The Umbrella of Westerness

New Blog

2009-05-26T15:45:00.000-07:00

Go to Umbralite.com to see all the latest updates from the Umbraverse.

The Best Day

2009-03-03T13:43:00.000-08:00

Well, for somebody.
This is what happens when the the song you are basing your artwork off of is completely useless in the radial-imagery department, and the badly-conceived-lines-that-can-be-twisted department, and is completely happy to boot.
This is also the next installment of art belonging to the Pigeons of the Apocalypse genre, and it probably won't be the last. Originally, there was to be a much more elaborate swirling vortex of pigeons but as they say, "Man's imagination exceeds Illustrator's memory." So anyway, I went with the Forerunner Pigeon Arc look, which denotes less of the unbridled, primal energy, and more of a clear avimorphic construct of dire function. One of these days I'll have to work out what it actually does.

2-D project the fourth.

Love in a Time of Breakfast

2009-02-16T08:20:00.000-08:00

A chill breeze swooped through the grey morning, scattering the meager raindrops in its wake.

Sybil liked the cold and she liked the rain. They made everyone feel more uncomfortable than her, and that showed how she was completely superior to those around her.

At least that was what she told herself. In truth these cold, grey mornings made her fell lonely, alone in an indifferent world with no one to shield her from the chill gnawing of the wind. She secretly thought the wind only chewed on people because it was lonely too. She also secretly liked daisies while we’re on the subject.

Hefting her broom over her shoulder, Sybil climbed the steps of Blitzkerk’s town hall. She told herself that she liked being a cleaning lady, that she preferred the company of soaps and dustbins to that of other human beings. She told herself that cleaning products did what they were told all the time, as opposed to people who only did what they were told some of the time. She told herself that she liked living in a small town, everyone understood her well enough to be mildly frightened of her and stay out of her way. But really the fact that no one ever wanted to know her better or spend the lonely hours of the evening in deep soulful converse secretly hurt her immensely.

She paused on the threshold, a few watery shoe marks lay glimmering on the tiles of the entry hall, someone had neglected to wipe their feet properly that morning. Sybil bent low over the offending footprints for a moment and muttered something imperious under her breath. The water instantly coalesced into a single stream and slithered of in a thoroughly purposeful manner. A few moments later she chuckled quietly to herself as the muffled spluttering sounds of someone discovering an inexplicable ounce or so of water shooting up their nose made its way back down the corridors.

Sybil wandered off to sweep out the corners of the hall, whistling merrily to herself, which just went to show how deep-seated her depression really was.

As evening fell Sybil made her way back home, her broom held at a jaunty angle, she was probably the only person who knew how to do that but the effect was unmistakable. She told herself she was in a good mood and her fellow townsfolk noticed it as well, which was why only half of them crossed to the opposite side of the street as she approached. As she let herself into her small, and despondently empty house, she told herself that she had no interest in events of the dark and mysterious persuasion, otherwise she would have noticed the shadowy figure at the end of the street. As it was she overlooked the leather overcoat and the broad brimmed hat that composed the bulk of the gothic silhouette, nor did she perceive the two eyes that glinted from the shadowy countenance, watching her with an intensity she had never before witnessed. In fact, all Sybil did do was go inside and make a cup of tea.

The next day dawned just as grey and hopeless as the last. Sybil had had enough, it was time someone did something to improve the morning. She traced a series of runic equations on the surface of the enormous iron caldron that dominated her kitchen. The water within sprang instantly to a full and hearty boil. She waved her hand vaguely at the floor beneath said cauldron, there was a flash of eldritch light, and flames sprang into existence on the scorched bricks. As something of an after thought she tossed down some wood. Sybil then proceeded to flit about the room, flinging open cupboards and iceboxes, retrieving mysterious packages and containers and emptying their contents into the frothing water. When she cast the final ingredient (an outlandishly contorted root, rent from some far off earth) into the cauldron it let out a venomous hiss that nearly drowned out the sudden knock at her door.

As she went to the door she told her rapidly beating heart that it must be a mistake, “No one calls this early if they know what’s good for them,” she muttered.

Sybil flung the door open to reveal a mysterious man rapped in a leather overcoat, his face, etched with cares not all together worldly, was shadowed by the brim of his dark hat. When he spoke his voice was one of power beyond the mundane realms of time, yet dimmed by weariness vaster than the scope of mortal strength. “Sybil…you are…in danger!”

How could this be? Why would anyone wish her harm? Why would anyone bother, she was not important, and why would this care-worn traveler waste his time on the likes of her?

“I’ll just bet I am. Would you like to come in?”

Sybil’s heart beat rapidly as he crossed the threshold and surveyed the room about him with the wary eye of a hunting cat.

“Ah-ha!” he cried, pouncing upon the frothing cauldron, “and what is this exemplification of your mysterious yet innocent lifestyle which is the mark of your exciting heritage, that, while benign and, in fact, often benevolent towards your fellow countrymen, causes them to fear and abhor you in their secret hearts?”

“Breakfast.”

“What?” he demanded indicating the shriveled tuber, “with a mandrake?”

“That’s a potato, Herbert.”

“Fine, all the same, it is a testament to your inherit exoticness that you’ve opted to make up your…” he gave the frothing mixture a quick once-over, “left-overs in a caldron.”

“I wanted something hot and the microwave isn’t working.”

“I suppose that makes sense, but it really doesn’t have to if you don’t want it to.”

“And by ‘not working’ I mean someone came in yesterday while I was out and smashed it.”

“Ah, an indication of malevolent forces, yet unsuspected, circling round, drawing ever nearer, and yet also, of something else standing between you, doing battle with it in an attempt to protect you for some undisclosed reason. Interesting.”

“Did you kill my microwave?”

“You know, you’re really not taking this the right way.”

“What ever, I have to be going. I told the treasury department that if I found any food rappings on the desks I’d have their eyebrows, don’t want to be giving them more of chance than necessary.” She strode out the door. “We’ll finish this discussion later, and don’t break anything while I’m gone.”

Striding down the town’s chief avenue in the late morning mist, whistling cheerfully, Sybil could not help but feel distracted and oddly melancholy. Thinking about the strange man in her kitchen caused her to feel strangely hot and flustered, so much so, that she opted to keep her shawl on the rest of the day just to prove to herself that she was really quite chilly.

Sybil returned home that evening feeling well pleased with the day’s work, apart from being depressed and distracted and conflicted and fearful that is. She passed a small worried crowd gathered around some van or other and paused a moment in interest. The driver of said van seemed to be unconscious and sprawled on the pavement. It seemed someone had attacked him as he was attempting to enter his vehicle. This struck Sybil as slightly odd, usually when there were strange men lying strewn about the sidewalk, she was the first to know.

It was only when she had almost reached home that Sybil perceived the shadowy figure framed against the setting sun. Because his face was shrouded she could not be sure, but her heart told her that he had been watching her for some time. The desire to run and hide in her closet sprang upon her, yet she was somehow drown to him despite the fact that he frightened her terribly. She didn’t know what she should do.

“Herbert, what do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m being significant!” he called back.

“How are you doing that?”

Herbert sighed, hopped off the stepladder upon which he had been standing, and plodded over. “Surely you were wondering about your thrillingly narrow escape and secretly doubting that mere chance save your life.”

“You’ve lost me.”

“I saved you form being hit by a careening van! Don’t tell me you missed it.”

“Very well, I shan’t.”

“That van parked at the curb in front of the drugstore! It was going to run you down!”

“It didn’t come anywhere near me. It wasn’t even turned on.”

“Of course not, because I saved you!”

Sybil’s heart gave an odd twitch and it was completely due to this that she began to glare. “Herbert, you are blithering.”

“Well what did you want me to do, jump in front of you while it was baring down on you and, I don’t know, stop it with my super strength? That wouldn’t work, even if I had super strength! I haven’t enough body mass to stop an on-coming van.”

“And so…”

“I used forethought. I simply clobbed the driver of said van over head before he had a chance to start up the engine, and thus managed to pull off the heroic with minimal bother to everyone involved.”

“Except that you had to accost me in the street to explain it.”

“Most heroines wouldn’t have had a moment’s trouble figuring this out.”

“What do heroines have to do with it? No, don’t answer that, as much as I enjoy explaining to you just how much of an imbecile you are, someone spilled an ashtray and I must come up with an appropriate response before I turn in. You may show up for breakfast if you have a mind.”

With that, Sybil hopped inside and began looking up nicotine-related curses; she refrained from sighing passionately through a massive expenditure of willpower.

The next morning Sybil was bord. Actually she was an emotional basket case waiting for her visitor to arrive, but her turmoil was so intense that it came out the other side of the spectrum as boredom. In any case when the knock finally came, she opened the door a trifle listlessly. All the same, when he entered the room her breath seemed to stick in her throat. He seemed to radiate a palpable aura of strength and yet at the same time there was an unmistakable air of vulnerability about him. “That hat wouldn’t do a bit of good if someone took a broom handle to his skull,” she thought. All she could think to say was, “Why are you wearing a monocle?”

Herbert rolled his eyes, “this isn’t a monocle. Do you see any glass?”

“Fine, why are you wearing an empty frame around one eye?”

“It’s a mask.”

“Beg pardon?”

“A mask.”

Sybil was at a loss, “How?”

Herbert began marmalading some toast, “Well, masks are mysterious and romantic, so I thought I’d wear one, but, let’s face it, there is always the possibility that a mask is concealing some horrible disfigurement and no young lady really wants to deal with that issue. So I thought I’d go for a half mask to show that not only am I mysterious but also roguishly handsome.”

Sybil snorted. Actually she was acquiescing, but it sounded like a snort.

