tsquared

Jake is struggling through a bus station with two huge and obviously
heavy suitcases when a stranger walks up to him and asks, "Have you
got
the time?"

Jake sighs, puts down the suitcases and glances at his wrist.

"It's a quarter to six," he says.

"Hey, that's a pretty fancy watch!" exclaims the stranger.

Jake brightens a little. "Yeah, it's not bad. It's an invention of
mine.
Check this out."
He shows the stranger a time zone display not just for every time zone
in the world, but for the 86 largest cities.
He hits a few buttons and from somewhere on the watch a voice says,
"The
time is 10 past seven," in a west Texas accent.
He hits a few more buttons and the same voice says something in
Japanese. Jake continues, "I've put in regional accents for each
city."

The display is unbelievably high quality and the voice is simply
astounding and the stranger is full of admiration.

"That's not all," says Jake. He pushes a few more buttons and a tiny
but
very high-resolution map of New York City appears on the display.
"The flashing dot shows our location by satellite positioning,"
explains
Jake.
"You can zoom in and out as well," he adds, "and the display changes
to
show all of eastern New York State."

"I want to buy this watch!" says the stranger.
"Oh, no, it's not ready for sale yet. I'm still ironing out the bugs.
But look at this," says Jake, as he proceeds to demonstrate that the
watch is also a very creditable little FM radio receiver with a
digital
tuner, a sonar device that can measure distances up to 125 meters, a
pager with thermal paper printout and, most impressive of all, has the
capacity for voice recordings of up to 300 standard-size books.
"I only have 32 of my favorites in there so far," says Jake.

"I've got to have this watch!" says the stranger.
"No, you don't understand," argues Jake, "it's not ready yet."
"I'll give you $1,000 for it!"
"Oh, no, I've already spent more than that on it."
"I'll give you $5,000 for it!"
"But it's just not..."
"I'll give you $15,000 for it!" exclaims the stranger pulling, out a
checkbook.

Jake stops to think. He's only put about $8,500 into materials and
development, and with $15,000 he can make another one and have it
ready
for merchandising in under six months.

The stranger frantically finishes writing the check and waves it in
front of him. "Here it is, ready to hand to you right here and now.
$15,000. Take it or leave it."

Jake abruptly makes his decision. "OK," he says, and peels off the
watch.
They make the exchange and the stranger turns to leave.

"Hey, wait a minute!" calls Jake after the stranger, who turns around
warily.

Jake points to the two suitcases he'd been trying to wrestle through
the
bus station. "Don't forget your batteries."

__________________

nanajoanie

LMAO so now I'm buttless I probably would have had a brain freeze and forgot to mention batteries

__________________
Toodles, Nanajoanie

teenies*mom

OMG T - thats so funny - thanks for putting a smile on my face today - I needed it.