Donna gives him endless crap about the coffee bean thing.

“Get an automatic maker with one of those timers,” she said. “Then it would be ready when you get out of the shower. You could even sleep a few minutes later.”

“But it wouldn’t be as good.”

“It’s a lot of work being you,” Donna said.

What can I say? Frank thought. Itis.

“You’ve heard of the phrase ‘quality of life’?” he asked her.

“I have,” Donna said. “Usually referring to the terminally ill, whether they pull the plug or not.”

“This is a quality-of-life issue,” Frank replied.

And it is, he thinks this morning as he enjoys the smell of the roasting coffee beans and puts the water on to boil. Quality of life is about thelittle things-doing them well, doing themright. He takes a small pan from the rack that hangs over the butcher block and puts it on the stovetop. He lays a thin slice of butter in it, and when the butter just starts to bubble, he breaks an egg in the pan, and while it’s frying, he slices an onion bagel in half. Then he carefully slips the egg out with a plastic spatula (onlyplastic-metal would scratch the nonstick surface, which is something Donna can’t seem to remember, which is why she’s not allowed to cook in Frank’scucina), lays it on one of the slices, puts the other over it, and wraps the egg sandwich in a linen napkin to keep it warm.

Donna, of course, gives him grief about the daily egg.

“It’s anegg, ” he tells her, “not a hand grenade.”

“You’re sixty-two years old, Frank,” she tells him. “You have to watch your cholesterol.”

“No, they found that wasn’t true about the eggs,” he says. “They got a bum rap.”

His daughter, Jill, harasses him about it, too. She just graduated premed at UCSD, so of course she knows everything. He tells her otherwise. “You’repre med,” he says. “When you’remed, then you can give me agita about the eggs.”