I can draw a fairly straight line from my personality as a young fella to who I am today.

I mean, look at this nerd. He’s got a Commodore computer running Workbench 2.04. Dot matrix printer. Stephen Lawhead books on the shelf. A thermometer that read the outside temperature. Basketball trophies. This would be a great submission for one of Hemispheric Views Desk Reviews.

Andrew as a youngun

But it doesn’t end there. As listeners of my podcast will know, I maintain a depreciation spreadsheet tracking my major asset purchases. Turns out, this isn’t a new concept for me. Here is the prototype, from 2001:

Depreciation 2000's style

People may also know me as a prodigious booster of YNAB as a means to manage your personal finances. Before YNAB, there was Quicken. Before Quicken, there was my ledger book.

Financial Ledger Book

And before my ledger book, there were my transaction registers!

Financial Transaction Registers

To give a sense of the timeline, the registers, as the first documents, are dated from 1994. That would put me at 16/17 years old. My memory has me doing these a little younger, but this is the first documented evidence.

I also found a neat record of my automative service history from 2000. This car needed a lot of work!

Automotive Service Log

I’m not sure I’ve changed much in the 30 years since.