"Brenda W Clough - How Like A God" - читать интересную книгу автора (Clough Brenda W)

late. He dropped his briefcase on his desk, hung up his jacket, and hurried
to the kitchen alcove for that first reviving cup of coffee.

"Yo, Bobster," Danny Ramone said. He was bearded and generously built, like
a rollicking black Santa Claus. "How they hangin'?"

If there was a name worse than Bob, Rob thought, it was Bobster. But he
didn't want to say this to the head of the software project. Instead he
said, "Low, Dan, very lowЧin need of coffee. Traffic on 66 was all shot to
hell this morning."

"You should leave earlier. Hey, I got in at 5:30 this morning! The commute
was a breeze!"

Once more Rob held back his first words. Daycare didn't start until 8 A.M.,
and it was impossible to ask for more. Miss Linda already kept the twins
until 6 P.M. And Julianne's job at the Garment Design Association demanded
so much from herЧ

Again there came that opening sensation, as if a skylight gaped wide in his
forehead. In the driveway at home it had been a mere flicker of
enlightenment, a camera shutter opening and then shutting again. Now Rob
stared at his boss, amazed at the flood of sightless unheard perception.
Danny was pouring coffee and saying something about the joys of unlocking
the office and having the mainframe all to himself. He hadn't intended to
annoy or criticize. He was too busy contemplating his own vigor, efficiency
and intelligence. There was no more malice in him than there was in the
elevator doors that shut before the passengers crowd on board. Rob could
almost taste Danny's magnificent, glistening self-absorption, like a
Thanksgiving turkey huge enough to shrink everyone in Chasbro Corporation
into small potatoes and side dishes. "Wow, that's weird," Rob said.

"Coffee too strong for you, huh, Bobster?" Danny clapped him on the back
with a meaty hand and turned away. Rob stood staring at nothing for a few
moments. Had he always been able to do this? It felt so natural, to inspect
personalities in fine detail through this new mental microscope. Then why
had he never done it before?

But self-examination had never been Rob's habit, and anyway the oddity of
the whole business made him uncomfortable. He dismissed all these peculiar
thoughts and went back to his cubicle to immerse himself in the day's work.
Since the days of the abacus, no software has ever been developed smoothly,
cheaply, or on time. Nor was Chasbro going to be the first to do it. Rob,
like everyone else on the team, in the division, and in the entire company,
was racing the clock to produce, lurching from one looming deadline to
another without letup. It was a crazy way to make a living.

As the program booted up, he briefly considered getting away from it
allЧdoing something entirely different with his life. But the thought was a
fleeting one. The mortgage, the twins, the car payments: All these turned