To my right, atop a foot-thick stack of papers, is an AC power adapter or charger for something, I just have no idea what. I’ve wrapped its black cord around its length and secured same with a rubber band. It has a two-prong plug jutting out of one end and a manufacturer’s label reading “YHi Power Adaptor [sic].” There’s no hint anywhere as to what it’s supposed to plug into, only the helpful suggestion, “Caution: Indoor Use Only.” For the moment, masochist that I am, I intend to take it along. . .just in case I ever figure out what’s it for.

In the top left-hand drawer of my desk is a PCI card from Stac Electronics copyrighted 1990. It’s in one of those foil-lined bags that warns “Contents static sensitive: Use grounding wrist strap when handling circuit board.” I have no idea of what it was for, either, although it occurs to me at this point that I have yet to unearth one of those grounding wrist strap things. Maybe if I dig deeper. . .

In the same drawer is what I take to be a video or monitor adapter. It’s about an inch wide and a little over an inch long. On one end it’s got a nine-pin male plug, on the other a fifteen-hole female plug. It’s still in its original little plastic pouch, so I’m assuming I’ve managed to live without it to date. Being it’s so small, though, I’ll move it, too. You never know when it might come in handy, if not as a shim for something, maybe as a Christmas tree ornament, or a high-tech fashion statement. I think it would look perfectly ravishing attached to a transparent USB cable and strung around the neck, atop the appropriate cleavage, of course. Future archeologists will recognize it for the fertility symbol it obviously is. 

Next in number to fossilized AC chargers and video adapters is power cables, of which I have an abundance, again with no notion as to original origin. The readiest to hand is about six feet long, ends in a three-prong male plug on one end, a three-hole female plug on the other. I have no idea as to what it was supposed   to originally connect. Do I pass it down to future generations, while acting like serial and parallel cables never happened?

Digging deeper, I encounter what appears to be a 3.5-inch disk drive. I have vague memories of having once replaced such a drive, but no memory whatsoever as to why I held onto the outcast product. I think I’ll let this one go.

Underneath is a recycled cardboard box labeled “HP ScanJet IIp Interface Kit,” which dates to the days of the first great grayscale scanners, retail $899. Ouch! I no longer know where the scanner itself is, but for some reason I still have the add-on card in my possession. Maybe this I won’t move.

Now, we’re really entering into prehistoric times. I’m coming across box after box of 5.25-inch floppies, even original copies of software programs distributed via same, all of which I once vowed to copy to 3.5-inch diskettes before tossing. But, needless to say, never got around to doing. Too late now. Of all the artifacts uncovered to date, none has a working 5.25-inch disk drive inside it.

Lower still, I find something truly Jurassic, the Typist from Caere Corporation, a T-shaped, handheld scanning device that came bundled with Caere’s text-recognition software, OmniPage, version who knows what? The software has evolved and survived, latest reiteration being v11.0. But Caere’s hardware has long since been absorbed and surpassed by other hardware scanner manufacturers, from Canon and Nikon, to Umax and Epson. 

Evolution continues at a scary pace, especially when computers are involved. In an ideal world, I could hand this stuff down, as in from father to son. In reality, my son would now belch, look embarrassed, and ask, ’Gee, dad, what were you thinking? Are you a dinosaur or what?”

Well, yes, once upon a time. . .