“But then there is the issue of symmetry, and besides, one might still be half-ugly, which also isn’t very useful.”

“So you went for a monocle.”

“If you’re going to insist on calling it that, than yes. Wearing this proves that although I am, in fact, remarkably attractive, I am also unconcerned with such trifles. You wouldn’t be able to get that if the mask actually covered my face.”

Sybil stared at her bread until it began to brown of its own accord, “Perhaps I’ve missed something, but why are you trying to be romantic?”

“Oh, because I am in a romance.”

“What, why?”

“It’s a long story.”

“Hmm, if it’s a long story coming from you, I probably don’t want to know, come to think of it.”

“True, I’m also a vampire.”

Sybil took a moment to remove some toast from her windpipe, “When did you die?”

“I haven’t died.”

“How can you possibly be a vampire without being dead? That’s what being a vampire is all about!”

Herbert looked affronted, “Goodness, no. Vampires are all about lost and lonely souls seducing young women.”

“Um, right. So you’re saying that being dead is optional for the living dead?”

“Well, think about it; falling in love with a corpse? That’s just gross. No, it’s more like a tragic curse that permeates our lives, making us noisesomly miserable, alone, and angsty.”

“But what’s the point of drinking blood if you don’t need it to sustain your unholy existence?”

“I don’t drink blood.”

“What?”

“But I could if I wanted to.”

“Well so could I!”

“But that’s not the point.”

“Is it too much to hope that you’re even some horrible manifestation evil?”

“Well, I certainly have an unquestionably vile nature that I’m always acting in spite of,” he supplied cheerfully.

“But,” Sybil cried, exasperated, “what is the point in being a vampire if everything that composes a vampire is mysteriously absent!?”

Herbert looked thoroughly bemused, “Vampires are edgy.”

She blinked a few times, “And that’s it?”

“I do not understand the question.”

“Were you even bitten by, oh I don’t know, anything?”

Herbert waved his hand airily, “Vampirism is more of a state of mind than an actual physical malady.”

“Fine,” Sybil felt a headache coming on, “So who is this poor sap you are trying to seduce, anyway?”

Herbert glanced over at the mangled microwave, “Oh, would you look at the time, must be vanishing mysteriously.”

And with that he was again gone from her life. Sybil’s first impulse was to throw herself prostrate across her couch and weep for no apparent reason, but her self control reasserted itself and led Sybil back out into the world to glare at toilets until they became uncomfortable enough to clean themselves.

That afternoon Herbert came upon her in someone’s momentarily disused office. She had strewn the contents of the filing cabinet in a rough circle on the floor. Said financial records were now emblazoned with intricate inscriptions in a flowing, slightly luminous script. Sybil was standing in the middle of it all, looking pensive and prodding a turbulent energy vortex with a rubber duck. “Er, Sybil, we need to talk.”

What was this all of a sudden? He had never spoken like this before, the earnest worry, the deadly seriousness. Could it be that his feelings had changed? The suspense was unbearable, she had to know yet feared the answer even as she looked into his eyes and found the courage to speak.

“Later, I’m busy,” she said without looking up.

“It’s important.”

“If its about that whole ‘in danger’ thing, tell them to wait outside, I’ll smither them presently.”

“Actually, I never found anyone who would be willing to try and kill you, so we’re kind of working with hypotheticals at the moment. Anyway, the point is-“

“Do you think I should have used blank paper? All these typed summaries could be interfering with the containment field, I’m not that good at inscription, to tell the truth.”

“You’re not listening, are you?”

“Hmm?”

“Look, there is a reason I’m spending most of my time hanging around you while trying to concoct a romance.”

“I mean, it’s supposed to take all the disused food rappings and switch them with single-minded swarms of mosquitoes, but all that came out was this sundry bath toy, and every last roll of toilet paper in the building has vanished.”

“The point is, it’s you I’m supposed to be seducing.”

“Anyone who thinks that rifts in the space-time continuum are good time-saving devices is clearly off their rocker.”

“You know, most people inscribe on the floor itself. You’re supposed to be madly in love with me at this point.”

“What and get it dirty? That would be a bit counterproductive, don’t you think? The entire point is- wait, what!?”

“So I’m sure you’ll understand when I say that, so far, you have been less than helpful.”

Sybil’s heart leaped into her throat, this was it, the declaration. All her life had seemed to be leading up to this one moment. And yet, now that it was come, it seemed like it would end here too. Was this the beginning of something new, or the death of safe and familiar? Her mind was a swirling vortex of conflicting emotions; she didn’t now what to say first.

“I’m one hundred and twenty-seven!”

“And I’m immortal. Don’t you understand, it’s perfect; not only will you be incorrigibly soppy about me; you will also respect me deeply as a much wiser and higher being. Where as I, despite my feelings, will worry constantly that the gap in our ages denotes that we are unsuitable for each other. It will provide this wonderful tension in our relationship.”

“How can you possibly expect me to be party to this, and with you of all people? I spent twenty years being invisible just so I wouldn’t have to deal with the landlord, for Pete’s sake!”

“See, you have body-image issues. Tell me that’s not the mark of a good romantic heroine.”

“I’d love to. In point of fact, you have no clue what makes a good, romantic anything, except for, perhaps, premise. Your notion of the romantic hero is, if anything, worse than that of the heroine. All you’ve really managed to pull off is a sense of vague creepiness, and that’s with the improvised narration, don’t think I haven’t noticed. I mean, ‘power beyond the mundane realms of time?’ What does that even mean?”

“Fine, so this sort of thing is antithetical to my nature, but at least I’m trying.”

“Really? Well if I am a proto-version of you, than it’s antithetical to my nature as well!”

“I thought you said you were going to forget I said that.”

“We all lie to ourselves from time to time. And the question still stands, why are you picking on me of all people?”

“Actually, you were the only female character available.”

“Well, now that we can see how silly this is, we can drop this whole romance thing and go back to our own affairs, can’t we?”

“Um, no. The universe is a romance now, and it won’t stop until it gets some closure.”

“But the only interaction I’ve ever really had with men was to send them on shopping errands.”

“I brought you some chocolate.”

“Yes a very robust variety I see, I don’t think a bowl of Hershey's bars is quite of the amorous archetype, do you?”

“I don’t understand.”

“My point exactly.”

Herbert sighed, “Look, if you want out all you have to do is get to the finale.”

“And that being…”

“How about you fling yourself into my arms and kiss me passionately.”

“How about I run you through with my broom?”

“I don’t think that will work, we’d have to go back and lay down way more subtext.”

“Oh, come on, can’t we try?”

“No.”

“Than I want a new hero.”

“Ha, have fun trying to find someone else who deals in pure emotion, because you’ll need one if you pull him in this far along in the plot.”

“Else? Herbert, you don’t deal in pure emotion. You deal in paranoia and adrenalin.”

“It doesn’t matter, no one is going to fall for this genre unless they do it on purpose. So just fling yourself already, there’s nothing else you can do.”

“Oh, yes? Just watch me,” she gave the ring of papers on the floor a vicious kick, scattering them to the four corners of the room. There was an odd snapping noise and the wormhole began to distort and expand like a jagged tumor in the fabric of space, which, to be perfectly frank, it sort of was. The sound of rushing wind filled the room and spilled out into the hallway. Sybil plunged both arms up to the elbow into the writhing vortex as bits of carpet began to tear themselves off the floor and vanish into oblivion. “I manipulate people into saving the world, that’s my nature. It’s why this was a stupid idea to begin with, but it’s also why I am going to save this bloody, stupid romance of yours. I am going to find a suitable heroine, there has got to be one in the nether somewhere!”

There was a deafening bang, a blinding flash, and a huge, billowing wave of dust. Sybil stepped out of the swirling cloud holding something in her arms. She set it down on the half destroyed desk with an audible clunk. “This is Florence,” she said.

The bowl of Chocolate had never seen anything so beautiful in its life, the brilliant white, and alluring, pink floral pattern, the way the light glinted off the charming curves. It was the perfect melding of form and function. And since it dealt with the opposite side of the digestive track, together they formed the perfect single unit of being.

Herbert blinked, “A chamber pot?”

Sybil shrugged, “Help me find the vacuum cleaner, will you?”

Abstractions

2009-02-05T21:01:00.000-08:00

Let's all pretend that this did not turn out looking like what we all know this looks like. I hate abstract.

Still 2-D, still pen and ink.

Lines, Focal Points, and Disgruntled Corvids

2009-01-30T16:13:00.000-08:00

First 2-D project with pen and ink.

Notebook Dragon

2009-01-28T18:48:00.000-08:00

Josiah's fault, and I had nothing better to do.

By Request

2008-12-21T14:22:00.000-08:00

A Speech of Persuasion

C. S. Lewis once said, “Peanut butter is inherently demonic and every person who eats it should be painted orange, repeatedly”

While prevailing opinion demands that all the statements you present in your orations must carry the integrity of fact for said orations to be of any consequence, I am going to show you that it is, in fact, a better lookout for you and your audience if you fabricate all of your facts.

While plagiarism can get you expelled and you still have to do all the work of finding stuff to plagiarize, Rampant lying is easy to do, only gives you bad grades, and improves the environment.

It is true that without an arduous and consistent eye for accuracy no one in their right mind will believe whatever it is that you are asking them at that moment to believe, but I beg the question: is it not better that way?

Abraham Lincoln, the first of three sentient apricots to achieve the title of U.S. president, wrote in a letter to his family taxidermist, “A suspicious man is a credit to his lawn-mower, but a trustful man eats far too many pancakes.”

