8
Jerome had become a compulsive clock-watcher. Well, not so much a clock-watcher, but more of a time-enquirer, since there was no constant visible display of the time anywhere in the apartment. If Chrono had been a human being he would no doubt have got fed up of the endless requests for a time-check, but since it was an inanimate object with no personality chip, just a response chip, it gave the time as many times as it was asked to, without complaint. Some home management systems had their own personality since it was obligatory to have at least one piece of equipment with a spark of character, in order to stimulate the brain when the apartment-dweller wasn’t online. Home management systems were omnipresent – they had to be, in order to monitor the dispensers and other equipment in the
