Chapter 4

John started to sit back in the Lazy-boy and watch more TV until Bill came, but decided it was better not to get into that habit. Instead, he started to make Brenda a list of the items she was supposed to pick up. He was almost finished when Bill knocked on the door. John let him in, and he joined John at the table. Looking over what John was writing he asked, “Is that the list of hardware and software she’s picking up?”

“Yeah, I thought it’d help her to know what she should be getting.”

“What are your system specs?”

John grinned, and said, “I don’t know. I’ve been away too long to have much knowledge about current computer architectures. I told the guy who’s building it to get me the most current CPU, the maximum RAM (computer memory) the system will hold, the biggest hard drive reasonably available, and configure it as if it was his own.”

Shaking his head Bill said, “I don’t know if I’d give anyone that kind of blank check.”

“Bill, you have to remember when I was put in here the Pentium Four had just been announced. I’m more than five years out of touch. In this industry that’s like two generations. I have to depend on others to try to get me back up to speed. Besides, I didn’t give him a blank check, I set a maximum he doesn’t know about.”

“Are you paying for this, or is he billing the state?”

“I’m paying. It’s already set up with my lawyer. When Brenda is satisfied she’ll give him an authorization code. He can take the invoice and the authorization code to my attorney, and they’ll immediately cut him a check.”

“That makes sense. So what do you need from me?”

“I need you to start giving me an overview of your current system, both hardware and software.”

“John, this will take a while. Why don’t I get us some things to look at and transfer my calls to somebody? It’ll soon be lunch, how about seeing if Brenda could include me in one of those awesome meals I keep hearing rumors about?”

“That’s a good idea. Do you happen to have any portable whiteboards?”

“I think we’ve got two or three. Do you think we’ll need them?”

“I’ve always found they’re great for brainstorming, even when you’re working with just two or three people.”

“Then I’ll send them down as soon as I get to my office.”

As he headed out the door John noticed a spring in Bill’s step he’d not seen before. John thought, Here I’m about to create major work and headaches for him, and he was almost dancing.’ Suddenly John realized, ‘Bill is honestly excited about this. He has been living with maintaining the status quo for so long he was looking forward to this. If I can get the rest of the staff to feel the same, then this job will be both easy and fantastically productive.

John called the Warden’s office again, and asked Sarah for Brenda’s extension. She gave it to him, and he thanked her. He then called Brenda, but ended up with her voice mail. He asked for her to return his call. A few minutes later she called back. John asked, “Would it be too much trouble to include Bill in the lunch plans for today? We’re going to be working through lunch, and he keeps hearing about those fabulous meals you’ve been preparing.”

“I don’t see where that would be a problem. I was planning on having Mesquite Chicken, southwestern style vegetables, with black bean soup and grilled flat bread. Do you want me to eat with Aunt Beth, or you?”

“Yes,” John said with a chuckle

“John, you’re confusing me.”

“Invite her to join us. I’d like more input from the administrative side, which is her, as well as the guard / staff side, which is you.”

“OK. I’ll see if she’s free.”

John went back to working on the list for Brenda. He’d just completed it when Bill knocked on the door. John was getting tired of going to the door, and decided there was a point where you can overdo ‘respecting one’s privacy.’ As a result he just shouted, “Come In.”

Bill entered, pushing a cart. On it, were six white boards three by five feet. Two guards followed carrying the boards’ easels. They quickly helped get everything set up, and left the room.

“Bill, I talked to Brenda, and she’ll include you for lunch. I asked her to also include herself, as well as Warden Saunders.”

“Did she say what we were having?”

“Something about Mesquite Chicken, with southwestern vegetables, and black bean soup.”

“Sounds delicious.”

“Bill, everything that woman prepares is delicious. I think she could make a feast out of peanut butter and grape jelly. Adding to that, she’s also very lovely and intelligent. I can’t believe someone hasn’t grabbed her up before now.”

“Are you interested?”

“Bill, I’m probably going to be behind these bars for the rest of my life. What can I offer someone like that?”

“I don’t know. Maybe respect, tenderness, and joy. I wouldn’t close the door just because of how your circumstances appear, and I certainly wouldn’t try to make up her mind for her. She deserves the opportunity to decide for herself what her definition of happiness is.”

“Don’t I have anything to say about the matter?”

“Sure. Just make sure the decisions you make are for you, not for her. John, if you don’t want a relationship with her, or if you only want her to be your friend; then fine, tell her that. But, if you try to push her away to protect her, you’ll cause her great harm.”

“Bill, those are pretty strong words. Are you sure you’re not in love with her yourself?”

“John, I’m happily married with two great kids. But, I’ve known Brenda since before high school. She’s strong in some ways, and very fragile in others. I’ve seen her fall in love several times, but those guys were just using her; she was nothing more than a notch on their headboard. But you’re different. You care. But sometimes people care so much they do stupid things to try to protect the ones they love.”

“How can you do that?”

