I don't remember exactly when this was, but it had to be sometime in 2004. Eddie was in town, most likely for a holiday visit. While working at a large financial institution, a few employees had to work half a day during a holiday. This was to support other countries that did not celebrate the same holiday as the United States.
Well, at some point it was my turn to work over the holiday and I suggested to Eddie that we meet up for lunch since he was going to walk around downtown that day anyway. When Eddie arrived at the lobby, he gave me a call. I told him which floor to request access to and he was on his way up. I met him at the elevators and proceeded to show him around the floors.
One of the floors I took him to was the trading floor. To me, it wasn't much, since I saw it everyday. It was a room full of long tables with chairs and LCD monitors running along them where people looked at the current trading trends. Though Eddie was a Computer Engineer, he had a strong affinity to the financial market, so his eyes lit up when he first gazed upon the floor. I remember him saying somethng along the lines of, "this is pretty cool." And I just looked at him and responded, "I guess?"
I didn't show it to Eddie, but it made me really happy to know something I thought was so simple and small could bring him such joy. Afterwards, I think we went to McDonald's to grab some lunch and then went home.
