Do It Yourself (the annotated version) words & music copyright 1985 by Bill Sutton annotations copyright 1993, 2005 by Bill Sutton music based on "Macnamara's Band" I went to buy computers and they said, "A million bucks For a brand-new mainframe IBM" -- now, that price really sucks! So I looked at all the pictures and I chose to build my own, For you can build a mainframe from the things you find at home! CH: IBM, DEC, and Honeywell, HP, DG, and Wang, 5 Amdahl, NEC, and NCR, they don't know anything. They make big bucks for systems so they never want it known That you can build a mainframe from the things you find at home! Take the CPU, you see it's only just a box With blinking lights and whirring fans and lots of cable slots. 10 So I spent an evening working with some wires and bulbs and pins, Then I hauled them to the basement and I plugged the freezer in. CHORUS Next I needed tape drives, my tape drives were a steal. I climbed into the attic for my dad's old reel-to-reel. Some cable and some binder twine and soon it was complete -- 15 My CPU and tape drive at a price no one could beat! CHORUS Then I looked for disc drives, but it didn't take me long. "Function follows form," they say -- or have I got that wrong? I found a drive with 5 new modes that blows the rest away ... Cottons, linens, wash-n-wear, rinse, and lingerie! 20 CHORUS I had to have a console just to make my system run. Without a fancy console, then my system wasn't done. I tied a ten-buck typer to a broken TV tube, And now I've got a console that can write the evening news. CHORUS I've had my system running, I'll admit its not the best. 25 The data isn't right, and the response time is a mess. It crashes every hour and it isn't worth a damn, But I'm satisfied because it runs just like an IBM! CHORUS 0: The music is very similar to "Macnamara's Band" and can almost be sung to it. However, if Paul Simon can claim arrangement changes as an original work, who am I to argue ... 1: This version typed in from non-error-correcting memory. Your lyrics may vary. 5: It's depressing to note that of the 8 computer companies listed, 3 are defunct or have been bought out and two more are struggling. I'm glad I work for HP! 6: In Standard Southern American English, 'thing' rhymes with 'Wang' ... 10: Remember status registers?? Ahh, those were the good old days ... 12: Plugged the freezer into the wires and bulbs and pins so now there's a box with a fan and lots of lights ... ahh, forget it. 13/14: Audio recording tapes used to be 1/4" wide and come in big spools. Computer data tape used to be 1/2" wide and come in big spools. C'mon, I'm not _that_ old, am I? I could have used player piano rolls and an old fork for a paper tape reader, you know ... oops. I guess I AM that old. 17: Yes, DISC is spelled with a "C". With a "K", it is short for "diskette" ... it's my etymology and I'll lie if I want to ... 20: Remember when you could put a MAYTAG label on a 10 Mb disc drive and fool your mother into thinking the computer room was really a laundromat? Now a 10 Gb disc drive would be smaller than the MAYTAG label. 26: Is "data" plural or singular? It's a collective noun, and in American English a collective noun tends to be singular. However, "data" is often an exception ... It really doesn't matter, since "the data aren't right" also scans (for sufficiently drawn-out pronounciations of "aren't".) 26: Now that I think about it, this line begs for an ST:TNG version -- "You can build a starship from the things you find at home". In that version, "My Data isn't right" would be correct grammar. Hmm ... 28: Obviously, this is the best line in the song.