Alex and Caroline already had a table and margaritas when James met them for happy hour. The three of them had been meeting every Friday for drinks since they had started at the County in April nine years ago. Since then, there had been weddings, children, promotions and houses.

“Look who finally shows up,” Alex said, as James took the seat next to him.

“Sorry, I lost track of time.”

“What were you doing?” Caroline asked.

“Playing around with raw data on the web. Good stuff, you two should check it out.”

James motioned to the waitress. He ordered a margarita on the rocks, no salt. Caroline pushed across the basket of chips. They were still hot, and James figured he couldn’t have been too late.

“So you’re serious about bringing in a new application?” Alex asked.

“Yep, already scheduled the demo.”

“I can’t believe you got Greg and Lloyd on board,” Caroline said.

“So far.” James wiped his greasy fingers on a napkin.

“But we’re so far in the hole with this budget crisis, I can’t believe they’re even entertaining the idea.”

James’s margarita came and he thanked the waitress.

“It’s because they have to,” James said. “The City just found $5 million dollars hidden in a shadow system, and Gemstone isn’t much better than what they use.”

“It’s crazy,” Caroline said. “It has to be the first time in history that finding money is a bad thing.”

Alex shook more salt onto the chips. “Why is that a bad thing?”

“Finding $5 million makes both the Finance Department and IT look bad,” Caroline said. “Really bad. The press is all over it.”

Alex winced.

“We’re in better shape than the City,” James said. “But there are tremendous inefficiencies in a big ERP system, and there are so many departmental applications that don’t and won’t ever integrate. Putting raw data on the web and linking eliminates all those barriers.”

“Still,” Alex said, “don’t get your hopes up. Greg doesn’t want to support any new projects now.”

“Speaking of support,” James said, waving a chip, “either of you interested in watching the simpler/gov demo?"

Caroline set down her margarita, finished swallowing, then said, “Yes.”

Alex shrugged. “Maybe.”

“No pressure,” James said to Alex. Then he nodded to Caroline. “I’ll send you the link to the version that’s open to the public, that way you can play around with the software.”

“You don’t want me to come?” Alex asked.

“Not if you don’t want to. If you’re happy with the status quo—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Who said I was happy with the status quo?”

“All I’m saying is that the project is too new and too fragile for pessimists.”

“James,” Caroline said, “I hope you don’t think me a ‘yes’ girl. Because, yes, Gemstone is limiting and boring, and I know there are better things out there, but I am comfortable with Gemstone. It's much easier than writing huge SQL statements.”

James rolled his eyes. “I’m not asking you to be a ‘yes’ girl. I just need you to be interested and willing enough for this to gain traction and get to Greg.”

“Well, I’ve already heard about it from a friend who used it at her last job and I am interested.”

“You’ve already heard about it?” both Alex and James said together.

“Sure. And I love the idea of templates based on dynamic XML.” Caroline rose and laid ten dollars on the table. “Anyway, I’ve gotta get back to my place and feed Cleo.”

“Fine,” Alex said, after she left. “Count me in. Send me the link.”