Mmm . . . pastries!

[Tachyon 0]

Four days and I'm already longing for my hometown, the only place in the world where you can get persians (the pastry!). Waterloo is great and all, but . . . anyway, Rawel seems to agree with me on this point (surprise surprise).

 

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Unlike San Francisco, little heat from the sun bothered Rawel as he sat at the sidewalk cafe table. This was partly because he was beneath a nice green awning that was there expressly to create shade. It was mostly because he was in Thunder Bay, Canada . . . probably the most unlikely place of all for him to be.

 

Large-scale climate control was still beyond them at this point in time, so Thunder Bay remained a northern city, with cold winters and mild summers. In fact, Rawel had no idea why he was here.

 

He could imagine what some of his colleagues would say. Once, about two years ago, Rawel was working with another company to create security software for a lunar shuttle company. They had encountered a particular difficulty in the project that both were having trouble solving, and Rawel disappeared for a week. When he returned, he informed his partner that he had been touring France. His partner had replied with an outrage exclamation of: "He takes a vacation?! We come up against an obstacle, and he takes a vacation?!"

 

Rawel chuckled. That was precisely what he was doing right now. The Challenger computer system was a complicated maze that even he could not traverse. It was not by far the most sophisticated computer system, but the very mobility was proving challenging. Unlike the computers on Earth, which maintained extensive networked databases, all information in the Challenger computer had to be stored inside the computer's memory. There would be no database stations in deep space, no permanent comlinks to the Net.

 

A waiter interrupted his reverie. "Another, sir?" he asked in a strange accent that Rawel still couldn't get over. There was still one thing missing, but even that was put to rest when the waiter added, "They are good, eh?"

 

Rawel nodded. "Indeed they are. I'll take two more, and a refill of iced tea while you're at it."

 

The waiter smiled and took the glass of iced tea away. Rawel wondered how good those pastries were for his body . . . probably not a whole lot healthy, which made indulging all the better.

 

Soon the waiter returned with a fresh glass of iced tea and a plate upon which two pastries rested. Rawel had heard so much about these pastries from one of his lab technicians, who had briefly worked up here in Thunder Bay. Called a 'persian', the pastry was a flattish, oblong sort of bun with cinnamon streaks within. Atop the bun rested a moderate coating of pink strawberry frosting. As Rawel bit into his second persian ever, he knew that this visit had been worth it. It was a shame they were only available in Thunder Bay.

 

All his troubles soon evaporated away while Rawel reclined in a duraplastic chair, reading a battered paper copy of Canada for Dummies, and eventually slipping into a relaxing doze. Ah, the wonders of slacking off.