The other morning as I traversed the woodsy path betwixt where I park my car and where I park myself each morning, my eye was caught by a flit of black and white wings. The wings themselves were black, the tips white - very like a magpie, and very unlike anything else I knew of, so I kept an eye on the bird as I walked. Soon, the corner of a red breast came in view, and I was quite perplexed, as it really looked like a robin. As I saw more of it, and the red breast was confirmed in all its blood-hued glory, it suddenly turned its head and stared at me out of a glinting crimson eye. It truly had a wicked aspect.

While it is probable that the bird in question is merely some sort of red-winged blackbird I have not previously encountered or such, it is my more favored opinion that either the long-haired or the short-haired of the two black cats that prowl and stalk the campus has learned to shift his shape - and while he attempts to turn his guise to that of an innocent robin, his malign purpose infects and informs the very tincture of his eye and feathers…

It is a good thing to note that, in one of the curious contradictions which surround and inform our existence, Matthew had one of the most productive weekends on record. He did our taxes, bought patio furniture and put it together (yes, with Wonko’s help), took delivery of a piano we’ve been given, took delivery of the pieces of our bedstead and assembled said pieces, moved the metal bedframe we had been using into the spare bed and reassembled it under that mattress—in short, it was very pleasing for a puny girl with a very unproductive weekend under her belt to come home and find that her husband had been such a picture of industry.

Well, despite all my excitement over going up North to Seattle to stay with my sis, that was quite possibly the worst weekend I can remember.

Against my better judgment and my failing memory that my sister meant to cook dinner for me, I stopped at Burger King on my way north. By the time I reached the Emerald City, my back was in knots from the drive and my stomach was feeling strangely topsy-turvy. The best my sis and I can figure is that I had mild food poisoning with a side of muscle tension. There were a few lovely moments when I felt merely puny and weak—during which moments (perhaps three or four hours total) I had a lovely haircut from my sister’s stylist, rehearsed with the guitarist for my sister’s wedding, and gleefully shopped for shoes with my sister (bridesmaid shoes: 0 pair. Red patent indulgences: 1 pair). Other than that I was either sick or recovering the whole weekend. My sister was a wonderful, doting nurse, and I am very grateful to her and her fiancé for putting up with me and my whinging. I’ve never had my body so thoroughly refuse to go back to food ever. Usually, if I’m sick, at some point I wake up to my body saying, ‘FIVE COURSE TURKEY DINNER! COUSCOUS-STUFFED PEPPERS! VEGGIE PIZZA!’ This time, I kept on waking up to new pains and aches and the same feeling that food is, on the whole, a bad idea, and we should have stuck with photosynthesis. Except that whole sunshine thing.

So I’m feeling mostly better now. I went ahead and stayed home from work, and am making myself little portions of food and patting myself on the back whenever I finish one. I feel almost human again, and have decided maybe photosynthesis isn’t the way to go. Hmm, except that there’s that lovely patio chaise Matt put together while I was gone…

I got up at five o’clock this morning. It was into a shifted world I rose, one I haven’t entered for some time. Everything is very cold so early—the water in the pipes refuses to warm, and when I accidentally stepped onto the bathroom floor rather than the bathmat, I was sure I’d plunged my feet into ice water.

But early morning has its charms, as well. The faintly pleasing sensation of virtue both from rising before others and from triumphing over your own sloth, the sense that this time is more precious because it has been stolen. The feeling that everything you do while you would have been asleep is extra, more life than you would have had otherwise. The suspicion that you have started your day early and gotten the jump on the world. Delicious.

I don’t like lying very much, and I couldn’t think of anything plausible I wouldn’t feel bad for lying about — so instead I decided to celebrate the day with abject silliness. So, without further ado, I bring you… a completely contrived fight between a character from a silly world and a character from a serious one. Lihan Hawkhome vs. Captain Bessa Seford!

In Creation, there is a road. There are many roads, in fact, stretching across the expanses of that which is known and believed in. This one, however, is special — it is cut, straight and long, across a dusty, flat expanse, peppered with prairie-hog holes and the occasional patch of wildflowers. Once upon a time, Lihan Hawkhome walked along this road, scanning the horizon with a sense of comfort. He could see for miles. Nothing could approach him unseen, and his magics would allow him to flee long before they should reach him. He felt comfortable, and therefore, from the deep sleeve of his coat, he drew a battered volume and read as he walked.

