On a recent Sunday afternoon, I went to a coffee shop (to have a coffee). I gave my order and made my way past the counter to wait for my drink, scanning the space while doing so. A guy in one of the corners of the room caught my attention. It seemed as though he was installed there for quite a while already: his rucksack was laid out, his laptop open on the table, connected to a mouse on a mouse pad, he had headphones in his ears, his eyes in a dead-strong focus towards the computer screen. I couldn’t really tell what he was reading / writing, but there is no doubt it was code. His laptop was a company laptop (with the familiar inventory sticker), and the screen was protected by one of those sneak-peek-preventing filters. So yeah, he was coding for sure, and totally immersed: in-the-zone. He had planned it this way. Very deliberately, he had ordered two cappuccinos at once upon his arrival in the coffee shop – they were placed next to his laptop, one on each side, the left cappuccino was almost empty, the right cappuccino was still full, but most certainly already cold. During the hour or so that I was in the coffee shop, I watched him as he finished the first cappuccino, never taking his eyes off the screen, and started the second. So much for a fragment of Silicon Valley working culture.