Flashback: the Fall of 1996. I'm sitting in a meeting room one fine Saturday morning at the Paoli Hospital, wondering, "Just what I am doing here?" I remember inquiring at work about whether there was a Mac users group in the area and if anyone could possibly help me with my archaic Mac Plus. Via an electronic newsgroup at work a one Moe Comeau came to my aid. Moe seemed nice enough and very informed about Macs. So I bit, and came to the meeting. The whole meeting seemed a bit much because I had been out of the personal computer game for quite a while. (I'd acquired the Mac Plus from a friend at work who used it at college, but was migrating to Windows.)

Little did I know that the meeting would end with my Mac informant (and then Vice President) Moe Comeau hoisting up his shirt to reveal an Apple logo tattooed upon his tummy. Though permanently scarred by that event, I was able to capture the moment by drawing a 128x128 pixel bitmap which became the first Moegoe (Moe logo(e)) ever.

Now, jump forward to the present; some 75 or so Moegoes later I find myself having to write this here Member of the Month column and not really knowing quite what to say. I guess I'll start with when I got my first Mac. I was in on the ground floor when Apple introduced the Mac. I started at Drexel University in the fall of '83 and in '84 all freshmen had to purchase a 128K Mac for $1000. (The ImageWriter printer was another $400.) Let me tell you I loved my Mac. Sure, I was going for a degree in computer science, but I loved MacPaint. In my spare time I would draw. I would draw everything from Max Headroom, to cars, to Garfield, but most of my favorite drawings would be off-color or some would say sick ones (traces of which can be found in past Moegoes Lady Moediva, the "got mac?" cow, and Marilyn MonMoe, etc.) that I drew for friends.

After my first year at Drexel and after a six month co-op at General Electric (at 32nd and Chestnut streets in Philadelphia) I found myself not enjoying the hectic 10 week courses at Drexel, so I transferred to Glassboro State College (now Rowan University) and loved the 15 week courses, the small class sizes, and the short commute (from Swedesboro, NJ). I was still majoring in computer science, but kept on drawing on my Mac. Over summer vacations I interned at General Electric in Valley Forge and would occasionally hang a Mac drawn cartoon on my cube wall at work.

In May of 1988 I graduated from Glassboro and accepted a job at General Electric. Eventually my original Mac died (sometime in '89) but I continued to hand draw going-away flyers for people at work and an occasional softball or volley ball team logo. It was also at this time that I met my wife Lynne at work who will say that I begged and begged her until she agreed to go out with me. We married in the summer of '91. In this timeframe General Electric in Valley Forge briefly hiccoughed as Martin Marietta and then reappeared as Lockheed Martin. My wife and I bought our first house (albeit a townhouse) in Gilbertsville (home of the odoriferous Zern's Farmers Market). In the spring of '95 we were blessed with the addition of a beautiful curly blond daughter we named Rachel who has been an endless joy and who also seems to share my sense of humor. About this time a buddy of mine gave me his Mac Plus and I was off and drawing again on a good ol' Mac. I believe it was about that same point in time that I switched to SuperPaint which I quite liked.

Shortly thereafter I also received a Mac SE from a cubemate at work. Eventually Moe cobbled together a Frankenstein Mac IIsi for me from some odds and ends that I'm pretty sure he grew in his basement. For what it was, it worked just fine and I was off making more Moegoes with a COLOR monitor. At the tail end of 1999 we left the townhouse lifestyle and moved into a single family home in Royersford. A month later, after consulting with Moe, my wife surprised me with an iMac DV SE for my 35th birthday. With some birthday money, I purchased a small Wacom graphics tablet to go with my iMac. It has worked out great for me. Over the last couple of years I switched from SuperPaint to Photoshop Elements (to allow for greater detail) for most of my drawing needs, but I still haven't found my perfect drawing package yet. Until then PE will have to fill the bill as I Moegoe off into the sunset.

I've been told that my presence has been requested at the February MLMUG meeting. Apparently it's required that the Member of the Month shows up sometimes. (Isn't one MLMUG meeting every 8 or so years enough?) Tell you what: I'll attend under one condition — that Moe doesn't reveal any new tattoos!

—Matt Mucha