It is getting late, and I am sitting at my desk sorting various bits of data on my hard drive. This the modern form of paper filing, as our grandparents used to do with carbon copies of memos in 1950's office buildings. But we have a new phenomenon - data files that we pull from the internet. Personally, I like to save articles from the New York Times on random subjects. Why? I don't know, I rarely read the article again - if at all. But the habit causes me to sit at my computer and contemplate things with enough substance to pass the time (but not too much to get distracted), waiting for download.
There is a certain energy that winds through the office near happy hour on Friday late afternoon, like the feeling of the last few minutes of school before summer break. The work is done for the week, the bags start to pack with computers and pens and notebooks, and people start to smile again. Sometimes, there is actual laughter in the office.
Outside, the sun is shining in San Francisco today. The bay sparkles something special, if one can avoid the snarled traffic painting the bridges. For me, this is no worry - I walk home, through the Financial District and down Columbus Street through the middle of North Beach. I know I am close to home when I hear the Powell-Taylor cable car clanking down the hill, last stop headed for Fisherman's Wharf at the base of Bay Street.
Now, it is Friday late afternoon; my bag is packing with its own pens and notebooks (soon, computer too). I am smiling as well. I can feel happiness soon to think of the sun at my back walking past Vesuvio ...
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