Too much trust within the confines of a public speaking class is not healthy, with all the emphasis on studious, insightful research and academic integrity; pure truth inevitably abounds, and with it comes complacency. Your audience becomes used to being fed high-quality information and thus comes to expect it. Because it is vastly easier to sit back and let someone else do all the work of verifying factuality than to worry about it yourself, your audience will simply assume that everything you tell them is completely true. While this situation dose have an up side, particularly if you need money, it is only for the moment.

There is several serious side effects inherit in becoming a wellspring of all knowledge that can be detrimental to your health.

The first is a loss of perspective. Even though you are considered a wellspring of all knowledge by you classmates, (and that only when you are in front of them, speaking) no one else thinks of you in this manner. No less than twenty-six students were expelled from APU in the last ten years as a direct result to their kidnapping Dr. Wallace and expounding at great length on the subject of “Why scantrons are evil and how I actually passed that test.”

The second is the becoming of a “self believer.” This is where you truly believe that you are the wellspring of all knowledge, to the point that you lose interest in actuality composing speeches and collecting data and so forth. You just sort of loaf about truthing at people, which isn’t a verb for the very sensible reason that you are not actually doing anything besides standing around, and maybe drooling a bit. It is not the most practical use of your time and people invariably get sick of wiping up after you and simply toss you in a dumpster somewhere.

The third is the event of wellspring rivalry and the tactical use of the liner flow of truthfulness. After awhile some individuals notice that the term “wellspring of all truth” is singular, and yet they end up sharing it with the entire class. While it is true that each student takes the platform equally, it is a sad truth that some omnisentient beings don’t like to share.

Suppose you were up here and had just finished delivering this wonderful in-depth look at the nature of permafrost. And after the throngs had finished applauding and throwing roses and curing their head aches with you, the next person comes to the podium and says, “Statistics show that the person who comes before me in the speech queue is a werewolf and has to be killed immediately.” While you would probably agree with this person at the time, it would still be markedly unpleasant to be stabbed to death by an angry mob wielding silver earrings. And I’m not just talking to the two werewolves who are in this class, I am talking to everyone. You do not want this to happen to you. Statistics show that one hundred percent of all murder victims die.

None of these things can come to pass if you keep you speeches riddled with flaws and untruths.

But it isn’t just you, the speaker that can suffer from unbridled accuracy, the audience is always damaged. When you the speaker do all the work of checking your facts and assessing your arguments, the audience receives absolutely no incentive to listen with a critical ear. Those who go over the information in the many and varied speeches and actually look in to them for themselves, become fewer and fewer. There is no need for their vigil if you do your own fact checking. They know that there are strict guidelines to determine the quality of the speeches they are ingesting and so they loose interest in finding information for themselves. If you make it so your audience can simply sit back and enjoy your monologs without having to worry about weather or not they are true, you have done your fellow students a disservice. The very nature of the University is that of people coming together to discover for themselves the many and varied facets of the universe, not to be simply spoon-fed on the truths that you already chewed for them. They would grow dependent on the outside world to tell what is true and they would be left to believe that the outside world knew what it was talking about.

Not only that, but society as a whole would suffer. This policy of strict truthfulness will spread, infecting the entire world as small groups of people, trained in universities like this one come together to form larger groups of people all with the same understanding of public speaking.

What happens when the masses are confronted with a speaker who dose not actually check his own facts, well rely, nothing everyone will merely assume that this person like the hundreds of individuals before him, is speaking the truth. Thus the nations of the world will spend a sorry couple decades believing that toads are a form of pillowcase or something.

Or worse yet, suppose someone begins to purposefully mislead people, probably only as a hobby, seeing as there would be little challenge in it. But think what it could do to the world if all the earth was subject to the whims of some unscrupulous person. You could wake up one day to find that science has proven the existence of levitating mushrooms or a sugar substitute that doesn’t actually kill you faster than the original sugar.

For those of you that would not actually mind believing the world is more interesting than we have been lead to believe, all I can say is: I understand and I am glad that in the coming months of chaos and whatnot I am glad you will be happy.

But you need to understand that the world outside these walls is very dangerous to those who have been taught to trust. Most of them will not survive the harsh climate caused by telemarketers, radio adds, and the backs of cereal boxes.

All this can be prevented, though. If you, the speaker, fabricated all your facts, if you lead your rapt audience on a merry goose chase through untruth and mired logic, the world would not only fail to die an extremely odd death, but would become better than ever before.

If you tell outrageous lies to you classmates through the medium of this public speaking class, you will force them to exercise their minds. If they can no longer assume anything about you presentations, they will have to resort to analyzing them with pitiless detail. They will have to scrounge through libraries and suchlike places for the evidence that you should have given them, and come to the conclusions that you shamelessly butchered.

Not to mention, you would not have to look anything up for your self. If you fail to actually take down poignant quotes to stimulate you audience, and you fail to consult authorities on the subjects you are discussing. Your audience will find the quotes themselves whilst they search for what on earth you were not telling them, and they will be stimulated all the more for having discovered them themselves. They will become intimately acquainted with the works of authority on any dozen of subjects and will retain the information all the more readily for have searched it out themselves.

What it all comes down to is that if you lie in your speeches, you will have to do less work and your audience will be blessed for it.

When they go out into the world after their sojourn here, they will be the most suspicious and untrusting people the world has ever seen. But because of this inability to see the truth for themselves that you, the speaker, secreted within their cold cynical bosoms, they will spur the world onto the path of personal discovery. If every individual on earth cannot trust the truth from anyone but them selves, every individual on earth will be forced to each become a great physicist, theologian, philosopher, mathematician, gardener, cook, television repair man, and house painter. Granted the highest level of human achievement, as a whole will descend, without the sharing of knowledge great progress cannot occur to society, but the net knowledge and experience of the human race will skyrocket; and all because you were too lazy to look up your sources.

This is why it is imperative that instead of handing the truth to our audience of a proverbial silver platter, we should do our utmost to hide it, to misinform, to misquote, and misdirect. In this way the human race will become stronger and more self-¬reliant, and will also do all the work for you. Changing the world has never been easier. Besides, statistics show that eighty-seven percent of people only use real facts in their public speech class die young from clam bites.

Josiah

2008-12-19T08:53:00.001-08:00

Now I can get back to writing.

A Short Story

2008-12-08T10:46:00.000-08:00

Methuselah Oddbin sat in his pew and watched the flock of churchgoers come to roost around him, fidgeting in their Sunday plumage. He found that once again he would have to put on the Strong Armor of God, the Breast Plate of Righteousness, and the bowler hat of whatever it was, and persevere. Once again it was that time of the week that he absolutely had to take a nap, not that anyone cared. The rigors of his day-to-day life demanded this, he was up at the crack of dawn every day and, though quite willing to turn in with the sun, (some times) it was after dusk that his family always seemed to need him to socialize and whatnot. No matter how much they chose to ignore him during the course of the day, once supper commenced he felt rather a dead opossum among a family of crows:

“…How was your day, dad?...”
“…Are you feeling up to Scrabble tonight?...”
“…Would you like to ask Bobby about his day at school?...”
“…Would you like to hear about this odd lady at the supermarket?...”
“…Grandpa! You’re falling asleep again! Will it help if I poke you a bit?...”
“…The neighbors called today. Now I know you’re a man of great moral character, but I have to ask whether, in the course of the day, you may have, however inadvertently…”

It was all very well, as his son pointed out, that they all loved him and wanted to be part of his life, (they should, after all) but they wouldn’t stop trying to draw him into their trivial little worlds. Methuselah had better things to do than actualize people.

Oh, well, when it came right down to it, matters were coalesced into the simple question of what was more important in the grand scheme of things: his naps or his family. Or, in any case, it would if Methuselah were a creature of soulless logic; sometimes one must forgo what they know is right in order to be nice to their family.

Pastor Hibbly began the invocation.

He had tried once to explain this to young Hibbly but had made very little headway. Methuselah was of the opinion that the pastor did not give him nearly enough respect for a man all of twelve years his junior. He had kept trying to sidetrack the conversation so as to bring up the Bible. Methuselah knew there was such a thing as professional pride but this was a bit much. Every time someone tried to hold a conversation with their not-so-venerable preacher, be it politics, psychology, or (of all things) theology, he would invariably bring it back to this one solitary subject. It was obvious why; master Hibbly had gone to school for it, so if he made every argument he got himself into somehow about that book, he could always expect to win by way of relatively superior knowledge. Tactical sense though it made, it was still not the conduct of a gentleman. In any case it was boring, Methuselah flattered himself that you didn’t see him hounding the very same subject over and over, without end, like a nesting barn swallow at a poor, unassuming passerby.

Besides, when you came down to it, the maneuver of always using the Bible as your means of authority wasn’t the best notion, if someone trumps you with something higher you’re stuck.

This was the thing that really annoyed Methuselah: pastor Hibbly was only coming from the Bible, he, Methuselah, on the other hand, was coming from the standpoint of morality, there was no competition. They were not discussing devotional duty and whatnot; they were talking about naps and the taking of them. He seriously doubted that Hibbly believed in higher purposes at all. Someone had once told Methuselah that pastoral stuff was all about wishful thinking and self-delusion anyway.

Methuselah threw a reproving look at his son. It was not as though he was complaining about coming to church, just about the ridiculous ground rules inherent thereof. And they weren’t just normal respectable rules either, they stank of double standards. Look at that Ambrose Penbright in the pew across, sitting there with his head bowed, his hands folded peacefully on his lap, clearly unconscious. He had demanded, once, of his son why he didn’t pick on Ambrose for a change. His son had replied that first, he was not Ambrose’s son, (Methuselah had very nearly replied that he wished he was, but decided that that would only serve to make things very complicated. Emily, God rest her soul, for one, would be very confused.) and second: even if Ambrose did sleep during the service, which he doubted, he had never noticed.

