Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2009 07:38:59 -0800
Reply-To: Anthony Egeln <regnsuzanne@YAHOO.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Anthony Egeln <regnsuzanne@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: Re: More early list memories...
In-Reply-To: <011201c96f44$58c00bd0$0101a8c0@gp207joel>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
And this is why the list is as much community as it is source of technical info!
Thanks, Unca Joel......
Anthony
'89 Syncro GL (Hidalgo)
--- On Mon, 1/5/09, joel walker <uncajoel@BELLSOUTH.NET> wrote:
From: joel walker <uncajoel@BELLSOUTH.NET>
Subject: Re: More early list memories...
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Date: Monday, January 5, 2009, 9:46 AM
it was a dark and stormy night ... the winds of Change howled
as they tried incessantly to find a way into the hearts and minds of
volkswagen bus owners throughout the land.
and the land itself was dark. there were shadows upon the land
and its peoples ... lingering, hovering shadows, creating
FEAR (Fright, Ecchymosis, Anxiety, Rage) in all that hove to
the Olde Wayes, and even in those that did not.
and those shadows were called Dealers. and, lo, they were vile
and unscrupulous creatures, bent upon the destruction of wallets
and wills whenever someone foolhardy enough to venture near their
snares was entrapped. and like the spiders, spinning their webs
and trapping their victims by sticky paperwork covered with
legal phrases of no escape, they sucked the vital life forces
from anyone foolish enough to leave their vehicles for 'service'.
and the times were sad. and sadder still was the plight of the
people ... for no one heard their cries and lamentations, though
loud and constant they were.
and a voice cried out in the wilderness ...
"can anybody help me fix my 84 vanagon??"
and another voice answered across the internet, saying
"ya know, that same thing happened to me on my 80 vanagon ...
here's what you do: ...".
and, lo, a list was born!!! and a small ray of sunshine
and sparkling light pierced the gloomy clouds, and shone upon
a small piece of firmament, and caused thereupon a flower to
grow and send out tendrils, seeking more and more voices,
offering succor and solace to the downtrodded and oppressed.
and the great volkswagen gods looked down from their celestial
junkyard, and smirked, and said amongst themselves,
"this ought to be good!". and thus ended the third
month.
well ... that's how i remember it anyway. :) i had a job that
didn't require any real work of me, just sitting around doing
nothng like a lot of other state government workers. so i had
time to kill every day, and the fools, the mad stupid fools,
had left me with a pc connected to the .net whatever-it-was
thingie. and i found rec.autos.vw.
and noticed a message asking for help on a problem with an
84 vanagon. first time i'd seen another vanagon mentioned
among the golfs, rabbits, beetles, karmann ghias, and so on.
so i replied. the asker was gerry skerbitz, and my answer
seemed to help him. so we started emailing back and forth.
and it was decided that a mailing list would be better, since
we wouldn't have to wade through all that mess with the golfs,
rabbits, beetles, etc.
and since i had no access to any servers (the folks with little
to actually do weren't trusted with such things), and he did
and he seemed enthusiastic to find more folks ourselves, with
vanagons, he asked his boss, and got permission (he was a state
worker, too, and apparently didn't have an awful lot to do. but
he did have access to the servers!), and set up the mailing
list. and here we are:
one guy, standing at the back of his van, hunched over his engine,
tools in hand ...
with eighthundred-some people with beer bottles, standing around,
telling him what to do.
(courtesy of G. Jannini) :)
and what a long strange journey it has been ...
in Foreman's basement. :)
unca joel
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