About · Lexi

I used to know what $D011 does. Then life happened.

Hi, I’m Lexi. From 1984 to 1997 I was part of the Commodore 64 scene, the coolest digital subculture there ever was. Thirty years later I’ve forgotten almost everything I knew about 6502 assembly. This blog documents how I learn it again.

Back then

I wasn’t one of the legendary coders, and I won’t pretend I was. My intros and demos were strictly average, and my English was even worse than my code. What I lacked in skill, I made up for in action:

Cracking: a handful of games, sometimes with trainers
Trading: swapping disks by mail and over the modem, keeping the pipelines buzzing
Running a BBS: sysop of Cyberdome
Writing: texts for diskmags like Reformation and Earthshake
Parties: I organised The Ultimate Party, and as a visitor I was at events like The Party 1993 and Radwar Party 8

Along the way I passed through quite a few crews: Destruction, Ionix, Dualis, The Guardian Angels, Device, Legend and a few more. The absolute peak was joining Fairlight, a crew I’m still proud to have been part of.

The full list of sins is on my CSDb profile.

The 30-year gap

Then real life took over. The C64 went into a box, and 6502 assembly went somewhere in the back of my brain where I couldn’t find it anymore.

Today I look at three lines of code that I could once write in my sleep and have to stop and think. Which flag does cmp set again? Why does my raster bar flicker? Where did I put that sei?

Why this blog

Because learning in public keeps me honest. This is not a polished tutorial site. It’s a learning diary, with:

the small wins
the crashes and ?SYNTAX ERROR moments
the bugs that cost me two evenings
the “aha!” when something finally clicks

If you see me doing something stupid, please tell me in the comments. The scene was always about helping each other out, and I’d love for that to still be true.

About the name

“Lexi” didn’t come from a scene intro or a sci-fi novel. My late friend Boban gave it to me. He didn’t care about computers at all, but we shared a deep love for heavy metal, and one day he just started calling me Lexi. It’s the only nickname I’ve ever had, and I still carry it with pride. (That also explains release names like Kill ’em All and Heavy Metal.)

Rest in peace, Boban.