“Of course you never noticed!” Methuselah had cried, exasperated. “You spend all you time vulturing me, waiting for the first sign of weakness!”

“It doesn’t take all that much attention to tell when you’ve dropped off,” his son had replied. “Everyone can hear you snore.”

“I do not snore,” Methuselah had returned with a fierce dignity that he was still to this day proud of.

“You actually may have a point there,” his son had said heavily. “I doubt Pastor Hibbly has yet worked out what that horrible noise was that interrupted his sermon last fall, and I bet that, at the time, the Weavers in the pew in front of us were convinced that the Apocalypse was upon us.”

Methuselah had wanted to say something scathing and possibly sarcastic in response to this, but he had forgotten what the Apocalypse was, though he had a sneaking suspicion he wouldn’t be allowed to sleep through that ether.

He took advantage of a pause in the liturgy to send a brief glare in the general direction of Ambrose. All those people who said that hypocrisy was rife in the Church knew what they were talking about.

Bobby poked him, “Grandpa, you’re making that grindy noise again.”

His daughter-in-law had recently taken to deploying his grandson next to him during the service, presumably for nefarious purposes of her own. He had heard her and his son talking about it in the hall. They still thought he couldn’t hear them through two closed doors and a wall. It was naive to the point of being cute, when he opened his bedroom door a crack and got his ear down there, he could make out the general gist of their conversations. Three weeks or so ago, conversation had come to include increasing references to Bobby and church and “your dad.” On the other hand, it was hard to tell exactly, sometimes they seemed to be talking about juggling geese too.

“Mom said you weren’t supposed to. Mom said it was rude,” Methuselah received another poke.

“Jabbing you’re grandfather is rude, particularly in church.”

“Mom said people expect me to be rude in church,” came the assured reply.

Methuselah leaned over to his son, “the young man is becoming impertinent, this is getting as bad as those times he insists on accompanying me on every single excursion I make beyond the house.”

“He just wants to keep you out of trouble,” came the belated reply as sonly duty won (as it should) over the hymn, We Give You But Your Own.

“I do not partake of trouble. I do not require supervision.”

“Dad, you were in the neighbor’s back yard in a lawn chair.”

“I fail to see your point.”

“At six-thirty in the morning.”

“Yes?”

“Watching their house with a pair of binoculars.”

“There were black phoebes nesting under the eves!”

“And that’s why Bobby is keeping track of you.”

Methuselah glowered briefly and turned archly away from his son, his gaze sweeping across the aisle.

“I don’t see anyone keeping track of Ambrose Penbright! And look at him, he’s practically bent double!”

“We are praying.”

“Maybe you are…” he muttered. What did his son know about justice anyway? He didn’t know a blackbird from a grackle.

The sermon commenced.

Why was everyone so confounded fond of Ambrose? Only fifty-nine and the whole congregation thought he was some sort of peer among them. Why, while Ambrose was having his diaper changed, Methuselah was, well - celebrating his ninth birthday! He was the oldest man in the entire church and he was not going to be passed over for some upstart youngster who hadn’t even been second oldest until Horace Brook had taken up cancer and dropped out of the running! Granted, people seemed to hold him in some awe, but not all that much. When someone wanted an example of the Man of the Church, so to speak, they always gravitated toward Penbright.

He shoved his hands moodily into his pockets and met with sudden inspiration. There was a rubber band in his left trouser pocket. Methuselah squinted, hawk-like, across the sanctuary at his antagonist. It was about time someone taught Penbright the untouchable a lesson, proper church behavior be- he paused, he was pretty sure one couldn’t damn proper church behavior.

Proper church behavior be temporarily purgafied!

He eased the band free and onto his lap, he gauged the distance, and stopped. These words suddenly floating down from the lectern,

“Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them falls to the ground apart form your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.”

No one had ever told him that the key characteristics of the overarching personage who ran the church included bird watching. He had never viewed church as a place where proper attention was paid avians. Certainly there were doves lying about here and there, but for the most part they looked like mutated fish with mutated wings. Methuselah had always rather wanted to know what deep theological purpose this served, but no one ever seemed terribly interested in discussing it. He really could not see why any spirit, be he holy or of the more mundane persuasion, would want to be depicted as something that looked like a seventh-generation denizen of a radioactive waste puddle. Besides beached pigeons got old.

He scrabbled for a moment with his ears, trying to catch the word’s fleeting context within the half-heard sermon, but again he paused. Young Bobby was momentarily distracted, but that would not last; unless Methuselah let the rubber band fly at this very moment he would never get the chance again, but if he took the time to aim he would likely loose Hibbly’s train of thought, and this was the first time he could remember actually caring what the their preacher was being long-winded about.

He dropped the band to the floor. Penbright’s day would come, but for now Methuselah had a chance to peer into nature of this world that had him in its talons.

He listened.

As the closing hymn swept them from the sanctuary, fallowing in Hibbly’s train like so many quail, Methuselah found a new perspective on life beginning to dawn. For once the world looked to be making sense. He wasn’t sure he had understood the half-heard fragments of sermon but he knew a way to shore up his knowledge.

Methuselah had never really paid much attention to the fluttering throngs in the narthex, but now he listened to the circling chatter: some was about family members, (both the distant and venerated and also the present and misbehaving) some was about football games, some was about dinners (past present, and future), but some was about the sermon passed. He listened to the different discussions as the handful of the churchgoers whose want it was, tore into Hibbly’s monologue like parakeets to millet.

Listening, he found that the multiple dissections round about him explained the inner meaning of the sermon quite concisely. They seemed a bit disgruntled about said meaning, but personally, Methuselah thought it explained a great deal about the Church in general, quite enlightening, in fact. He would never understand why everyone got grumpy on Stewardship Sunday.

`Methuselah felt someone poke him in the leg and this was the first time he didn’t need to fight down the momentary images of deranged flickers. “Bobby, you are more important than a dead sparrow,” he said cheerfully.

“I know,” came the reply with assured solemnity.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Methuselah helped his grandson off the ladder and onto the roof. He felt that he had disvalued his company; he was the boy’s grandfather, after all. Besides, Bobby would have fallowed him up anyway.

The wind had kicked itself into a lively briskness but was sill moving with a marked fifteen-degree discrepancy from the air some twenty feet above.

“Its probably the Henderson’s birch trees. I dare say no one would mind too much if I found the time to cut them down. Let’s see; your father shouldn’t mind; it would stop all those leaves and things getting in the birdbath. Your mother shouldn’t mind; it will be good, strenuous, character-building work for a strapping boy like you. I would have to stay here and shout instructions and suchlike things, so you would know where to cut, angles change you see. The Henderson’s couldn’t possibly mind, it saves them no end of trouble and expense; I hear those professional logger people are quite exorbitant.

Actually, I rather fancy we have enough daylight to make a fine start of it. Why don’t you run down and fetch a saw or, a hatchet, or one of those weed-whacker things, and I’ll show you what to do.”

“Dad said not to play with his tools.”

“Oh, certainly, it would be an insult to such venerable things as tools to play with them. You don’t see people playing catch with their gyr falcons, now do you? But we are not going to play, we are going to hunt fowl so that we can eat dinner.”

“Uh…”

“By which I mean that you and I are going to cut down the Henderson’s birches so that we can see all the way into nice Mrs. Pamly’s yard. Do you know, she said she had a cormorant in her little pond just last fall?”

“Grandpa, its cold!”

“Your mind is wandering, my dear boy. Here, sit down and lean against these fine bricks, they are still warm from today’s noontide sun. I suppose we can start tomorrow, this is your first time being here, after all. You should enjoy yourself. Look, the crows are holding their last congress of the day in the trees around us, the gulls are heading back to their watery haunts for the night, oh, look, there is a hooded oriole on our bath! There are a couple of finches in the yard to our left, and, goodness, what is that on the Matten’s feeder? Oh, it’s a squirrel. I don’t suppose you have a firearm of some sort about you? Perhaps acquired on some birthday or other? No? Well we will have to see about that next Christmas then, just as well, anyway, it’s gone. Oh, and there is Mrs. Matten herself (you can’t see her as you’re sitting down, angles, you know) perhaps I should drop her a line about the squirrel situation, or even give her a shout now. Oh, its too late, she’s gone back inside.”

Methuselah eyed his grandson sitting fluffed against the chill with his back to the chimney, “Tell me Bobby, how much do you give in Sunday school?”

“Seven cents.”

“Ha, so if a sparrow is worth half a penny, and presumably, only when it is alive,” He thought a moment, “in terms of the Church you are, in fact, at least fourteen times more important than a sparrow!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“I believe I have had a sort of spiritual appendectomy.”

His son eyed Methuselah across the Scrabble board, “I think you mean epiphany.”

“Whatever they are called, how much does Ambrose Penbright give in church?”

“What? That’s your epiphany?”

“According to you at any rate. I worked it out after church today, monetary donation is directly proportional to one’s worth in the Kingdom of Heaven. Also, you appear to have spelled ‘gumboil’ incorrectly.”

His son blinked owlishly, “That is not how it works, weren’t you paying attention to the sermon?”

“Of course, it was the main source of my information.”

His son looked uncomfortable, “Kia’ is a proper noun.”

“It is a parrot in New Zealand. And do not change the subject, Ambrose is thought better than me because he is worth more money.”

