*                     Abort, Retry, Ignore?
*  
*   Once upon a midnight dreary, fingers cramped and vision bleary,
*   System manuals piled high and wasted paper on the floor,
*   Longing for the warmth of bed sheets, still I sat there doing spreadsheets.
*   Having reached the bottom line I took a floppy from the drawer,
*   I then invoked the SAVE command and waited for the disk to store,
*   Only this and nothing more.
*  
*   Deep into the monitor peering, long I sat there wond'ring, fearing,
*   Doubting, while the disk kept churning, turning yet to churn some more.
*   But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token.
*   "Save!" I said, "You cursed mother!  Save my data from before!"
*   One thing did the phosphors answer, only this and nothing more,
*   Just, "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
*  
*   Was this some occult illusion, some maniacal intrusion?
*   These were choices undesired, ones I'd never faced before.
*   Carefully I weighed the choices as the disk made impish noises.
*   The cursor flashed, insistent, waiting, baiting me to type some more.
*   Clearly I must press a key, choosing one and nothing more,
*   From "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
*  
*   With fingers pale and trembling, slowly toward the keyboard bending,
*   Longing for a happy ending, hoping all would be restored,
*   Praying for some guarantee, timidly, I pressed a key.
*   But on the screen there still persisted words appearing as before.
*   Ghastly grim they blinked and taunted, haunted, as my patience wore,
*   Saying "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
*  
*   I tried to catch the chips off guard, and pressed again, but twice as hard.
*   I pleaded with the cursed machine: I begged and cried and then I swore.
*   Now in mighty desperation, trying random combinations,
*   Still there came the incantation, just as senseless as before.
*   Cursor blinking, angrily winking, blinking nonsense as before.
*   Reading, "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
*  
*   There I sat, distraught, exhausted, by my own machine accosted.
*   Getting up I turned away and paced across the office floor.
*   And then I saw a dreadful sight: a lightning bolt cut through the night.
*   A gasp of horror overtook me, shook me to my very core.
*   The lightning zapped my previous data, lost and gone forevermore.
*   Not even, "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
*  
*   To this day I do not know the place to which lost data go.
*   What demonic nether world us wrought where lost data will be stored,
*   Beyond the reach of mortal souls, beyond the ether, into black holes?
*   But sure as there's C, Pascal, Lotus, Ashton-Tate and more,
*   You will be one day be left to wander, lost on some Plutonian shore,
*   Pleading, "Abort, Retry, Ignore?"
*  
*                                              -- Author unknown