America, Frank thinks-we’re the only country in the world afraid of our food.

By the time the lethal egg sandwich is ready, the coffee beans are roasted. He pours them into the grinder for exactly ten seconds, then pours the ground coffee into the French-press maker, pours the boiling water in, and lets it sit for the suggested four minutes.

The minutes aren’t wasted.

Frank uses them to get dressed.

“How a civilized human being can get dressed in four minutes is beyond me,” Donna has observed.

It’s easy, Frank thinks, especially when you lay your clothes out the night before, and you’re going to a bait shop. So this morning, he puts on a clean pair of underwear, thick wool socks, a flannel shirt, an old pair of jeans, then sits on the bed and puts on his work boots.

When he goes back into the kitchen, the coffee is ready. He pours it into a metal go cup and takes his first sip.

Frank loves that first taste of coffee. Especially when it’s freshly roasted, freshly ground, and freshly made.

Quality of life.

Little things, he thinks, matter.

He puts the lid on the go cup and sets it on the counter as he takes his old hooded sweatshirt from the hook on the wall and puts it on, jams a black wool beanie on his head, and takes his car keys and wallet from their assigned place.

Then he takes yesterday’sUnion-Tribune, from which he’s saved the crossword puzzle. He does it late in the morning, when the bait business is slow.

He picks the coffee back up, grabs the egg sandwich, flicks off the stereo, and he’s ready to go.

It’s winter in San Diego and cold outside.

Okay, relatively cold.

It’s not Wisconsin or North Dakota-it’s not the painful kind of cold where your engine won’t turn over and your face feels like it’s going to crack and fall off, but anyplace in the Northern Hemisphere is at least chilly at 4:10 a.m. in January. Especially, Frank thinks as he gets into his Toyota pickup truck, when you’re on the wrong side of sixty and it takes a little while for your blood to warm up in the morning.