Personal Story

About Me — William “Bill” Myers

My Motto, “Good Programs Work, Bad Ones Don’t” in every aspect of life, not just computers. How my earliest memory shows my way of thinking throughout life.

Synopsis

• Two other biographical articles talk mainly about writing, particularly for Medium. This one presents my view of life and underlying reasoning, like how I was afraid of girls in high school, didn’t start going out dancing until 40 years of age, and was 72 when I first performed karaoke.
• General descriptions like programmer, romantic, writer, trainer, singer, dancer, retired, describe activities, not the driving force behind them.

Motivation

I analyze everything. In fact, people called me “The Count” in one of my early jobs. Most of my writing is analytical, but not in the vein of the mad scientist, but more

I always liked to be helpful, Even when someone didn’t want help.

So far, I have published 160+ articles on Medium, plus technical articles in computer magazines before I retired. Links to articles and songs referenced in the text are at the bottom.

I write for fun, just like I designed and wrote computer apps for fun during my career. My first one solved 40 equations with 90 unknowns. Getting paid is just a bonus, a form of recognition, no matter how much or little it is.

My earliest memory was when our sitter brought her 1st-grade daughter with her. We had oatmeal for lunch. My brothers and I mixed the milk and oatmeal into a smooth consistency. Milk floated on top of the daughter’s portion.

Trying to be helpful, I said, “Maybe it will be better if you stir it up.” The sitter heard me and said that if I didn’t like it, I didn’t have to eat it and dumped mine down the drain! That was probably 66 years ago.

Many of my Medium articles try to be helpful. If you learn anything new or try a new approach, then I’m successful. The others cover nearly everything I can imagine.

I created a TOC (Table-of-Contents) post when the list got too long for a new reader to scan on my profile. It’s organized into 17 categories. It was still too long, so I am now adding sub-category links at the top.

Background

I grew up in Indiana, attended Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology when it was an all-male school, majored in Math, and worked in Indianapolis for about 25 years. Then I went to my boss and said, “Anne, I want to move south where it is warm. Find me a place.”

My song, “Freezin, Freezin, Freezin” to the tune of Rawhide explains why I wanted to move.

The company had places all over the world, including 3 in Honolulu, with 20,000 requests to move there. I wound up in Houston, Texas, where I met my wife. I finally retired at age 70 and moved to Florida, with a brief stop in Peru first.

Work

I designed and built computer apps before personal computers and cell phones existed. People using the apps had no access to the computers. It was up to us to make sure the apps did what the people needed.

My job through my working years always helped people, but not always in the eyes of management. My article about how to manage a cat has many examples of what my poor managers had to go through.

Personal

My wife and I go dancing almost every night. That’s why we retired to The Villages, FL. A live band plays in the town square every day. Since Covid, we moved inside to City Fire, a local nightclub. Five articles track their gyrations from the start to almost fully reopening throughout the Covid crisis. Currently, they have live entertainment 6 nights per week.

People come up to us, comment about how they enjoy watching us dance, then ask how long we’ve been married. They expect 50 years or newlyweds. They’re surprised when I reply 20 years and we met on the internet.

Her ad said, “Intelligence is important.” Mine said, “Bugs Bunny is my hero.”

She went out with me anyway. My article The Greatest Compliment You Can Pay Your Sweetheart highlights our marriage.

Romanticism

I had hundreds of science fiction books and comics while growing up, and read sci-fi throughout most of my adult life.

Then I read “Starstruck” — a teenage, sci-fi, romance novel by the romance novelist Brenda Hiatt. It was so good that I read all 19 of her romance novels and was hooked.

She is converting Starstruck into a musical! We, members of her users group, get to hear the songs as they are being written. The second song is incredibly moving.

I’ve never read a book first, then watched it being converted to a musical. It’s a fascinating process, not as simple as it sounds, but logical after seeing the finished product.

