Happy birthday, Bruce.
Earlier in the day, domain investor and developer Bruce Marler, celebrated his 80th birthday.
The gathering of family and friends for this special occasion was manifested via Skype, still a strong contender in the telecom space at this time and era.
Bruce tapped away on his Apple mac, sitting on an AirTron chair that levitated half a foot above the carpeted floors. The virtual keyboard, projected by a laser beam onto his lap, was easier on his arthritic fingers.
“Good times, eh Tiff?” said Bruce, adjusting his Google SmartGlass. “Who would have thought they’d still remember us old school programmers, I just got another email asking me to fix the sloppy job some college kid did back in 2010.”
Tiffany smiled, the two dogs Scruff and Fluff curled at her feet. “I remember, after WordPress got sold to Yahoo! everyone turned to us for fixing their broken themes,” she said.
“SmartGlass, download full data schema,” said Bruce, instructing his device to backup the 2.5 petabyte database. “Verify. Compress. Email to: mr800king@aol.com. Confirm receipt.”
Bruce rubbed his chin lazily, as the commands were being executed. “Incoming call: Rick Schwartz, retired domain king. Accept?” said the Skype message.
“Hey Bruce, congratulations on your 80th birthday,” said the retired domain king. “I’m using MentalSpeech today as I am too sleepy to be awake. I hope you had a fun birthday and lots of cake, my friend” said Rick Schwartz’s virtual manifestation, using LifeHolo projection.
Bruce smiled; the birthday wishes from a centenarian domain pioneer wasn’t something one would get often.
‘Thank you, Rick, it means a lot to me that you called. Your packaged data is currently uploading. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to fix your blog’s database, it wasn’t an easy task, let me tell you!”
As Rick Schwartz’s hologram waved goodbye, Bruce leaned back on his AirTron which adjusted to a more comfortable angle. A glass of red wine hovered on his right side. He took a sip, then looked at his wife Tiffany, napping happily in her own chair.
“What a blessing, to be able to work from home, at this time and age,” said Bruce. “Who would have thought I’d still be doing it in 2053,” he whispered, raising his glass in a thankful gesture.
Outside, the sun was setting fast, bringing an autumn breeze through the ajar windows. It was time to call it a day.
