Kathy smiled at
him. "Your turn. Why politics?"
Mike smiled back. "Same reason most people get started in
it. I was a bit of a firebrand when I was young. Idealistic, determined to
change the world, you know the story. My parents couldn’t have been more proud.
Neither of them were born here, and it gave them a lot of pride to think of
their son being elected. It’s not like they needed me to prove that they’d
fully adapted to America. Dad made himself a good chunk of money in real
estate. But to talk to them, you’d think the fact that I’m in Congress is
somehow proof that they’re real Americans."
"How do you come by Vincent for a last name, then?"
Kathy asked. "Doesn’t sound very ethnic."
"My mother was totally German, my father was half English and
half Slav. He got the name from the English half."
Kathy nodded and fell silent. Looking at her across the table,
Mike admired the way the red wine enhanced the color of her cheeks and lips.
Even after what they'd been through, she still looked good. A long strand of
brown hair hung low over her eyes.
Kathy pretended to concentrate on drinking her wine, knowing
all along that Mike was looking at her. She returned the favor.
He obviously took care of his appearance. His hair was neatly
in place, despite everything. And if he needed a shave, it only added a rough
edge to his otherwise polished appearance. He wasn’t quite on par with, say,
John, when it came to physical strength. But he was fit enough. The contours of
his chest under the shirt were those of muscles that got used.
Setting her glass down, she said, "I need to hit the sack,
Mike. Let’s re-cork this wine and drink the rest tomorrow. Can you give me a
few minutes to get into bed?"
He concealed his displeasure at the idea of drinking day-old
wine, then went into the bathroom to take a shower .
***
"OK, Colleen, I'm going to bed. I'll see you tomorrow
morning."
Colleen kissed her boyfriend and watched him walk away to bed.
Idly, she stared at his computer, where she'd been helping him with an assignment
for his Human-Computer Interaction class. Tony was actually majoring in the
subject, yet he still needed her help to make his semester project work.
She scrolled through line after line of program code, wondering
what they were missing, why the program wouldn't run. Tony had chosen a project
that was probably above his head, but between the two of them maybe it could be
made to work.
Colleen enjoyed more technical aspects of computer science, but
in her more objective moments she admitted that HCI, as the insiders called it,
was a more important field of study.
Everything people do with computers comes down to putting in or
taking out information. It might be typing text or scanning a picture in for
example. Recording a sound – this was the focus of Tony's project – was still
another method of information input.
Tony's semester project was designed to demonstrate the
technical feasibility of creating an operating system designed to receive its
primary input from spoken commands. Colleen admired the ambition of it – that
was the coming giant leap forward in Tony's field, after all.
Her boyfriend’s work was about making the process even easier
than a touch screen. What if, instead of tapping an icon, all the user had to
do was say what he wanted? Obviously, the learning curve would get even
shallower, and the computer age would open up to even more people. Voice
recognition had become common, but building an entire operating system around
it had not yet been done.
That was Tony's project. Not to write the actual operating
system that worked like that – though no doubt someone would hire him to work
on that after college – but to demonstrate that it was possible.
Colleen closed the window they'd been working in, and turned on
her instant messaging program. Tony's wasn't the only project she had to help
with, after all. Whatever Kathy had gotten involved with, she wouldn't
him. "Your turn. Why politics?"
Mike smiled back. "Same reason most people get started in
it. I was a bit of a firebrand when I was young. Idealistic, determined to
change the world, you know the story. My parents couldn’t have been more proud.
Neither of them were born here, and it gave them a lot of pride to think of
their son being elected. It’s not like they needed me to prove that they’d
fully adapted to America. Dad made himself a good chunk of money in real
estate. But to talk to them, you’d think the fact that I’m in Congress is
somehow proof that they’re real Americans."
"How do you come by Vincent for a last name, then?"
Kathy asked. "Doesn’t sound very ethnic."
"My mother was totally German, my father was half English and
half Slav. He got the name from the English half."
Kathy nodded and fell silent. Looking at her across the table,
Mike admired the way the red wine enhanced the color of her cheeks and lips.
Even after what they'd been through, she still looked good. A long strand of
brown hair hung low over her eyes.
Kathy pretended to concentrate on drinking her wine, knowing
all along that Mike was looking at her. She returned the favor.
He obviously took care of his appearance. His hair was neatly
in place, despite everything. And if he needed a shave, it only added a rough
edge to his otherwise polished appearance. He wasn’t quite on par with, say,
John, when it came to physical strength. But he was fit enough. The contours of
his chest under the shirt were those of muscles that got used.
Setting her glass down, she said, "I need to hit the sack,
Mike. Let’s re-cork this wine and drink the rest tomorrow. Can you give me a
few minutes to get into bed?"
He concealed his displeasure at the idea of drinking day-old
wine, then went into the bathroom to take a shower .
***
"OK, Colleen, I'm going to bed. I'll see you tomorrow
morning."
Colleen kissed her boyfriend and watched him walk away to bed.
Idly, she stared at his computer, where she'd been helping him with an assignment
for his Human-Computer Interaction class. Tony was actually majoring in the
subject, yet he still needed her help to make his semester project work.
She scrolled through line after line of program code, wondering
what they were missing, why the program wouldn't run. Tony had chosen a project
that was probably above his head, but between the two of them maybe it could be
made to work.
Colleen enjoyed more technical aspects of computer science, but
in her more objective moments she admitted that HCI, as the insiders called it,
was a more important field of study.
Everything people do with computers comes down to putting in or
taking out information. It might be typing text or scanning a picture in for
example. Recording a sound – this was the focus of Tony's project – was still
another method of information input.
Tony's semester project was designed to demonstrate the
technical feasibility of creating an operating system designed to receive its
primary input from spoken commands. Colleen admired the ambition of it – that
was the coming giant leap forward in Tony's field, after all.
Her boyfriend’s work was about making the process even easier
than a touch screen. What if, instead of tapping an icon, all the user had to
do was say what he wanted? Obviously, the learning curve would get even
shallower, and the computer age would open up to even more people. Voice
recognition had become common, but building an entire operating system around
it had not yet been done.
That was Tony's project. Not to write the actual operating
system that worked like that – though no doubt someone would hire him to work
on that after college – but to demonstrate that it was possible.
Colleen closed the window they'd been working in, and turned on
her instant messaging program. Tony's wasn't the only project she had to help
with, after all. Whatever Kathy had gotten involved with, she wouldn't
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