“Look, there is more to being a Christian than tithing. People respect Ambrose Penbright more than you because he does not show up to church late and spend the entire service grumbling one thing or another. It doesn’t have anything to do with money. Look,” his son appeared to be concentrating rather hard, like a scrub jay trying to remember the location of its nut stash. “Even you will admit that baby pigeons are one of the most ugly animals on the face of the earth, but they become rather nice-looking birds, not because of anything they do but because of some old lady throwing bread crumbs to their parents so they don’t die young and hideous. And, er, God is like someone like you, who keeps pigeons just because they are pigeons,” his son finished a bit self-consciously.

Methuselah was rather shocked, the world appeared to molt before his eyes. “Oh, I suppose that makes sense. You are right; it was petty to only think about money. I think I am going to bed, do you happen to have a copy of the Bible about you?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next Sunday Methuselah didn’t try to sleep during the sermon and he actually smiled at Ambrose once or twice, this new perspective on life was oddly liberating.

“That was a marvelous sermon, dear Hibbly,” he said ringing his hand, “I particularly enjoyed your metaphor of the car transmission, it was so apt and, I confess, until that moment I had never looked at the matter quite in that way before. Oh, and while we are on the subject of automobiles, if someone could be found to drive me there, I would be more than happy to preside over that charitable food drive you mentioned.”

Their pastor looked rather like a kingfisher that had forgotten to swallow his herring headfirst. Methuselah stood aside, out of the trickle of departing congregators, to watch.

“Let’s see Penbright top that,” he muttered.

His son was right, they were all pigeons in an enormous aviary, and the ones that did tricks were the most important.

Orders

2008-09-11T11:45:00.000-07:00

Bath Knights, Umbrellas of the Apocalypse, Darling Shipyards, Sword of Damocles

Self-Harmonizing Banshee

2008-09-09T22:24:00.000-07:00

Happy now?

Mermaid

2008-09-09T22:23:00.000-07:00

Darth Stygien

2008-09-01T14:20:00.000-07:00

Josiah's birthday present.

Agatha's Hatchet (Original Concept Recording of the Motion Picture of the Book Soundtrack)

2008-08-09T00:31:00.000-07:00

I know, I was supposed to be writing chapter two, but my brain highjacked itself as usual and this came out. This is by no means the complete soundtrack; entire sequences of the plot are probably not represented at all. Ironically, putting this together did actually help me in coalescing said plot.

By the way, I feel absolutely no compulsion explain anything about these titles.

Chapter The First

2008-07-08T20:10:00.000-07:00

“Magnolia bushes,” muttered Filbert. “What sort of burglar hides under magnolia bushes?”

It was just about five a.m., Saturday and Filbert had been under those same bushes for just over an hour and forty minutes. In fact this entire mission to “infiltrate the residence of the nefarious next-door neighbor and retrieve secret papers at the behest of my dear great aunt out of sheer good-nephewishness and not at all because she scares me half to death” began at dusk that evening and had gotten no further than old Mrs. Himmle’s back yard.

Not that he hadn’t been quite busy during that interlude of time betwixt than and now. The above-mentioned mission title had taken a good twenty-five minutes by itself; Filbert believed in being thorough. He had begun with some two hours of “stamina amassment” a.k.a. sitting in a chair doing nothing, followed by an hour of “mental preparation” otherwise known as procrastinating. After this came two hours of “putting one’s affairs in order should one die valiantly in the attempt,” a phrase which here means stalling. Then came the “mission briefing,” the high point of which was the inception of the mission title (he wrote it on a piece of paper and taped it to the fridge). And after that was the “inventory check,” mostly involving clutching one’s crowbar and wondering if there is a specific kind of hat that infiltrators wore. Another thirty minutes were consumed by “combat conditioning” in other words, sitting on the kitchen counter with a pot of coffee and mentally thanking whoever it was that coined the term “battle stimulants.” Next, an hour of “stealth and patience” which means essentially the same thing that “mental preparation” means. Only thereafter had Filbert felt prepared to scramble over the brick wall dividing the two adjacent yards and wedge himself firmly under the magnolias, a feat he was rather proud of as said hedging did not at first glance seem to contain enough spare room for Filbert’s physique. Actually, some of the lower branches were still being rather outspoken as to that fact.

“The sort of burglar that hides under magnolias,” Filbert hissed peevishly, overcome by the need to answer his own rhetorical question, “is the sort of well-meaning, considerate person who wishes to do things right but is hampered by other people’s careless omissions in the content of his upbringing.”

Filbert’s affinity for being peeved by other people’s inconsiderateness towards his person was so finely honed, he himself was not actually exempt from it, should he happen to think something insensitive.

Few people, in his opinion, appreciate how hopelessly complicated the affair of breaking into the home of one’s aged nemesis (he had always wanted a nemesis) really is. Take the actual breaking bit, per example; an unconcerned and more importantly uninvolved person would say, “Its perfectly simple, you have that nice hefty crowbar laying about in the garage somewhere. People are always using crowbars to gain entry into homes that don’t want them, use that.” And then have done. Filbert agreed wholeheartedly that this was indeed what crowbars were for, in fact, he had always vaguely wondered why there were no federal restrictions on such items that clearly served only that nefarious purpose, but once you had the said tool and the said house how exactly did the whole affair of bringing them together work?

Did you use the crowbar to break one of the windows? Perhaps the glass in one or more of the doors should be smashed. Or did one just beat the doors in? It seemed that if one could do that with a mere crowbar, where did battering rams, shaped charges, and pizza deliverymen come in to it? Or if one was to use the prying aspect of the thing, did one pry the door away from the frame or the frame away from the door? Although he was not entirely sure he had seen it done anywhere, Filbert entertained a suspicion that a crowbar could be used to get beneath shingles on the roof.

“No, wait, that’s Dune,” he muttered distractedly.

Filbert took a deep breath, “Well, there’s nothing for it but to have a look at the door and see if anything presents itself.”

So saying, Filbert quickly scanned the grounds for signs of any large dogs or small grandchildren the occupant of the house might have left behind to devour the unsuspecting intruder. Upon finding none he wriggled laboriously out of the hedging and made his way across the lawn.

“Actually, aren’t people supposed to put little instruction stickers on the back or inside flap of things?” he thought, beginning to cheer up a bit. “I’ll bet there is a government-approved, safe way to break into houses. So, all I have to do is- Wait,” he paused, frowning. “If the sticker is on the inside of the door, how am I supposed to be instructed on how to open the door so I can see the instructions? Ghaa! The world hates me! I should sue someone.”

It was with bad grace that Filbert finally stomped up to the back door and glared at it through the dim light. It was a fairly short-lived glare, though.

Getting a good look at the door was, after all, what he had come over to do, but all the same, Filbert found said object severely disconcerting.

“To be perfectly frank, this isn’t helping my nerves any,” he mused, eyeing it suspiciously.

The rear door to Ophelia Himmle’s home was neat, self-respecting and just a touch prim. There was a neat, clean white-painted inner door, over which was a neat and relatively clean screen door, over which was a neat little note, primly penned and requesting that all burglars kindly use the front door as it was unlocked, thanks ever so much.

Filbert looked down at the crowbar clutched in his hands. It completely failed to give him a pitiful, betrayed look, so he chucked it and headed round the side of the house. The sky was beginning to lighten around the edges and Filbert felt hurried. Thus he only paused briefly to survey the forward premises, the flowerbeds were the sort that looked rather empty without a sprinkling of garden gnomes, in fact the only item of nongreenery present was another prim little sign staked in among the geraniums. It stated,

Death is a natural part of life; at any rate it is a natural part of disturbing my flowerbeds. You have been warned.

Filbert stared at this a moment, then firmly pushed it out of his mind and stole quickly up the gravel path to the front door. He seized the handle and twisted it with all the desperate energy of a fully flustered amature burglar, and, upon finding that that the door was indeed unlocked, he slipped gratefully inside.

Filbert’s first impression, as he leaned against the wall of the dim entryway, was that the house smelled rather funny. Not that the smell was over obvious, it was just that it was rather dark and the wall felt perfectly normal, so the first thing to come to his attention was the smell, and it (as I may have mentioned before) smelt odd. But this was no time to be deciphering incidental smellings, he had a job to do and standing in the dark snuffling would only delay his getting started.

About five minutes later he got it. It was not what the house smelled of, but rather what it didn’t smell of. There was no smell of cats. Experience had taught Filbert to associate old ladies with this sent, though he was not entirely sure why. Only about half of his aged relations kept cats. It must, Filbert decided, have a little to do with all the inter-visiting that went on and have a lot to do with aunt Madelyn, who’s home would completely asphyxiate anyone even remotely allergic to cats in just under thirty seconds.

That being out of the way, Filbert grudgingly felt his way into what appeared to be a sort of large sitting room; even in the dim light it gave off the distinctive air of somewhere where people would sit around drinking tea. He found a light switch and, because he suddenly had remembered about fingerprints, flicked it on with his nose.

Apart from the whole cat thing, Filbert found this room to be very properly old-ladyish, it was bright and cheery in a slightly subdued manner and just a little bit frilly. There were potted plants and pictures on the assorted end tables and doilies wherever it could conceivably be managed. The bulk of the room’s interior was taken up by an assortment of sofas and over-stuffed armchairs arranged in a sort of loose circle around an empty umbrella stand. Whatever for, Filbert had no idea. Some glass-fronted cabinets were set into opposite walls and a fireplace stood opposite the door. The mantle was covered by an assortment of ceramic figurines, which did not quite go with the rest of the decor. They looked rather cheap and the overall effect was a bit reminiscent of a shelf of canned goods stocked by an alarmist who had taken it in to their head that society would be overturned and destroyed by about two that afternoon. Above the mantle hung a large, stately portrait of a man, who, in Filbert’s opinion, seemed a great deal too smug for someone who had come to his sitting dressed in what looked remarkably like faded, blue upholstery.

