I was scheduled to speak at a conference in San Francisco two weeks after September 11, 2001. I half expected it to be cancelled, but it wasn't. It was an interesting flight across the country with about a dozen people in a 757.

I got in the evening before the conference was to begin and I was supposed to present mid-morning. So I walked over to the Moscone Center a little early to register, pick up my speaker swag, and maybe find some free food for breakfast. I stepped outside for a moment and as I did I heard the familiar wump, wump, wump of an approaching helicopter. At the same time I noticed a large number of people lined up outside one of the entrances to the auditorium.

I asked someone walking past what the big deal was and after giving me a very strange look he explained that Steve Jobs was delivering the keynote in a few minutes. It was a toss-up between snagging that free breakfast and Jobs but fortune dictated that I go hungry that morning.