"bud sparhawk - the suit" - читать интересную книгу автора (Sparhawk Bud)

The Suit
by Bud Sparhawk

****

Do we *really* need all the help we can get?

My morning did not get off to a great start.

YOU DID NOT PICK UP YESTERDAYтАЩS MILK ORDER, the fridge
chided over my house link. I looked in my to-do and couldnтАЩt find the order.
Once again, my unpatched suit hadnтАЩt picked up the fridgeтАЩs message, but
just try explaining that to an irate icebox at too-damn-early on a dismal
November morning when youтАЩre standing around in the bath wearing
nothing but your earbud.

After cursing the engineers who had bestowed that PandoraтАЩs box of
a modern appliance on me, I added тАЬGet milkтАЭ to my to-do and resigned
myself to a milkless breakfast of dry VegeCrunchies and the
electrolyte-supplemented juice my ever-solicitous toilet had recommended
in its prim schoolmarm voice after analyzing my morning pee and dump.

I wanted to follow my breakfast with a chocolate doughnut and a hot
cup of coffee, but the kitchen overseer insisted I eat one of MerckтАЩs
enhanced biomedical apples to go with the stoveтАЩs selection of an
invigorating organic herbal tea. FLU SEASON IS APPROACHING, it
warned me as I took the apple from the tray. YOU DO NOT NEED
ADDITIONAL STIMULATION, it added as I sipped the vile decaffeinated
brew that it had dribbled into my commuterтАЩs cup.

For a moment, the thought crossed my mind that the whole kitchen
was pissed at me for forgetting the milk. I took a bite of the apple, mindful
of my toiletтАЩs warning about restricting my sugar levels, and wondered, as I
dumped the appleтАЩs core into the disposal, how my ancestors had
managed to survive without smart appliances ensuring their continued
health.

But a part of me wished I could find out.

****

The closet wanted to know what I wanted to wear to the office but
without the coffee and doughnut I was too sleep-fogged and
sugar-deprived to think. Instead I grabbed the dark blue, double-breasted
Lauren IтАЩd worn yesterday. I really liked that suit, even though it was running
a buggy version of e-suitware.

I stopped upgrading and patching that suitтАЩs software when I heard
Lauren was about to release version 7.0. I generally avoid buying the first
version of any release, but for Lauren suitware, IтАЩll always make an