I was doing some inventory on my laptop today when my battery died.
As I quickly needed to calculate some large numbers, I asked a young colleague to go to my office and bring me a "Digitron" from the drawer of my desk where I keep various office equipment.
He looked at me in amazement, until I told him that it was a calculating device, which was actually called a Calculator 🙂
I felt really old at that moment and immediately thought of #ThrowbackThursday and remembered my childhood, when that very device was our only help in counting.
While I was waiting for him, I remembered why we called this device a Digitron.
Just as we associated toothpaste with one brand (Caladont) and called every toothpaste that way for years, regardless of who produced it, this electronic calculator, produced for the first time in Europe way back in 1971 in the Croatian city of Buje by Digitron, became a synonym for all future calculators.
My laptop wouldn't work after the battery died, and this Olympia calculator with a built-in photocell, which I've had for over 20 years, still works perfectly to this day, even though its batteries have never been replaced.
I had almost forgotten how good it felt to feel the resistance under my fingers as I pressed the little plastic number buttons.
The well-known protrusion on the number 5, which clearly marks the middle of the dial, ensures that the error when entering numbers is reduced to a minimum, unlike clicking on the virtual calculator keyboard on a mobile phone or moving the touchpad on the laptop screen.
When you want security, type on a retro calculator (Previously, calculator models with a tape were used to confirm calculations, before models with a step memory appeared).
When we finished work and returned to the office, before I put my Digitron back in the drawer, I showed my young colleague how we used to have fun as kids.
By typing a combination of numbers, we got a string, which at first glance had no meaning, until the calculator screen was turned 180°.
Then that combination of numbers turned into a word.
I remembered a few of them:
3838
0705
3708 (name of one of my friends)
907039 (one profession)
379009 (this word did not exist when this number game was popular)
But also a "cheeky" one
3515
And there are also a few words in English that I know
07734 (universal greeting)
31907018 (another profession)
And probably one of the most famous in English
5318008
Is there any word in your language that can be represented as a combination of numbers on digital calculators (if you are old enough to have seen such a calculator 🙂)
Of some other words, I have only heard of the Spanish combination
50538
which is sending kisses to all the Hivers out there this Friday and #TBF getting ready for the weekend ahead.