He wasn’t feeling terribly gracious at this point. Filbert knew that even though he was burgling it, he had lost his initiative to an empty house. The knowledge was not pleasant. The problem, he decided, was probably confidence, since, apparently, that’s what the problem always is. He could not assert his will against that of the house because the house knew how to be a house (how could it not) where as Filbert did not know how to be a burglar. He wanted to flaunt his unbridled power at the house; it could not do anything to stop him, since it was, again, a house. But he simply didn’t know what to do now. Well he knew he was supposed to get these papers, but Filbert wanted to do it masterfully. He wanted Mrs. Himmle’s reaction on coming home to be horror and grudging respect, not to merely assume a raccoon had gotten in; For her to envision, on discovering her loss, some dark phantom of the night who could, he didn’t know, stick a cheese grater in her microwave while her entire bingo club were sitting down to dinner if he wanted to, not someone who sits in magnolias.

“I wish someone would have written a book on this sort of thing. What would that be called? Illicit etiquette?”

“Well, the only thing to do is to try,” he muttered. “Thoroughness is a good trait in any profession, I shall start by becoming accustomed to my surroundings. Besides a real burglar would be scouting for valuable stuff to steal.”

The coffee table in front of the largest sofa looked rather promising; it bore a small glass case, a framed picture, and a small stack of books. Making his way over, Filbert found that the case contained a small, very tarnished silver spoon, which, in his opinion, seemed a bit odd. The picture frame contained a photograph of what appeared to be Mrs. Himmle and some friends, a dozen or so all smiling and oozing camaraderie; rather like a volleyball teem, only they were all old ladies wearing hats, all but one of them was clutching an umbrella, and volleyball teems generally are not pictured with what looked remarkably like an unconscious motorcycle gang strewn about their feet. He turned to the books, though he could not shake the impression that one of those depicted looked oddly familiar.

The first was a small brown book entitled, H. C. Fitzgerald’s Handbook of Illicit Etiquette. This House did not appear to be giving up easily.

“If I read that, I have truly lost,” Filbert decided, and firmly looked to the others.

The rest of the stack contained such titles as The Phantom Pig Warrior and Other Legends and The Tales of Edna Weatherspindle. One title in particular caught his eye; it was the apparent fourth book of Robin Hobb’s Liveship Series, entitled: Ship of Pinkness. The cover art featured a ship that was indeed pink and also a lot of monkeys. Filbert was slightly confused, he had never heard of it before. On top of which he always had the impression that the books in question were supposed to be a trilogy. Still this might be worth reading, he thought. Personally he preferred Anne McCaffery, but Robin Hobb was all right.

And that was it, Filbert suddenly realized; he would swipe this book and thus throw everyone who might come after him into confusion. Now he could finally get the papers and get out of here. But Filbert found that he didn’t want to.

There is something strangely empowering about swiping someone else’s book, it felt as though he had reached the height of reckless abandon and nothing horrific had happened to him yet. After all, this was just about the most provocative thing one person could do to another, particularly if person A swiped said item whilst person B was still reading it. Filbert didn’t actually know if Ophelia was still reading the book. He just hoped so.

The possibilities were beginning to bloom: he could pilfer her fridge or rearrange her furniture. Or, the inspiration struck him, if one wanted to be invasive with minimal effort one could just pop over to the answering machine on that nice end table in the corner and listen to her telephone messages.

A moment later Filbert was looming over the abovementioned bit of appliance. He could feel it cowering before him like a grounded partridge under the adamant stare of a hawk; hoping desperately that the telephone receiver on its back will hide it from the inevitable.

“Nothing can stop the inevitable!” cried Filbert as he jabbed the play button. “That’s what the word means!”

There was the slightest pause; just enough time for Filbert to reflect that if the oncoming recording was from a telemarketer the mood would be completely ruined.

The machine commenced.

“You have reached the telephone of Ophelia Himmle She is obviously doing something much more important than standing around listening to you talk. So if what you have to say is worth her while, please continue, but on your own head be it if you are simply wasting other people’s valuable time.”

There was the expected tone and a new voice took over, “Er, hello, Aunt Ophelia. It’s Will. Sorry I missed your last call but Herbert insists that I keep my phone secured while I’m on duty, he brought this soundproof box and everything. Anyway, nothing really important has happened, we, by which I mean I, have managed to avoid public damages, for now anyway. On the other hand, Herbert’s taken up aspirin obsessing again and this time I don’t have a clue why. From what I got out of him I’m pretty sure it isn’t telepathy withdrawal. But that can wait, I doubt it will turn into too much of a field problem; there’s only one more target and then we’re heading back. I guess I’ll see you in a couple days - bye.”

“Okay, forget messages,” Filbert thought. “Messages are weird.”

He switched it off.

By now blue-grey early morning light was peering apologetically into the room through the Northward window and Filbert decided that, all things considered, he ought to get a move on. He therefore made his way over to the cabinet opposite the window. It did not take more that a cursory inspection to show that this was what he was after; it clearly contained a veritable myriad of doilies. (The other looked to house various knickknacks, he though he had seen a snow globe).

Upon trying it, he found the cabinet door to be locked. This did not perturb him terribly, the door’s structural integrity looked unimpressive. Of course, at that point Filbert perceived a reemergence of his old nemesis; there was a note taped to the inside of the glass paneling. This one was neither neat nor prim, but was a nasty scrawl dripping with smugness. It read, Force this open, I dare you. Positioned conspicuously near this note was a small glass vile filled with a forbidding clear liquid.

While this new development gave Filbert pause, he flatly refused to surrender his newfound confidence. He reasoned that there must be some secretive opening mechanism of sorts nearby; a pressure-sensitive floorboard or a bust with a button in its neck or something.

The only object nearby proved to be a radio/CD player, but it proved to have no hidden purposes that he could find. Still Filbert resolved to put on some music to show his defiance of the note whilst he examined the floorboards. He was surprised to find among the scattered CDs on the player’s end table, a copy of the Raiders of the Lost Ark soundtrack, it did not really strike him as old lady-ish. Nevertheless, it seemed oddly appropriate for the present situation, so he popped it in. Filbert hesitated briefly between tracks three and nine as to which went the best with present activities, he decided on the latter, hit play, and got to work poking at the carpeting.

After just about two minutes and twelve seconds amid the carpet lint and swirling orchestral tones, Filbert, while digging about under a nearby chair heard an audible click behind him.

Fighting down the sudden image of a batty old woman leveling an Uzi, he looked quickly over his shoulder and was taken aback to see that the cabinet was swinging slowly open of its own accord, spilling completely superfluous yet oddly necessary mist across the floor. For Filbert it was the work of an instant to resolve not to even bother trying to figure out what had happened. He simply waited for the cabinet to finish its lengthy drama and stand with its contents fully revealed.

There were rather a lot of doilies within and it took some time sifting through them to find the small bundle of papers in the back of the third shelf. The papers, Filbert was gratified to see, were covered in coded writings. Nothing makes a task seem worthwhile like cryptic documents at the end of it.

And thus, his quarry finally in hand, Filbert hastily exited the house, popped round the back, retrieved his trusty (albeit useless) crowbar, scrambled over the garden wall, and careened gratefully through his own back door. He slumped to the kitchen flopped in a chair, and marveled at how much adrenalin was seeping out of his system. He also found time to be wildly thankful, in an exhausted, shaky sort of way, that it was all finally over.

It was at this point, his cares atypically flown, that Filbert had time to notice the long white object that had definitely not been on the table when he had left earlier that mourning.

It was Aunt Margaret’s umbrella. There was no mistaking it, the two were seen everywhere together. In fact, the only times one ever saw it out of the woman’s grasp was when she would leave it laying conspicuously about a room for the expressed purpose of providing a obviously theatrical, yet effectively forbidding cue to the fact that she was at that moment lurking in some dark corner or other, if not actually planning to do something horrible to one, then at least fantasizing about it vigorously.

“I see you survived,” came the familiar voice from the shadows near the fridge, it was not a terribly pleasant voice, it seemed always to have a sardonic chuckle waiting in the wings.

Aunt Margaret stepped slowly into the light, the way she moved gave the distinct impression of a cloak billowing darkly about her, and not the sort of cloak one wears to keep of the rain, the sort one wears when one is some sort of medieval arch villain and wants to be sure everyone knows it.

Filbert felt the appropriate response to this was to look franticly round his ankles for Miffy. He didn’t see any sign of the neurotic little dog, but his aunt didn’t give him time for more than a cursory search. She strode to the table, seized her umbrella, and pointed it at Filbert’s forehead in a manner remarkably suggestive of a harpoon gun. It possessed the air of an unmistakably dangerous line of sight along with enormous overtones of skewerage.

“What have you brought?” she demanded.

The hand that gripped the bundled papers shot into the air, it took all of Filbert’s self control not to wave them franticly. Margaret took them and looked them over briefly but did not lower the umbrella.

“Is that all?” she asked.

“That’s all there was,” Filbert quavered, wondering desperately how he could possibly have messed this up.

His aunt’s right eye narrowed.

“That, er, had to do with my mission, um, thing,” Filbert attempted to clarify.

“Yes?” she hissed, impatience and disgust warring for dominance in her voice.

“Well, I also took this book… thing, but it didn’t have anything to do with, um…” Almost before he had it out of his pocket, Margaret snatched the object under discussion and gazed at it fixedly for a pregnant moment. Filbert thought he saw, for just the briefest instant, the shadow of a smile play about his aunt’s thin lips. The umbrella came away from his head.

