I’ve started teaching in my spare time. Like I have any of that. I have the loud ‘tick tock’ of the clock pounding in my ears all day, and I decide to spend my evenings and weekends preparing class lectures and teaching. I get a rush out of it though, getting up in front of a room of people who get a grade if they listen to me. It can be addicting to have people hang on your every word, when just an hour earlier some Johnson was telling you how stupid you are. So I climb into my little red, late model sports coupe and fight the traffic of the sprawl to cross the city and arrive at the University campus just in time for another three or four hour class, once a week. So I’m either jacked into the Net or racing across the Sprawl for more hours a day than I care to think about… but it keeps me from turning into an obese cyber-addicted geek behind my console all day, and it forces me into the grit of the real world. Being on campus takes me back to my early undergrad days. I feel detached from the daily grind, as if I am in a surreal, virtual world on campus. The clock tower stands out at the center of the campus, and the winter air seems brisk as I watch my breath condense on my walk back to the car. I like what I’m doing. It keeps me alive. It gives me perspective. I’ve had many other jobs… technician, a computer salesman at Manny’s Cybermart, a chauffer for cadavers… maybe this is a sign that things are starting to pay off. Well, I’d better not jinx things. Later…