part of the culture back then–except for Noah. The world had never yet seen a drop of rain, so just believing that God was going to destroy the earth with water was a stretch, but he did it. But then, to build a boat on dry land, build it the size required and believe it would float, and then trust that the animals from all over the earth would just find their way there and walk right in? Wow! Most of the world would have called, and probably did call, Noah a crazy man. But he obeyed in spite of their accusations.
Growing up, we had a record, and yes I mean a vinyl LP album, called “Bill Cosby is a Very Funny Fellow…Right!” I can’t tell you how many times we listened to it, but it was funny pretty much every time. The part we listened to most was the three skits where God calls on Noah to build an ark. Noah asks questions like, “Am I on Candid Camera?” and “Who is this really?” And while the story is written as a comedy, so much of it rings of truth when thinking about how humans react to that which is supernatural in God. To hear it for yourself, listen to this recording at God Tube… http://www.godtube.com/watch/?v=WL7YYLNX and let me know if it’s your first time hearing it, or if it brings back some great memories for you.
And after you listen to Bill Cosby, and/or read today’s Scriptures, ask yourself whether you would act like Bill’s Noah, or the Noah in the Bible who, rather than doing things his own way, did ALL that God commanded of him. No wonder he found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
Share this post on:
October 5, 2013 Posted by Crystal A Murray (aka CrystalWriter) | Bible Study, Nonfiction, Torah Commentary | album, ark, believing God, Bible, Bible study, Bill Cosby, Bill Cosby is a Very Funny Fellow...Right!, comedy, command, Complete Jewish Bible, Cosby Noah, Creator, crystalwriter, funny, Genesis 6, God, humor, Lord, LP, memories, miracle, Noah, nostalgia, obedience, right, salvation, Scripture, sketch, supernatural, Torah, Torah commentary, Torah Portions, Torah Reading, truth, vinyl, Word, Word of God, Word of the Lord, Yahveh, Yahweh | Leave a comment