My handle-saundby-is a name I started using as my name for a medieval re-enactment group (
http://www.sca.org/) about 28 years ago. It's the last name of an author of some books on WWI aviation that I liked the sound of. Since then I've used it a lot since my "mundane" name is so common as to be virtually useless for identification.
Other handles I go by or have gone by are atari7800mod (after my website at geocities) and Mr Yuk (adopted in 1978 when I read in the paper that they were replacing the skull and crossbones on poison materials packages in Pittsburg because kids saw the Jolly Roger and thought that meant there was "Pirate Food" inside, so they made up a face they called Mr Yuk.)
My Vic-20 was my first store-bought computer, all the prior ones had been homebrews or kits. I got it from Monkey Wards when the Vic was still new and cool. I'd been thinking of getting a KIM for some time, and the Vic looked pretty much like a KIM with the add-ons I wanted already added on.
I owned it for about three months before I bought any mass storage for it. I'd write my programs on paper and key them in when I wanted to use them, and just leave the system powered up if I wanted to keep the program for a while.
I had just finished shopping for the parts and etching a board for an 8K expansion when I went out shopping for a Datasette. Sale prices induced me to buy a Super Expander and a 16K RAM cart as well--the parts for the planned 8K expander are still sitting in my parts drawers across the room from me.
Within a short while I added a Vic-1540 disk drive (which was replaced under warranty with a 1541) a 40/80 column card, and later the crowning add-on, a RamMaster32.
-Mark G.
