When plans for bitcoin were first introduced, in 2008, it was one of a number of new cryptocurrencies being touted as substitutes for government-issued money. He came across a BBC news story about a twenty-nine-year-old Norwegian man who had just used profits heРІР‚в„ўd made as a bitcoin holder to put a down payment on a four-hundred-thousand-dollar apartment in Oslo. His mates noticed that he wasnРІР‚в„ўt drinking his share, and upon returning to Wales, he told me, he was РІР‚Сљin a shit mood, and couldnРІР‚в„ўt figure out why.РІР‚СњР”Р„ couple of months later, Howells realized what was bothering him. In Cyprus, Howells didnРІР‚в„ўt have as much fun as he had expected.

He told himself, РІР‚СљOh, fuck-sheРІР‚в„ўs chucked it,РІР‚Сњ but he was still groggy, and he soon fell back asleep. РІР‚СљAh, did you take the bag to the tip?РІР‚Сњ he asked. Howells remembers waking upon her return, at around nine. The next day, Hafina got up early and took the garbage to the landfill after all. РІР‚СљIРІР‚в„ўve never thrown a hard drive in the bin. As his head hit the pillow, he recalls, he made a mental note to remove the hard drive from the bag. He remembers her declining, saying, РІР‚СљItРІР‚в„ўs not my fucking job-itРІР‚в„ўs your job.РІР‚Сњ Howells conceded the point. Later, when the couple slid into bed, Howells asked Hafina, who dropped off their kids at day care each morning, if she would mind taking the trash to the dump also. Howells grabbed the unwanted hard drive and threw it into a black garbage bag. HeРІР‚в„ўd removed the drive a few years earlier, after heРІР‚в„ўd spilled lemonade on the computerРІР‚в„ўs keyboard. The other held files from an old Dell gaming laptop, including e-mails, music that heРІР‚в„ўd downloaded, and duplicates of family photographs. In a cluttered desk drawer, he found two small hard drives. РІР‚СљIРІР‚в„ўm chucking this out, putting this back in-bunch of cables, bunch of paperwork, broken mouse.РІР‚Сњ РІР‚СљThe office area, with the window open, was the smoking zone.РІР‚Сњ She chatted with Howells as he chose which items to discard. РІР‚СљShe wanted to have a fag with me,РІР‚Сњ he remembers. I donРІР‚в„ўt want to be on a hangover and cleaning this mess up when I get back.РІР‚СњР”Р„t around 10:30 P.M., Hafina peeked into HowellsРІР‚в„ўs office. As he recently recalled to me, РІР‚СљThe thought process was: IРІР‚в„ўm going to be drinking every day.

Howells, an engineer who helped maintain emergency-response systems for various communities in Wales, often worked from home, and that night he decided to neaten up his office. So he had made plans to treat himself to what he called a РІР‚СљladsРІР‚в„ў vacationРІР‚Сњ: a trip with friends to a resort in Cyprus.

Howells and his partner, Hafina, were raising three children, and family trips-like the one that they had taken to Disneyland Paris-were fun but exhausting. The decisive moment, he now thinks, occurred one evening in August, 2013, when he was twenty-eight and at home with his family in Newport, a small city on the Welsh coast. If things had gone just a bit differently, James Howells might today be as rich as the Queen of England. This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from.

Fantasy grounds ii reset password