Abbra Cadaver

CD in Play: DJ Cheb i Sabbah, Shri Durga. Tabla Beat Science, Tala Matrix.

Emulation

I have some old games that I would love to play - Alpha Centari, X-Com, Doom II, Civ II, etc. Of course, these games are quite dated now and will not play on an XP system. I also have some educational software that I would love to be able to run again. What's a guy to do? Get an emulator.
However, not being the trusting sort I don't want downoad the programme from the on-line universe. I decided to hit a game shop today and inquire if someone was making a commercial emulator that would allow me to run my old software. First thing out of the girl's mouth was, "I'm not allowed to talk about it." Huh?
The girl stated she was not allowed to talk about or suggest emulators, direct me to websites where emulators were availible for download, etc. I asked why emulator's were illegal and was there such a thing as a legal emulator. She didn't answer the latter part, but she stated that emulator's were considered to be piracy.
Piracy? So it is illegal for me to download a programme that will allow me to use old, previously paid for programmes? How does that make sense?

The Absurd Apparatus

So the contraptions used by Wiley E. Coyote, Wallace, Spy vs. Spy and the game Mousetrap are all the oddball offspring of the cartoons of Rube Goldberg - known as Rube Goldberg Machines.

Above is a Rube Goldberg device from one of his cartoons. (I pulled this from http://www.rubegoldberg.com/) The apparatus is thus explained:

"Rube Goldberg mistakes a lot of broken glass for bath salts and when they pull him out of the tub he mumbles an idea for dodging bill collectors
As Tailor (A) fits customer (B) and calls out measurements, college boy (C) mistakes them for football signals and makes a flying tackle at clothing dummy (D). Dummy bumps head against paddle (E) causing it to pull hook (F) and throw bottle (G) on end of folding hat rack (H) which spreads and pushes head of cabbage (I) into net (J). Weight of cabbage pulls cord (K) causing shears (L) to cut string (M). Bag of sand (N) drops on scale (O) and pushes broom (P) against pail of whitewash (Q) which upsets all over you causing you to look like a marble statue and making it impossible for you to be recognized by bill collectors. Don't worry about posing as any particular historical statue because bill collectors don't know much about art."

Feel any smarter? No? Well, I have the idea for this device that will make people smarter. All need is a shotgun, a coffee can, a badger, a bamboo rake, a fedora, a steaming kettle...