Dodging 1985

The   user   interface   has   the   following   format.   Upon   accessing   the   URL,
the   user   sees   a   welcome  message   with   some   explanation   of   the  service
provided.  The   user  is   prompted  to   enter   his  or   her  name,  date  of  birth,
When  everything  else  fails,  try  something  new.  and  email  address,
For instance, try the central mental hospital, then  to  left  click  on  the
sit back and mumble enjoying the  belle  vue   submit  button.  Based  on
until  the  nurse  has  counted  you  all.  this  information,  the  CGI  script
Our group files  in  fresh  from  the  courtyard walk,  generates “on  the
a  pageant  of  male  flesh  in  ugly  dress.  fly”  an  appropriate  horoscope
There’s bundles of  excitement  but  little talk. reading  for  the  end  user,
The  chess-players  are  breaking  out  their  chess. or  displays  the  logs
No  one  to  mention  the  Afghan  War.  The  state, and  user  Statistics if
crumbling, buys me my sparse and forkless lunch. the  current  user  is
This  latest  novel   fails  to  kill  my  worries,  the  site  admin.  Parse  CGI
The  Plexiglas  window  withstands  a  teenage  a  punch.  variables  (or
God,  I  must  prove  completely  nuts,  by  fate  lookup  logged  record) to
unfit   for  active   military   service.  obtain  user’s  birthday.  Parse  user’s
stats,  verify   and   save   to   log   file.  Compute   user’s   Zodiac   sign   based  on
birth   date.  Print   personalized  greeting.  Generate  a   horoscope  reading  and
send  it   to   user’s   browser}  else  if  (user   ==   administrator)  {compute  stats.

Copyright Credit: Philip Nikolayev, “Dodging 1985” from Monkey Time. Copyright © 2003 by Philip Nikolayev. Reprinted by permission of Wave Books.
Source: Monkey Time (Wave Books, 2003)