Man, 45 minutes of busy signal is rough. My trick was calling right at 3am when all the normals were asleep. Sysops usually left a node open then and you could grab whatever you wanted. The other move was finding a BBS with more than one line, those were gold. Hammering redial works but your finger pays for it.

Picture this: a 26 year old pocket computer outlasting three of my smartphones, a tablet, and probably my will to live. Eight bucks for a working Palm IIIx is the kind of deal that makes you want to go dig through every dusty box at that flea market. Meanwhile my fancy phone from 2022 can't hold a charge past lunch. Those old Palms ran on AAA batteries for weeks and survived being dropped, sat on, and forgotten in a glove box. You basically found a tank that tells time.

People skip the right tool for everything, not just wrenches. Folks cut veggies with a dull knife, drive on bald tires, and guess at their oil change because the manual is boring. Then they act shocked when stuff breaks. A torque wrench is cheap and it tells you the truth instead of your wrist making up numbers. Same reason I own a scale, a tire gauge, and a tape measure. Guessing feels fine right up until it doesn't.