In the distance, there was a humming sound, as of hornets gathering. Lihan read in absorption about the varying widths of chisels used for different inscriptions in the First Age. A pinpoint of light appeared in the distance, fractured the air around it, and poured a churning prism of chaos into the quiet afternoon. Lihan was fascinated to discover that chisels made of the Five Magical Metals were only used in inscriptions on Manses, because of the resonance patterns that could be set up by a less-than-careful hand in a less-than-Essence-reinforced structure. The kaleidoscoping rainbow emitted a sleek, golden car with fins higher than a man, and it careened down the straight road towards Lihan as the shimmering fracture closed in its wake.

Lihan looked up in alarm as a building roar approached, and with a look of abject terror threw himself off the road and out of the way of the gleaming juggernaut. The car also swerved at the last moment, and flipped up up into the air, coming down heavily on a prairie dog colony, on its side. A door rose like the wing of a wounded beetle, and a redhead in a scarlet jumpsuit leaped out, nostrils flared like a hunting cat. Spirits and Great Gods, thought Lihan, why are small redheaded females always trying to kill me?

Rapidly gathering up his fallen books and bags, Lihan started to walk briskly away from the wreck.

“You!” cried Captain Bessa, explorer of the unknown, “Are you a native of this land?”

“Bessa…” Araminta sighed, “you almost ran him over…”

“Nonsense,” muttered Bessa, “he tried to sabotage our vehicle. Now get out and help me in case we have to settle this the old-fashioned way.”

“My seat-belt got stuck in the crash, sir. Gerald’s, too.”

Bessa frowned, “Do not fear, Crewman Jones. As soon as I’ve dealt with this cowardly reprobate, I will return to free you.” With that, she paced towards Lihan. “Now, knave, why did you attempt to interfere in the affairs of the Paracosmonauts Expeditionary Company?”

Lihan blinked. “I’m very sorry, ma’am —”

“Sir! Address me as sir, please, my rank is Captain, the PEC has rules about proper forms of address.”

“Er, quite. Quite right, sir. As I was saying, I wasn’t aware that any… expedition was taking place on this road today, and was merely attempting to reach…”

Bessa scoffed. “I don’t believe it for a moment! Why are you so shifty, varlet?”

“Er, shifty, ma— er, sir?”

“Yes, shifty!” her eyes narrowed, then widened. “You’re a pirate! You belong to the Crossdimensional Elite Pirates! I can tell by your hair!”

Lihan stared in consternation at his hair, which was long, red-brown, and contained a few braids. “I’m sorry?”

“Defend yourself, foul minion of the CEP!” cried Bessa, and began to circle ominously, weaving a pattern of menace in the air with her hands.

“Halp!” cried Lihan, assuming a clumsy defensive stance.

“Why did you let her drive?” said Minta, more sorrowful than angry, hanging sideways like a forlorn fruit bat.

“Something about me being a pilot, and cars needing a driver, I think,” Gerald said. “Sorry, Minta, won’t happen again.”

Bessa dodged, feinted, and struck! “Ow!” cried Lihan, “I really don’t know, ‘sir’, why we have to – OW! – resort to these – ACK! – barbaric measures over a – My hair! – misunderstanding!”

Bessa drew back and narrowed her green eyes to feral slits. “We understand each other perfectly, fiend!” she growled, and sprang, hands together, to fall like a hammer of doom upon Hawkhome’s back!

Lihan fell to the ground – as all men do when struck in the back by the fists of a captain-explorer – and with a groan, wheezed, “That’s enough!”

Bessa, arms raised and rictus securely in place for another blow, looked crestfallen. “Are you giving up?” she said wistfully, “Wastrel?”

But Lihan Hawkhome, the Copper Spider, the Chosen of the Unconquered Sun, Seer of Truths and Knower of Hidden Ways, rose dusty and dishevelled from the prairie dirt, light boiling from his brow and his green-woven anima curdling from the air of Creation behind him. He spoke low words that Bessa did not understand, and she stepped back involuntarily.

“Dear…God…” she managed to say, before the winds gathered around the man and whisked him muttering from her sight.

Captain Bessa looked after the retreating cyclone for a moment in consternation, then smiled. “Another victory for the invincible Paracosmonauts!”

I am such a good sport, after Ryan tied my stomach in knots. For posterity, this was me jollying along anyone deceived by Ryan’s April Fool’s.

Had a little downtime on the webserver this morning. Several other people’s websites who use poseidon (the blog software wonko built) had their websites broken into and vandalized, so Matt thought it was the better part of valor to take the site down and investigate it—indeed, he found a hole in the software and patched it up, so the faerye is back in the web.