“My mom loved a boy who was drafted into the Army during Vietnam. They had sex several times during the last month before he went overseas. He refused to marry her though, because he didn’t want her to be tied down. He also told her he feared she’d become a young widow. He was killed on his second patrol, two days before my mother learned she was pregnant; somehow the protection they were using hadn’t worked. His parents rejected Mom and me, because they hadn’t married. Her parents threw her out of the house, because she was pregnant. In desperation she ended up marrying the first asshole that asked, and regretted it the rest of her life. She died of ‘old age, ‘ at forty-two. Would her life have been better if he hadn’t been so ‘noble and ‘self-sacrificing’?”

John sat there, stunned and speechless. In one way it could be said this was more information than he wanted to hear. On the other hand, this was the voice of someone who’d been there, and had lived it. John was honestly confused, not knowing what he really wanted regarding Brenda. This whole thing would definitely require more thought. John finally gathered himself, and said, “Thanks, Bill. I appreciate your sharing those very personal facts. I don’t know what I want, but I’ll not try to be ‘noble’ and make the decision for her.”

“Good, now lets talk about the system.”

For the next two hours they went over their existing system, if you could call it that. They were using one of the last Digital Alphas, before Digital was bought out by Compaq and then, ultimately, by HP. The bulk of their system was originally written for a PDP-11 back in the mid-seventies. But some of it was even older than that! It had just been ported over, so as to run on the PDP-11! Then, when they purchased the Alpha, they selected the VMS operating system rather than Unix, and just ported all the earlier applications to run under VMS. About the only thing that had been done since then was to add a GUI interface when appropriate, so it would appear to be compatible with Windows. This was of little use, as about half the terminals in the system were Wyse 30+ monochromatic (green font) terminals, and even the PC’s in the system were ‘dumb terminals’ when it came to running anything on the network. All the processing was still being done by the main Alpha System, in a typical mainframe configuration of the 1970’s!

The part that blew John away the most was none of the data was stored in a relational database. They had a file for everything, but most of it couldn’t be linked. They had all the inmates filed by prisoner number, but an inmate couldn’t be pulled up by name without doing a special sort. Past inmates were filed by social security number, but their prisoner number wasn’t included, and the current prisoner database didn’t contain social security numbers. The worse part was the inmates that didn’t have a social security number were given a phony one. Unfortunately, there was no log of the phony numbers used, and no notation in the computer the number was phony. The result was they were finding many people had the same number, causing the system to produce faulty information on the reports. This carried over to the fact most of the important information was only available in hard copy reports that were usually run at night, or over weekends. They couldn’t even pull up an inventory of who was supposed to be in what cell on the terminal, or a schedule of where an individual prisoner was supposed to be at any point in time. All of the notes about prisoner problems or disciplinary actions were maintained only in a paper file, so were pictures, fingerprints, and even prior criminal activity.

The final straw that made John want to throw his hands up in the air was Bill had found no way to actually export data, other than in a raw ASCII format. At this point he was ready to scream. He actually got up, walked to a wall, and started lightly pounding his head onto it. It probably looked pretty stupid, but it was a good outlet for John to express his complete exasperation over this whole thing. The funny thing was while John was doing it Brenda and her Aunt brought lunch into the room. The shocked look on the women’s faces got Bill laughing too hard to explain what John was doing. John wasn’t any help, since he was just making guttural noises while beating his head against the wall. They were seriously wondering if John had snapped, until the two men finally calmed down enough to explain John was going through an emotional release after getting an insight into their existing system. Seeing his actions through that explanation they started laughing, too.

When they sat down to eat Warden Saunders asked, “Well, John, is it fixable?”

With a serious look he answered, “No, Ma’am. This system is so dead rigor mortis set in eight years ago.”

Disheartened, she queried, “So there’s nothing you can do?”

After encouraging everyone to eat while they talked John answered, “Warden, I didn’t say that. I just said this system couldn’t be repaired, it’ll have to be replaced. I’m convinced most of this system was originally designed for punch cards, and a computer that was little more than a card sorter.”

“But, how can we afford to replace it? The state has paid millions for what we have now.”

“Warden, that may be true, but it doesn’t reflect reality. I know that sounds strange. What I mean is what’s past, doesn’t necessarily reflect the present, or the future. Do you remember your first microwave?”

“Sure, it was an ‘Amana Radar Range.’“

“Do you remember what it cost?”

“I’m not sure, but I think it was close to a thousand dollars.”

“And what would a microwave oven cost today?”

“Less than a hundred. Oh, I see. Just because I paid a thousand twenty-five years ago doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll have to spend a thousand today to replace it.”

“That’s right. Now, add to that the fact today’s dollar is worth about a third of the dollar of twenty-five years ago, and what do we have?”

“I guess what you’re saying is comparing apples to apples, the new one would cost around thirty dollars if I was comparing nineteen-eighty dollars.”