“You have done well,” she remarked and abruptly swept from the room.

As he listened to his front door slam shut, Filbert toyed with the idea of being peevish about his lost reading material, but he found he really didn’t care that much.

He had survived and Filbert felt rather pleased with himself.

Prologue

2008-06-19T18:13:00.001-07:00

I was so sure that everyone would overlook the incident of the day before. “After all,” I’d reasoned over my bedtime glass of milk, “it’s only what anyone in their right mind would have done. They’re probably more likely to applaud my presence of mind than get snappish. And even if they do, which I will not admit to being anything but doubtful, it will only amount to a minor twenty-second scolding.”

So immersed was I in these thoughts that I didn’t even notice that the milk had tasted odd. When I awoke I found that I had been taken.

The Swale of Vindictiveness is not readily discovered on a map. In fact as far as anyone can tell it has never been included in any effort of cartography to date. However this may merely be the result of its having some official name that does not sound like it came out of The Neverending Story which we haven’t heard of. My cousin once spent several fruitless hours at his computer examining satellite photos in an ill-conceived attempt to locate it, but gave up after he developed the theory that even if the swale’s position was officially known, someone would have bribed the government to classify it by now. In any case, this hardly matters because when one finds themselves in the Swale of Vindictiveness, concerns of geographic positioning tend to sink into irrelevancy.

From the inside of the swale one finds it almost possible to believe the legend that this murky place exists as a small alternate universe manifested by the simmering ill-will of a bunch of crotchety old ladies. The sky is masked by impenetrable grey fog to the extent that it is a pure act of faith to believe that there is one at all. Mist smothers the landscape, daring you to consider any place beyond the grey walls that contain this brief world of dead trees and mud. The trees are stunted and bare and seem to grow naturally in a dead state. Their gnarly root system is the only firm footing amid the swaths of dark mud that resembles nothing so much as indifferently made chocolate pudding to which someone has added a great deal too many dead insects. The only noises to be heard are the ones you make yourself while scrambling about on tree roots, but even these sound dead and half-hearted. The air is cold and dank to the extent that your clothing dampens immediately and the activities of breathing and drowning are no longer mutually exclusive

My two escorts were firmly rapped in expansive, hooded rain ponchos to the point where it was impossible to tell who on earth they were. Not that it mattered much, in all likelihood, they were from that class of broken-down, old fossils that I’ve only met once or twice at those ghastly family gatherings.

Now, most of my family doesn’t agree with my analysis of their social functions, but that is because they are all dynamically obsessed. The only way to pass time at those things is for everyone to be horribly active at each other in an organized fashion. You must either play badminton, volleyball, or prance about chucking Frisbees at people; no one has ever had the sense to smuggle in a few video games! So when I, very sensibly, would sneak off to relax near the refreshment table, this flock of crones would descend like vultures to sit around and make disparaging, suggestive remarks about my physical and mental health. All of which being quite unfair as you never saw any of them messing about on the croquet lawn. I’ve found the only thing to do at that point is to munch on the chips as loudly as possible so I don’t have to listen.

I slipped, completely clotting my left pajama leg in gunk.

“If you’re going to drug me, ship me off to wherever here is, and tramp me through muck, you could have at least brought me some decent footwear. My socks will never be clean again,” I opened angrily, it was bad enough that my night apparel was damp throughout without getting mud all over it.

The shrouded figure who had my right wrist to its keeping merely snorted in a dismissive manner and hauled me over another root.

I wasn’t about to let them go on ignoring my most basic needs, “and furthermore slow down. I can’t keep up this pace with impunity.”

“Seeing as all your athletic experience has never reached beyond sitting on couches or suchlike objects, I am hardly surprised,” returned the figure that had my left, in a voice that would have been dry in some other climate. They didn’t reduce their pace.

Finally we reached our goal; it appeared to be another stunted tree. Without further ado my companions duct taped me to it with many an unnecessary comment about how much tape it took to go all the way around me. Half a dozen nodules dug into my back as those confounded relics made off into the mist.

“Hey!” I shouted, “you can’t just leave me here!”

“That we can, my paisley- clad little louse,” one shot over her shoulder nastily, “you have been a disgrace for the last time. You must now face the consequences.”

“You can’t seriously be trying to sacrifice me to the spirit of my Great Aunt Millie!” I yelled after them, “that’s absurd! She isn’t even dead yet!”

No one listens to me. I think deep down they know that they’re nuts but will never admit it. They have far too much fun with these delusions of family dictators.

I suddenly realized I was sweating, which given the climate was rather disturbing. My mind kept wandering off into grisly conjectures on what it was that honorary spirits did to people. And although I still held that great aunt Millie was a harmless old loony who was not worth any consideration, I couldn’t seem to shake the recollection of how horribly frightening I had always found her.

The last time I had seen her was when I was six. We were at some sort of communal tea and I had decided to get hold of one of her personal crumpets (I was a champion food-snatcher at that time). Three minutes darting from tablecloth to tablecloth, two minutes waiting under the nearest table for the coast to clear, and I was just reaching towards the platter of pastries when I heard a disapproving sniff. Looking round over my shoulder I saw great aunt Millie just standing there and glaring. There is something about the why she glares that makes you instantly regret that you ever did anything to make her even notice you. As I recall, the first thing I did was wet my pants and the second was to run for my life. And come to think of it, I seem to have spent the last sixteen years studiously avoiding her.

As an excuse to do something to distract me from these morbid recollections I began meticulously drying my glasses; a futile activity but I couldn’t pace, eat, or cut up washcloths so it would have to do.

Upon restoring them to my face I received a bit of a shock, great aunt Millie was standing directly in front of me, swathed in a great cloak that looked like it had been made out of moth-eaten curtains, and clutching in one claw-like hand the bone handel of her black walking stick. Her head was thrust forward as she observed me over the square spectacles on her long, boney nose; her whole aspect rather gave the impression of a deranged, homicidal macaw trying to decide which appendage to remove first.

“So, we meet again young Filbert,” Millie began in a quiet voice that sent shivers up my spine –it was the kind of voice that one reads barrow-wight incantations in- “Been having fun with Margaret’s Chihuahua have you?”

“No, that is to say, yes, but err,” I stuttered, “Look, I didn’t mean to throw it out the window, just to throw it generally away from me, there was no mellitus intent towards aunt Margaret’s herb garden really! Or all that much toward the dog ether, I mean for goodness sakes it was trying to eat me!” I ended on a bit of a squeak.

She just looked at me.

This was a time for desperate measures, “I could apologize.”

My great aunt raised an eyebrow.

“And pay for rabies shots?”

She pushed her spectacles up her nose. They seemed to behave in a manner similar to magnifying glasses, taking the whole of her brownish-gray, watery gaze and intensifying it into two burning pinpoints of imperiousness. My stomach began to shrivel.

“Help replace the herbs Miffy destroyed?”

“You know, why don’t I set you up with my hair dresser?” Millie mused contemplatively, “ You could use a perm.”

I fought down the scream that had risen into my throat, “I’ll do aunt Margaret’s laundry!”

“And a manicure.”

I really did scream at that point, my body was rocking against the tree uncontrollably, “I’ll do it every day and vacuum the rugs too! You can’t manicure me!”

“But you need to look presentable when you model my new lipstick prototypes at the armature cosmetics convention this month.”

The world spun around me, I appeared to be melting into the mud right through my socks,
“Not that,” I wimpered.

Great aunt Millie sighed, “It’s too late. You have talent and ability but you’ve squandered it these twenty-two years by pruning yourself into a vegetable. Vegetables only have two uses: to be eaten or to be thrown at people you don’t like.”

She started to turn away.

“Please!” I screamed, “I’ll do anything you want! Just don’t make me model lipstick!”

She suddenly struck me over the head with her cane.

When I came to, I was sprawled on the floor of my room covered in mud. A small slip of paper was pinned to my shirt.

Your next-door neighbor, Ophelia Himmle will be out of town this weekend. She has some papers hidden in her doily collection. Get them.

And that, Bill, is why I can’t help you clean out your garage on Saturday.

Scout

2008-06-17T17:43:00.000-07:00

Nothing new is really forthcoming at the moment, I thought I’d pop this up to keep your angry accusations of procrastination at bay.

A pen and ink I did last Fall in response to the Amtgard rulebook’s generally blah illustrations. It furthermore answers my most prevalent peeve about fantasy games in general, namely that there are not enough birds.

This could also, possibly, be a portrait of Valruin, but if that is the case he’s using someone else’s sword.

Aelinim Mark 2

2008-06-04T19:28:00.000-07:00

Valruin

2008-06-01T21:21:00.001-07:00

...and so forth...

Aelinim

2008-06-01T13:38:00.000-07:00

and so on...

Albino Kraken

2008-05-22T21:27:00.001-07:00

Bill strikes again.

Anti-Paladin

2008-04-25T16:06:00.001-07:00

Paladin

2008-04-25T16:02:00.001-07:00

Wizard

2008-04-24T17:33:00.000-07:00

Warrior

2008-04-24T17:28:00.001-07:00

Scout

2008-04-24T17:23:00.001-07:00

Monster

2008-04-24T17:20:00.002-07:00

Monk

2008-04-24T17:20:00.001-07:00

Healer

2008-04-24T17:19:00.001-07:00

Druid

2008-04-24T17:18:00.000-07:00

Bard

2008-04-24T17:16:00.001-07:00

Barbarian

2008-04-24T17:14:00.001-07:00

Assassin

2008-04-24T17:12:00.001-07:00

Archer

2008-04-24T15:33:00.000-07:00

Episode two in the pointless-Illistrator-doodles series: the completely unofficial seals for the Amtgard classes.

