October 5, 2016

  • Chord Company C-Stream Streaming Cable, Part 3

    Many of my friends went to jam-packed, competitive, and crowded UC Berkeley. OTOH, I went to UC Santa Cruz's sparsely-populated Crown College, where there generally weren't any large groups. The flip side to that was that you got to spend a lot of time with individuals.

    Living in the dorms during our first two years, one of my best friends was Warts. While there were others when we ate in the dining hall, most of my time with Warts was one-on-one. In addition to the dining hall, I'd hang out with her in the quads or in each other's dorm room. During freshman year, she and I didn't particularly care for a party we had attended, so we left together. We went to her dorm room, where Warts said she was from Merced or Modesto, Califorinia's Central Valley. She said it was hot, dusty, polluted, and full of farms. Thus, even in the '89 earthquake aftermath, she greatly preferred being on the coast.

    Because we were in our late-teens, we had all sorts of skin conditions and blemishes. While her nickname was Warts, she did ignore skin anomalies which weren't bumps. She did not have any actual warts. She would, however, jokingly call out any bump as a wart.

    I had the Sony D-10 Discman. Since Warts did not have a CD player, she would ask me to bring over the D-10. She would use the cable with a mini-headphone plug at one end, and two male RCAs at the other, to connect the D-10 to her small desktop stereo's AUX input. I do not recall what we were listening to, but she pulled down the tank top strap over one shoulder, revealing a small, raised, pinkish bump. She smiled, and jokingly said that the bump was a "wart."
    IMG_3163
    Nope, in 89-91, Warts and I could not have imagined Ethernet cables, certainly not for audio use. Back then, Chord Company did exist, but neither Warts nor I had heard of them. So here we are. The Chord Company C-Stream Streaming Cable uses this molded RJ45 plug. Hey, at least its off-white color isn't a beige pus, red rash, pink bump, or blackhead.

    Another time, Warts came to my room. After kicking off her Birkenstocks, she pointed to small calluses on top of her toes. She lifted her foot closer to my face, and said, "Warts!"
    IMG_3152
    From the side, the C-Stream Streaming Cable's RJ45 plug may or may not remind us of Warts' toes. But parts are gold-plated, and the molding does have a splash of light blue.