“That’s correct. The same thing works with the computer. The Digital system you’re currently using as a mainframe could be replaced today with a good server for roughly two percent of the original cost of the Alpha, and that’s at today’s dollars. The new machine would be many times faster and hold considerably more data. Plus the efficiency of the modern programming languages and database systems, and the cost to replace will not be overwhelming at all. What I’ll do first will be learning what’s currently being used by friends and associates around the world, as well as doing a lot of online research. I hope to start on that tonight.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes, Ma’am. Many of the people I’ll be talking to over the Internet are in England, Australia, and New Zealand.”

“But, how can you do that and not let people know you’ve free access to a computer and the Internet?”

“Most of them only know me by my username or a nickname. They don’t know who I really am. On the few sites where someone could recognize my user name and know who I am I’ll create a new user name.”

Bill said, “Warden, I think he’ll do everything he can to protect what you’re doing for him. The problem I have is he wants to immediately get started and I can’t get cable run in here quick enough. Can we go ahead and put him in the other apartment, and then make the changes?”

She responded, “I’ll take a look at it after we finish eating. By the way Brenda, this is an excellent meal.”

Bill and John both agreed. Brenda was pleased with the praise, but she was also shy enough she still blushed. This was the first time John had really interacted with her in front of others (other than her Aunt), and he was surprised as to how shy and reserved she seemed. He thought, She really is a complex person. Bill did a good job making me aware of her vulnerability. After what I’d seen while we were hostages, I wouldn’t have imagined how easily I could hurt her.

When they finished eating Warden Saunders and Bill headed back to her office to see about immediately moving John into the apartment. John helped Brenda with the cleanup and reviewed the list of what she should be picking up with her, explaining how the authorization code would give his attorney the approval to write the computer company a check.

She nodded she understood, and asked, “What’s the authorization code?”

John handed her a folded slip of paper, and said, “This is the code you’re to give him.”

She opened the paper and raised her eyebrows at his having written ‘Framed.’

He shrugged his shoulders, and said, “It’s the first word that came out of my mouth when my attorney asked me for a five to eight character word.”

“That makes sense. I could understand why that word would be on your mind at the time. I know Aunt Beth wanted me to take a guard with me, but will it be necessary?”

“Brenda, they’ll load everything for you, and the store isn’t in a bad neighborhood. Unfortunately, I think there are a couple of rough neighborhoods on the way. Driving around alone in a van marked Arizona Prison System might be inviting trouble. If not to please your Aunt, at least take someone to give me some peace of mind. If you got hurt running an errand for me I might never forgive myself.” Her astonished look in response to what John had said made him wonder if he’d said too much, but it was the truth. There was a bond between them, and there was no use denying it. John didn’t know where it’d lead, but there was no way he could not care for her - they’d just been through too much together. She gave him a tender kiss on the cheek and left.

Bill returned in a few minutes, and said, “I think we’ve got the details worked out. We should be ready to set things up in the other room when Brenda returns. I’ve already got someone drilling a hole in the wall of my workroom. We’ll run Cat-five cable through it, and then add the ends to make it a long patch cable. It’ll be connected to the router in my workroom.”

John replied, “That works for me. Now, let’s start reviewing the current system. I need to see examples of the data, how it’s stored, how it’s updated, as well as current inquiry capability, and reports.”

They started with what Bill had with him, and John continued reviewing it when Bill went back to his office for more. They spent over three hours going over the information, only stopping when Brenda returned. The computer was taken to the new apartment, and while John gathered his things together several people came in and started moving the bed, TV, and other furniture over to the apartment. These were inmates, many of whom John knew. He had the forethought to put the orange jumpsuit back on before everything started, to try to reduce the questions, but he probably should’ve gotten totally away from both areas while the move was going on.

One of the people was a long time trustee named Joseph. John had helped him in the past with some letters to his lawyers, so he knew who John was. “John boy, how you doing? Sorry about ‘Jumbo.’“

“Thanks. ‘Jumbo’ was a good friend; I’ll miss him.”

“So like, what’s going on?”

Trying to think quickly so as to keep down the gossip John answered, “Well, I’m still recovering from the beatings, and the lack of food and water. The Warden has this idea about me helping straighten out their computer system while I recover. They were going to have me stay in this ward of the infirmary, but there’s no way to connect a computer to their system in here. It also takes away too many infirmary beds from you guys. Anyway, they’re going to temporarily put me in an area next to the computer workroom while I recover and am working on the system.”

“That makes sense. That’s right, you’re supposed to be some kind of computer genius.” Then pointing to the TV, he asked, “What about all this stuff?”

“Joseph, I’m so far out of date concerning computers the only reason I might be able to help them is their system is even more out of date than I am. As for as this stuff, they put it in here to try to make me more comfortable. If you ask me, I’d say it was to try to butter me up so I won’t sue their asses.”

He grinned, and asked, “Is it working?”

John raised his eyebrows, and his eyes flashed a quick twinkle as he answered, “What do you think?”

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