← The Boy

Isabella and His Jubilant Might the Emperor Adelmar strolled down to the docks, with several chessmen following gravely. Halfway there, the Seneschal retreated in defeat, bearing the crown that Adelmar had pronounced too heavy for outside use. Only a few feet short of the water, Guano fluttered down to perch on a crate and address Isabella.

“Doll! Pal! Have I ever missed you! You’re such a…” the seagull’s eyes darted to Isabella’s coat pockets, “sensible person. D’ya have something to eat?”

Isabella shook her head sadly, passing an apple to Adelmar behind their backs. Adelmar was staring in frank amazement at the bird.

“What is that?” whispered the Emperor to the frank-faced lady beside him.

“A seagull, your Majesty.”

“Is it a sort of bird?” asked Adelmar in some doubt.

“Indeed, sire. A rather common sort of bird,” she said, pointing to the wheeling clouds of gulls above the dock.

“That explains it then. Do they all talk?” asked the boy, still shy of Guano.

“Not as a matter of course, no,” smiled Isabella.

Guano had watched this exchange with some interest, and, now that the boy-king’s eyes were on him again, became ingratiating. “Your…uh, Majesty, she said? You look like a very sensible person. And generous.”

Isabella nudged the Imperial Personage. The chessmen tensed as for an attack at the affront, but Adelmar did not seem to mind, and thrust the apple towards Guano.

“Sensible, did I say? Genius!” said Guano, and buried his beak in the fruit.

“I will see you later,” Isabella took her leave of the blissful bird gravely, and he murmured his goodbyes and thanks — it seemed — through a mouthful of apple that made them less intelligible than the squawks of the most stupid of his kin.

Isabella and the Many-Storied All-King made their way towards the docks, where row on row and rank on rank of black triremes sat passive and ready, swaying slightly on the breath of the waves. Isabella frowned into the distance, where the tidy order of the harbor was broken.

“What is that?” said Isabella, pointing to a ship right against the harborwall.

Adelmar squinted in the sun, but nodded, “That’s probably Eckbert’s Palace.”

“It’s a palace?” Isabella asked.

“Oh, yes. Eckbert is the only Emperor ever to have rebelled and built his palace outside the Avenue of the Emperor.”

“And it’s a ship?”

Adelmar nodded. “Everyone disapproves.”

“I think I like Eckbert,” said Isabella, “sounds sensible.”

And so they passed by a score of dour triremes, and stood in the shadow of Eckbert’s Palace. She was larger than any ship Isabella had ever seen, and Isabella was a child of the waves. She was a brilliant, joyous scarlet, with ribbons of egregious gilt tracing every shapely curve. She had three great masts, with strangely glistening sails furled at the ready. She exulted in her very garishness like a long-haired tortoise-shell cat, and her tier of shining windows gleamed like the smuggest smile.

“I think,” said Isabella to the small Emperor, “that we have found our ship.”

They climbed aboard by means of a gangway chessmanned into place at a thought, and surveyed the gleaming decks, the extravagant carvings, and the fine dark wood of the ship’s wheel. Adelmar smiled as the deck swayed gently under his feet, stared off at the sunlight glinting off the water, and turned his freckled face towards Isabella with a shy smile.

“I don’t think I want to be Emperor anymore,” he mused, and felt his heart grow light at the thought. He looked very thoughtful, and then said, unexpectedly, “Are elephants real?”

“I do believe they are, Your Majesty.”

“Then we’ll go where there are elephants.”

At this one of the chessmen, the harbormaster, apparently, from the shining anchor pinned to his robes, exclaimed, “But, your, uh, Extravagant Munificence! You are the Emperor! You cannot just leave!”

With the sunlight glowing through his wind-mussed hair, the little boy grinned a surprisingly gap-toothed grin and yelled in joy and excitement, “I go where I like, and I do as I please, and you can’t say better than that!”

I had an extraordinarily contradictory weekend. On Saturday, I arose and, my morning routine accomplished, betook myself to [the abode of wonko, lissel, and bedrick, you shall recall|text|Friendland], where I proceeded to spend the day watching Die Hard, Die Hard 2, and Die Hard with a Vengeance; petting a cat I am very allergic to; eating pizza; playing Mario Kart on the Friendland Gamecube, and generally disporting myself. On my return home, I played Unreal Tournament against wonko (under his curious nom de guerre, ‘pants’) until the small hours of the morning.

