Of course, after writing a thing about the urge to repair the Commodore 64 I already have as opposed to buying the 64 Ultimate, I ended up buying the latter anyways. The trigger came from pricing out parts and upgrades for my existing unit, and once it got more expensive than just buying the C64U, I just pulled the trigger.
This bothers me. I know full well that I'll get the C64U soon, and I'll mess around with it for awhile. Maybe I'll even fall in love with it a little bit and spend lots of time tinkering. Maybe. More likely, I'll experience the immediate loss of novelty once the New Object simply becomes an Object.
I have plenty of tech cluttering my home for this exact reason. I have laptop computers, desktop computers, pocket computers, embedded computers. Open any drawer in my house, and you'll probably find an SBC of some flavor. Arduinos and ESP32s and a whole flock of phones forgotten due to planned obsolescence. Most of it is still perfectly functional, able to take a Linux or AOSP installation. Most of it is gathering dust.
Yet I'm still buying more. Not nearly as much as I used to, but it's still happening. I even started down a rabbit hole about the Amiga and found an FPGA version of it, and briefly considered buying that too. Stopped myself again. Wondering how long that might hold.
I'm a long time tech enthusiast, but the last decade of alleged advancement has left me feeling empty. Too much of what is happening has lost its magic, strip-mined of anything worthy of awe and shellacked with the same old greedy gaze. Get the new widget with improved surveillance tech. You need higher specs because our codebase keeps bloating. Stay imprisoned.
I think this might be the last time I spend money on technology. I have more than enough tech, and I need to actually spend time building and using it instead of just consuming it. There are plenty of half-built projects on my bench that deserve better treatment than what I've given them.
So tired of this loop.
2/100DTO
