Microserfs

Thought: sometimes you accidentally input an extra digit into the year: i.e., 19993 and you add 18,000 years on to now, and you realize that the year 19993 will one day exist and that time is a scary thing, indeed.

Actually, I've noticed recently that conversations always seem to reach the point where everybody says they don't have any time anymore. How can time just . . . disappear! Early this morning I told this to Karla as we were waking up and she said she's noticed this, too.

She also said that everybody's begi

She paused and looked up at the ceiling. "Your mother doesn't like me."

"How can you get so random out of nowhere? Of course she does."

"No. She doesn't. She thinks I'm a hick."

(Oh God-not this stupid stuff again.) "You two never talk, so how can you even tell?"

"So you admit she doesn't like me?"

"No!"

"We have to do something together. We have no shared experiences or memories."

"Wait a second-don't / count?"

"Maybe she sees me as stealing you."

"Mom?"

"Let's arrange a lunch. We've been here how long? And we've never even had a lunch out together."

"Lunch? That's not much."

"Memories have to begin somewhere."

Now that I think about it, Mom never comes over to our work area. Ever. And the two of them never really do chat. It occurs to me that I should have noticed, and I realize that I'm worried about it.

A crisis in my new-and-improved life.

We shot Nerf darts (Jarts) for a few hours this afternoon down in the backyard to allow the sunlight to reset our circadian rhythms. We drank Napa Valley Cabernet like we were Gary Grant and made Klingon jokes. We used Dad's Soviet binoculars to inspect the enormous blue "Jell-O cube" down in the Valley below-a.k.a. the Air Force Satellite Control Facility, at Onizuka Air Force Base in Su

A citrus tree was blossoming outside the house; the air was lemony fresh and smelled like an expensive hotel's lobby.

Ethan was, as usual, in a beautiful suit, like one of those sunta

We asked Ethan if he wanted to throw Jarts with us, but he said, "Love to, kids, but antidepressants make me photosensitive. Sunlight kills me. My retinas'll get etched like a microchip. You kids keep on playing. Sunlight is good for productivity." He and Dad then went into the kitchen to discuss psychopharmacology while Mom made us a tray of Dagwood sandwiches.

Ethan told me something really cool. He said that the reason lion tamers brandish chairs while cracking the whip is because the lions are mesmerized by all four points of the chairs legs, but never all of them at the same time- their attention is continually distracted, and hence they are subdued.

Ethan talks so "big-time." I've never heard people talk this way before. Susan says he talks like characters in a miniseries.

I agree with Susan that Ethan is a

really being honest. "I know you've been working hard." I never know what to say so I always just look back at my screen and keep on coding.

Another a

I sure wish we had that Bali money back now.

One must grudgingly admit Ethan does seem to know a good deal about Valley business. Like many people in computers and gaming, he never went to college. He designed a game that sold millions in the Pong era, became a millionaire, went bust with Atari, became a millionaire again in Reagan's '80s with a SEGA-based something-or-other, went bust again, and now I guess he's going to become a multimillionaire in the Multimedia '90s.

His tech credentials are good, too. Somewhere amidst all the money he did manage to squeak in work with Xerox's El Segundo Lab and TRW in Redondo Beach.

I’ve never seen a stock get more attention than 3DO. Everybody's wondering if they should invest in it. I mean, if we had money to invest. I must remember to drive by their parking lot some Sunday afternoon.

Karla asked Mom out to lunch and Mom balked at first-"I don't know how much time the Library can spare me for." That kind of thing. I mean, if someone wants to have lunch with you, they simply don't make pseudo-excuses like that.

But Karla wore her down, like someone who's been to Anthony Robbins lectures. The three of us are going to have lunch later this week, but I hope it isn't a grudge match.

I asked Michael what he wanted for his 25th birthday next week. His message flashed onto my screen at 2:40 a.m., from his office where he was working with the door shut:

>Birthday:

I want one of those keys you win in video games, that allows you to blast through walls and reach the next level get to *the other side*.

This is a particularly long message for Michael whose e-mail tends to be lli'"ii three words long, normally. A carriage return, punctuation marks and everything!

Now that I've been thinking about it, I'm not sure what exactly Oop!'s money structure is. Wouldn't it be a sick joke if I got into something without understanding the financial underpi

There was a windstorm last night and a bunch of branches blew off the eucalyptus tree beside the garage. Around sunset Bug, Karla, and I pretended we were a trio of evil Fi

Karla is preparing a list of subjects to discuss at lunch with Mom. I said, '"Karla, this is a lunch, not a meeting." She wants to make a good impression so badly. I am surprised by how much that pleases me.

Michael is furious at Todd for taping over a VHS cassette of Oop! graphic animatlion that Michael had done as a demo for potential investors. Todd replaced it with The Best of Hockey Fights III.

Todd and Susan have the flu, so I guess we're all doomed for it now. And Ethan's been acting weird all week. Our bank account must be ru

unraveled brown cassette tape on the freeway