On Sunday, I arose, and, my morning routine likewise completed, applied myself to the excavation and organization of my project room, oft called Wunderkammer in pursuance of an excellent suggestion by mfc. It was, before yester morn, little more than a mass of boxes, with the occasional foot-sized clear patch of carpet for when I needed to find something in its depths. The closet, containing several very shallow shelves, had a few forlorn boxes of comic books, piled with unorganized comics… the bookcase, long a victim of misplaced shelf brackets, held a few oddments on its two fixed shelves. Yesterday I worked for somewhere around seven hours, or perhaps six. It is now a room! A room with an antique writing desk, books on the shelves and shelves in the bookcase, a stained-glass hanging lamp securely suspended from the ceiling, and space to walk around the few remaining unsorted boxes! My comic books have been bagged, boarded, and filed, my special books - too special for the rest of the fiction collection - duly installed as inspiration. Boxes of sewing patterns and stationery await the call of duty, and various beading accoutrements have come to light. I did not only work on the wunderkammen—I also scrubbed the flight of cement steps up to our door (something I’d wanted to do since Winter, but was finally allowed to do by Matt’s purchase of a hose, and goaded into by lissell’s slipping and falling on them last week!) I got SO much done.

So I had, in short, the most contradictory weekend ever. People kept politely asking me today how my weekend was—and it was a rather difficult question!

Whilst this musing is not pertinent to the meteorological expressions seen today, it is a matter of some note that it has hailed no fewer than four times since November. This is an occasion of wonder to me, as I was full ten years of age before I ever saw hail, and one cannot expect hail more than once a year in this spot with any sobriety. And yet the hail falls, the irked percussion of the clouds! The graduate students and scientists skitter to and fro with unseemly haste and previously non-cranial attire worn like bizaare millinery.

Why now? Why do the hails so pelt upon the Beaver State? What dastardly force calls forth the icy wrath? Is it the end of days? What unseen hand plucks ice from the very clouds to heap upon us?

Warning: Rambling post. First part of post (up to horizontal line) also kind of detailed regarding a computer game you may not care about. Under horizontal line, more general.

I’ve been playing a fair amount of Unreal Tournament 2004 of late. For those of you who do not know, this is one of those violent videogames which are to blame for juvenile delinquency. I like it.

There are, of course, different ways of playing any first person shooter (FPS). The most simple is the old-fashioned “Deathmatch”, wherein players and computer-simulated players grab ludicrously powerful weapons and try to kill as many of the other players as possible before time elapses or someone reaches the goal number of kills. Then there is Capture the Flag (CTF), where there are two teams, two bases, and one must attempt to capture the other team’s flag by stealing it and transporting it to your own flag (without someone killing you and picking their flag up). In Unreal Tournament 2004, there is a new game mode called Onslaught, a team-based game where there are various strategic points you must capture before destroying the enemy base, and a panoply of fine vehicles as well as weapons.

I’m not very good at Onslaught. Oh, I’m not usually at the bottom of the rankings, but I seldom reach the upper levels either. I really enjoy it – there’s nothing like being able to run someone over who’s trying to kill you with rockets, after all – but I’m just not that good at it. It’s occasionally frustrating, and I realized last night why it’s so frustrating – I am quite good at Deathmatch, and reasonably good at CTF. When I played deathmatch regularly, it was fairly rare for me to slip out of the top three or four on a server, and sometimes I completely dominated. Of course I had my bad days – but there was usually a rhythm that I could easily fall back into. I don’t think I have a rhythm for Onslaught. Maybe it’s the large expanses of territory – I spend a fair amount of time trying to get where I’m needed, and then die promptly once I get there – but I just don’t have a rhythm for it. Whereas Matthew is good at Onslaught, and I think I can usually beat him at Deathmatch.

Something different in our brains, I guess. Which brings me to my second point. I realized the other day that none of my female college friends or female friends of today play FPSes. N-O-N-E. Now of course, as a girl who loves FPSes, I hate to hear guys say that it’s a “male game” or “girls don’t get it”. But as a girl, I’m curious why my female friends, who don’t usually seem particularly bound by gender stereotypes, and many of whom at school were engineers and so forth – otherwise prime candidates for FPS playing – find it unappealing. Perhaps they just never try. I once taught a dear, sweet, Quaker, slightly Luddite friend of mine to play Quake III. She was horrible at it, but she loved it. Maybe it’s just a matter of picking up the mouse…thoughts?