Cora Crow

The story:

The first time I played the Commodore 64 game "Frantic Freddie" was at a friend's house when I was 5. I was instantly hooked by the kick-ass music it had. Man, I would load up that game just to listen to that song for hours!

About 5 years later I heard this song on the radio. I was surprised to realize the song in the Frantic Freddie game was actually a cover version of this song playing on the radio, this... "Cora Crow".

I was excited. I kept on humming that tune and occasionally singing out loud those only two words I caught from the lyrics: "Cora Croo-oo--oww"!

I kept on doing that for 17 years.

Today, I stumbled upon a video of Frantic Freddie on Youtube and watched it. It swept me with feelings of nostalgia and memories of better days. Some helpful soul had listed in the comments section all the songs covered in the game. Level 3 definitely didn't have "Cora Crow". Instead it had one called Kodachrome.

My face turned the deepest shade of red, and still is that way. Luckily, at the time of this embarrassing revelation I was buried in a secluded nook of the telecommunications lab at my university. All alone, programming computers. As I always am.

Hardly anyone ever comes here and if they do, they've made a mistake with the corridors.

To be honest I don't really understand my work myself. The system I am programming is an enormous one, and I am responsible but only for a small part of it. I am nothing but a cog in a huge machine. No one else seems to understand, nor care, what I am supposed to do here either. One by one, the other team members have either left or been appointed to other projects.

The e-mail is mysteriously quiet. Sometimes weeks pass by without me getting any mail. And when I do, it is from mr. Sashburan, offering me great enhancements for my manly organ.

Sometimes I write little haiku poems on paper notes and post them to myself in the internal mail to confirm that I still exist. My days consist of drinking insta-coffee and playing MUDs. My character's on level 816. The second-best player is on 57.

I am an office ghost.

I would like to go ask the manager for real work, but I'm afraid he will fire me once he finds out what I have been doing for the past two years.

My choice of career was heavily influenced by my experience with Frantic Freddie as a child. Now, how's that for irony?

Plus, I always thought the song was by CCR.