Statement From a Marine Neurocrustaceologist!

I have my third copy of GEB - no questions asked - so it will be half as battered as it would have been by the time I finish it - sometime in 2017 I think. Well, maybe not then. I am deep into part 2 which seems to have less maths so far but is interesting just the same. I have found myself as interested in the distinctions between machine code, Assembler and compiled languages as I ever was when I first learned about them. I never do any assembler now and I only ever wrote one commercial assembly language program. This was some small portion of the input stream for an ATM deposit system. Knowing the world of technology there is some chance that this code is still in place in a live system. I keep meaning to start on assembler again one day just to say I can still do it but having to bother about carrying puts me off. Pointers I hate!