I tend to identify with a character, or the story, while reading these novels. If I can’t, it’s just not a very good book for me. My Amazon review of a recent novel by another author - Fanny Finch, “Training Lord Somerset (The Heart of Dorset Series: Book 1): A Clean & Sweet Regency Historical Romance Novel is a great example. The book review:

5.0 out of 5 stars (Reviewed in the United States on May 8, 2021 (Verified Purchase)

One event started Humphrey’s change, but that one startling experience wasn’t even enough

I was much like Humphrey! Nothing terrified me more in High School than asking a girl for a date and I never kissed a girl until I got to college. Except Humphrey was even worse. He couldn’t express himself or take a stand with anybody, not just girls. Lydia, the Ice Queen, wasn’t much better with personal feelings. One time, she implied many times that Humphrey should make a declaration, but he was too scared! I felt like smacking him. Humphrey’s whole life, and Lydia’s by connection, will be a disaster unless Humphrey changes. The event starting the change was a real surprise. A well-written heart-wrenching story.

Finally, I don’t like 16 pages of porn that contribute nothing to the story (boring) and avoid books labeled “steamy.”

Karaoke

If you told me in high school, college, or the day I retired at age 70 that I would get up in front of a bunch of people and sing, I would have said that you were nuts!

Last week during Karaoke night at City Fire, Alan Ross introduced a singer from South Carolina. She sang her first Karaoke song at age 14 at one of his shows 20 years ago. After her song and my song, I walked over to her table and said,

Me: So, you did your first song at age 14? Her: Yes Me: I did my first one at age 72

I really shouldn’t say things like that when a person is eating and their mouth is full…

For my first song by the Shirelles, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, I just hoped that I would get to the end without messing up too much. I’ve added more songs by U.S., Canadian, and Australian folk singers. Also, rock songs like the 1961 song Runaway.

My latest one is I’ll Never Find Another You, my third by the Seekers. The line There is always someone for each of us they say certainly applies to me. Most of my songs have meaning.

I change words if they are depressing to something uplifting or romantic. For example, in A World of Our Own by The Seekers, I change the line

From: Oh, my love, oh my love, I’ve “cried“ for you so much To: Oh, my love, oh my love, I’ve “yearned” for you so much

Karaoke is very popular in The Villages. I usually get only one song over 3 hours on Wednesday, Karaoke night.

Writing

Term papers saved my college Humanities grades. I always wrote instructions for my computer app users, even when no other programmer did.

Then, in 1982, I wrote my first article, “Computer Programming and Systems Analysis in the Rapidly Changing VideoDisc Environment”, for the RCA Engineer magazine. I didn’t expect to get paid, but they gave me an “Honorarium” larger than my total payments from Medium to date and it sold more reprints than my total number of Medium views. The views count will probably surpass my RCA article sometime this year.

My writing follows my view of the world. I analyze everything, usually with cold, mathematical logic. Some articles reflect that logic while others show the playfulness of Bugs Bunny, like my article Shocked by the Dance Floor Surprise.

My review of my first 50 Medium articles generally summarizes my approach to writing. An article could be about anything.

I read every comment. Sometimes I agree, other times I disagree, learn something new, or just like the comment. I have even written articles based on a point in a comment, either on my piece or someone else’s.

They are also an excellent source for finding writers to follow. I always look at the writer’s profile to see what they have written.

One time, the company hired a new department head. The first week, we were supposed to give him a short description of our projects. I turned in a “brief executive summary” of 23 pages covering everything from that point to the end of time! He said that he remembered 2 or 3 things from that list. I really did restrain myself.

Another manager heard me explain something to one of our trainees. Later, he said, “If someone asked you for water, you would give them a drink from a fire hose!”

I’ve tried to keep this article shorter than that by listing others covering more extensive points at the end.

Conclusion

My mother wrote a weekly column for the local newspaper in Attica, Indiana, after retiring from the restaurant business. I hope I do as well as she did and give my readers something new to think about.

References:

Most important article:

Most popular:

Work life — most descriptive:

Most romantic:

Why I moved from Indiana:

Playfulness:

After first 50 articles (132 now):

College: Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology

Karaoke songs:

The Shirelles, Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow Del Shannon, Runnaway The Seekers, I’ll Never Find Another You, Frankie Lane, Rawhide Harve Presnell, They call the Wind Maria

Other authors:

Brenda Hiatt: Starstruck: The Musical, Act 1 Scene 1, “Is This Guy for Real?” — YouTube

Fanny Finch: Training Lord Somerset: A Clean & Sweet Regency Historical Romance Novel