There was a Ms. PAC-Man machine where I worked during 1982-84. We grew from 11 to 33 employees crammed into the company owner's home basement, while a standalone new construction building took shape nearby, and required municipal hearings and ultimately some 'payoffs' to cure certain substantial 'deficiencies' in siting/design/construction in order to help the relocation project over the finish line.
For the tabulation of marketing research surveys, I wrote computer specs on a DEC terminal hardwired from our mid-Nassau County, LI location to the West 34th St NYC mainframes of our lead supplier. Most printouts were batch jobs printed out in the city overnight and delivered by messenger service the next mid-morning. But when necessary, I could slowly print out the 4-part sprocketed paper, and have others help me do the separations and binding.
On those late nights particularly, I played Ms. Pac-Man for free, for hours on end, and got quite good at it. This was while a family with parents, 3 kids, 2 dogs, and a housekeeper went about their weeknight routines on the two floors above me. After that, I'd drive a traffic-free LIE back to my home in a village 35 miles away, half way out to Montauk from Manhattan.
