Steve, Author at Nomadic Research Labs

This little snapshot occurred after I finally escaped the San Clemente book-writing layover and plunged through Los Angeles, heading for Silicon Valley with the madness of the road again my daily life. But something was different; I was starting to contemplate how it might end, with tempting offers both personal and technical even as my…

I was struck by the obvious affinity of these two photos from my 1984-5 travels, and they have always been together in the album. The top one is Gaviota State Beach, about 35 miles west of Santa Barbara, California. The stone columns are in Arches National Park, an astounding place in eastern Utah and the…

This article appeared just about at the end of my first 10,000 miles. I had landed in San Clemente for a while to write the Computing Across America book, and it was a time for synthesizing what this all had meant… although one significant leg of the journey remained (continuing up the West Coast to land…

Computing Across America, chapter 47 by Steven K. Roberts San Clemente, California February 14, 1985 Wait a minute — are you sure we’re talking about the same San Clemente? —The average San Clemente resident, upon hearing of my experiences here It began slowly, subtly. First it was just a pair of corduroy pants, then some…

After almost 10,000 miles on the road in 1983-84, I had grown used to on-the-road questions. Every time I came out of a restaurant, there was a small crowd around the bike, fellow campers would amble over, and reporters would chase me down. It finally occurred to me to print and laminate a Frequently Asked…

Written from the perspective of my first year on the road, this article in the annual Writer’s Yearbook (from Writer’s Digest) captures some of the excitement about new tools that we now take for granted. Not long before, I had been submitting manuscripts in the form of double-spaced sheaves of paper with 8×10 photos and…

I felt a wistfulness developing, as my adventure moved into its second year. The tug of community… finding places that touched my heart and made me want to find a home. Previous homes had simply been default states, but what would it be like to live somewhere because you love it? What a concept… by…

Computing Across America, chapter 46 by Steven K. Roberts Palm Desert, California December 31, 1984 Visits always give pleasure — if not the arrival, the departure Portuguese proverb It’s odd to be in a place where everything looks familiar, even though you’ve never been there before. At first, from the north, Las Vegas was just…

Personal computer users, a breed apart back then (despite that phrase sounding absurd today) were fascinated by the implications of this newfound technology. In 1984, it was still somewhat radical to think of working “at home” instead of “at the office,” so taking it to the next level and working on the road was newsworthy.…

By the end of my first year on the road, my CompuServe “blog” was amassing a huge population of readers… and back in 1984, merely being online was an effective filter. In my mind, my readers were all intelligent, trustworthy, and fun (and for the most part, that was accurate). As a result, the column…

Posts by Steve

Tempted by Santa Barbara

Erotic Landscape

Recumbent Bicycles and Remote Work

Windows in the Ha-Ha

Digital Nomad FAQ – 1985

Breaking the Chains – 1985 Writer’s Yearbook

Cycles – Wheeled and Otherwise

Life in the Desert

Parole from the Ordinary – Personal Computing

One Year on the Road – A Retrospective