Working Title Announcement

2008-04-11T12:24:00.000-07:00

Poster Project

2008-04-08T17:32:00.000-07:00

A poster advertising a hypothetical exhibition by art deco-ist A. M. Cassandre.

Pigeons of Manwe

2008-04-08T16:20:00.000-07:00

As an introduction to Photoshop we were to take various images and combine them into a single image of specific expressiveness. Then our professor went on to construct a semi-impressionalistic depiction of the Garden of Eden as an example, it must have been that that did it.

Carawolf Atonomical Study

2008-04-03T21:29:00.000-07:00

This would be my learning-to-use-my-tablet bit of artitude, also this would be the culmination of the doodling-during-American-Lit.-project after the lightsaber forms.

I have always found it curious give their unspeakably prominent place in the world of fantasy that the wolf is never used in the construction of chimeras, and anyway, I wanted a heavy scout/pack class to bridge the gap between the standard and sparrowhawk-weasel versions.

Stationary

2008-04-01T18:14:00.000-07:00

Computer Graphics Project 1

Buisiness Card

2008-04-01T18:11:00.000-07:00

Stationary

2008-04-01T18:08:00.001-07:00

Envelope

2008-04-01T18:04:00.000-07:00

Mandalorian Form

2008-02-24T18:41:00.000-08:00

Okey, this is the last one. You should all be greatful that I don't allow double-blade and duel-saber to be forms.

Stoorian Form

2008-02-24T18:38:00.000-08:00

Form Zero

2008-02-24T18:36:00.000-08:00

The dread form that avoids all contact with the enemy's lightsaber and annoys them into oblivion.

Reverse-Grip

2008-02-24T18:32:00.000-08:00

Now that Force Unleashed is here, this is an official form.

Juyo

2008-02-24T18:29:00.000-08:00

Form VIII

This form is almost entirely offencive in nature. Its main focus is in attempting to finish off it opponent at every opportunity and as such is a sort of anti-duelist form.

Palpatine, Mara Jade.

Vaapad

2008-02-24T18:27:00.000-08:00

Form VII

Force saturation form. This form borders on Sith technique as it utilizes continual energy flow from one's own emotions and hence requires enormous levels of control in order to keep out of the Dark Side.

Mace Windu

Niman

2008-02-24T18:24:00.000-08:00

Form VI

Coleman Trebor, for all the good it does anyone.

Djem So

2008-02-24T18:15:00.000-08:00

Form V

The point of this form is essentially to beat one's way through their opponent's offences and defence and hack them into little bits.

Anakin/Darth Vader and Luke.

Ataru

2008-02-24T17:56:00.000-08:00

Form IV

This form is nearly the opposite of Soresu in that its practisioner almost never holds still and throws presision to the winds, at least as much one can in combat. An integral part of this form is the use of augmentation from the Force and general acrobatics.

Yoda, Qui-Gonn, Darth Maul, and Obi-wan at that point as well.

Soresu

2008-02-24T17:48:00.000-08:00

Form III

This form provides neigh impenetrable defences with lightning quick ripostes to utterly frustrate one's opponent, while he's still alive that is.

Obi-wan Kenobi, in Episode 3 to be technical.

Makashi

2008-02-24T17:34:00.000-08:00

Form II

This form emphasises precision and thus works towards exploiting the ungainliness, or, in fact, any unnecessary movement, of the opponent. Djem So has a tendency to kineticly overwhelm its defences, but it is still the only form that allows one to remove both their opponents elbows with a single flick of the wrist.

Count Dooku, Shaak Ti

Shii Cho

2008-02-24T16:36:00.000-08:00

Form I

The basic lightsaber form. This is a prerequisite to all the other forms. It is fairly plain with a balanced emphasis on the aggressive and defencive and a moderate threat radius, but it is not ineffective if used well. The only consistent drawback to this form is that it only last about 30 seconds against Makashi.

Theoretically, Kit Fisto uses this form and I suspect that Ki-Adi-Mundi does as well.

Obsession of the Week

2008-02-24T14:26:00.000-08:00

Well, for the past couple days, instead of drawing mermaids and working out the social political/structure of the League of Umbrellas, I have been hard at work on a project that only I will really appreciate. But that's all right; you should all be satisfied with the fact that I'm posting.

So, combining my fondness for Star Wars, categorizing, and runic, (and thus showing the dangers of doodleing in class) I have gone and made a sigil for each of the lightsaber forms and will be supplying them over the next week or so along with who uses what, or something like that just to put things in context those who don't have this sort of thing memorized.

The Black Silverfish

2008-01-12T01:42:00.000-08:00

With the onset of his career as a blood-thirsty marauder, Patrick Guthwine, being keenly aware of his own deficiencies in the areas of personal prowess, tactics, and general seamanship, commissioned his mother to make a flag which would set him apart from the other sundry pirates and communicate by sheer nastiness of visage general thoughts of surrender and suchlike things to the minds of those unfortunate enough to gaze upon said bit of cloth on the high seas. His mother was only to happy to lend any amount of aid to her son’s financial endeavors being of the opinion that as Patrick had already failed in every other career he had ever gotten himself into, he would need as much aid as he could get. So, on the eve of her son’s maiden voyage Jemima Guthwine proudly presented him with the flag he had requested and sent him on his way, apparently unaware of the mental anguish which this gift had cast over Patrick.

Scholars generally agree that the dark image, which Patrick Guthwine had intended as the outer face of his persona had almost certainly been a black scorpion, but either because Jemima was unfamiliar with scorpions or that she disagreed with her son artistically, the flag he flew on his first voyage, bore the image of a black silverfish. “It may even have been miscommunication,” says one such scholar, “In a moment of mental abstraction, Patrick may very well have just waved his hand vaguely and said, ‘Oh, you know, those arthropods with tails.’”

At any rate, when Captain Guthwine reentered port two days later to pick up the powder kegs he had inadvertently left behind, he made the mistake of patronizing the local tavern. The other clientele, his fellow sea captains, felt it necessary to enlighten Patrick as to the extent to which he was entertaining the local populace. They made it perfectly clear that to be symbolized by what was essentially an upper class cockroach was not at all lacking in the humorous. Patrick Guthwine tragically died in the brawl that fallowed and his already disillusioned crew abandoned the ship and scattered to the winds.

When Jemima Guthwine was informed of the event and circumstances of her son’s death she rounded up her younger relations and, livid over the insult to her handiwork which she found to be quite well up in the viciousness department, set out in her son’s ship to track down those responsible.

The slaughters that fallowed were purportedly ghastly to behold. Within the space of three weeks Jemima Guthwine had sent four ships to the bottom. Thus obtaining a fondness for life at sea Jemima continued on, carving herself a place as the thirteenth most feared pirate of that time. This number, though, was no accurate depiction of the woman’s tenacity and bloodthirstiness which was well above that of any other pirate captain. She was, as one historian puts it, “a knitter.” In fact, the only reason Jemima did not attain the status of other less dangerous men was that the rampant destruction and death that marked her pirating exploits were only sporadic, accruing only when the orchestrator of such events was running low on wool.

But even if it was slowly, hampered by infrequency and the short life expectancy of eyewitnesses, news was spreading. In a letter to the family taxidermist Jemima’s nephew Archibald describes his aunt, “The old lady would set into battle with a glee bordering on the infernal.” And soon whispers and only half-believed tails of the Black Silverfish, Demon Granny of the Caribbean were heard in taverns the world over.

The ultimate fate of Jemima Guthwine remains clouded in mystery and though her involvement in the Lady Katherine affair is probable, the details concerning that event are known only to few.

Arien and Gothmog

2007-12-07T17:37:00.001-08:00

Speaking of snowmen…

This was actually the charcoal’s idea more than mine. No one in their right mind tries to depict sunlight passing through the body of a being of varying translucence composed primarily of corporeal shadow, but my medium has been nagging me all semester and I’m never in my right mind anyway. I think I’ll leave off explaining the deep inner meaning of this picture just yet, so Rachel can be ambiently smug for a bit.

My conscience is now clear.

Beware, Josiah.

Hypothetical Clutter Part One

2007-06-09T14:44:00.000-07:00

Atalante
Music Inspired by the Akallabrth

David Arkenstone

1. The Star of Earendil
2. The Land of Gift
3. Vision of Avallone
4. The Counsels of Sauron
5. Of Isildur and Nimloth
6. The Temple of Melkor
7. The Fleet of Ar-Pharazon
8. The Eagles of Manwe
9. Nine Ships
10. The Strait Road

Journal fragment recovered from a London gutter

2006-09-28T23:07:00.000-07:00

-disposable cameras for the American tourist kits.

6/24
7:02 am

We have narrowed our choices down to cathedrals B and E. When the director arrives Saturday we should have a probable location for the tomb. She'll be pleased about that.

9:57 am

Have managed to get beneath cathedral B through the sewers and are digging into the catacombs. Ed forgot the potato chips and has gone back up for them.

11:23 am

Inside the catacombs now, will eat lunch just as soon as Ed gets back.

11:41 am

Something is wrong. I sent George back to see what was keeping Ed but he couldn't find him anywhere. He says the pigeons outside have vanished.

12:16 am

I think something has followed us into the catacombs. There has been a lot of unexplained noises down out off the way tunnels and our equipment was ransacked when we weren't looking. I'm making for the cathedral exit but don't know if it will work.

12:55 am

George disappeared a few minutes ago,we heard him scream and a lot of snarlish and rendy noises. That can't be good.

1:12 pm

I count at least three pood-