Stephen Mejias

Monday is a holiday. President's Day. I am happy about that. I need a day off like our country needs a stimulus package.

Fortunately, I didn't have to rob any banks or max out my credit cards this weekend. I didn't even have to travel to Africa. The crazy heat and humidity (Footnote for Jaclyn Gooding), however, made it feel like high noon in the Kalahari Desert. Simply sitting at my kitchen table, my laptop (Footnote for AlexO) open and our April 2008 issue turned to page 155, was a kind of dull, hot torture.

I am almost done with the "Recommended Components" blurbshttp://blog.stereophile.com/stephenmejias/072006essay/">blurbs;. And it feels so good.

Fourteen years ago this week, when I was 16 years old and spending all my spare time memorizing the lyrics to Ini Kamoze's "Here Comes the Hotstepper," John Atkinson was busy penning this">http://www.stereophile.com/asweseeit/294awsi/">this "As We See It" essay.

It was around 9:30am on Monday, November 12, when my plane landed in gray and chilly London. I managed to get through Customs with nothing more than the usual amount of stress and embarrassment, satisfactorily answering all of the agent’s odd questions. That out of the way, I next had to find my host&#151KEF’s head of brand development, Johan Coorg. Because my cell phone wasn’t working, I was worried that I’d be left stranded at Heathrow, but I recognized Coorg immediately: At the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show, he had introduced me to the stunning KEF Muon, and, at KEF’s lavish 50th Anniversary celebration, he had introduced me to a delicious Pimm’s Cup. Now he was standing casually at the Arrivals gate. He wore a dark brown blazer, striped button-down shirt, gold cufflinks, faded blue jeans, shiny leather shoes, and a look of comfort. He was busy pressing buttons on an iPhone.

“Johan,” I said.

“Hello! You made it!”

He led me from the airport, through the parking garage, and to an impressive black Mercedes. After loading our bags into the trunk, I instinctively walked around to the right-hand side of the car and nearly opened the door.

“Wrong side, mate. Unless you want to drive.”

It was a mistake I’d make a few more times before our three-day trip was over.

I'll have to check with JA to be sure (he remembers these things better than anyone), but I think it was Thursday, August 10, 2000 — exactly six years ago — that I first sat down in front of a computer screen for Stereophile.

He hates being this close to so many people. "I hate being this close to so many people." He prefers loudspeakers. "I prefer loudspeakers." He thinks to himself as he suffers the hot and crowded PATH train morning, clinging to a large box marked "Arro." Arro. He reads over the short man's shoulder: